DayZ mods: how to play on modded maps, including Lingor, Takistan, Fallujah and Utes.

First, a bit of background. DayZ mods have previously been frowned upon by the DayZ development team. Speaking to us at Gamescom, Dean "Rocket" Hall explained that locking down DayZ was “a difficult decision to make,” but one that was essential to demonstrate the viability of the DayZ gametype. “I know a lot of the community wasn’t happy with me, but I needed to get a clear message out to the gaming industry that players wanted to see this. I wanted to have saying ‘DayZ needs to be THIS’. Not single player, not this, not that... but we’ve achieved it. Now we can open it up; the community can do Lingor Island, do single player, do whatever they want.”

As of now, there are four DayZ maps worth playing outside of the official Chernarus map: Lingor Island, Takistan, Fallujah and Utes. Here’s how you play them.

Getting started 

Despite technically being ‘mods’ of DayZ, half of the work you need to do to get involved in these new and exciting environments was already taken care of by installing DayZ in the first place. A lot of the technical work is actually handled at the server end. .

At the moment, there are two ways of playing DayZ that we would recommend you use if you wanted to try out the new maps – PlaywithSix and DayZCommander.

In DayZCommander the updating and patching interface will tell you when new maps become available, and it’s very easy to install, and then filter the server list by the Map name.

Takistan and Fallujah shouldn’t take that long to install – but Lingor (being the oldest of the ‘new’ maps) is over 600 MB’s. Check the updating and patching interface regularly: Commander isn’t great at letting you know there are updates available.

DayZ Utes, the fourth new map, doesn’t require any downloads at all, you just need to find a server that is running it using whatever DayZ launcher you prefer.

PlaywithSix does a similar job. Once it’s downloaded and installed, simply click on the ‘No Mod Selected’ box and it’ll give you a list of all the DayZ mods.

DayZ Lingor and Takistan are separate downloads to DayZ: we recommend you install them both. At the time of writing, Fallujah wasn’t supported by PlaywithSix… but considering its not great, you’re not missing much.

Final note: if you’ve previously used SixLauncher (a precursor to PlaywithSix) to play DayZ, it’s a bit more complicated to get the other maps to work. My advice would be just to ditch it for Commander or Play. I have all three installed at the moment and although they don’t seem to clash, they may use up more space than is needed.

Now that you’ve got the easy bit out of the way, it’s time to go travelling. Are you all packed? Bandage? Check. Flashlight? Check. Let’s get cracking…

Lingor Island

Lingor Island is the ‘oldest’ of the new DayZ maps, and therefore the most developed. It’s a tropical island, slightly smaller than Chernarus (10x10 as opposed to 14x12). That being said, it’s got a higher concentration of villages and towns, and a higher concentration of loot spawns, especially military.

Like Chernarus, you spawn on the coast. Unlike Chernarus you can spawn anywhere: North, South, East or West. A common spawn point tends to be the village of Chupinka in the south-east, or the town of Medlina (or other nearby towns) in the south-west.

Lingor is a decent map that’s geared mainly towards PvP. You can enter almost every building you come across, and most of them will include a loot spawn. Getting weapons and gear is a lot easier than it is in Chernarus, making pure ‘survival’ in terms of food and water less of an issue anymore.. There’s also a lot more vehicles, especially boats.

If you’re looking for PvP action, head towards the Southern Airfield and the adjacent town of Calamar.

Other Highlights

• There’s a multi-high value military base way, way up north beyond the equally attractive northern airfield.
• The North-eastern Islet has a lot of vehicle spawns, but you need to get across a extremely long bridge to get there.
• Look for the hotels. This new building type contains several levels, each with 6 rooms that you can check for loot. They make great places to hide out and wait, and great sniping position.
• There’s another new building type we’ve dubbed “El Presidente’s Palace”. It makes for some particularly amusing last stands against hordes of zombies.
• Here’s a useful Lingor loot map.

Takistan

The other developed map, Takistan is the closer to the ‘spirit’ of Chernarus. It’s about the same size as Lingor but set amongst a desert. It’s a tough, tough place; towns and resources are extremely sparse, and there’s very little cover. That means you spend most of your time just thinking about staying alive.

Even navigation is a hard job: I’ve spawned on top of a hill with no landmarks to get my bearings. It was only after chancing upon a road, and then finding a sign on that road, that I could figure out where I was on a external map.

There are four large towns and 24 villages, with an airfield to the North and South, but don’t expect oodles of loot. You’re just not going to find it. Instead, concentrate on your own survival.

Other Highlights:

• Like Lingor, there are more military spawns. When you do eventually find one, you’ll be fine for kit.
• Zombie aggro is painful on Takistan. The lack of trees and other ‘objects’ means it’s very hard to break line of sight. You could be kiting zombies for ages.
• Be extra-careful of snipers, especially around the airfields and towns. Those hills and valleys make for perfect sniping spots.
• There a fewer buildings (apart from military ones) that you’ll recognise, so expect a period of learning where you’re not sure what will spawn.

Here’s a decent Takistan reference map.  

Fallujah

Fallujah has only just been released over DayZ Commander, and isn’t available yet through PlaywithSix. It’s a work-in-progress, so make sure to keep updating.

It’s a 10x10 map, set in a desert like Takistan. A large chunk of Fallujah (4x4) is given over to the city of Fallujah itself. There’s a river, with bridges and a damn, a military airport and a Firebase. The city is surrounded by both desert and an oasis landscape.

Sadly, despite being a highly urban area, you can’t enter as many buildings as you’d like. That does force you to be more careful with regards to zombie aggro; the ‘native’ buildings to this map don’t usually have back doors you can run out off. It’s also a little easier on your skills of navigation: you’re just going to want to head to the city.

It’s not a great map overall right now, but the team are still developing it. When the map has been improved on, I actually think the urban environment is going to be fun.

Here’s a Fallujah reference map.

Utes

There’s not a lot to Utes. It’s an insanely small map (5120 x 5120m) with a small airfield and only two small towns. It’s more of a PvP map: it forces every player into the same place rather quickly, and there’s only one military spawn for people to fight over.

Let us know how you get on in-game - we’d love to hear your zombie stories in the comments.