A guide to choosing the right DayZ SA server for you

[krazypenguin 174]

Intro
The first time you play the game, or if your previous server is offline, or if you just click "Change Server" you will see the "Servers:" screen.

There's a lot of information here and not much explanation of what it all means so this guide is designed to explain the various server options to newer players, to help them understand why sometimes their character appears to be reset and, perhaps most importantly, to assist them in getting a more rewarding DayZ experience.

Throughout this article I may refer to various server hosting rules and guidelines, all of which are taken from the official thread located here. Otherwise, I mainly draw on my experience of playing 200 plus hours of DayZ SA.

At the top of the screen is a row of buttons:


Internet (largest section so placing in a spoiler)

This is the main tab and the most important to understand since the rest tend to follow the same layout.

Column 1 is either a green circle or a gold key. The green circle means it's not password protected, the gold key means it is. Trying to join a password protected server will prompt you to enter the password - get it wrong and you cannot join. Note that it is against the server hosting rules to put a password on a public server, only private servers should be password protected.

Column 2 is Host. This is a description of the server that the server admin chooses, and ideally should be something that is easy to remember (in the above screenshot I always remember one server - guess which one...hmm bacon) and should also provide 2 key pieces of information not displayed elsewhere - whether persistence is on and how often the server restarts. However, the server admin may not include this information in the description, in which case you will need to work it out for yourself.

• Persistence on means that most gear dropped on the floor should stay there after a regular server restart (but still not a Wednesday morning server maintenance) but can also lead to odd loot distributions and will not feature helicopter crash sites. Persistence off means that loot will be respawned after every server restart (so a tent or backpack left on the ground will disappear) but has the advantage of spawning helicopter crash sites where you can find some of the top end military loot.
• Server restarts will tell you how regularly the server is restarted which controls the respawn of loot. This is particularly important on persistence off servers (for finding helicopter crash sites) and just generally for getting a feel for how hard your game might be - join a high pop server 3 hours into a 4 hour restart cycle and don't expect to find much loot! Server restarts are typically 1, 2 or 4 hourly, but almost anything is possible.

Note - Many server admins will chose descriptions that actually break the server hosting rules, either to attract more players or to try and warn them away. The most common of these is by promising different amounts of loot ("high loot" to attract more players or "low loot" to try and keep people off of the server) or put warnings in the descriptions like "Join=kick", "server not working", "Character reset if join" etc... The server admin has no control over loot spawn (outside of how regularly they restart the server which might help a little) and kicking players without just reason is against the rules.

Column 3 is Hive and is a very important piece of information. There are 2 types of hive, public and private. In DayZ every private server you join will have its own character. So if you join a private server you have never been on before you will start as a fresh spawn on the coast. If you then switch to another new private server you will create another new character. Each character exists only on the private server they were created on. If you want to be able to play the same character across servers you will need to play on Public servers - however you also need to consider the mode of the public derver (1PP or 3PP - see "Mode" below).
One final consideration when deciding between a private or public hive is that because characters on private servers only exist on that specific server, if the server is offline you cannot play that character and, even worse, if the server admin ever stops paying the bill you will lose that character forever.

Column 4- Mode. This shows whether the server is a 1st Person view only server (1st Person or just generally referred to as 1PP) or a 1st Person and Third Person server (1st/3rd Person (or simply 3PP)). 1st person only mode is considered a more hardcore mode and requires significantly greater situational awareness. Switching to a 1PP server for the first time after playing a lot of 3PP is a very disorientating experience. However, it is also more rewarding.

Note that you have a different character on Public 1PP servers from Public 3PP servers. Therefore, you effectively have 1 character for 1PP Public servers, 1 for 3PP Public servers and then one character for each Private server. 3PP Public servers are by far the most common and popular. 1PP servers (be they public or private) are considered "hardcore".

Column 5 shows the current version of the game that the server is running.

Column 6 is the in-game time - most servers are daytime so this is useful if you specifically want to play on a night time server (which is a great experience!)

Column 7 shows if you have any friends currently playing on that server. Unfortunately, it doesn't tell you who the friend is, so if you have 2 friends playing on 2 different servers you'll just have to guess which one is which if they can't tell you.

Column 8 shows the number of players on a server and the maximum number that can play on that server at the same time. Obviously, the more players the greater danger, but also the more opportunity for interaction. Some people also find high population servers "laggier" due to the server having to calculate more objects and items (the players and their bullets) especially when some very high ping players are on.
Note that even on servers with a low number of players or even zero, the main hotspots such as the North West Airfield can still be very dangerous as people hop in and out of servers to repeatedly loot the same location across multiple servers. Even on a zero pop server you should regularly press "P" to open the player list and see if someone else has joined. Chernarus may be 225 sq km but there are lots of stories where there are only 2 players on a server and they run into each other in the middle of nowhere...

Column 9 is the ping - the lower the better, obviously.


Favourite
When you select a server (by clicking on it once to highlight it) you'll get the option to add it to Favourites. Once you've done this, it will appear under this tab.

History
For me this is a bit buggy - when I switch to this tab it shows my Favourites list, then after about 15 seconds it fills up with a load more servers but not really with any that I recall playing on and certainly not in the manner that it should, i.e. most recently played server first.

Friends
This view lists only servers which you have friends playing on.  Unfortunately, it doesn't tell you who the friend is, so if you have 2 friends playing on 2 different servers you'll just have to guess which one is which if they can't tell you.

LAN
Presumably it is possible to play the game over a LAN if you can find someone to host it - I've never used this.

Remote
This is a really useful tool for connecting directly to a server if you know the IP Address and Port. These can be found by highlighting a server in the server list and clicking on details at the bottom of the screen. Note the IP and port and put them directly into the Remote screen and you can connect in without having to search through the full list of servers. Sadly the "add to favourites" option does not currently work if using the Remote tab to find it.

 

Finding a server - tips
Another way of finding a specific server is to use the "Filter" option at the bottom of all of the screens except LAN and Remote. However, using Remote is generally easier and more reliable.

If you've just played on a server but cannot remember which one it is you can check your C:\Users\yourUSERid\Documents\DayZ folder for a file called YourDayZName.DayZProfile file - open this in notepad\word\whatever and you will see the name, IP and port of the last server you played on near the bottom of the text file.

So...which server should I play on?
This is the big question. Ultimately, it really depends on what gaming experience you want.

 

Public 3PP
By far the most common and most popular choice, 3PP public servers undoubtedly offer the "easiest" and "quickest" game mode - whether it is frowned upon or not, the ability to transfer your character to any other public server allows people to raid the same military site across multiple servers in rapid succession and thus quickly accumulate a lot of high tech gear. It also allows ghosting and combat logging. The 3PP mode itself is also significantly easier to play than 1PP mode, offering the ability to see around corners and over walls.  

 

This sort of gameplay naturally appeals to the less patient\hardcore\serious player and thus KoS (Kill on Sight) is much more common on this sort of server. Life is just cheaper here and thus these servers, whilst offering the potential for great reward, are incredibly dangerous, especially the high pop ones.

 

Public 1PP
In my opinion, this may actually be the hardest game mode to play on since 1PP public servers are much less likely to have casual players on (becuase 1PP is "harder" than 3PP) meaning that those players you do meet will probably be more experienced players, possibly groups or clanners on team speak - this will put individual players at a serious tactical disadvantage.  Also, because this is still a public server hive, these players can still gain military tech quite quickly by hopping.

 

Private 1PP
If you want a slower paced, more serious and challenging game, a 1PP private server is more likely to reward you. Since this hardcore mode is less appealing to the majority, you are more likely to find a more serious gamer, possibly an RP (Role Player) and thus less likely to be KoS - though you should always exercise extreme caution around any other player on any server.  Typical player numbers on these servers are very low. This is my current favourite type of server.

 

Private 3PP
However, perhaps the best balance is the 3PP private server. This offers the easier 3PP mode but combined with the inability of people to server hop (because it's a private server) which means you are less likely to run into gangs of 5 fully kitted out military types who just want to torture bambis in Electro. However, as with all private servers, the gameplay can be a bit slower - just raided a barracks and not found anything? Tough luck, either wait for the next restart or start running for the next installation.

 

If you are sick and tired of getting gunned down with minutes of spawning in Electro or Cherno a Private 3PP server *might* well be the answer to your problem.


I hope this guide is helpful to people and feel free to make comments on where you think I can improve it.

Thanks,
krazypenguin

Edited January 26, 2015 by krazypenguin