Some collaborative work would be cool, I've already jumped in and started working with the BIS tool set.
It's a hell of a trek if your used to something like UDK or Crytek though, if something gets going I'll be happy to offer up some documentation that isn't 3 years old.
The changes are alright, much more zombies now though. I've seen the servers hit 900+z's damn!
I made a video and will hopefully post It soon, someone earlier requested, but It's not really anything special only a short how I survive, I guess.
Got stuck (not in video) logged off right now but I am stuck by either a large town or 3 towns close by each other almost like a wall. There are nothing but zombies their unless your in a huge group no one is getting past those guys especially with this new spawn count and re spawn count... I feel they re spawn awfully fast maybe It's just me.
That sucks Zip.
I'm down to try to make some small objects, items, icons, things of this nature for a start, I wouldn't mind making a weapon I've been wanting to. Fart in the wind (lol) or not at least we are letting them know we have that much interest.
It sucks to spend money on this Arma2 and here around the corner comes Arma 3 ...
Myself and 3 other artists are most definitely willing to help out. We were going to contact him ourselves, but if we are getting a community thing going here that would be great.
Yeah, I wouldn't mind at all to contribute to something that kinda feels like Stalker with zombies. There need to be deadlines for whenever people says "dibs" on something, so they don't 'block' the model from being made.
Finally was able to find some weapons and explore without running out of ammo. Met a cool guy who I explored with a bit and he ran into me on top of a building randomly later after I became a bandit for killing some guy I thought killed someone else. We explored a bit more after that but 2 guys we ran into instantly killed us because of my bandit skin and I lost my M4A3. Definitely a better experience than running around for a few hours out of ammo and not even finding one bandage.
Didn't know the dev was an employee at BIS - that's pretty nifty to make this as a side project.
I'd personally be willing to work on any env assets. New enter-able houses, fences, crates, foliage - all that jazz. Would be swanky to see some nice new weapon models in there. The ones in ArmA II by default aren't exactly top quality.
Learning the BIS tools will be a bitch, but judging from some of the screenshots in those dev interviews, he used 3dsmax. So I'm guessing there's a plugin somewhere. That would definitely help.
Just shot an idea of creating an entire custom world for Day Z specifically. The idea being we include small narrative elements that play off the radio transmissions heard in various parts of the map.
Just shot an idea of creating an entire custom world for Day Z specifically. The idea being we include small narrative elements that play off the radio transmissions heard in various parts of the map.
Now that sounds rad. A bitch to manage I would think, but amazing nonetheless.
The limitations with arma in terms of modding are a little odd. Basically the island and all the buildings on it are a single, static environment that you can't change -- but you can make additional structures, vehicles, weapons, and characters to be placed as assets in the world. There are also a LOT of vehicles, weapons, and characters out there, some of very professional quality. Browse some existing mod communities to get an idea of what is and isnt being produced before you get too excited.
I'm familiar with Arma2's modding community and what is capable. I've seen plenty of custom made maps so I'm not afraid of what can or cannot be done. (Also, limitations and the like are no reason to not do something.) We'll cross that bridge when we get to it, if ever.
Sup/Jo: Take a look at some of the custom islands, like Namalsk. It's possible to replace the environments. That's pretty certain. Modifying Chernarus or the other tinier Island might not be possible though.
Also: The only person I've seen on the forum who I definitely know has actually gotten his hands dirty with Arma2 is Harry. If anyone has any questions about particulars, he'd be the most likely to know.
Just shot an idea of creating an entire custom world for Day Z specifically. The idea being we include small narrative elements that play off the radio transmissions heard in various parts of the map.
yea I like that idea too. Giving the new location name would be fun too.
getting on a server wasn't too bad tonight. Got a good few hours play in.
Spent 3/4 of that time running through woodland. Plundering the odd Deer stand and barn. Killed a few zeds. Didn't see a single person the whole time. Love this game!!! I love the orienteering factor the most atm. Studying the map and deciding on a route that passes some nice looking buildings, etc.
This might have been talked about already but here's something i'd like to see in future builds.
Weapons that need maintenance and cleaning. If they aren't they jam or break.
Zombies more spread out and more in the forest areas. If you know you aren't near buildings its pretty safe. If they added a random zombie here and there it would make woodland travel a bit less boring.
MELEE WEAPONS! To add realism it definitely needs to have melee weapons, also sneaking and being able to do silent kills would be awesome.
hardcore mode (no HUD, no 3rd person) should be standard across servers. This adds realism.
Man, me and a friend played for like 1-2 hours when we decide to enter a town to find some ammo. My friend finds a guy that appears to be suspicious because he ran from us then started stalking us. So we started shooting him, lucky for him the servers lagged like shit and he just blinked all over the place and survived. Unlucky for us, suddenly we had around 50 zombies chasing us and we both died.
So we decided to respawn and give it another shoot before going to bed. I got "unlucky" and spawned in the harbors in Elektrozavodsk. Since I had never been there and was new to the game (still am) I panicked and started running. I found a bandit sitting ontop of a roof sniping people of and decided I would give it a shoot to kill him, but when I got there no one was alive except one guy pointing a gun at me. Afraid as I was, I simply panicked and riddle hes poor body with bullets. After he's body hit the floor I hurried to hide inside to avoid being killed. To my big surprise the floors were filled with dead bandits. Obviously a war had just taken place in here and I had shoot the only survivor.
So at the moment I have in my possession an Alice bag, M16 and an AK47. Fuck this game has my blood pumping. I don't even dare to login again since I'm pretty much stuck in a firehouse with valuable equipment that I stole from the dead. And yes I shoot anyone who approached the building, so incase I shoot someone from PC. Sorry, but don't approach a mad men who just struck gold.
*Tonights edit : Thankfully I just found a compass. Had to kill 2 Z-Boys in the process and work my way up to some structures with flares, but i got away with just cuts and bruises....now if I could only find a Winchester, i'd be all set for the moment.
So at the moment I have in my possession an Alice bag, M16 and an AK47. Fuck this game has my blood pumping. I don't even dare to login again since I'm pretty much stuck in a firehouse with valuable equipment that I stole from the dead. And yes I shoot anyone who approached the building, so incase I shoot someone from PC. Sorry, but don't approach a mad men who just struck gold.
If you log in a different server those bandits won't be there so you'll be safe. I doubt they'd return there after such a big fight either.
@Adam, on the subject of PC contributing to the creation of a new map, I think that would be amazing. The map right now let's the mod down a bit in my opinion and that's something we could really improve. Depending on where it would be set at we could provide a lot more unique landmarks, diversify the towns, and really improve the exploration.
Seems to be huge issues ever since their new update, sites down and everything, hope this is good news in the end.
I really dislike the forced re spawn I was in a very safe area... away from bandits anyway with my precious gear. Instead I was at starting zone but in an area SURROUNDED by nothing but water and since theirs a bug when going into water, guess what happen... YUP I lost all my items and couldn't recover them.
Now since then I've died 3 times, 1 lack of ammo, 2 a bandit, 3 too many zombies for one guy to take out.
Zip, yea I also do that once I see someone's name and they are camping, let's say a spawn point but I managed to get gear, I'm a ghost. I'm not making It easy for them.
New map zones would be great even though I still haven't scratched the surface of this one just yet.
The website being down and the servers being dicks doesn't have anything to do with the update I believe. The mod has grown by 50,000 players over the last week so everything is just getting swamped. Two days ago I never had trouble getting into a server but it takes like an hour just to get past the Waiting for Server Response screen now.
I've been working with ArmA 2 as well - very nice to see it get all this (overdue) attention and I'd love to help in a Polycount collaboration.
The pipeline isn't complex at all: Oxygen2 (the model editor) supports .3ds and .obj import and there is a 3dsmax toolbox that helps. Rigging (or lack of) is the only really frustrating part: there's no way to import weights so it's done through vertex painting.
Maps (islands) I haven't dabbled in yet, but the general process is to import a heightmap, create a satellite texture (applied at far distances), and lay out detail textures and objects. An ArmA specific consideration here is that you're very limited in heightmap resolution, in balancing the overall size of the map against performance. For example, Chernarus at 15x15 km and a 2048x2048 heightmap would have a cell size of about 7.3 m.
McGreed, if by isolated environments you mean buildings and similar objects, yes - these are all their own 3D models and instanced in the island (island generally refers to the landmass, map often refers to a mission or otherwise landmass). They can also be placed individually in the mission, although too many cause performance issues. All the dynamic objects in DayZ (loot, vehicles, wrecks) are mission placed. Landmass modification is not possible without going back into the source files and repackaging it (thus no editing of Chenarus or Utes)
Generally - there are limitations, but as always, it's possible to work around them. Having a solid art base and expanding the modding community will do wonders for the ArmA series. Even with ArmA 3 just around the corner, these assets most likely will be able to be ported over relatively easily (many ArmA 2 mods are ported from ArmA 1 and even OFP) and the playerbase is such as that mods will be needed to breathe life into the game.
Mother fucker. I finally got on a server and did some scavenging in Elektro. I found an Alice Pack, a shit ton of makarov ammo, quite a chunk of meds and like 8 cans of food. Then I'm fucking climbing a ladder onto a building and just fall off when I get to the top and die. Tried to disconnect so it didn't save but I'm not sure if it worked yet.
EDIT: Got onto a new server. It put me back like 20 minutes before I found any of that shit. Mother fucking ladders!
Like Contrails, i've also being working with the Arma modding tools, and got some tips from harry - particularly in the area of material setups, RVMATS etc - he actually has a guide on his website about those.
My experience only really lies with O2 right now, but i have been dabbling with Visitor and the world creation side of things.
As for creating worlds, we'd have alot of control, however there are two restrictions, one of which isn't present in A3.
That being you global lighting on terrain, and difficulty creating concave terrain, so you can't really make caves. But someone has managed to create some small cave systems on a custom map recently, i forget the name of the map. So caves are hard to do, but not impossible. And the global lighting affects this, so if it's day outside, even if there is no light source in the cave, the cave will be lit as if the sun were shining right there.
I think to create a world, specifically for dayz, would be amazing, and you can really make some incredible, and large maps.
CLAfghan is a good example of large, but details map.
I hope so. What do we need to do to make that happen? I'm willing to donate to the cause.
Little rant: I just found out over at the DayZ forums that when you are off the game your thirst and hunger carry on going down. Everytime I start each day I need to drink and eat. So you get punished for not playing. I thought it was a bug. What a silly idea!!...
I mean making it as realistic as possible is great but making so people have to be on all day everyday is a bit much.
I keep hearing about all these crazy scenarios that people are running into and how intense the game is. I'm not sure if I've just had a bad start or if this game is more fun playing with someone you know or what.
Is anyone else finding this game to play more like a hiking sim with an occasional creature/zombie?
I spent 3 hours doing basically nothing but running around in the mountains looking for something. I'm wondering how much not being familiar with the maps is hurting me, or if I was just on a bad server. Also it's rather hilarious trying to figure out the controls at night when you can't see anything.
Features I would like to see is the ability to create barricades, so you can make proper camps, or just to make a better last-stand.
For example being able to hammer a couple of planks on the open door, maybe have stages so first one you only get a couple on the top, and next stage you cover the bottom.
The good: The zombies needs to tear down those before they can get in, or need to crawl.
The bad: The hammer sound of you putting up the planks will attract zombies/people. You will need to find and carry hammer/nails/planks.
At the moment, as I understand it, it might not be feasible because of the zombies collision boxes isn't working optimal, but maybe later.
#Contrails/kaptainkernals:
So, it's possible to create buildings and such, but not with something like cellars, parking garages, bunkers and such, since it needs to modify the ground, which means the whole map?
Yeah. If you chose to run about the countryside then your not going to have may encounters. Either find the map ingame of go to the wiki and have a look at that map. I'm really enjoying orienteering and plotting a route to check out interesting looking buildings and things. Once I get a good amount of gear i'll probably start thinking about going into the larger towns, teaming up with people or Bandit hunting.
Side note: Rocket (game creator) is running a poll over at DayZ asking "Poll: Should we scrap Bandit models?"
I voted YES. They should be scrapped. In a real zombie apoc Bandits wouldn't magically wear different clothing. I don't play as a bandit but I find it odd that their clothing changes because of the descisions they've made.
But, should there be an alternative way to distinguish a bandit?
This is the map with the "cave" system. It's basically just a cave created using rock meshes, but as you see, it's not actually darker inside than outside.
The actual terrain can't have holes cut into it, for cellars, and bunkers and the such. There are ways to fake of course, but then it required advanced planning, and a method like the above.
I believe in Arma 3, the new terrain system, will allow cutting holes into terrain, and concave terrain, i don't know for sure, but i heard / read it somewhere. I'm also hoping we get visitor 4 with Arma 3 - as that will make terrain creation a fair bit easier.
Also, regarding the zombies and them moving through objects. That unfortunately isn't a collisionbox issue, it's a standard behaviour of Arma 2, and it's AI pathfinding system. Previous zombie mods had the same issue, but much much worse, dayz handles it pretty well, i've barely noticed it in fact.
Basically, its to stop AI from getting stuck, of course, as a result, collisions with objects are then ignored, this is especially prevalent as an AI zombie has to get within contact of the played in order to do it's core action of attack.
I agree get rid of bandit models. Dicks who always play bandit will have a normal skin when they start that character and I always get fucking killed by them. That way if you ask Friendly and they don't answer then you can kill them and not worry about becoming a bandit yourself which also sucks because then people will kill you on sight.
Maybe have a reputation stat, so there more bad you are, the more the word goes around about you, so when you meet the person, you will suddenly get a "reconized" message, but only if you are close enough to see his face. The badder the person, the further away the message triggers.
Mother fucker. I finally got on a server and did some scavenging in Elektro. I found an Alice Pack, a shit ton of makarov ammo, quite a chunk of meds and like 8 cans of food. Then I'm fucking climbing a ladder onto a building and just fall off when I get to the top and die. Tried to disconnect so it didn't save but I'm not sure if it worked yet.
EDIT: Got onto a new server. It put me back like 20 minutes before I found any of that shit. Mother fucking ladders!
You need to switch to a flare or have nothing in your hands to climb a ladder, but don't do what i did. I thought I was putting the Mak in my bag, climbed a deer stand, came back down and went into my bag to see my mak wasnt there.
I had accidently dropped my only weapon in the grass along with the mags.
I found the mags but the gun was gone.....it wasnt long before I was zed food.
As for the lack of encounters...all the action and loot is in the cities, small towns and farms. The bigger the prize the more danger. Use the woods to get somewhere, but you definitely need to read that location tag in the first seconds of the loading. The compass has proven to be more valuable than a weapon in the woods.
@Stinger88 You won't actually die from starvation/dehydration if you miss playing for a while, so it's not so bad.
Scrapping bandit models will turn this mod into Deathmatch with zombie extras. Certainly will for me, currently I never open fire on survivors even take warning shots from them but if there's no indicator, then yeah I'll be killing everything that I can preemptively.
I've spent all my rounds, had a good run, 89 zeds and 1 bandit, I've been trying to get in the small villages the last couple of days and every time had to run for it, without finding any ammo I can use.
I agree with firestarter - KEEP the bandit skins. If there are no bandit skins I will kill every single person on-sight if I don't know them. I don't like that. Blabber on about "in real life, blah blah" - no, this is a game. There's no such thing as trust in a game. You can't properly communicate, you can't see body language - the things that often let you know if a person is pulling your leg. Without true interaction, there needs to be a way to differentiate "them" from "us".
OK, its not real life and its never going to be. But its a game that trying to be as close to real life as possible. And I think Bandit skins are a really silly idea. Currently if I kill some one my clothing changes.....How is that anything like real life?
There must be a better, more thought out way, so that players have to interact or try and weigh up players they encounter.
Maybe it could go down the "Insane killer" route. Players with low humanity could start to show signs of insanity. Random garbled speech, grunts and physical ticks that the character models produce but the players have no control over.
paněl says that the developer is actually accommodating DayZ in ArmA II's next update.
"We're more than happy to assist DayZ in any suitable way and considering the mod's popularity we are committed to do some related work in the next Arma 2 update (1.61)."
Meaning, they'll help, with providing certain features, fixing certain existing features etc. Nothing new, Bistudio has often accommodated modders.
So basically, bistudio will help the Dayz dev with certain core game features, not include the mod in an update, thats just absurd.
i think they should go down the KOTOR route and have their face change based on light / dark actions. The more you kill the more scarred and grey your face becomes. Could be gradual and use the humanity points.
How about the more you Ransack a dead person whom YOU killed or was in the vicinity during the killing will make you look more and more like a bandit?
On the other hand, if you scavenge dead bodies which didn't die when you were around, you look more like a 'simpleton', just drap clothing and slouched posing.
Killing only zombies or trading alot without human kills vs. ration of scavenging should make you look more like Indian Jones or something.
I don't think pulling something like that off in ARMA2 is going to be an easy task.
I wouldn't mind something like skins being equitable items you need to find. If you shoot without the bandit skin on you are identifiable, maybe even automatically broadcasting when you are shot by another player if you had ran crosshairs over them revealing their name. I know some servers will disable names and 3rd person so it might also work as an optional choice.
the creator mentioned that current Bandit populations are around 10% which is higher than real life already. Since you can't trick the player into feeling empathy or being horrified by killing another human, the bandit skin may be the best solution we can get.
Maybe they could also add loot that zombies might have on them. Weapons, not so much, but maybe a can of Pepsi, or a much needed clip of ammo. Would at least give a little reason to go for an easy Z kill for a can of beans, than go after a harder target like a PC.
Maybe they could also add loot that zombies might have on them. Weapons, not so much, but maybe a can of Pepsi, or a much needed clip of ammo. Would at least give a little reason to go for an easy Z kill for a can of beans, than go after a harder target like a PC.
That's already implemented. Not every zombie has stuff on them though, but about every tenth zombie has food I'd say. Military zombies tend to have ammo (plus NVG very rarely) and police zombies tend to have .45 rounds.
Maybe they could also add loot that zombies might have on them. Weapons, not so much, but maybe a can of Pepsi, or a much needed clip of ammo. Would at least give a little reason to go for an easy Z kill for a can of beans, than go after a harder target like a PC.
Then I think they should also have zombie near-death settings, so you have to be sure that the zombie is actually ACTUALLY dead.
If a zombie gets something like 95-99% damage, it falls over and looks dead, but have small twitchs which is only noticable when close, and if someone gets up close to him, he will grapple your legs or something, bite your ankle, whatever.
So it will give a bit of "should I check this body for stuff? He might still be alive and I might need to use ammo on him. But I need stuff..."
So I was going ahead and coming up with locations which can used for the map, just for the fun of it, in case we are going to make stuff for it:
Kindergarten
Fire station
Police station
School
University
Water plant
Power plant/Nuclear plant
Transformer farm/Power station
Office building, one floor
Business building, many floors
Car dealer
Car repair shop
Gas station
Shopping center
Retirement home
Park
Playground
Animal Kennel
Zoo
Amusement park
Ruins (ancient, like castles)
Bridges
TV/Radio Station
Hospital
Mortuary
Graveyard
Church
Boathouse
Harbour
Ferry/Cruse-liner
Airfield
Airport
Downed plane
Military base
Camping site
Water processing plant
Factory
Construction site
Pools/Gym
Shops
Recycle plant/Garbage site
Lumber mill/site
Oil rig
Barn
Farm
Train station
Bus station
Restaurant/Fastfood
Replies
It's a hell of a trek if your used to something like UDK or Crytek though, if something gets going I'll be happy to offer up some documentation that isn't 3 years old.
I made a video and will hopefully post It soon, someone earlier requested, but It's not really anything special only a short how I survive, I guess.
Got stuck (not in video) logged off right now but I am stuck by either a large town or 3 towns close by each other almost like a wall. There are nothing but zombies their unless your in a huge group no one is getting past those guys especially with this new spawn count and re spawn count... I feel they re spawn awfully fast maybe It's just me.
That sucks Zip.
I'm down to try to make some small objects, items, icons, things of this nature for a start, I wouldn't mind making a weapon I've been wanting to. Fart in the wind (lol) or not at least we are letting them know we have that much interest.
It sucks to spend money on this Arma2 and here around the corner comes Arma 3 ...
I'd personally be willing to work on any env assets. New enter-able houses, fences, crates, foliage - all that jazz. Would be swanky to see some nice new weapon models in there. The ones in ArmA II by default aren't exactly top quality.
Learning the BIS tools will be a bitch, but judging from some of the screenshots in those dev interviews, he used 3dsmax. So I'm guessing there's a plugin somewhere. That would definitely help.
Now that sounds rad. A bitch to manage I would think, but amazing nonetheless.
Arma3 on the other hand...
Here's a completely custom island:
[ame="
yea I like that idea too. Giving the new location name would be fun too.
Spent 3/4 of that time running through woodland. Plundering the odd Deer stand and barn. Killed a few zeds. Didn't see a single person the whole time. Love this game!!! I love the orienteering factor the most atm. Studying the map and deciding on a route that passes some nice looking buildings, etc.
This might have been talked about already but here's something i'd like to see in future builds.
Weapons that need maintenance and cleaning. If they aren't they jam or break.
Zombies more spread out and more in the forest areas. If you know you aren't near buildings its pretty safe. If they added a random zombie here and there it would make woodland travel a bit less boring.
MELEE WEAPONS! To add realism it definitely needs to have melee weapons, also sneaking and being able to do silent kills would be awesome.
hardcore mode (no HUD, no 3rd person) should be standard across servers. This adds realism.
So we decided to respawn and give it another shoot before going to bed. I got "unlucky" and spawned in the harbors in Elektrozavodsk. Since I had never been there and was new to the game (still am) I panicked and started running. I found a bandit sitting ontop of a roof sniping people of and decided I would give it a shoot to kill him, but when I got there no one was alive except one guy pointing a gun at me. Afraid as I was, I simply panicked and riddle hes poor body with bullets. After he's body hit the floor I hurried to hide inside to avoid being killed. To my big surprise the floors were filled with dead bandits. Obviously a war had just taken place in here and I had shoot the only survivor.
So at the moment I have in my possession an Alice bag, M16 and an AK47. Fuck this game has my blood pumping. I don't even dare to login again since I'm pretty much stuck in a firehouse with valuable equipment that I stole from the dead. And yes I shoot anyone who approached the building, so incase I shoot someone from PC. Sorry, but don't approach a mad men who just struck gold.
One thing I've started to do is check the world clock to help find the daylight servers.
http://www.worldtimezone.com/index24.php
*Tonights edit : Thankfully I just found a compass. Had to kill 2 Z-Boys in the process and work my way up to some structures with flares, but i got away with just cuts and bruises....now if I could only find a Winchester, i'd be all set for the moment.
If you log in a different server those bandits won't be there so you'll be safe. I doubt they'd return there after such a big fight either.
@Adam, on the subject of PC contributing to the creation of a new map, I think that would be amazing. The map right now let's the mod down a bit in my opinion and that's something we could really improve. Depending on where it would be set at we could provide a lot more unique landmarks, diversify the towns, and really improve the exploration.
I really dislike the forced re spawn I was in a very safe area... away from bandits anyway with my precious gear. Instead I was at starting zone but in an area SURROUNDED by nothing but water and since theirs a bug when going into water, guess what happen... YUP I lost all my items and couldn't recover them.
Now since then I've died 3 times, 1 lack of ammo, 2 a bandit, 3 too many zombies for one guy to take out.
Zip, yea I also do that once I see someone's name and they are camping, let's say a spawn point but I managed to get gear, I'm a ghost. I'm not making It easy for them.
New map zones would be great even though I still haven't scratched the surface of this one just yet.
The pipeline isn't complex at all: Oxygen2 (the model editor) supports .3ds and .obj import and there is a 3dsmax toolbox that helps. Rigging (or lack of) is the only really frustrating part: there's no way to import weights so it's done through vertex painting.
Maps (islands) I haven't dabbled in yet, but the general process is to import a heightmap, create a satellite texture (applied at far distances), and lay out detail textures and objects. An ArmA specific consideration here is that you're very limited in heightmap resolution, in balancing the overall size of the map against performance. For example, Chernarus at 15x15 km and a 2048x2048 heightmap would have a cell size of about 7.3 m.
McGreed, if by isolated environments you mean buildings and similar objects, yes - these are all their own 3D models and instanced in the island (island generally refers to the landmass, map often refers to a mission or otherwise landmass). They can also be placed individually in the mission, although too many cause performance issues. All the dynamic objects in DayZ (loot, vehicles, wrecks) are mission placed. Landmass modification is not possible without going back into the source files and repackaging it (thus no editing of Chenarus or Utes)
Generally - there are limitations, but as always, it's possible to work around them. Having a solid art base and expanding the modding community will do wonders for the ArmA series. Even with ArmA 3 just around the corner, these assets most likely will be able to be ported over relatively easily (many ArmA 2 mods are ported from ArmA 1 and even OFP) and the playerbase is such as that mods will be needed to breathe life into the game.
EDIT: Got onto a new server. It put me back like 20 minutes before I found any of that shit. Mother fucking ladders!
material findings
My experience only really lies with O2 right now, but i have been dabbling with Visitor and the world creation side of things.
As for creating worlds, we'd have alot of control, however there are two restrictions, one of which isn't present in A3.
That being you global lighting on terrain, and difficulty creating concave terrain, so you can't really make caves. But someone has managed to create some small cave systems on a custom map recently, i forget the name of the map. So caves are hard to do, but not impossible. And the global lighting affects this, so if it's day outside, even if there is no light source in the cave, the cave will be lit as if the sun were shining right there.
I think to create a world, specifically for dayz, would be amazing, and you can really make some incredible, and large maps.
CLAfghan is a good example of large, but details map.
Namalsk is also great, as is lingor etc.
I hope so. What do we need to do to make that happen? I'm willing to donate to the cause.
Little rant: I just found out over at the DayZ forums that when you are off the game your thirst and hunger carry on going down. Everytime I start each day I need to drink and eat. So you get punished for not playing. I thought it was a bug. What a silly idea!!...
I mean making it as realistic as possible is great but making so people have to be on all day everyday is a bit much.
Is anyone else finding this game to play more like a hiking sim with an occasional creature/zombie?
I spent 3 hours doing basically nothing but running around in the mountains looking for something. I'm wondering how much not being familiar with the maps is hurting me, or if I was just on a bad server. Also it's rather hilarious trying to figure out the controls at night when you can't see anything.
For example being able to hammer a couple of planks on the open door, maybe have stages so first one you only get a couple on the top, and next stage you cover the bottom.
The good: The zombies needs to tear down those before they can get in, or need to crawl.
The bad: The hammer sound of you putting up the planks will attract zombies/people. You will need to find and carry hammer/nails/planks.
At the moment, as I understand it, it might not be feasible because of the zombies collision boxes isn't working optimal, but maybe later.
#Contrails/kaptainkernals:
So, it's possible to create buildings and such, but not with something like cellars, parking garages, bunkers and such, since it needs to modify the ground, which means the whole map?
Yeah. If you chose to run about the countryside then your not going to have may encounters. Either find the map ingame of go to the wiki and have a look at that map. I'm really enjoying orienteering and plotting a route to check out interesting looking buildings and things. Once I get a good amount of gear i'll probably start thinking about going into the larger towns, teaming up with people or Bandit hunting.
Side note: Rocket (game creator) is running a poll over at DayZ asking "Poll: Should we scrap Bandit models?"
http://www.dayzmod.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=720
I voted YES. They should be scrapped. In a real zombie apoc Bandits wouldn't magically wear different clothing. I don't play as a bandit but I find it odd that their clothing changes because of the descisions they've made.
But, should there be an alternative way to distinguish a bandit?
What do you guys think?
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This is the map with the "cave" system. It's basically just a cave created using rock meshes, but as you see, it's not actually darker inside than outside.
The actual terrain can't have holes cut into it, for cellars, and bunkers and the such. There are ways to fake of course, but then it required advanced planning, and a method like the above.
I believe in Arma 3, the new terrain system, will allow cutting holes into terrain, and concave terrain, i don't know for sure, but i heard / read it somewhere. I'm also hoping we get visitor 4 with Arma 3 - as that will make terrain creation a fair bit easier.
Also, regarding the zombies and them moving through objects. That unfortunately isn't a collisionbox issue, it's a standard behaviour of Arma 2, and it's AI pathfinding system. Previous zombie mods had the same issue, but much much worse, dayz handles it pretty well, i've barely noticed it in fact.
Basically, its to stop AI from getting stuck, of course, as a result, collisions with objects are then ignored, this is especially prevalent as an AI zombie has to get within contact of the played in order to do it's core action of attack.
You need to switch to a flare or have nothing in your hands to climb a ladder, but don't do what i did. I thought I was putting the Mak in my bag, climbed a deer stand, came back down and went into my bag to see my mak wasnt there.
I had accidently dropped my only weapon in the grass along with the mags.
I found the mags but the gun was gone.....it wasnt long before I was zed food.
As for the lack of encounters...all the action and loot is in the cities, small towns and farms. The bigger the prize the more danger. Use the woods to get somewhere, but you definitely need to read that location tag in the first seconds of the loading. The compass has proven to be more valuable than a weapon in the woods.
Scrapping bandit models will turn this mod into Deathmatch with zombie extras. Certainly will for me, currently I never open fire on survivors even take warning shots from them but if there's no indicator, then yeah I'll be killing everything that I can preemptively.
I've spent all my rounds, had a good run, 89 zeds and 1 bandit, I've been trying to get in the small villages the last couple of days and every time had to run for it, without finding any ammo I can use.
http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=16786
im glad I wait a bit longer
There must be a better, more thought out way, so that players have to interact or try and weigh up players they encounter.
Maybe it could go down the "Insane killer" route. Players with low humanity could start to show signs of insanity. Random garbled speech, grunts and physical ticks that the character models produce but the players have no control over.
Sorry, but it's not going to be a part of Arma 2, that was a massive misquote, and misread on the author of that article.
http://kotaku.com/5910279/pc-zombie-darling-causes-sale-explosion-arma-devs-happy-to-help
Key points:
Meaning, they'll help, with providing certain features, fixing certain existing features etc. Nothing new, Bistudio has often accommodated modders.
So basically, bistudio will help the Dayz dev with certain core game features, not include the mod in an update, thats just absurd.
On the other hand, if you scavenge dead bodies which didn't die when you were around, you look more like a 'simpleton', just drap clothing and slouched posing.
Killing only zombies or trading alot without human kills vs. ration of scavenging should make you look more like Indian Jones or something.
I don't think pulling something like that off in ARMA2 is going to be an easy task.
That's already implemented. Not every zombie has stuff on them though, but about every tenth zombie has food I'd say. Military zombies tend to have ammo (plus NVG very rarely) and police zombies tend to have .45 rounds.
Then I think they should also have zombie near-death settings, so you have to be sure that the zombie is actually ACTUALLY dead.
If a zombie gets something like 95-99% damage, it falls over and looks dead, but have small twitchs which is only noticable when close, and if someone gets up close to him, he will grapple your legs or something, bite your ankle, whatever.
So it will give a bit of "should I check this body for stuff? He might still be alive and I might need to use ammo on him. But I need stuff..."
Kindergarten
Fire station
Police station
School
University
Water plant
Power plant/Nuclear plant
Transformer farm/Power station
Office building, one floor
Business building, many floors
Car dealer
Car repair shop
Gas station
Shopping center
Retirement home
Park
Playground
Animal Kennel
Zoo
Amusement park
Ruins (ancient, like castles)
Bridges
TV/Radio Station
Hospital
Mortuary
Graveyard
Church
Boathouse
Harbour
Ferry/Cruse-liner
Airfield
Airport
Downed plane
Military base
Camping site
Water processing plant
Factory
Construction site
Pools/Gym
Shops
Recycle plant/Garbage site
Lumber mill/site
Oil rig
Barn
Farm
Train station
Bus station
Restaurant/Fastfood