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Warning! Unofficial server-stories...


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Greetings folks

I am a survivor that found this game 7 months ago. I really kicked myself for not seeing it earlier, tbh, but somehow I missed it.

Ive enjoyed my DayZ experiences tremendously, in general. And Im stoked about all the Work, some of you put into this game, and the wonderful mods being made. Great job, Guys. Modding is probably the best game Development, in the World atm. It makes for the best immersive gameplay, by far and creates great networking, in the process.

 

Ive tried regular DayZ servers, a few of the different maps out there, and have now been playing for 2 months on a new unofficial Epoch server. Met the admin setting it up, and had a great fun time, helping him and the server to build up a regular player-base. He made me a moderator, after a while. And all was well. Lots of glitches, bugs and other issues as you can imagine. Epoch is a real hard thing to make Work properly I hear. And as such, nothing out of the ordinary.

 

A server lives on the whims of the Admins. It rises and falls with them. As it should be. However, 2 more admins soon joined, and took over most of the daily running of it. And suddenly, large packs of AI started spawning on top of everyone, with little chance for us to survive it. Most of the traders were glitched, and didnt spawn the vehicles that players purchased, so they lost all their gold.

Many of the regulars stopped logging in, and even though I gave my feedback about the issues to the admins, they just asked me to shut up or go to another server, if I didnt like it. 

Clearly a change in their attitude and their motives. We was a few holding on to the server, hoping for some reasoning and change to happen, but Things kept screwiing up:  lots of unscheduled restarts, traders still didnt work, Plot poles were bugged, so Buildings kept falling apart, AI kept spawning in suddenly, on top of players, 3 Admins, and they only spend their time on adding AI, rather than servicing their player-base or fixing the bugs pertaining the base of the game. Mainly gold, Building and crafting. If those arent working, you might as well play regular DayZ...

 

The server is called:

BambiWorld UK Epoch Chernarus Server (IP:  37.187.77.74:2302)

Admins were:

shaun

(Admin) Jim

(Admin) Picto Wolf

 

I have come to the conclusions, that either that server is a trap for newbies, where they welcome you, and promise you a lot, and then they invite their Clan-mates from other servers in, to rape the Bambi´s. Which is why they dont much care about fixing the basic bugs. Since they know that people will leave, after being destroyed utterly, by their mates. Might be great fun for them, but for new guys trying to learn the ropes, its really a low blow, imo.

Or its just a few newbie idiot Admins, playing with their antfarm with a magnifying lens.

 

So my advice to new people reading this: If you want to learn the ropes in Epoch, I suggest using dedicated servers, and to not trust anyone. And should you use unofficial servers, dont trust the Admins. They arent there to help you.

 

So to shorten the post Down, I thought Id save some new people some anguish, by posting that server here. I bear no grudge, but neither do I think its acceptable for that Newbie-trap to exist, unhindered.

Hope you Guys find some good servers, out there, with REAL admins, willing to listen to feedback, and not taking it like a proper, adolescent  moron.

See ye all in Chernarus o/

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I'm sorry you had such a terrible time with your experience with that particular server. It may be true for several of the servers and admins out there, but it is by far true of all of us. Like you, I was late to the DayZ party, having only downloaded the game six or seven months ago. But, with the combined efforts of a few friends, and more importantly a solid server to start out on (thanks Maca and the CCG team) myself and my group have started our own public server.

 

While we don't cater to the "bambi" player, we don't shun them either. Everyone gets a fair starting load out, with the exception of the admins, and the regular group members who get slightly modified load outs. This gives everyone a fair shake at looting the map without getting spanked by zeds or AI. Our missions range in difficulty from solo style light weight missions, to heavy duty team based. If you want to go it alone, you won't be left out of the fray.

 

What should have been done, in your instance, is to bring the problems to the admins who were adding the content to the server, and suggest they tone it down some. If they didn't want to listen, or completely pushed your opinions away, then you should stay on the server to at least keep a watch on it and help push the "bambi" players somewhere safer. Be that a completely different server, or just a base you've built on the map where you can dole out some weapons and give a few tips and tricks before they head off into the wild of DayZ themselves.

 

I've joined servers that seem to be geared to the extreme veteran player, where there are AI units spawning in every nook and cranny, and zeds that aggro from 200 meters away and are nearly impossible to shake. Those servers are never fun for rookie players, and should be advertised as such. I do wish there was a way to sort by "difficulty" rating, but sadly theres not, and its up to the admins to adjust their servers display name to hopefully show what a new player should expect.

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Hey Saizyn

Thx for your reply. Yeah, I agree on it all.

For the avid DayZ Epoch Fans, Id be happy to share my stories and direct new players towards more clean pastures, with serious Admins, fighting to keep the game going. The new Arma 3: Epoch announcements might make it live even longer :-)

The SA might be too hardcore, for most players, once it launches fully, but I expect Ill play it, al the same. But I think the gameplay in the Mod will die hard, tbh. Even though its still glitchy at times. Something I hope our generous modders are working on, tirelessly :-)

 

I actually Roleplayed at first, on the mentioned server. I have a character that is called the Mad Friar of Zelenogorsk (named Wotan Rexus though). He is purging evil, and helping survivors in need. He fight s for the Lord!

I even build a church, in a grotto near the ship wreck, North of Berezino. Had a few buddies help filling it with Medicals and food/drink and Building the church. Good fun learning experience. Then a few kids logged in, and detroyed the church, while I was offline. They crashed my Osprey and kept trolling in side chat lol. But alright, lesson learned. Social experiment finished.

 

Then teamed up and made a wilderness camp. Build a large Bauhaus-style Cabin, with a safe and a plot pole. Lighting and everything. But the plot pole was bugged, and the cabin disappeared soon after. In bits and pieces lol.

We salvaged what we had left, and found a barn and set up in there, and thats when the 2 new admins joined, and things started going wrong. More clansfolks logged in, people started killing each other more, in Cold blood, after helping them. AI started spawning in, and they sometimes kept spawning in, so I ended up killing 12 of them, with 6 of them left. Ran out of ammo lol, and had to bail.

 

Many regular players, who spend days gathering stuff for their bases and collecting gold, lost most their stuff to either AI or glitched traders. SOme never came back, and the rest are left discontent and have frequent fallouts with the admins. I got kicked (I was a moderator), for saying that we just lost 80 gold on a heli-purchase....Again. Just told me to leave. Out of the blue.

 

So in essence, I have just spend 2 months helping the admins Building up a player base, helping out new players, making fun and involving gameplay on their server, and dragging at least 5 potential steady players to their server, and then got hit in the head with a mallet.

Let that be the lesson to the aspirering admins of the future (if not the present):

- Screw over your regulars, and its a slow server death happening

- Ignore general discontent at your own risk:  If people are bitching, its because they like your server, and want to stay there. Its not about not appreciating your Work. THey do, I assure you.

- When making corrections to the server, announce it clearly. And preferably in the Loading screen, if possible.

- Keep what you promise, to the population:  Dont make unscheduled restarts all the time. Dont say that there will be something happening for us all to enjoy, and then dont show up.

- Dont write "active admins" in the server details, if it aint so. Its fine if the admins arent active much, but if so, just say so.

- Reimburse, regulars at least, for their loss, due to server/mod issues, that isent a generally known bug, that hasent been fixed. I know its a bother for some admins, to be actually logged in, but this is what eventually will lead to regulars leaving.

- If you have a server, where there are Work being done, with many bugs or glitches, name your server *test*, so people dont expect a fully functioning server, upon login.

 

Anywho. For those it may concern, I hope this helps a Little. As a player of the game, and moderator, I can only thank you modders/admins for making this game so cool. Hopefully, when I find a new serious server, I can rekindle that love :-) 

 

NB. I did concurrently report these issues to the Admin(s). In a civil way. And showing a LOT of patience and understanding. They either took is as bitching and moaning or told me they had other priorities. Like server stability. Seems to me, they just made that worse, by adding AI, rather than sorting basic bugs. They had a 1 week server breakdown too, which is okay ofc. But the way they handled it was pretty bad, in ways of communicating the issues to their guests. And not reimbursing the players who lost all their stuff, do to server-side issues. 

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Not all servers are like this. I have had a similar experience where the admins/owner just kept upping the difficulty as the AI were not a challenge for them.... which was mostly true because they were flying around Apache choppers, driving tanks, using thermal scoped M107s and spawning in ammo for them. When they would die they would spawn in whatever kit they needed... this is how I found out about the thermal scope as I checked one of the bodies. 

None of the regular players had access to any of these things. There were a couple non-standard choppers and one armored troop transport we could get with enough gold, but that was about it. So the AI would pop up, kill you, and you would spend hours trying to get back to your body or base while running from constantly spawning AI patrols and vehicles. 

The server emptied out. There was just no way to even expand on a base much less get one started as you would put one wall up and then you would have to fight AI who would call in reinforcements. 

Look for a different server and get to know the people on it, that will help a lot.

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I sure hope there are better servers. Hard to imagine the amount of idiots exceeding that of adults, in my world, but maybe Im naive.

Like the Sainted Frankie on PC says:

"Youd think the apocalypse would have lowered the average intelligence. But the Zs seem to have raised it."

Too many players, admins and clans find enough joy, in the misery of others, and lack sufficient imagination to think of how it would all be, if simple honour were practiced. Not to mention openess to ideas and feedback.

And as I write this, my camp-mate is negotiating with others on the server to leave it. So I guess that shows, at least, that the power lies with the people, in the end...

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Heh, yeah. I guess the dedicated/nondedicated server-argument isent the point. Just had a notion that most asshat-admins wouldnt be as dedicated to their job, if they just made their own playground to experiment on. But might be mistaking.

And yeah, I have met idiot admins aplenty, in more games than this. They come in clusters atm, it seems. Lol.

And what can a community do, I hear you ask, to rid the lists of those crap-traps? Well, its easy: dont use those servers. Dont take no shit. Dont stay around, to try and talk sense into these morons. Simply leave it, and spam the IP and admin names on the forum. Weed out the bad apples, this way. If we dont, we get exactly the admins and servers we deserve, afaik.

And to answer why its not just that easy to simply change servers: I spend 2 months getting to know the crew there, and to find out who could be trusted, and who could not. So ofc I changed server, but it will be some time, before I can know for sure, if its a good place. That time is annoying to go through, every time an admin has a hissy fit. So the idea about just changing server, in itself, isent quite satisfactory to me. Itll work a few times, but eventually you get fed up with starting over and over, all the time.

But atm, Im looking for a new place. But most servers seem to be german based. The British/french ones seem to be only about hardcore PvP and asshattery, so far. I guess I better start learning German....

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