Time and resource calculations for underground construction (+fancy sketches <3)

[NFK 102]

I have to say, I love the system you've come up with, it does a great job of encouraging cooperative play.

[Daerk 8]

If something like this were to be implemented, it would need to be more realistic for the conversion from plan to actual development. Specifically, require a minimum set of tools and materials to BEGIN the construction, however allow the player to have to stop construction to then go out and gather more resources to continue the project. Requiring ALL of the components prior to construction beginning is unrealistic. Often-times projects grow or shrink in scope during development, requiring an "on-the-fly" re-adjustment of priorities, resources, and manpower. I should be able to start development of my hideout without requiring every stick of wood to have been gathered first.

Also, there needs to be some choice in how the excavation dirt is handled.

By default, it's all just piled beside the entrance. OR, you could take more time and energy in transporting the dirt and rocks to another area and dumping it there... possibly also requiring more tools or equipment such as a wheelbarrow or dump cart. Or you could even create a few "dummy" hideouts, where you only dig a small entrance and build a door over it, and dump all of your dirt beside it. Any other players looking for hideouts to raid will see the dirt mound, and when they go to raid it, the explosive you rigged to the door of the fake hideout goes off. ;D

[C0LDKILL (DayZ) 34]

I see a lot of talking about locking systems.

What about a multitude of design schematics?

Different designs schematics appear in rarity.

Example:

Very common - Tent

Common - Footlocker

Uncommon - 1 level bunker (small)

Rare - 2 level bunker (medium)

Very rare - Split level bunker (large)

Extremely rare - 3 level bunker (extra large)

Bunkers should be upgradable when better schematics are found.

Bunker accessories should be available for players to find. Locks, doors, gun racks, water wells, storage lockers etc...

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

Different designs schematics appear in rarity.

Bunkers should be upgradable when better schematics are found.

Bunker accessories should be available for players to find. Locks, doors, gun racks, water wells, storage lockers etc...

EVE-Online-Like schematics and blueprints will be against DayZ concepts. If you think about it, then you'll realize the following failing logics:

1. You build something.
   
2. You find a blueprint to upgrade your structure.
   
3. You upgrade it.
   
4. Then you die.
   
5. Then after some time you can construct new structure.
   
6. Then you can't upgrade it, because you don't have that piece of paper.
   
7. Some other random noob can upgrade it, because he has this paper, but he never constructed or upgraded anything.
   

No logical reason of you forgetting how to upgrade your structure.

Any blueprint concept is absolutely equal to skill system, it's just a "magic scroll of construction" in terms of WoW. It's not working for permadeath. In Arma you have authentic stars and constellations, time and sun relation. If you know how to navigate with it in real life, then you are able to do it in Arma. If we implement skilling and "magic scrolls" then if you don't have "magic scroll of stars and constellation lore" then Arma must hide the stars at the night sky? :) Or make an unreadable mess of it? :)

In DayZ, every player will have equal abilities and skills right from the start. All he will have to do to use them is to find resources and survive long enough to collect all he needs.

Edited August 29, 2012 by -=PA=-Mikhail

[Rumata1 41]

up

[Bizmal 19]

My biggest concern is what happens to your shelter when you die. If it stays put its a down fall. If people can loot it then it's useless

[Lights Out 141]

As much as you don't want to wait forever to build a bunker it should not be easily obtainable. If it is then everyone is going to have one and it won't be anything special. You should have to build it slowly and put work into it including upkeep. This will make dying and losing a bunker that much more devastating. I feel this is a crucial element of the game, making permadeath horrible, you should really lose alot in death.

I also question what will happen with the bunkers. Seems like sooner or later the whole map could be filled wall to wall with bunkers like apartments. Can they be looted and destroyed? Can I break into it? Blow the door off? Blow the walls in and get rid of the bunker?

[Bizmal 19]

Well from experience in an older game they allowed players to place houses in the open world and it rocked. However the homes were loot able. Within a month houses were every where. But soon they just became empty landscape objects. No one stored anything in them. They became useless.

As hardcore as the game was the housing aspect was no fun and in turn no one cared about them. It wasn't until they made houses lockable that people began to use them. Then they became fun and they were a major part of the gameplay.

My point is it may be realistic to have your shelter loot able but in terms of gameplay why would you waste time building something that's useless. Traps or no traps delaying people from taking your stash will be useless in the end.

From my experience your shelter should be secure but not permanent upon death.

[Lights Out 141]

Well from experience in an older game they allowed players to place houses in the open world and it rocked. However the homes were loot able. Within a month houses were every where. But soon they just became empty landscape objects. No one stored anything in them. They became useless.

As hardcore as the game was the housing aspect was no fun and in turn no one cared about them. It wasn't until they made houses lockable that people began to use them. Then they became fun and they were a major part of the gameplay.

My point is it may be realistic to have your shelter loot able but in terms of gameplay why would you waste time building something that's useless. Traps or no traps delaying people from taking your stash will be useless in the end.

From my experience your shelter should be secure but not permanent upon death.

How do you deal with player's friends who are sharing the bunker. Will all of their stuff that's there disappear? If not and they are now able to use that bunker, what stops the recently dead player from making a new character, meeting back up with them and just getting his stuff back? Would kind of take away from what permadeath is meant to be. There needs to be some kind of chance of losing stuff somehow even if it is to other players. Having something that is 100% secure isn't fun. It feels too "safe" for me. Bunkers can't be 100% safe, especially through death.

[DZR_Mikhail 2424]

I tried to guess how to prevent locked construtctions being invulnerable and lootable ones being useless. THere must be a partial balancing and the Claiming Mechanics.

Claiming and "LockDown" concept for constructions

Let's say, there is a "Lockdown" (LD) state of a construction.

• LD means the construction is claimed private and at this moment a person is inhabiting it.
  
• LD lasts for 12 or 24 hours.
  
• After that - LD is removed and building is lootable and anyone can destruct it.
  
• While LD lasts a construction cannot be destroyed and entered\looted
  

Now the most interesting

A person can activate LD only if:

• he is alone in a construction or mutual LD activated
  
  • mutual LD is activated when two or more players accept "Agree to lockdown" while looking at eachother.
    
  • after mutual lockdown everyone participating in it inside a building after 5 minutes can safely logoff or stay inside.
    
  • mutual lockdown is removed if any person particiapting in mutual LD exits the strucutre to open world.
    

  [*]he is inside of construction

  [*]he spent at least 5 minutes there alone

  [*]he logged off the game inside the construction

It needs a tunup and balance with time values, but in all other cases it is a good idea, which will:

• make your structure unguarded if you exit it
  
• make your structure protected and secure if you are in in
  
• gives you a chance to be safe with all your items inside your construction
  
• preserves lootability and PvP while giving ability to make it private storage
  

It's a brief suggestion, but may be it can be developed in a clean and straight mechaninsm to meake everything cool. What do you think?

[Daerk 8]

Just generate a salted hash for the player's cd key + that specific player number, use it as a reference to the instanced underground shelter. If another player ID number comes along with the same player cd key (as in, the player has died and is trying to get back into his old house using a new character), randomly increase the chance for things to happen such as:

* Roof cave-in of the shelter, destroying % of stored items, and severely injuring anyone inside

* Infected swarm around the door area of the shelter, disallowing access in/out without removing them from the equation

* "Accidental Discharge" of a stored munition (a shotgun round goes off, smoke grenade, etc)

* The "Bed" becomes infested with lice/ticks/bedbugs/etc & now requires replacement, otherwise you become sick & need antibiotics & time to heal.

* Any nearby grass around your shelter door immediately becomes flattened and stays flat for X amount of time (days)

* Rats infest the shelter and eat all the food

Any player that assisted with the building of the shelter is referenced as having a "key" to the place. They're on the "list" of accepted players without causing the above problems. The process of "working" on the shelter itself, putting in time digging, or installing the wooden components yourself (not giving them to your friend to install, but doing it yourself), automatically adds you to the accepted ownership list for that shelter.

Shelters are instanced on the server you're on.

Leaving that server, the server uploads the content for your instanced shelter back to the main central server database and it then retains the instanced shelter for 1 hour before sending it to dev/null, allowing only the central db to retain memory of the shelter... UNLESS there is another person still on the server that is on the "owners list" of players with access to that shelter. Once ALL players with access to that shelter are gone from that server, the server retains the instanced shelter long enough to allow someone to loot it. IF someone DOES loot it, the server uploads to the central DB the updated shelter info.

The next time you join any server, that server instances the shelter based off of downloading it from the central db (referenced directly via your player hash created from cd-key + player id number).

If you've died and created a new character, and are joining a server, the server will NOT instance your old shelter for you UNLESS you had a buddy assist in building the shelter AND your buddy is still alive AND your buddy is on the same server as you.

Allowing someone who did not assist in building the shelter to go into the shelter will randomly cause some of the problems listed above.

If a player leaves a server, immediately joins another server (thus generating a new instanced shelter based off the the old server updating the central db and the new server retrieving the data from the central db), and on the old server their shelter is looted or destroyed before it is de-instanced, when the old server updates the central db with that info, the central db sends an update to the NEW instanced shelter server, and any of the items that were looted are immediately purged from the player's inventory or home inventory, or the shelter is destroyed entirely, etc. If the player was inside the shelter at the time... well, goodbye shelter, goodbye player... hello "You Are Dead" screen.

In the instance that two shelters are supposed to have their doorways in the same position in an area, and both are being instanced on the same server, the server will temporarily "offset" BOTH entrances a few feet apart from each other. It will NOT send the offset info back to the central db. Offset entrances are temporary server specific instances.

I can imagine a situation where a popular shelter spot might have half a dozen players on the same server, so there are now six entrances immediately within a few feet of each other... increasing the risk of looting or destruction. This would mean it is extremely important to carefully pick your shelter location. Don't use a location that everyone else is picking. Digging that shelter inside of a castle courtyard MIGHT just not be as genius an idea as you originally thought.