Ammo Boxes and Reloadable Magazines

[miket 92]

NOTE: This thread is a repost from the original thread I posted in DayZ discussion. Just moving it to the right place. Some edits have been made. Original thread can be found here: http://dayzmod.com/forum/index.php?/topic/51103-ammo-boxes-and-reloadable-magazines/

TLDR Version:

- Ammo boxes containing a specific type of ammo can be found and used to reload magazines (which takes time)

- Empty magazines stay in inventory for reloading later

- High capacity bandoliers for 12 gauge and rifle rounds to balance ammunition carrying capacity

- Ability to combine partial magazines.

- Ability to transfer rounds of the same type between magazines for different weapons (eg. M9/G17 both take 9x19mm)

The players capacity to carry ammunition is quite limited in this game. Sure, if you were carrying nothing but ammunition, you'd have a decent capacity, but as we all know, this is never the case.

I think a great feature to enable the carrying of greater amounts of ammunition would be the ability to find 'ammo boxes'. An ammo box would take up one standard inventory slot and contain an amount of ammo dependant on its ammunition type. To compliment this, empty magazines would not be dropped, but would return to the inventory with the red cross through them much like an empty water bottle.

The player would need to load their magazines from the ammo box, which would take anywhere from 2 seconds to 2 minutes depending on the type of magazine. For example, a revolver speedloader would take only 5 seconds to reload whilst a full 200 rnd M249 ammo box would take a full 2 minutes (reloading only 100 rounds from the box would take 1 minute).

If would also be good if weapons like the double-barrel shotgun and M1014 could be reloaded directly from something like an ammo pouch or bandolier with maybe a 24 round capacity and that bandolier would be reloaded from a box of shells. The current requirement to split 12 guage loads between 8 and 2 not only takes up a lot of space, but means you can't load perfectly good shotgun shells into an M1014 because you don't have 4 lots of 2 to combine.

In addition, you could have bandoliers for both 12 gauge shells and perhaps other types of rounds like rifle rounds for the CZ and Enfield. This would really balance out the current system which enables someone with an assault rifle to carry 150 rounds in 5 inventory slots, whilst someone with a CZ can only carry 25 rounds in the same space. Or even worse, a double barrel shotgun user who can only carry 1 8 round mag and 4 2 round magazines in 5 slots for a total of 16 rounds (because you need atleast 4 inventory slots to unpack an 8 round magazine), but still needs to stop to unpack the 8 rounds before use.

Finally, like many people have stated, partial magazines need to be combinable, and magazines of like ammunition types need to be exchangable for each other. Currently you can switch .45 ACP rounds between M1911 magazines and revolver speed loaders, but you can't switch M9 magazines to G17 magazines, even though they both use 9x19mm.

Whether or not something like this could actually be implemented is uncertain. It may simply be that ARMA 2 is too restrictive.

Ammo box sizes could include (just an idea, obviously would need balancing):

120 rounds 5.56 mm (1 inventory slot)

60 12 gauge rounds (1 inventory slot)

120 rounds 9mm (1 inventory slot)

100 rounds .45 ACP (1 inventory slot)

300 rounds 7.62 mm (2 inventory slots)

[necroslord 73]

I like this, except the ammo capacities. That goes too far. But I always wanted to at least be able to merge partially used magazines. Firearms, the old half-life mods does this.

[dvious 9]

I think they should have a another section just for your primary ammo.

[sealteamaus 16]

Love it!!!

[Sol (DayZ) 132]

Thread number 6123 on this very topic.

Search button... it's there for a reason.

~Sol

[Kittyhawk78 7]

Pretty much everything about the OPs post is spot on.I can't tell you how many times I've been carrying around an M14 and found a 200 round M240 magazine and thought "That's 200 rounds of 7.62x51 I could be using if the game would let me get them out of the fucking box."

[Nexius 0]

I would love to be able to top up magazines and transfer ammo from M240 mags to empty mags. Is this possible to program with this game engine?