Core gameplay, private servers

[wangtangnoodle]

From talking to quite a few Arma 2 DayZ Epoch players & server owners now, there's already massive intent to mod the living shit out of the upcoming A3 Epoch mod when and if the server files are released. I mod the heck out of some servers just for personal benefit. There's plenty of other folk who do too, for public use. On the other hand I can understand how creators of a mod or game have their own vision and deep down would love to see the majority of private servers keeping to the vision created back at the roots.

 

A2 DayZ Epoch quickly evolved from say, 1.0 onwards into a modding paradise with backs being turned on the core features. Some people want the vanilla experience of a game / mod, most want a pick up & play fragfest. I remember reading dismayed responses from some of the dev team towards certain scripts that masses of owners were adding to their servers (safe zones, generous loadouts, over-militarization etc). Stuff that has become the norm. One example, I see players joining servers without safezones and then leaving instantly. Whilst having impressive features, A2DE has been soiled for probably around a year, in terms of the mod's vision.

 

What are the devs' thoughts on things like this happening again? Kind of interested.

 

There's a lot of impatient players on A2 DayZ Epoch and a lot of do-good server owners who will together create a simplified experience and lower the amount of time to reach "end game". I see players testing out A3 Epoch on streams, or chatting about what they've seen. Some are liking the extra elements that can affect your player, some love the enemies, some are liking the change of map combined with the fact it's Epoch. Already though I'm sensing the need to "add extra this" or "have these all over the map" etc when it's out. I can foresee the exact same thing happening with A3 as it did with A2 and there being very little, if any, servers out there with the "vanilla experience" of the mod.

 

It'd be cool I think to be able to somehow grant some kind of official status to the private servers who don't dilute the experience, but are creating and adding features that could then be implemented in future patches. Wouldn't stop people modding it badly, but when I hear the term DayZ Epoch now I think "militarization, live off trading, no scavenging, easy street, safe zones". It'd be nice to think of Arma 3 Epoch after a year and still think of "Open world survival mod set in the year 2035, Just two years after the mass extinction of billions of people. Those that remain are left with remnants of a once technological society. Try to survive, build, or explore your way through the harsh dynamic environment."

 

Cheers, good luck with the mod.

[T1NY]

I love it how it is. If groups worked again and it had a few more vehicles/guns and no bugs.....i would love it. The traders are perfect. Building is great (but the limit sucks atm)

[Shaifa]

I´ve seen the overly modded servers and agree that they suck, but what I´ve loved are the safezones. Personally I hate the Bandit attitude that seems to have taken control of everyone. I don´t understand why everyone would only think of themselves when the human race is about to go extinct. Few "bad apples" belong to human traits, but everyone?

[Mercules]

Yeah, I have seen a lot of servers that have been advertised as a "Hard Experience" but you start with a solid rifle, silenced pistol, backpack, hatchet, matches, map, toolbox, and food/water. The hardness comes into play with AI spawning in less than 300m from you and immediately agroing on you. Um... what? Just leave all the gear off, start me off without a backpack even, fewer vehicles, and such. On a vanilla Epoch server I can typically have a solid gun, ATV/Mozzie, larger backpack, and all the survival things I need in a couple hours of play. That is more rewarding to me. 

[scottybhoy85]

Couldn't agree more mercules.

I hope they limit what server owners are able to change as it just turns into battlefield when you spawn fully geared. You have nothing to lose.

[TheVampire]

When I first started playing Epoch back in 1.0.1.5 or something, there was hardly any modding going on. People had been playing it mostly vanilla to that point. There were servers with Sarge AI on them, but that was about it. The first two mods that seemed really popular was Trader Safezones, and Missions. Safezones prevented you from experiencing getting ganked at the trader city, and missions gave players something to do for an endgame, or as a boost to reaching the endgame (if they could "win" the mission).

 

I think Epoch started out with people playing it as-is because they enjoyed the features it had, and then began modding it later on to try to change the experience, or add more end game content. Once you've made 5 different bases on vanilla epoch, things start to get boring. You don't really need to work for any gear anymore (as long as you can store it) and the grind gets boring. It's why some of the best videogames out there all have mods for them. You play through them the fifth time and want something to spice it up, so you install a mod.

 

Where things have gone wrong is instead of "appreciating" a mod for making things a little easier, a lot of the Epoch playerbase has became accustomed to having them, and can't play without them. I've played with clan mates before who joined a server, it had no SelfBB, Safezones, and some other things and they refused to play it. (You can witness it firsthand when a new server owner asks why he has no safezones, because they assumed it was in default epoch)

 

Something I wish the devs would do is actually limit storage space. What tends to make the endgame in Epoch is having a hundred safes full to the brim with all the gear and cash you would ever need for the rest of your time on the server. If the devs decided to do something like only allowing vehicles to have storage, or other really rare placeables with very small storage, it would expand the endgame play. If they figure out a way to make it so you can never have enough of anything, (while not just making survival ridiculously hard to do it) people will keep playing for much longer. Imagine trying to have a base with enough vehicles to hold all your gear, with something like DayZ's Stash's as the only other storage method.

 

As for how I plan to mod A3 Epoch, it's not with ease-of-use mods, it'll be immersion/time-consumption/mystique mods. Things such as ambient audio, in depth missions, weather, radioactive zones, communication, textures, weapons, etc.

 

Making things easier to do this early in the game will just ruin the long term playability of the mod.

[Mercules]

Where things have gone wrong is instead of "appreciating" a mod for making things a little easier, a lot of the Epoch playerbase has became accustomed to having them, and can't play without them. I've played with clan mates before who joined a server, it had no SelfBB, Safezones, and some other things and they refused to play it. (You can witness it firsthand when a new server owner asks why he has no safezones, because they assumed it was in default epoch)

It's even worse than that. There are people who have never played Epoch who associate things that are added in after the fact with it. I see quotes on other mod and the DayZ SA forum all the time like, "This isn't Epoch. We don't have Safe Zones here." and I need to remind them that vanilla Epoch doesn't have any of those things either.

 

 

Something I wish the devs would do is actually limit storage space. What tends to make the endgame in Epoch is having a hundred safes full to the brim with all the gear and cash you would ever need for the rest of your time on the server. If the devs decided to do something like only allowing vehicles to have storage, or other really rare placeables with very small storage, it would expand the endgame play. If they figure out a way to make it so you can never have enough of anything, (while not just making survival ridiculously hard to do it) people will keep playing for much longer. Imagine trying to have a base with enough vehicles to hold all your gear, with something like DayZ's Stash's as the only other storage method.

Yes, I have considered starting up an ARMA II Epoch server and simply removing safes. Everything else has the possibility of being broken into except lockboxes and those are rare and hard to find. Then I wouldn't restock the vendors I would simply let the players selling things restock the vendors so not everyone runs around with the best items in the game. No missions, no starter kits, no safe zones. Instead I'll probably just wait for ARMA III Epoch and play the vanilla of that. :)

[hobobandit]

I don't see any problem with modding when it only means loading additional content mods besides the official epoch mod, ie. maps, weapons and vehicles + simple server customizations with the provided configuration files. Adding more stuff to loot, to traders and to vehicle spawns wouldn't affect the gameplay that much (when not adding main battle tanks, jets and other crazy stuff), it would only bring more variety to the equipment players have. I hope that the devs make it easy to add more content, so it's only a matter of adding the class names and trader prices to some configuration file in the servers mission folder.

When talking about safezones, I think there should be at least one in the Altis mainland. It would bring a more social aspect to the game, as some people simply don't know anything beyond the bandit style gameplay and KOS, and most importantly it would allow safe trading between players. If there will be an official mission system built into epoch, it would be nice to be able to define custom missions. This wouldn't affect the core gameplay, again if the server owner does not overdo it.

 

Epoch is awesome even now in it's vanilla alpha version form, with no public access to server files. So moddin the mod is probably not yet a timely topic, but it is something that will surely happen in the future. Hopefully by officially supported means, and done so that it doesn't ruin the gameplay. :)

[TheVampire]

I don't see any problem with modding when it only means loading additional content mods besides the official epoch mod, ie. maps, weapons and vehicles + simple server customizations with the provided configuration files. Adding more stuff to loot, to traders and to vehicle spawns wouldn't affect the gameplay that much (when not adding main battle tanks, jets and other crazy stuff), it would only bring more variety to the equipment players have. I hope that the devs make it easy to add more content, so it's only a matter of adding the class names and trader prices to some configuration file in the servers mission folder.

When talking about safezones, I think there should be at least one in the Altis mainland. It would bring a more social aspect to the game, as some people simply don't know anything beyond the bandit style gameplay and KOS, and most importantly it would allow safe trading between players. If there will be an official mission system built into epoch, it would be nice to be able to define custom missions. This wouldn't affect the core gameplay, again if the server owner does not overdo it.

 

Epoch is awesome even now in it's vanilla alpha version form, with no public access to server files. So moddin the mod is probably not yet a timely topic, but it is something that will surely happen in the future. Hopefully by officially supported means, and done so that it doesn't ruin the gameplay. :)

 

I ran a server for a while with tanks and jets. They are really good extended endgame items, the problem everyone has with them is when compared to someone who is not at the endgame yet, they get wrecked.

 

If its two endgame players with tanks that duke it out, it's fine, but its the endgame player in the tank wrecking someones base or a random that you always hear about.

[BoONDocK]

I think there is a place for both worlds.  Some people will love the Extra modded servers allowing easier game play and more customization with loot and things like that.  I mean yea it does appeal to the more casual player base but come on everyone can't all be MLG pro's lol.    

 

But I hope the vanilla version stays around maybe with some kind of official servers with private hives or something that have that more hardcore aspect of the game for the more seasoned players looking for a tougher challenge.  

[Freedom]

i think most people would be fine to have the vanilla and modded versions of Epoch.

 

But i do think the devs will want to make sure their work will not become a way for server admins to make money. 

 

If developers and admins can respect the rules then i dont think there will be any limits to what we will be allowed to make with Arma 3 Epoch.

[CartoonrBOY]

Personally I prefer survival, I prefer the challenge and in trying desperately to gain a player base I've had to dilute my integrity to provide a balance between the hardcore survivalist and the military player. It's an ongoing struggle and one which I do not shy from.

 

I have added a lot of mods, but I have been careful not to go too far. My starting kit is (almost) vanilla (certain kit items can be crafted from trash items in true survival fashion) and my Ai do not wander around killing players, instead they are confined to specific areas (dungeons) so you know where the risks are.

 

But in the last 6 months I have seen very few new players, instead the masses pouring into servers providing kits and vehicles for free. I don't understand what has happened, as my love for this game remains as strong as ever. Isn't it more interesting to not only pvp, but to do that against a survival theme?