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Anti Server hopping measures
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Description

I think the way this is implemented is a mistake. Please let me try to explain what I mean.

I play with a group of friends. Most of them more casual DayZ players. Some do not know the map very well. They are used to certain places. Used to be able to have friends spawn nearby. And most notably: they're used to having certain freedoms in the game. I can't and I won't try to convince them that the freedoms and choices they used to be able to make, have all been taken away. Be it about the nights, be it about server population. We plan our missions carefully so everyone on the team has fun, and everyone has a place.

Playing on a hive means options. Means choice. Means freedom.

The way anti server hopping is implemented right now, is so punitive and restrictive towards new players and those who want to accompany them, that I'm honestly quite shocked.

I understand the need to prevent server hopping in some capacity to prevent mass looting or ghosting or base raiding by cheating. I am OK with taking measures against that happening.

But what this currently does is a massive interference in everyday gameplay. Just plain put: it ruins all the fun. Please give people a way to switch servers. Limit it to 1 hop every X hours if you have to. Find other ways to do this. I implore you.

Many geared players will now constantly spawn at the coasts. New spawns have even less incentive to go in-land. They might as well just sit at the coast and wait for the next best geared guy.

A lot of servers will be traveled by the same players. There will be considerably less a chance for the randomness that makes DayZ so great. It's going to make the experience increasingly more stale as time passes. That's another advantage a Hive has over private servers. One that we intended to benefit from.

Simply exploring a server, -any random server really- is one of my favourite pasttimes. I enjoy wandering servers for hours just to see what's where. Not to rob. Just to enjoy the traces other players have left behind. While I enjoy long walks, I would vastly prefer to have free choice for where I start, and where I end my hiking trips. These adventures have been incredibly fun! I found amazing setups! Please don't make this harder to enjoy.

I cannot expect my friends to sacrifice more time. I cannot expect them to run all the way to a meeting point, because it's been raining on a server. As a group, we enjoyed the game greatly up until now, and suddenly, everyone is sure bound to be pushed around back to punish or prevent what they didn't set out to do in the first place. And that -- even if a full day or even a week has passed since the last time they joined another server, I expect. I haven't seen any information on how much time needs to have passed, if such a mechanism is in this.

This is a major discouragement for any new players, and for those trying to simply avoid the night, or learn the ropes of the game. This even is a huge annoyance for experienced players who want to simply change servers once every few hours.

The benefits of playing on a hive have been helpful in so many ways, to this day. Please reconsider. Find a better way to do this.

Thank you for reading! :)

Details

Severity
Major
Resolution
Open
Reproducibility
Always
Operating System
Windows 10 x64
Operating System Version
Windows 10 Pro 1709 (16299.547)
Category
Gameplay

Event Timeline

Jammet created this task.Jun 26 2019, 9:38 PM
Jammet updated the task description. (Show Details)Jun 26 2019, 10:48 PM
Unknown Object (User) added a subscriber: Unknown Object (User).Jun 26 2019, 10:50 PM

It's the best and only way to implement protection against server hoppers like you and i am saying it, here again, if you decided to play on public hive then you won't be able to cheat anymore in any way, and you are not even console player...

In T141513#1900646, @mov3ax wrote:

It's the best and only way to implement protection against server hoppers like you and i am saying it, here again, if you decided to play on public hive then you won't be able to cheat anymore in any way, and you are not even console player...

Thanks for your input.

There is always another way. And this is quite possibly the one of the worst. Everyone gladly supports malicious server hopping prevention. But not at the cost of dismantling the entire hive. Because being able to pick different servers, is the point of having that hive. I do not object to anti cheat mechanisms. I object to this one, because it is done wrong.

Unknown Object (User) added a comment.Jun 26 2019, 11:20 PM

If you decline, offer your own ideas instead of blaming developers and acting like a noob

In T141513#1900669, @mov3ax wrote:

If you decline, offer your own ideas instead of blaming developers and acting like a noob

I look up to these developers. My own ideas could only be rough outlines, and are unlikely to be of much help.

MollyMagoo added a comment.EditedJun 27 2019, 3:11 AM
In T141513#1900646, @mov3ax wrote:

It's the best and only way to implement protection against server hoppers like you and i am saying it, here again, if you decided to play on public hive then you won't be able to cheat anymore in any way, and you are not even console player...

Why do you assume everyone who changes server on public is a cheater? Some of us can't play night time, some of us like to play on servers with our friends that have a decent amount of population, some of us like the vanilla experience that is sullied by mods. Not all 'server hoppers' are loot hungry cheaters. I have been killed twice by geared guys who have just spawned in right in front of me, it basically sending fully geared toy soldiers to the coast to kill fresh spawns.

docterv93 added a subscriber: docterv93.EditedJun 27 2019, 6:10 AM
In T141513#1900646, @mov3ax wrote:

It's the best and only way to implement protection against server hoppers like you and i am saying it, here again, if you decided to play on public hive then you won't be able to cheat anymore in any way, and you are not even console player...

Thanks for your input.

There is always another way. And this is quite possibly the one of the worst. Everyone gladly supports malicious server hopping prevention. But not at the cost of dismantling the entire hive. Because being able to pick different servers, is the point of having that hive. I do not object to anti cheat mechanisms. I object to this one, because it is done wrong.

Ok this makes no sense at all. So every streamer who plays on official and logs off cuz there viewers can’t see anything on a cheater ok pal...

The only solution is to lock the servers.

Even if you make each server saves the last player location individually (like with tents, barrels, cars) if devs can´t make a dynamic spawnpoint system, there would be ways to exploit this. Again, if the devs refuse to lock the server (at this point I want to believe that there should be a valid reason for this) we are always going to have a possible exploit/punishment from any anti-hopping "fix" because this is an unnatural way to play the game and an permanent open door for exploits and shorcuts.

I don´t want to compare with other games but games like SCUM also work with public and private servers. The public ones don´t use the hive system and it works pretty well. Even when in that game you have a character progress far more developed than dayz, so its even more punishing to start all over in other server.

But thats just fair for all.

First of all, I'd like to say a big thank you for the new additions in DayZ's current updated. It's so great to see how the game has developed over the last few years. I've been playing DayZ for about three years now and it's one of the games that brought me back to gaming and started my passion to play online with my friends. There are so many different ways how to play DayZ. Be it PvP or PvE, there's room for everything. The experiences it provides are unique. Hiding from other players, talking to someone you accidentally meet and enjoying just being "nice" or getting caught in a gunfight and barely making it; these things make my heart leap. I think many of you know this feeling as well. Your hand trembles and your heart beats like a drum while you recover from what has just happened.
I've played various other first person shooters and I've never had such intense feelings with any other game out there. That's what brings me always back to DayZ even when certain changes were unpleasant for me. In the end it's up to the developers to decide what they do and I'm sure they have spent a lot of thought on this decision.

However, this change you all were talking about is somethings that really bothers me.
Now I don't consider myself a server-hopper. I don't really care about loot others would gladly kill for. Bases? I pass them by and leave them be. Maybe I admire them, but I wouldn't dare to enter them. The way I prefer to play DayZ is peaceful.
Yeah.. go ahead and laugh, but that's just my way of playing. And guess what? I can because the game offers me the choice. That's awesome and that's also another reason why I can't compare DayZ to SCUMM, CS:GO or other shooters out there. I just love meeting other players and helping them out with clothes, food and drink. DayZ is not only a PvP or a PvE kind of game. It has also become a kind of social experiment in parts.
White I'm friendly, I'm also prepared to defend myself if necessary and I've played DayZ this way for years now. However, with the new changes, I'm forced to spawn at highly-frequented places if I happen to change the server.
And let's face it: Apart from "server hopping" or "ghosting" there are several reasons why one might have to do that. Jammet mentioned some, as did MollyMagoo and docterv93. Is changing the server because your server just crashed, you can't play at night or you simply want to join a more populated server in order to meet other people really considered server-hooping? If your answer is yes, then I'm guilty.
I have my four to five favourite servers at the moment and you wouldn't believe what stories I could tell you. There were a lot of memorable moments. Loving memories! Not all of them peaceful of course, but exciting in every possible way. And I'd like to make new ones.
Now with the new protection or "penalty" most of the players will stay near the spawning regions and well-geared or even fresh-spawns players just have to camp and wait. I'm afraid that many players will stick to the south and east instead of exploring the map. Maybe long-term players will still play as before, but I'm worried about casual players and people who are new to DayZ. Now if you don't know the map very well and get shot on sight that might get frustrating over time. Also if you play in a group, as Jammet mentioned, it's really hard to coordinate. And it all ends in spending much time with walking to a certain spot while you could have such a nice time with your friends. Again, the casual gamers will suffer greatly. It's not their fault for having a reallife, you know? Sure, you can always argue and say "then the game is not for them!" and you're probably right. But it has been a game for them. For years. To put it simply: If you play once a week and change the server, this can get very frustrating.
I'm worried that DayZ the way it has been over the last few years will change and that many players might lose their interest. Again, this has happened before regarding other changes. Still, I just wanted to mention this because I hope maybe one of the people behind the game care about what the players say. You can always use a sledgehammer to crack a nut, but there must be other, more tolerable ways of doing this.

As for me, I'd prefer a solution which is not as punishing for casual gamers and groups who have no intention of harming anyone by server-hopping. Maybe the developers could set a timer for about 15-30 minutes until you can reconnect to a new server. Similiar to the penalty-time we already have if you change the server successively. Or maybe have the players could spawn in a big city a few miles near the last log-out point. I don't know, I'm not a programmer.
What I do know is that this new measure forces me to change how I play DayZ. Is it game-breaking for me? That depends. Right now the measure is taking certain things away from me I learned to love. Similiar to those nice little notes you could leave or checking the pulse and getting the players name. But compared to those trifles thisanti-server-hopping-measure is a major restraint for me. I don't know if you can relate to that and I don't think you must. I just wanted to let you know how I think about these things.

In my country, there was a time when you were forced to watch a video clip about video piracy and how bad it is every time you inserted selected DVDs in your player. I was in my late teens back then and it felt so so ridiculous and awkward. Just think: In order to watch a movie you bought legally, you had to watch this anti-piracy videos. Naturally, the ones who watched pirated videos of course never saw them. While I see the movie industry had a point it was really disturbing. Today, I feel the same.
On one hand, I understand the neccessity of doing something about ghosting and things like that, because this is a sever problem that breaks the game for other people. However, isn't there any other way the developers could handle it? You have the power to change the game. All I ask is please be reasonable about it and don't assume that everyone plays DayZ the same way everyone else does.
Please don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Thank you :)

Kind regards

~Paedman

From my point of view, I can nothing but agree with the thread owner. For me the current login process is also very annoying. Let me explain why.

I play DayZ about two times a week for usually no more than two hours. I would like to play more, but my real life doesn't allow it. I usually play in a group of 4-8 friends which tries to be friendly to other people and give them gifts (I know this is a very unusual playstyle for DayZ :D ). Most of my friends like and have time to play more DayZ and more PVP. Some others have less time and enjoy more the "beautiful landscape"-part of DayZ, like harvesting and having a barbeque. And half of them also would get lost in the big map of Chernarus, if I would not lead them to the best places.
For our "friendly Samaritan missions", we especially choose to play on medium to high populated, daylight servers to increase the chances to see and meet other players.

We haven't played in our group since the 1.04 update, because it is almost impossible to meet on a suitable server in an acceptable amount of time. Our best idea at the moment is, to choose one server and try to stick to it. But if the population of this server gets low or the mayority of our playtime would be at night, a server change would become neccessary to keep our moods high. But with the current state of the login process we would be scattered along the coast.

Yesterday, I tested and joined a potential server for my group. I needed more that 40 minutes to reach the area, where we usually carry out our samaritan missions. That's 33% of my available playtime for one evening. And I was lucky not to get shot, with all my gifts and gear and I also know Chernarus very well. In average I assume that some of my friends will need 1 hour or more to perform the same task. Or they will end up waiting for me to catch them up.

But enough of the wailing. I might have a good solution which might fit all needs:

First lets focus what the DayZ developers (much thanks for your work at this point!) try to avoid with the new spawing process.

  1. Combat-Ghosting (travel on an other server to get a better position in combat)

To do combat ghosting, time and position is essential. So to prevent combat ghosting, the player should be punished with penalty time and position change.

  1. Combat-Logging (logout to avoid a combat)

For this, time is essential. In my opinion the current lockout timer (15 sec) and the sitting animation is a good solution. Maybe the time cloud be increased a little bit (max. 30 sec) or the player should speak automatically "logout" or "goodbye" ingame as a signal for nearby players.

  1. In-Base-Ghosting (travel on an other server to get into a player base)

For this, position is essential. To prevent this, the players position must be changed during the login on a new server.

  1. Server-Loot-Hopping (loot the same place on several servers to gear up quickly)

I think here time and position are essential. Similar to the first point, server hopping gets annoying if you have to spend much time to reach your next looting spot (usually military areas). But if someone is willing to spent enough time, you cannot avoid players to play on low populated servers to loot up.

Cases which should not be punished in my opinion.

  1. Server changes due to population and gametime.
  1. Server changes due to server shutdown or restart.

Next, let's have a look at the current state of the login process:

Case 1 (If same server): Use last logout position. Time penalty 15 sec.
Case 2 (Else): Use random spawn point from Coast-Spawn-List. Time penalty 75 sec.

(Penatly time might be incorrect. I am currently not sure about it)

Having some knowledge about software developing, I can assume that the following information must be available during the server login process:

A) Name/ID of the last server played on.
B) Logout position of the player
C) List of coast spawn points

Other information which might be available or easy to implementent:

D) Date/Time list of last 5 logouts

Working with the information A) to C) the following process would be better:

Case 1 (If same server): Use last logout position. In spawing time 15 seconds (like the logout timer).
My idea behind this is to avoid surprise spawns in combat situations.

Case 2 (Else): Use random spawn point between 1 and 2 km from last logout position. Penalty time 60 seconds and in-spawing time 15 seconds like in Case 1.
My idea behind this is to use an extended spawn location list with inland spawn points. So if a player change a server, he will be moved at least 1000m (and out of any military area), but at a maximum of 2000m to let the player spawn in the rough area he logged out.

From my point of view this would prevent at least combat-ghosting (1.) efficiently, because the player would loose too much time. And in-base-ghosting (3.) would also be impossible, execept someone is building a base on a spawn point...
Preventing combat-logging (2.) is one the same level as currently. Only server-loot-hooping (4.) would again be easier, because you will spawn at least near your logout position and not at the coast.
But on the positive side, groups can faster find themselfs after a server change and vanilla-daylight players could also exlpore the inland of Chernarus. And anyone would have back the freedom to choose his favourite server to spent his freetime on.

Anything you would need is a additional list of some inland spawn locations. These locations shoud be of course outside towns, military areas and other hotspots, like most of the current spawn points. I would suggest somewhere in between some trees or bushes to be save from snipers. And, if possible, with some navigation hints nearby.
Using the iZurvive map coordinates, possible locations could be:

2758 / 4104 (near Bor radio tower)
4983 / 3345 (north of Balota airstrip)
7662 / 4015 (Kopyto dam)
10466 / 4878 (south of Staroye)
11356 / 8389 (between Polana and Berezino)
2601 / 11551 (between Vavilovo and Topolniki)
9706 / 13338 (south of Svergino)
and so on...

I would be happy to help with this list, if needed. With my suggested teleportation range of 1 - 2 km, one spawn point in every 3 square-kilometer or so should be enough. This would lead to around 60-100 inland spawn points.

With the other information D) (Date/Time list of last 5 logouts) even heavier penalties for server-loot-hoopers would be possible, because these type of players do not play much time on a single server.

Dear Team,

thank you very much for the continuous updates!
Unfortunately, the spawn-change update is causing a lot of problems for my game play…

Like others in this thread, I play with a group of friends - exclusively, I must add! I do not play DayZ alone, I only play with my group.
Our playstyle is nearly strictly PVE - travelling, looting, killing zombies and meeting and helping other friendly players. Since we do not take part in PVP, we usually avoid the coast area and meet up in the middle of the map or in the northern areas. So far this has worked quite well - we end a gaming session (usually only 2-3 hours as most of us are unfortunately too busy being adults… :) ), log out hidden in trees or bushes and log back into these bushes the next session. We often change servers, as we’re not night-time players (health-related for some) and sometimes don’t feel like travelling on an empty server - it’s fun meeting other nice players!

Now that I’ve described out playstyle, let me outline the problems we have with this new system:

1 ) We will have to decide on a “home” server, ideally, a fuller server.
Our size varies. We’re sometimes as few as 5 people, and sometimes over 10. With the old system, we were able to meet on an empty server without a problem and then logged into a fuller server - I’m afraid that with the new system we will lose a lot of gaming time by being stuck in a queue. This can be tolerated with the 5 people group, but may lose us 30 minutes+ with a 10 people group. Depending on how fast the players on the server change. As we most of the time only have 2 hour-sessions, we will lose a lot of time just logging into the server…

2 ) Switching servers is becoming incredibly risky.
It would cause us a lot of problems switching servers now and being spawned on the beach on a full server - it’s not only the walking distance, but the high risk of ones fully equipped character being killed! Everybody now knows that it’s no longer Bambis spawning on the beach...you now have a good chance of snatching up some fine equip just by camping and killing…

3 ) It’s stressful being spawned randomly just by switching servers.
This might just be my personal preference, and some of our group members, but it’s super stressful being spawned somewhere randomly. Chernarus is huge and I honestly don’t know the map very well, even though DayZ is my most played Steam game with a few hundred hours…
I’ve just spawned my character on our new “home server” a few hours ago, and I had a very hard time figuring out where I was.
For the past few years I very much enjoyed logging out in a tree, switching to a server with better weather, for example, and spawning in directly this tree again.

A few suggestions for this…
1 ) Increase the hopping-penality. 5-10 minutes (after passing the log-queue, if the queue time is at 15 minutes already, the penality should disappear obviously) should be good to discourage people from combat-logging.

2 ) Change the spawn locations, keep the beach for new spawns only. Make the server-hop spawns random, maybe 1-3 KMs around the logout position. As a result, people would not be able to camp for equipped hoppers, as they will spawn randomly.
→ If that’s not possible, please add a bunch of inland spawns, perhaps the suggestion of KanuTBL is best for this! Adding many new inland spawn points and then just randomly choosing one of those that’s in a certain radius of the logged off player.

3 ) I have absolutely no idea if that would even be possible, but some kind of setting, so that groups would at least spawn together after hopping would be fantastic and help our groups problem a lot! That way we could still change servers and travel to our locations together, as well as reducing the risk of getting killed for loot. Or at least be able to revenge a killed group member easily….

I hope my feedback is helpful and you will be able to figure out something that will help groups playing DayZ again properly!
Thank you in advance!

Greetings,
Frostpaw

So You just made it harder for new players to find there way and there friends and just made the spawns worse. why can't you guys listen to use and just make it for that you cannot log in Mil bases and make it for that you spawn in a random shed in the town you were in.........

Rahnin_Amok added a subscriber: Rahnin_Amok.EditedOct 10 2019, 4:03 PM

Please please take away this setup. The thing I love most about Dayz is that there can be anyone, anywhere, at anytime.. we had a solution previously. You could not combat log (cool down) and if you hopped you where visible while you logged for around 90 seconds or so. This setup makes new players complete targets, lost, meeting with friends is near impossible. The amount of interaction inland is minimal, no one is building and the coast is a warzone. Every other thing that you have done to this game is amazing ..I've been here since Tavi. I can climb ! I can hop fence Illness is brutal Night is amazing Sound is incredible !! But this server setup is killing the game again...just as we had a true AAA title ..kasplat. It feels like you've bowed to the pressure from console players that are new to the game and feel and have not learned to adapt to the flow of Days... That and most people that complain of ghosting are themselves campers. Let's be honest that's why people complained I'm the first place. They want to gear up and kill new spawn or camp military. These players don't build and don't need resourses to build so do not need to hop. (That's my reason mostly for hopping) I don't state my case aswell as the guys above but come on..it suckz

KarinaK added a subscriber: KarinaK.EditedAug 18 2021, 12:01 AM

I have a similar problem