Thinking about buying another ArmA II copy to make another DayZ Character

[Vulric (DayZ) 2]

Can anyone inform me of an easy way to switch between the two CD-Keys? Beans will be given for help!

[jdz (DayZ) 238]

Just play on a private hive, you'll have a character for each hive you play on. I have a character purely for playing alone on a noob server and my normal character is on a proper server

[Vulric (DayZ) 2]

Just play on a private hive, you'll have a character for each hive you play on. I have a character purely for playing alone on a noob server and my normal character is on a proper server

Well this could be a temp solution. Instead of wasting 30 bucks. Thanks for the suggestion!

[- Valkyrie - 89]

If you have the money, why not. To each his own. If I had the money I'd have 2 copies as well. One for this profile, my medic one. And the other for being a douche bag bandit :)

[Goonsquad 0]

Yeah i have often considered this also, would be a nice suggestion in the standalone to allow 2 or 3 Chars. Cause once you stacked one and get bored would be nice to have the option to take a different route or have a purpose to raid.

[dallas 5195]

I considered that too, but I just ended up relaxing my play style a little instead. Respawning at the beach, having to find new gear is probably what I enjoy most in DayZ.

[Vulric (DayZ) 2]

I too like the thrill of starting fresh, trying to avoid zombies rather than easily mowing them down with a CCO SD. But I guess I just want a fresh start also knowing I have a pretty geared character if I ever wanna go back to it. They say don't get attached to gear, but it's hard sometimes when you worked for it!

[venthos 605]

ARMA2's old style method of using a CD key stored in the registry means it's not easy to utilize two different copies.

Basically, every time you wanted to switch characters you'd have to edit the registry entry accordingly to the appropriate CD Key. If you use Steam, Steam will automatically overwrite the registry to whatever key you had through Steam each time you start the game through Steam. So, you'd have to:

[1] Make two .reg (registry) export files somewhere that would allow you to easily switch between what CD Key is in your registry

[2] Not launch through Steam

There's actually a lot of information on this process online because hackers need this information when they buy a new CD key because their old one got global banned ;P

I, too, hope that DayZ standalone will go along with a modern means of identification like MMOs. You just use the CD Key to "create" an account, and then just login accordingly with said account. This would eliminate the whole "cd key stored in the registry" issue.

I, however, do not want DayZ standalone to permit more than one character per account. This fosters using dummy characters as mobile tents that can "log off" and be immune to being raided. You'd also have people throw snipers on an otherwise naked character to sit outside cherno/elektro/etc. and just occasionally login every so often while they're bored/waiting on something without having to inconvenience them with the run to the coast and back. So on and so forth. It would just foster too much crappy things without risk/inconvenience to the player's main. At least force people to buy another copy of the game if they want to abuse things in that way. If someone were legitimately wanting a second character, then I doubt they'd have problems with forking another $15 or what not.

But yeah, the easiest option is certainly private hives.

[dallas 5195]

We defenently need to make account theft a little harder for the standalone.

No matter how many people BattleEye bans doesn't matter, if a hacker has 100 stolen keys read for use.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Dallas

[venthos 605]

We defenently need to make account theft a little harder for the standalone.

No matter how many people BattleEye bans doesn't matter, if a hacker has 100 stolen keys read for use.

There is no solution to this, as the fault is of the humans downloading cd key stealers/key loggers. Just like how WoW accounts are rampantly stolen because people download keyloggers despite that there is no CD Key stored in a registry for WoW. Once you figure out how to solve human stupidity, you'll solve the stolen account problem and inadvertently solve the identity theft problem world wide ;)

[machiavelli 38]

Can't you just go into the main game and create another profile? I had a woman character before (23 days, insta-server-wide killed by hacker...awesome and thanks dbag) and then created a new profile for current character (1 legit death, 13 hacker deaths).

[venthos 605]

Profiles do nothing other than retain certain ARMA2 settings and your name. DayZ cares not what profile you use and identifies you through your GUID (essentially your CD Key). Changing your profile does nothing for new/unique DayZ characters.

[corbon_hydrashock 14]

I fully see the advantages of a second character - a teammate had one loaded on his wife's computer. Technically it was her account, but he used that second character for saving items, duping, and saving his first character when he needed it.

Still, like others have said - I've played the game long enough (two months?) to know it is a serious waste of cash considering how buggy and hacked the main servers are. If you play on a vigilant private-hive then OK, I guess it may be worth it... but...

Still, even with a second computer at your disposal, I suggest that you take a little more time to contemplate just what the mod is about, what its limitations are, and consider that you may be a little off-aim in grasping just what there is to enjoy about it. For example, granted, for a while it was pretty frustrating to die and lose all my gear, but then I realized I took more chances, had more interesting interactions, and got more kills when I had to little to lose and was gearing up in a major city. I wrote a story or two to that end here: http://dayzmod.com/forum/index.php?/topic/85903-why-i-hate-dying-why-i-like-dying/

Where I originally wanted a second account to make life easier, I now feel pretty bad for most people who meet me in a major city when I get 'sent back' via getting killed or dying. And it's that totally new life, new experience, and new gear load-out that is the DayZ purpose - to make it in this post-apocalyptic world or not.

The advantages to a second account running at the same time are huge, and I used to do just that in Eve Online... but I just don't really see it being worth it now with DayZ... certainly not for $30.