Guess what. There used to be a reload sound when somebody spawned in nearby. For reasons unbeknownst to the DayZ community, the devs removed that sound. Which is ridiculous because now server hoppers are at a distinct advantage.

SOLUTION: re-implement the login warning reload sound!!!!!!

I don't see how this was definitely intentional server hopping. He may simply have logged back in at this point. The upsetting part for you is not the spawn, but the kill, right?

Allowing people to log back in like this, inside buildings or behind other players, is obviously something that needs to be improved though.

Not allowing to log in and out while inside buildings at all seems to me like the best suggestion. But you would have to be put back to where you were, not randomly moved to some other place.
Being seen before being able to see is unfair. Accidentally logging into danger yourself is as big a risk as having somebody log in on you.
Items disappearing is unfair as well. Right now, about half my logouts are not intentional but the result of server restarts or crashes. You can't punish people for that by taking all their progress away afterwards.

Though I agree with most of what ventrue said, I up-voted this because I do think something should be done to curb server hopping.
I actually wouldn't mind the disappearing items idea IF (big if there) they improved the rate of server crashes/restarts first.

The server hopper took the risk of being killed when he logs into a very high risk place. your friends and you should always be on high alert at ANY military place. as far as i have seen, there is a delay from when you log in and you are standing still for a period. your friend didnt see him and that is his bad for lack of perception.

The only way this is fixable is to have the players load somewhere in a safe zone.

Problem is grievers from there on out.

Its been placed in other games like warz/Infestation, safe zones do not work for the fact snipers kill you as soon as you leave the safe zone.

Also the hacks being used are able to see you pretty clearly leaving the safe zones.

I know your frustration, it was unlucky for your friend to be in the same spot :(

If they had random spots in the map to reload then it would be ok, but then you wouldn't like to walk 15 minutes to meet up with your friends. That alone drives people to leave the game.

*Note* you could have a safety net area that says "you can not log off here" message moving that player out of the no camping zones.

So hot zone areas are not allowed to log off in.

But be aware gamers look for solutions to zone in on you so you must be alert all the time. This might be the best solution to this.

I have thought about this a bit, also. It is frustrating that some people will camp high-loot locations and jump servers ad-nauseum to clean out all the good stuff easily.

One way to combat this might be to make server hoppers spawn in random remote locations, similar to the mechanics of fresh spawns, but different locations. This prevents you from simply cherry-picking from a large number of servers in a short time, requires some legitimate effort, and exposes you to more risk.
Couple this with a longer timer - 60 minutes or so between connections, and you are subject to random location.

An exception could be made if you are logging back into your previous server, you could spawn at your previous location. This would remove any penalty for crashes, restarts or disconnections; you are resuming the game where you left off. Regular spawn timer delay still applies.

its also pretty unrealistic to have someone appear right in front of your eyes.
Option 1 is pretty good, move away the spawner
all the other options sound really bad to me, if I was not in a highly dense area and someone is outside and knows someone logged in, he probably wouldn't have a hard time finding you.

So spawning near a place you logged out would be a good option.
(logging out still needs fixing though, if you battlelog and then get magically moved outside the death zone, yeah..)

I think your suggestions with the reload soudn are bad. What if you log in on your Server and everything you can see is a Person that shoots you in the Face. (Fair?!)

First of all the public servers should be "private". One character per server.
Second thing I would suggest is just to make people sleep when they log out (like in rust), so they need to find a safe place to log out.

quote: "Players that log out inside a certain or any building spawn back in a forest close by."

Not a good solution. It would be much easier for Combat Loggers to escape battle, and it helps ghosting. Say, you are trapped in a building under siege. Log out, log in so you spawn in the forest, go and kill the guys from behind.

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quote: "Items picked up by a player who shortly appears on another server disappears. "

Not a good idea. Sudden relogs can happen for thousands of reasons, server hopping is only one of them. You can't punish players with technical problems.

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quote: "Not allowing to log in and out while inside buildings at all seems to me like the best suggestion."
quote: "you could have a safety net area that says "you can not log off here" message moving that player out of the no camping zones."

Does not work. Alt-F4 and you're off the server regardless of your position.

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quote: "The only way this is fixable is to have the players load somewhere in a safe zone."

This isn't a solution at all, this will only create more problems and frustration. Getting killed as soon as you step out of the zone for example.

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quote: "players nearby someone logging in can see and/or hear him/her before he/she can see anything."
quote: "SOLUTION: re-implement the login warning reload sound!!!!!!"

This should work, but let the spawning char say "Hello anybody here, I'm coming now, beware!" (in a scared voice^^) or sth like that so you won't confuse it with actual reload sounds.
Anyway, the problem with this are still all those connection issues. You shouldn't be punished for looting a milbase when the server crashes and you have to log on another server where coincidentally a nearby player awaits your appearance. This is only a problem for public hive servers though, for private shards this solution is good enough I guess.

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OK now for my own suggestion.

I think, in order to solve this you gotta kill the root of the problem, which is server hopping. Why do people hop servers? Because they want more loot in less time. So the solution is quite simple, don't give them loot!

So when a player relogs inside or near a building, all loot in that building disappears. You could even have it disappear in the buildings next door and around if necessary. This and the above-mentioned login warning sounds should do the trick, I hope.

Maybe have the loot disappear 15 or 30 seconds before the actual character is spawned in, so when players in the area see loot disappearing before them, they know someone's logging in and can prepare.

Of course this solution isn't perfect either, it basically steals the loot from other players in the vicinity. But at least it would keep greedy players from logging out in milbase buildings for the sole purpose of server hopping for loot.

/edit: grammar and such^^

Fair? Yes. At least it's fairer than forcing characters to sleep like in Rust.
You have no control over your character while you're offline and it will only lead to more whining and frustration. Without any server restart warnings and with all the current connection issues, you'll have people sleeping in random places all over the map. That's not fair at all I think.

But I agree, making all servers private essentially eliminates server hopping. (it still doesn't really get rid of players who think logging out in a high-value-loot building is a wise move)