I've got it! This is how item storage should work! I'm a genius!

[Taphonomy 5]

It's simple:

Tents, vehicles, whatever you store items in: If you die, the storage unit and all the items go away IMMEDIATELY. (edit: In the case of vehicles, items disappear from storage. The vehicle does not despawn.)

New option for tents and vehicles: Save for Group. With this option, the tent or vehicle will now persist through your death. However, upon selecting this option the storage unit now must be maintained periodically in order to persist.

Example: Steve puts gear into his tent. He selects the Save for Group option. Now the tent and the items will stay there if Steve dies, free for his buddies to use. However, maintenance must be performed on the tent every (X) hours and with (X) spare parts/scrap metal. The Maintenance option now appears on the contextual menu of the tent.

With this mechanic...small teams would be able to save small camps, large teams would be able to save large camps. The ability of a GROUP'S items to persist is directly related to the group's ability to loot areas and find spare parts. Storage units would still be able to be looted by anyone, allowing raiding if the camp is unguarded.

Also...I think that the same mechanic should apply to tank traps and barbed wire. This would give LARGE groups some minimal security. Since larger camps are harder to hide, it would be helpful if they could set up barbed wire around their tents.

In the same way, a lone wolf could use barbed wire and tank traps to block other survivors from good spawns, but these too would disappear immediately if he died.

Am I a genius or what!? This will almost assuredly be the most awesome way to handle this aspect of the game. Don't even try to argue with me.

...Okay do....

Edited August 15, 2012 by Taphonomy

[xNeRo 4]

Nice im gonna check out if that works... if what your saying is true then your a boss :) Thanks for the info

[Taphonomy 5]

Nice im gonna check out if that works... if what your saying is true then your a boss :) Thanks for the info

No...wait. I didn't mean to mislead you.

See...this is the suggestions forum and...

[SystemiK 366]

Hint: He is not saying it works, he is making a suggestion

Nice im gonna check out if that works... if what your saying is true then your a boss :) Thanks for the info

Hint: He is not saying that it works, it is saying this is how they should make it work.....

[bazbake 456]

So individual players aren't immortal but groups of people effectively are.

You had a pretty good idea until group save, though. Take that idea, toss in "all storage wipes on reboot" and you've got a really good thing going there.

[Taphonomy 5]

Oh! Also, this would encourage players to team up more, as the decay rate and maintenance cost of storage units could be tweaked to require varying levels of player cooperation.

[Taphonomy 5]

So individual players aren't immortal but groups of people effectively are.

You had a pretty good idea until group save, though. Take that idea, toss in "all storage wipes on reboot" and you've got a really good thing going there.

I agree with you. However, lots of servers restart every 6 hours or so to avoid performance issues. Is this what you meant by reboot? If so...I would request that there be a separate type of restart that resets the world. That way, servers could continue to restart on schedule, but could also set it to where all storage units and vehicles reset on a different schedule.

[koze 113]

fine how it is buddy.

[Taphonomy 5]

Cool! I like my idea!

Care to elaborate on the finer points of your argument?

[Taphonomy 5]

I'm shamelessly bumping this because I genuinely think it is a great idea...

I've seen posts concerning item storage, permadeath, and also the current state of bandits vs survivors. This mechanic should directly or indirectly improve those areas, but I would like to hear other people's thoughts.

My basic points:

-Increased "permadeath" for individuals

-Permanence of a group's items is directly related to that group's ability to scavenge for parts to keep up maintenance on their storage units.

-Mechanic is flexible enough to allow for "balancing" of the maintenance times and items required.

-Mechanic could potentially encourage varying levels of player cooperation. (Depending on the values set for maintenance of storage units,would require an amount of "effort" such that it would be very difficult for an individual player to meet maintenance requirements.) ***

-It would give well-geared survivors something to do other than go human-hunting.

*** Ideally, an individual would not be able to meet the maintenance requirement on a single storage unit unless he got lucky / is very skilled. If a survivor chooses the "Save for Group" option on a tent, but has no group to assist him, it should be assumed that the player is skilled enough to be a potential leader. In this case, yes, his stored items would persist through his death; but the time lost due to death would make it even harder for him to meet the maintenance requirement by himself, and he would need to weigh the options of: a) risking losing his tent and items; B) finding another survivor to help him.

I think a scenario like this has the potential to give rise to new, emergent game experiences, while also preserving the current play styles preferred by many. For those who want to be a lone-wolf bandit that murders anyone and everyone else...you can still do that! You can even store items to re-gear yourself after you die! The difference is: you can not do it indefinitely, and it will be more difficult. You WILL be faced with perma-death at some point. When staring down your scope at the undergeared player, you will need to at least give a slight pause for thought, "my tent needs repairs, can I fix it on my own?". Pull the trigger and you MAY lose your items on next death. Next time it could be you, undergeared and tent-less, in the scope of a player who gave more thought to survival than to senseless murder.

Eager to hear other people's thoughts, especially those that give good reasons why this proposed mechanic would not improve the game. At this point I see no downside. This would improve DAYZ while staying true to the core of the game.

Discuss...

Edited August 14, 2012 by Taphonomy

[Gulmari 19]

Only issue with this is when a player is full geared and doesn't need anything else. He can just store a decent set of crap in his tent/vehicle then fill the rest with crap to "repair" that way he doesn't really need to scavenge every time he dies. Essentially its the current system but instead of a ton of extra ammo in the tent you have scrap metal and ammo.

BTW there are hundreds of industrial spawns spread out all over the map so that person never has to go into harms way to collect said items to "repair". Its not really adding a level of cooperation just an annoyance that makes absolutely no sense. Why would i need to fix a tent with scrap metal? Why would a perfectly working vehicle need to be "fixed" every time a person dies even if they aren't in it?

If you died in real life would your possessions simply cease to exist?

[Taphonomy 5]

Only issue with this is when a player is full geared and doesn't need anything else. He can just store a decent set of crap in his tent/vehicle then fill the rest with crap to "repair" that way he doesn't really need to scavenge every time he dies. Essentially its the current system but instead of a ton of extra ammo in the tent you have scrap metal and ammo.

BTW there are hundreds of industrial spawns spread out all over the map so that person never has to go into harms way to collect said items to "repair". Its not really adding a level of cooperation just an annoyance that makes absolutely no sense. Why would i need to fix a tent with scrap metal? Why would a perfectly working vehicle need to be "fixed" every time a person dies even if they aren't in it?

If you died in real life would your possessions simply cease to exist?

You make good points, but I think you're focusing on the details of the mechanic which I meant to leave open to discussion.

The idea is that the tent would require maintenance constantly (IF "Save for Group" was chosen over the regular save option). Any time a player dies, there is a chance that he either won't make it back in time to perform maintenance, or he will make it back but not have enough of the repair item. It is also entirely possible that he makes it back and gets everything out of the tent, and no harm is done. A single player would never be able to manage multiple tents, and a single tent only has enough space to provide a finite number of re-gears. Unless the player is skillfull, and manages time well... the tent will degrade before even one regear is possible.

The point is to just set the maintenance requirements in such a way that it is extremely unlikely -almost impossible- for an individual to maintain a (GROUP) storage unit without help.

Also, I merely suggested scrap metal because it already exists in the game. Maybe scrap metal is used for tent poles? It doesn't even NEED to be scrap metal. I also mentioned "spare parts" which do not exist in the game. Notice how I made no attempt to designate any numerical values for the mechanic? Industrial spawns all over the map do no good if you don't have the time to hit them all. Even if you found 10 scrap metals in one warehouse, I never mentioned how much would be required to repair one tent. All of this could be worked out to provide a balanced system that addresses some current issues without removing any types of emergent gameplay. ((Hell...you could make the storage require BEANS. It doesn't really matter what you use as long as the maintenance requirements are adjusted accordingly.))

Also, the vehicle's operational status and maintenance status should not be confused. If the vehicle stores items and is Saved for Group, then failure to meet the maintenance requirements only means that the items stored inside go away. That's all.

I don't want to focus too much on the scenario of a single survivor trying to take advantage of the "Save for Group" option. Remember, the point is to increase the amount of "permadeath" individuals experience, but allow groups of players to be able to build up supplies in a way that makes sense based on the number of people contributing.

Good points to address and think about, but I do not think they detract from the positive potential of the idea I'm proposing.

Edited August 14, 2012 by Taphonomy

[xximrtwoixx 104]

I think if the tent system Rocket originally tried to use worked, ie tents disappeared x amount of time after your death then the system would be fine. They would still work as storage and if you want all that crap in there you have to go find another one. It also preserves gear for groups and allows them to transfer into another members tent. All they need to do is fix the actual tent system that exhists.

[hatfieldcw 184]

I'm with you right up until "Group Save". Ditch that. When you die, everything you built, including tents, despawns as soon as your body is hidden, either manually or after the timer runs out on it. That way, you can kill a guy at his camp and then take his stuff.

Respawning at the coast should be a fresh start for you, not a footrace to get back to your stash of gear and rearm to exactly what you were before.

Vehicles are trickier. When you die, vehicles that you owned or had saved should be teleported to the nearest valid vehicle spawn point. So if you've got a GAZ stashed off-map in the West woods, then your death will cause it to spawn--with all repairs and contents intact--in Zelenogorsk. If you have a team, they'll have ways to protect it, like having someone else save it before your body is hidden or even just using their knowledge that it'll be respawning to prompt a salvage mission to nearby likely sites.

No more parking it in a bush 3km away from civilization and using it like a cabin in the woods, vehicles have to be with your team when you run the risk of losing the guy it's linked to, or you need a guy who doesn't take chances and just babysits the ride, or you need to deal with the inconvenience of actually starting fresh once in a while.

[ZedsDeadBaby 2287]

Respawning at the coast should be a fresh start for you

Okay, fine. What about the ten other people who make regular use of my tents and vehicles? They get to arbitrarily lose all their extra gear and effort too, because a friend of theirs got shot when they weren't even online? Great idea...

This whole "wipe everything on death" idea is a non-starter. It destroys the entire notion of an end game in DayZ and completely dismantles any long-term goals that a group of players might set and attempt to achieve for themselves. What about when underground storage bunkers are added to the game? My group cooperates for a week to build one, and it's supposed to just up and disappear randomly at some point to satisfy your need to remove these structures and storage options from the game?

Senseless.

Persistent storage is critical to sustained gameplay and long-term, cooperative and team-based goals. That's really it.

OP's idea is solid, but I don't see why it would work differently for solo players and groups. Both are/should be capable of farming supplies like scrap metal, tools, etc.

Just have the smaller storage like crates and tents require small amounts of maintenance so it's viable for individuals, while larger structures like bunkers and shipping containers require more maintenance so they work better for groups.

No point having the arbitrary wipe mechanic and "save for group" nonsense to draw a distinction between the two. What's next "save for duo," and "save for trio" etc.?

But, yeah, all the other "everything disappears" ideas in this thread are shit.

Edited August 14, 2012 by ZedsDeadBaby

[hatfieldcw 184]

Okay, fine. What about the ten other people who make regular use of my tents and vehicles?

[...]

This whole "wipe everything on death" idea is a non-starter. It destroys the entire notion of an end game in DayZ and completely dismantles any long-term goals that a group of players might set and attempt to achieve for themselves.

[...]

Persistent storage is critical to sustained gameplay and long-term, cooperative and team-based goals. That's really it.

[...]

But, yeah, all the other "everything disappears" ideas in this thread are shit.

Other people who use your tents can pitch their own tents and keep their stuff in them.

There is no end-game in DayZ, unless you count dying and starting over. Permanent stockpiles of gear that persist for weeks or months after the owner is dead and duplicate their contents accidentally are not core gameplay. Dying, respawning and retaining 95% of your assets through the process is not core gameplay. When you die, it ceases to be your tent, and it ceases to be your stuff, and you cease to be you. You respawn as a new survivor, and it's unfortunate that you wash up on the beach with special knowledge of where a recently dead guy parked his car.

What passes for an end-game in DayZ--The loot stockpiling, the barracks farming, the warring over helicopters and the newb griefing--all arise from the flawed mechanics of the current state of the mod. They are not sacred and need not be defended. I know it's fun to have infinite guns and food and ghillie suits and night vision goggles waiting for you when you spawn, and it's fun to be able to die and be back to 100% combat effectiveness in under an hour, but it's not the way the game is supposed to feel. You should care about staying alive, but people don't, because there's nothing to lose. You should lose your stuff when you die, even the stuff that you hid in the trunk of a car a mile north of Gvozdno.

Persistent storage and the play styles that it enables are errors in the game, problems with the system. It's why people only go to high-value loot spawns to either deathmatch or to murder the newbs who don't know how to "win" at DayZ. It's why vehicles are just mobile camps. Fixing the item storage will go a long way to making DayZ into the kickass zombie survival roguelike that so many people want it to be. The problem is that the current state of the project has chased away the target audience for the finished project, and filled the community to bursting with FPS enthusiasts who like it best just the way it is. When the standalone game is in beta and DayZ players start offering feedback, there will be enormous pressure to build a game that continues to cater to the current mindset and style of play.

The game is too easy for you, and it's easy because of persistent storage. Harden up, and leave your shantytown behind.

[ZedsDeadBaby 2287]

Other people who use your tents can pitch their own tents and keep their stuff in them.

So my multiplayer survival game with team-based tactical combat and team-based structure building and team-based cooperative mechanics will have completely individual storage?

Why? There's absolutely no justification for that. It's neither authentic nor conducive to the survival mentality. It's supposed to be "safety in numbers" not "safety in numbers but make sure you hide your own shit in your own tent in case someone you know gets shot while you're at work tomorrow."

Permanent stockpiles of gear that persist for weeks or months after the owner is dead and duplicate their contents accidentally are not core gameplay. Dying, respawning and retaining 95% of your assets through the process is not core gameplay. When you die, it ceases to be your tent, and it ceases to be your stuff, and you cease to be you. You respawn as a new survivor, and it's unfortunate that you wash up on the beach with special knowledge of where a recently dead guy parked his car.

Again, you're speaking from an entirely solo, individual, single-player perspective. If I pull up to a firefight in a pick-up with 3 friends and jump out and get shot in the head, you want my pick-up truck to disappear while my friends stand there stranded? And my enemies have no opportunity to steal it?

I assume that's not what you're suggesting?

But it is...

Tell me how a mechanic functions that guarantees enemies can steal my possessions or friends who are with me have an opportunity to reclaim vehicles that I was driving, yet somehow also prevents me from doing the same after re-spawning?

What passes for an end-game in DayZ--The loot stockpiling, the barracks farming, the warring over helicopters and the newb griefing--all arise from the flawed mechanics of the current state of the mod. They are not sacred and need not be defended.

I completely disagree with you. Other than the "newb griefing" which I'll ignore since I don't understand what it has to do with any of that other stuff, those things are in fact relatively critical to the DayZ experience. They are in their infantile states, and will certainly be fleshed out and expanded upon in stand-alone when rocket adds things like underground structures and permanent squad storage, both of which he has discussed at length. You are critiquing them in their unfinished, experimental stages. Storing gear to support a larger squad and recruit new members while vying for limited resources and precious vehicles is most definitely "core gameplay" in DayZ.

I know it's fun to have infinite guns and food and ghillie suits and night vision goggles waiting for you when you spawn, and it's fun to be able to die and be back to 100% combat effectiveness in under an hour, but it's not the way the game is supposed to feel.

I know it's fun to make sweeping generalizations and rely on the presence of duplication bugs which will certainly cease to exist in the very near future to make your point, but don't. Nobody has "infinite guns and ghillie suits" unless they are explicitly and deliberately exploiting the bugs in the game. I've worked for months in a team of 5-6 and we have only had 3-4 ghillie suits between us the entire time - same with the rarest guns. You're conflating the issue of item duplication with the desire to work in a team to ensure your long term viability and the strength of your squad and its ability to recover from losses.

Do not.

You should care about staying alive, but people don't, because there's nothing to lose.

This is absolutely bullshit and is based entirely upon a mentality which assumes that gear is the only thing of worth in the game.

When my 42-day-old character died I came as close to weeping over a game as I have since I was a child. And my friend who accidentally ran me over in our Land Rover? Got physically sick. And neither reaction had fuck all to do with the "stuff" I was carrying at the time. We cared about the player. The story. The history. That's what we lost and it broke both our hearts (his a bit more than mine since he was the drunk jackass who backed over me but I digress).

Gear is not why I strive to survive, so having some waiting for me after I respawn doesn't really take the edge off death in the way you imply.

Persistent storage and the play styles that it enables are errors in the game, problems with the system.

No, and no.

It's why people only go to high-value loot spawns to either deathmatch or to murder the newbs who don't know how to "win" at DayZ. It's why vehicles are just mobile camps. Fixing the item storage will go a long way to making DayZ into the kickass zombie survival roguelike that so many people want it to be. The problem is that the current state of the project has chased away the target audience for the finished project, and filled the community to bursting with FPS enthusiasts who like it best just the way it is. When the standalone game is in beta and DayZ players start offering feedback, there will be enormous pressure to build a game that continues to cater to the current mindset and style of play.

I disagree with this entire paragraph in almost every way so I'll just say that and not spend 15 minutes picking it apart.

Roguelikes are fun, but they're also generally single player games, with short term (relative to an MMO) play-through's and become repetitive. DayZ must adapt rogue experience to a multiplayer, team-based game with long term sustainability and replay-ability which means long-term goals that are achievable even if you drink from the wrong fountain or read the wrong tome. Nobody is going to play DayZ for 12 months let alone years if every death is a complete "reset" on their entire experience. That's just not an MMO anymore. Roguelike, right? Like as in similar, not identical?

DayZ has the hints of this progression right now. Very roguelike at the start - brutal, lose everything, start fresh, where-the-fuck and how-the-fuck kind of feel; but, with effort you can work against that and find your way into a group and work together and cooperate and then things change and the game morphs and you're playing at a different level and it's an entirely different experience and to me that implies a depth and breadth of design that needs to be explored, expanded upon, refined and polished not quashed before it has had a chance to flourish.

Yes we need to fix duplication exploits. That goes without saying. But that's not a reason to abandon entirely the depth and appeal of long-term storage and player built structures and compounds.s

I think rocket is on my side in this one ultimately, so I'm going to wait and see what he does and we can revisit the conversation in stand-alone. ;)

Edited August 14, 2012 by ZedsDeadBaby

[Jeetard 9]

lol a self proclaimed "genius" hahah

[alternater7@hotmail.com 4]

So I like to be the nice guy bloodbagging random strangers, and dropping food to fresh spawns. So your saying that all my stuff that I use to help people with will be abruptly taken away just because of some idiot bandit camping the tree line. No I disagree

[Taphonomy 5]

I think if the tent system Rocket originally tried to use worked, ie tents disappeared x amount of time after your death then the system would be fine. They would still work as storage and if you want all that crap in there you have to go find another one. It also preserves gear for groups and allows them to transfer into another members tent. All they need to do is fix the actual tent system that exhists.

I agree completely, and would be totally fine with this. I think my idea would add more complexity / depth in many player interactions. I realize complex is not always good though... sometimes simpler is best.

I'm with you right up until "Group Save". Ditch that. When you die, everything you built, including tents, despawns as soon as your body is hidden, either manually or after the timer runs out on it. That way, you can kill a guy at his camp and then take his stuff.

Respawning at the coast should be a fresh start for you, not a footrace to get back to your stash of gear and rearm to exactly what you were before.

Vehicles are trickier. When you die, vehicles that you owned or had saved should be teleported to the nearest valid vehicle spawn point. So if you've got a GAZ stashed off-map in the West woods, then your death will cause it to spawn--with all repairs and contents intact--in Zelenogorsk. If you have a team, they'll have ways to protect it, like having someone else save it before your body is hidden or even just using their knowledge that it'll be respawning to prompt a salvage mission to nearby likely sites.

No more parking it in a bush 3km away from civilization and using it like a cabin in the woods, vehicles have to be with your team when you run the risk of losing the guy it's linked to, or you need a guy who doesn't take chances and just babysits the ride, or you need to deal with the inconvenience of actually starting fresh once in a while.

Okay, fine. What about the ten other people who make regular use of my tents and vehicles? They get to arbitrarily lose all their extra gear and effort too, because a friend of theirs got shot when they weren't even online? Great idea...

This whole "wipe everything on death" idea is a non-starter. It destroys the entire notion of an end game in DayZ and completely dismantles any long-term goals that a group of players might set and attempt to achieve for themselves. What about when underground storage bunkers are added to the game? My group cooperates for a week to build one, and it's supposed to just up and disappear randomly at some point to satisfy your need to remove these structures and storage options from the game?

Senseless.

Persistent storage is critical to sustained gameplay and long-term, cooperative and team-based goals. That's really it.

OP's idea is solid, but I don't see why it would work differently for solo players and groups. Both are/should be capable of farming supplies like scrap metal, tools, etc.

Just have the smaller storage like crates and tents require small amounts of maintenance so it's viable for individuals, while larger structures like bunkers and shipping containers require more maintenance so they work better for groups.

No point having the arbitrary wipe mechanic and "save for group" nonsense to draw a distinction between the two. What's next "save for duo," and "save for trio" etc.?

But, yeah, all the other "everything disappears" ideas in this thread are shit.

I partially agree with both of you, which is why I made this topic. It is supposed to serve as a kind of compromise between: "everything goes away, period" and "stuff stays around". With this system, individuals lose their stuff. They die. Groups have more power to make their items persist, the ability to do that is directy correlated with the number of people in the group. More people contribute, more things can be saved past death. This allows for meaningful solo play that doesn't get boring. And allows small communities to come together and play socially in a way that rewards them over time, without forcing everyone to start over if somebody dies.

[Taphonomy 5]

So I like to be the nice guy bloodbagging random strangers, and dropping food to fresh spawns. So your saying that all my stuff that I use to help people with will be abruptly taken away just because of some idiot bandit camping the tree line. No I disagree

I wanted to address this because this type of gameplay is probably pretty rare. I wanted to show how it could also work in this system.

I believe that this type of behavior would definitely be appreciated by just about anybody that is nice enough to pause for a second and not shoot you in the face. By virtue of this... I believe that you, Sir, would be one of those rare few who would be able to maintain a persisting tent without ever having to be part of a permanent group. If you came up and bloodbagged me or gave me food, I would definitely want to return the favor by "tipping" you a few spare parts. If I didn't have any, I would try my best to help you find some before we parted ways.

You could definitely be a good samaritan solo player, and I don't believe the proposed mechanic would punish you for it. If you still disagree let me know. I'll definitely think about that some more. The type of playing you're proposing is NOT how the majority of people play, but diversity is IMPORTANT for a good game. So it is important that there be a solution that allows for exactly the kind of thing you're describing.

[Taphonomy 5]

lol a self proclaimed "genius" hahah

Yeah...I originally gave it that title because I figured it would mean a lot of people would comment on the thread just to flame me, and then my idea would get noticed more.

In retrospect, I wish I had given the thread a title that actually states the idea I'm proposing. Oh well...

[Taphonomy 5]

It seems most people think the Save for Group option is dumb. I admit I thought it sounded a little awkward when I proposed it. Still, I believe in the basic concept.

Maybe instead:

the normal save option initiates the maintenance requirement.

Not saving means no maintenance is required, but storage goes away immediately on death.

[hatfieldcw 184]

That's not bad.

ZedsDeadBaby, I think maybe you and I got off on the wrong foot. I mistook you for the sort of guy who plays the game in the most efficient possible way, using all available metagaming methods to maximum effect. Your story about losing a 42-day-old character, though, is exactly the sort of thing that I'm trying to encourage. The problem is that the current persistent storage system allows people to die ten times a day and never give a hoot about their character or his story. Instead, they can play the game like it's Diablo 3, where you die and then respawn with a slap on the wrist and full access to everything you've earned. It encourages people to do high-risk loot-gathering missions, because they can just throw everything in a tent then rush into the NWAF with an ax and an ALICE pack and come out with three nice guns and one mag for each of them, then dupe up a bunch of ammo and have an instantaneous full kit whenever they want it.

If everyone wept at the death of their character, the game would be deeper and the personal interactions would be more important. At this point, if I see a guy with a big coyote pack and a DMR running into Cherno, I don't think it's an old player with a hurt friend who needs morphine to keep his team alive, I think it's a guy who just geared up at his tent and is heading for his favorite rooftop to chalk up some more kills. I'd guess that I'm right more often than not, and when I gun him down and take his stuff, I don't feel like I'm undoing hours of work in a moment, I feel like I'm harvesting a bottomless quarry of duped loot.

If the rules encouraged your sort of play, and discouraged theirs, then that would make for a fun game. As it stands, you're voluntarily hobbling yourself by playing it "straight", preserving your character's life and working with buddies to legitimately obtain and expend resources. What you do in this game amounts to roleplay, because the game rules clearly support an easier, more efficient way to succeed. I want that roleplay to the the best play.