Standalone: Outside Base Construction (Very Detailed)

[MasterZ 90]

I love the future plans for building bases underground but when looking at zombie movies, series and games I see a lot of base construction by using already existing buildings and materials.

These are often frail and there is always the possibility to being overrun by either other survivors or zombies.

I would love to see this kind of base construction much more, boarding up doors, windows and other passages to create a small area of perceived safety that could end if you end up unlucky or neglect your defenses too much.

Don't worry about this being suggested before, the main concept of building bases has been suggested numerous times but my own suggestion of handling it is unique and seems to fit well within the standalone of DayZ.

It's a long read but I can assure you it's well worth it.

Creating a Base

First of all let me tell you that constructing and maintaining a base should be a hard and long, potentially never ending task.

But at the same time it should be easy to get into and most importantly a fun mid-endgame activity to let people do something else than banditry.

You should be able to choose to do it on your own, but expect your base to be small. You should also be able to work together and make a bigger base, potentially as big as 4-6 houses connected.

This is possible because Chernarus+ will have almost all buildings enter-able.

Step 1: Getting construction materials.

The first thing survivors will need to do is gather enough materials. The basic materials should be planks, boards,nails and scrap metal, items which should be easy to find laying around in sheds or near industrial buildings.

Aside from these building materials one also needs a toolbox that by default includes all necessary tools for basic construction needs.

Step 2: Finding a suitable location and create a basic base.

Now that you have some planks, boards, nails and a toolbox you can start working on your own little base.

You'll have to find a suitable location and what better location is there then to secure already existing buildings and streets? I shall immediately reply with none.

Securing existing buildings and streets will be a lot easier than building walls out of scratch.

You'll most likely end up securing a house first, you board up the windows to prevent anybody from crawling through them and you block off all entrances you deem unnecessary. You keep at least one entrance however and reinforce it properly.

Congratulations, you just finished securing your first area and have created a zone, an important mechanic I will get into later.

Step 3: Expanding your territory.

Now that you have a small base you can gather more materials, expand the territory your base covers and fortify your defenses where necessary.

Get more wood to create big barricades to block entire streets, possible add some gates so you and others can enter freely. (Gates can only be opened from one direction (inside) or by the person that build it.)

Be very careful though, there is a delicate risk/reward system in place. This is done by zoning and is a very important mechanic I shall explain.

Mechanic: Zoning

Once you barricade and enclose an area this will create a zone. This zone can be as big as an entire city and brings both benefits and dangers with it.

Loot and zombies within the zone:

A zone will create a perceived save zone for a (group of) player(s). Zombies will not spawn within these zones at all because you fortified all possible entrances.

At the same time there will be no loot spawns within zones following the same logic, other 'survivors' can't get in and drop random items they don't need. As is my logic behind how loot 'refreshes' itself.

I can already hear the people of this forum scream: but save zones should not exist!

Allow me to calm everybody by repeating it's a perceived safety.

Potential threats and dangers.

The total amount of zombies shall not decrease, the bigger your zone where zombies can't spawn, the higher the amount of zombies that can spawn around the base.

You build those barricades for a reason, you want the zombies and other players to stay out.

By building a base you will have to deal with zombies attacking your base as well as worrying about bandit groups finding your base and wanting to maybe take it over or loot your belongings.

That's why I called bases a perceived safety, and mentioned a risk/reward system.

You can build a base and defend it along with other people. But in exchange for this save zone, the bigger it is the more attention it will attract and the more defending you'll have to do.

This delicate mechanic will allow people to create nice bases that need to be defended but will prevent people from creating bases that are too big because defending and maintaining the base gets harder the bigger you make it.

Maintaining/Upgrading a Base

Building and expanding to create a base to your liking isn't everything,

As explained with the mechanic of zoning it's necessary to prevent attackers from taking down your base.

Step 4: Upgrading barricades.

Those basic wooden barricades you made aren't everything, a few zombie attacks or players with melee weapons can break it down in no time. This will breach the zone, something you don't want.

Going out you'll focus not only on getting wood to fix barricades but you'll also keep your eyes open for metal sheeting, more scrap metal, wiring kits and tank traps. Any material that can be used to improve the durability of your barricades and keep your base save for longer periods of time.

Cover the outsides of your wooden barricades with metal sheeting using your handy toolbox and scrap metal. This will increase the durability of your barricades and keeps them intact for much longer. It will also give players a lot more trouble.

You can add more than just a few metal plates too if you like but if that isn't enough you can also use the wiring kits to spread barbed wire right in front of your walls or even on top of them. This will hurt zombies, slowing those potential attacks but will also slow down hostile survivors as they have even more crap to breach through.

Step 5: Upgrading the base.

By now we are delving deep into base building and this goes way beyond the capabilities of just one person.

If you want to seriously expand and upgrade your base you'll need a group of people working together.

You and your (new) buddies created this zone for a reason, not just safety from hostilities but also a place of storage, relaxation or maybe you want to grow it out to become a trading post.

You can always use sandbags outside your walls to provide cover for the few friends that defend your base but maybe you want more.

With enough materials on the ground people can build deer stands to provide whomever is guarding, chests for storage that you can label accordingly. Potentially have a chest for storing weapons, maybe you want a large container for ammunition or maybe a place to store all those delicious beans. (Effectively replacing tents to a degree.)

But this isn't the end of the line just yet.

Step 6: Generators

It's possible to find generator components and build a generator that runs on gas that will power certain parts of your base.

Together with some wiring you'll be able to wire up lights that make the inside of your base seem more friendly but more importantly you can install lights on barricades that show the surrounding area so you can see enemies coming from far away.

If you want to do this is entirely up to the group, it might be nice to see more of your surroundings but you might also end up creating a beacon for every survivor and zed in the area to come pay a visit.

Defending a Base/Abandonment

Like I mentioned before, you need to defend your base because otherwise you'll be dead in no time. It's save only when defended properly.

Zombie attacks.

The bigger the base, the more zombies will be directly around your base. They wont immediately attack the walls like a bunch of rabid monsters.

Zombies attack the barricades when they spot live survivors within the zone created by the base, otherwise only a handful will occasionally start hammering the walls and sometimes walk away again.

When this happens you need to kill the zombies, go out with some construction tools and fix up the mess that is made, otherwise the barricades might break and your zone ceases to exist.

It's hard and dangerous work and this shows why more people are necessary the bigger the base becomes.

Player attacks.

Just like zombies, players can attack the barricades with melee weapons or start taking apart barricades using their tools (the later being slower but will salvage most materials that were used).

Keep an eye out for these bandits and take them out before they do significant harm.

This too shows that it becomes hard very fast when you go out of your way to create a bigger base.

Bandit groups will be naturally attracted to bigger bases, make sure you have plenty of people to guard it.

Abandonment

Zones wont exist forever for obvious balance reasons.

When no players are within the zone it takes maybe 12 hours until the barricades start to deteriorate on their own, this is to simulate zombie activity when no players are nearby.

After roughly 48 hours of no player activity within the base some barricades will break down entirely and the zone ceases to exist.

What follows is that barricades deteriorate at an increased pace, zombies can once again spawn normally and loot will also spawn normally.

The same happens when players or zombies destroy barricades and cause breaches while players are inside.

As long as players are inside, the zone will persist but as soon as all players leaves the zone ceases to exist and what I explained in the paragraph above will occur.

This is to give people (either old occupants or the new occupants) to fix up the breaches without zombies and loot spawning inside their precious base.

Server Hopping

A glaring issue is that people can leave the server, join another server, get to where your base is and login to the server with the base.

You would assume people could use this to get inside but this is an issue I already thought of.

When a player enters a server on a location where a zone is appointed, they will be given a notification that lets them leave the server or let them spawn roughly 500 meters away from the zone.

Unless the player logged out from the server while they were already inside the zone for at least 2 minutes without being in combat (shock), in that case they will spawn within the zone as normal.

The Outcome (TL:DR)

People can build bases using already existing infrastructure by build barricades to close of entrances to houses or streets.

This creates a zone that keeps them save for as long as the barricades exist but the bigger the zone becomes the more zombies attack and the more dangerous it becomes.

A single person can only manage to maintain one house being barricaded, no streets or stuff like that.

It would be hard enough on him to get just the doors and windows boarded up while also patching it up.

The more people you have, the bigger your base and thus the zone can become. Appoint a few people to guard the place and let some others loot.

This might end up in a few trading outposts guarded by 10-15 people where people can come freely and trade stuff with each other.

Or maybe a big raid on a camp of bandits. Maybe a camp of 'heroes' that works as a base of operations to help out people.

The possibilities with this are endless and it's only possible because the standalone will have most buildings enterable.

If you read the entire thread, thanks. If you liked it, show your support.

If you read the entire thread and disliked it, tell me exactly why.

Edited September 28, 2012 by MasterZ

[birdman 108]

Age of EmpireZ?

Edited September 27, 2012 by thebirdolux

[GLRUBBERDUCK 19]

What about being able to make an electric fence using a generator and wire fencing

[Nasakenai 34]

Great ideas, enjoy a can of Boston's finest.

I'd like zombies to be attracted to the sounds of hammering together wood as well, so that you can easily be swamped if you try to do it yourself.

For a solo player maybe just boarding off a room of a house would be enough. Groups could defend while other players board up an entire house.

Barricaded windows and doors are iconic in zombie film/lore, it would be great to have them implemented in to the game.

[indominator 95]

interesting, but this banditry fragfest will keep bases always at a low profile if they are implemented, thats why caves, they can be pretty well hidden, the only bad thing about bases when they are implemented is that you can loggout and when you login they can a total wreck or captured by other players. Its a very tricky situation, and a very dangerous one, but so risky and i hope bases offer something more than just a cosmetic feel and pride of like owning your own house, if its just for that it could end up becoming where people make houses and then leave it alone forever and go make another one but the guy will make a nicer one cause he has not only the skills but the knowhow of the works, and you can find a server filled with little houses but they are all overrun with zombies. If there will not be much to the bases, then some people will not even make them, our tents are not safe from anyone why waste time placing and gearing them?

[MasterZ 90]

Age of EmpireZ?

That actually sounds like a lot of fun.

Great ideas, enjoy a can of Boston's finest.

I'd like zombies to be attracted to the sounds of hammering together wood as well, so that you can easily be swamped if you try to do it yourself.

For a solo player maybe just boarding off a room of a house would be enough. Groups could defend while other players board up an entire house.

Barricaded windows and doors are iconic in zombie film/lore, it would be great to have them implemented in to the game.

They really are, I actually for the idea from watching other zombie series and movies recently.

It made me really want something like this in the game.

interesting, but this banditry fragfest will keep bases always at a low profile if they are implemented, thats why caves, they can be pretty well hidden, the only bad thing about bases when they are implemented is that you can loggout and when you login they can a total wreck or captured by other players. Its a very tricky situation, and a very dangerous one, but so risky and i hope bases offer something more than just a cosmetic feel and pride of like owning your own house, if its just for that it could end up becoming where people make houses and then leave it alone forever and go make another one but the guy will make a nicer one cause he has not only the skills but the knowhow of the works, and you can find a server filled with little houses but they are all overrun with zombies. If there will not be much to the bases, then some people will not even make them, our tents are not safe from anyone why waste time placing and gearing them?

Yes, that is a legitimate concern, I share with you.

I assume for smaller bases it would be easy to go undetected for quite some time depending on it's location.

Bigger bases would be a lot more trouble to defend when people are not online however, so it might be a nice idea to invest in meeting some people from a different timezone that could help guard the base at different times.

Maybe clans can work out something by meeting up on the forums and working together in shifts or maybe there can be an ingame guild/clan function, something that people are already interested in, that will improve this.

[Hetstaine 10852]

4-12 hours is too short a time for deterioration, especially for people who solo or are together in the same time zone and only a small tight knit group. The deterioration would discourage the time spent it takes to make something 'decent'. If you are going to spend days and days or longer building something then the same mechanic would need to apply to how long it takes to fall apart by enviromental means.

Sewers systems would have to be blocked as well. Tunnel digging or fire would be the obvious way to infilitrate without wasting lives on caveman type frontal attacks.

All that being said i would stay as far as i possibly could away from any remnants of civilisation in any zed scenario and build a treehouse :)

[Duckimus Maximus 2]

Love the ideas, but as the above poster said the time is too short.

I'd say 72hrs with some sort of deterioration starting at 24 hours.

This is a great combination with the infection as well, as people will come in closer proximity to each other, and get sicker quicker.

I'd like to add a mechanic not related tot his but that itnerplays wellt hat the infection eventually turns you in to a zombie.

So imagine having built your base and you turned it in to a good resting post.

An infected guy walks in that wants a place to dump his stuff for the night, the next morning he is replaced by a zombie, and spreading the infection.

[MasterZ 90]

Yeah fair enough you too, I tweaked it a little bit in the original post.

To be completely fair it's more of a concept that Rocket can build upon or take inspiration from if he reads it.

I know he's kind of busy right now so I'd like the thread to stay alive for a couple of weeks if possible.

Does anyone else have any suggestions?

[googlebox 8]

GODAMMIT ROCKET ADD THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[MasterZ 90]

GODAMMIT ROCKET ADD THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Too be perfectly honest, and I did flesh out the idea kind of well, I'd rather he drew inspiration from it.

I'm making a lot of assumptions after all. I don't know how zombies will spawn, how loot will spawn, how he plans to balance the game and what not.

I'd like to see Rocket implant outside base building, or at least something more than just underground holes. This is one of many ideas that could make outside base building work and I'm sure Rocket can get a good idea from what I wrote down.

Also I think that building underground bases is a bit too advanced for just the average person to do, realistically speaking.

[Yliidjednas 0]

This idea was awesome!. Well written ( I read the whole thread and i liked it ).. I hope some of Rocket's workers will read this and give him the idea. You have my beans.

[Toilet 204]

I liked your zone idea to remedy ghosting. Of course shit could be balanced and tweaked, but overall great approach to an idea that has been beaten to death over the months. Enjoyed the read too. Well done.

[Brad_543 0]

Hello

Awesome awesome ideas. I say take all this but instead of bases on land make it underground (I believe this is what Rocket would like to see in stand alone).This is for many reasons e.g for small groups who still want a base, I personally would find it annoying having small to large areas of a city/town closed of and not being able to access the loot there, Server hopping.......(yes you did mention this but still your solution would not be effective) etc etc. Underground construction would eliminate almost all of these.

Honestly awesome job going to all this trouble, love it :)

[Michaelvoodoo25 3120]

Every base built should be destroyed as easily as it was built. Balancing of materials and tools could work either way. What I would fear is if people got the impression they were building Scaramangas' secret hideout base and then a guy with a crowbar turns up and boshed it down.

I can't picture above ground bases being any good anyway, a few grenades would level them. I could picture underground bases being more better due to being hid better but suffering the same risk.

[apache25 133]

Great ideas, enjoy a can of Boston's finest.

you mean heinz beans not bostons finest heinz beans is a real brand of beans i think its used in england and ireland

[hawc 63]

The biggest problem i see is people can't be online 24/7 so any kind of storage would not be safe. If you think about it it's very hard to implement the base building properly so it's not too safe but doesn't demand too much time online.

IMO people should have to register a clan/group then when building a base they would select a timeframe when the storage is accessible. Like 6-10 hours a day. Other times it's not accessible by anyone, not even the group.

I know it seems unrealistic but i just don't see how else you could do it. Either you would need a very big amount of people from different timezones(also Europe is only 1 hour appart by timezones so you would need US/AU players which would have latency problems) or just play an insane amount of time.

Edited September 30, 2012 by Hawc

[Toilet 204]

you mean heinz beans not bostons finest heinz beans is a real brand of beans i think its used in england and ireland

Good sir you forget New Zealand!

Edited September 30, 2012 by Toilet