Character Status

In *DayZ*, **Character Status** can be described as the overall state and well-being of a player's character. A character's status is defined by a complex, ever-changing system of stats, values, and attributes and their interactions with one another. The status system can be broken down into three primary categories:

 Conditions
 Modifiers

Managing and monitoring your character's status is an extremely important part of DayZ. Not only to prevent death, but your character's status also impacts your ability to perform certain activities, how resistant you are to diseases, how quickly you can recover from injury, as well as many other effects.

## Stats

A **Stat** is a dynamic, a numerical value that represents a specific facet of a character's body or state at that moment in time. In *DayZ* players do not see their character's raw stats. Instead, they are conveyed to the player in more subtle ways, UI badges in the HUD, changes in character animations or visual effects, or specific audio cues. Almost all stats have Modifiers or cause certain Conditions when they reach a specific threshold.

There are approximately **14** character stats in DayZ Standalone, with the most important of them represented in the HUD. These stats can be broken down into four groups in order of *(general)* importance: **Critical**, **Core**, **Survival**, **Action**. It is important to note that not all of a character's stats need to be, or even can be, consistently monitored. For players old and new the **Critical** and **Core** stats are, in general, the stats that players need to be most aware of.

### Critical

 Health

The most important group of stats represents the current state of your character's physical health and well-being. Health and Blood being the most critical as losing enough in either stat means instant death.

#### Health

 *Main Article: Health*

**Health**, a core stat in *DayZ*, is perhaps the most important player stat in the game. A representation of a character's life, having your Health reduced to 0 results in instantaneous death. Easy to lose and slow to gain, Health must be monitored at all times.

All Survivors begin with 100 Health, the maximum that can be had, and lose Health from things like injury or starvation. Although the methods for losing Health are the same for all Survivors, the complexity of DayZ Standalone's Health and Damage system vary the amount of Health lost based on several factors. Even if two survivors are injured in the same way at the same time, they will still often lose different amounts of Health.

The amount, or lack thereof, of Health you have, has a large impact on your movement speed. The more injured you become the slower your character is able to jog, sprint, and even crawl, which can make you an easy target for the Infected, other Survivors or feral animals.

There is also no method, either through items or medical treatments, to instantly restore lost Health. Natural Health recovery over time is the only method for restoring lost Health. Recovery speed is directly tied to Blood so it is important that a Survivor treats their wounds, stays well-fed, and well-hydrated and out of the elements in order to maximize their recovery speed.

#### Blood

 *Main Article: Blood*

**Blood**, a core stat in DayZ, is second only to Health in terms of importance. Representing the amount of blood in a character's body, losing too much Blood can result in unconsciousness or even death.

All Survivors start with **5000** Blood, the maximum that can be had, and lose Blood from injury. While a small amount of Blood is initially lost when a character suffers certain injuries, the primary method of blood loss is bleeding from wounds sustained when a character is injured. Although individual wounds typically do not result in much blood loss, multiple wounds, with varying degrees of severity, can occur in moderate to severe injuries resulting in a high amount of blood loss very quickly.

Blood is a unique stat in a few of ways. First, the effects of blood loss don't happen when it gets close or drops to its minimum value of 0. Instead, the serious effects of blood loss begin to occur around 3,000 Blood, wherein a survivor will begin to take Shock damage until they either fall unconscious or regain enough Blood. Second, Blood is one of only two stats, the other being Health, that cause death to occur when it falls below a specific value. With Blood, a character only needs to lose ~2,500 Blood for death to occur. Finally, Blood is unique in that every character has a **blood type**, which is randomly determined when the character is first spawned. A character's blood type is unique to that character and does not transfer when a new character is spawned.

As long as a Survivor remains moderately fed and hydrated, they will regenerate lost Blood automatically. While the natural recovery process is faster than it is with Health, the larger amount of Blood a character has makes the recovery time approximately the same. Unlike Health, there are medical treatments a character can receive to increase recovery speed, via Saline Bag IV, or even instant restore lost Blood, via Blood Bag IV. Caution is advised, however, as an improper Blood Transfusion can result in the Hemolytic Reaction.

#### Shock

 *Main Article: Shock*

**Shock**, a core stat in *DayZ*, is more abstract that the other three core stats. Rather than representing a direct facet of a character's state, Shock instead represents the amount of trauma (and ensuing circulatory issues) a character's body has received in a short period of time. While not exactly the same as its real life counterpart [Shock], the underlying causes are similar.

In *DayZ*, loss of Shock is cause by certain injuries, a drop in blood pressure due to too much Blood loss or suffering from stage 3 Gas Poisoning.

As of update 1.10, shock status is shown as a visual effect when taking damage (bullet, melee, fall damage, etc.). This makes it considerably easier to track how much shock you have sustained. However, shock damage is not shown when suffering from blood loss.

While falling unconscious definitely leaves a Survivor vulnerable, it is not necessarily a death sentence. Relative to both Blood and Health, Shock regenerates rather quickly, even when unconscious. As long as a character's wounds aren't too serious or they have been bandaged, the character will regain consciousness within a couple of minutes. Additionally, the use of an Epinephrine Auto-Injector will instantly restore a character's Shock value back to its maximum value allowing them to regain consciousness. Alternatively, another Survivor can perform CPR on an unconscious character, speeding up their Shock recovery and allowing them to regain consciousness much faster.

### Core

 Energy
 Water
 Stamina

While not as immediately important as the critical stats, the core stats are incredibly important to manage as they can indirectly lead to a character's death.

#### Water

 *Main Article: Water*

The level of water in your character's body. Necessary to recover Blood, If this status drops too low your character could become Dehydrated.

#### Energy

 *Main Article: Energy*

The nourishment level of your character. Needed to recover Blood.

#### Stamina

 *Main Article: Stamina*

The most dynamic of the core stats, **Stamina** is the representation of your character's endurance; with its loss representing your character becoming more fatigued. In terms of immediate survival, Stamina is the least critical of the core stats. However, due to its ever changing nature, Stamina requires the most management.

Stamina is lost when performing actions that require a lot of physical effort, like sprinting, jumping or swinging an Axe and gained while resting or doing activities that require little physical extertion. The rate or amount of Stamina lost and gained is dependent on what actions are being performed. Stamina recovery always happens gradually, over time. Losing Stamina, however, can happen gradually or instantly. Actions like sprinting or quickly swimming will cause a gradual loss. Actions like jumping or attacking with a melee weapon will cause an instant loss.

The amount of Stamina a survivior has can change as well. All survivors begin with **100** Stamina. As they begin to pick up equipment and gear, the amount of weight they are carrying will start to affect how much Stamina they have. The more weight a survivor is carrying the less Stamina they will have available to them. Carrying too much weight will cause a survivor to become overloaded, preventing them from performing certain actions until they drop some of the weight they are carrying.

### Survival

Survival stats are the more abstract, "behind the scenes" stats. Representing a character's protection and state against exposure and the environment, these stats can have subtle, lasting effects on a character.

#### Temperature

The body temperature of your character. Maintaining normal body temperature is an important part of surviving in *DayZ*. Failure to do so can result in a severe deterioration of your character's health and overall well-being. This can lead to issues like shivering, disease, and even death.

#### Immune System

A Survivor's immune system fights off diseases and other sicknesses. Your immune system is affected by your Survivor's energy, water, blood and health stats, and certain medications or lack thereof. The immune system is important to the survivability of your character. Players can prevent a weak immune system by keeping the four aforementioned stats full.

#### Stomach

Everything a survivor eats or drinks, goes into their stomach to be digested. Within the following few seconds or minutes, its contents are transformed into energy and water stats. This process is visually indicated by small upwards pointing Ʌ icons above the corresponding HUD badges. Once the digestion is done and the stomach is empty, the icons turn back downwards.

Stomach has a limited capacity of 2 liters for holding food and liquids. When it's more than half full, a “stuffed stomach” warning symbol will be shown on the HUD. If the survivor continues to consume beyond the 2-liter limit, they will vomit, expelling all undigested content from their stomach.

Stuffed stomach warning when the stomach is over 50% full:

The time needed to digest a full stomach varies from about 3 to 10 minutes, depending on the type of the ingested food and drinks.

### Action

These are non-critical stats that primarily affect a character's ability to perform actions and don't necessarily need to be monitored.

#### Load Weight

 *See Also: Stamina*

In DayZ Standalone, Stamina is affected by one thing, how much weight a character is carrying. All items, from apples to weapons, have weight. As a survivor begins picking up equipment, food, clothing, etc., they begin to increase their load weight (i.e. the weight of the items they are carrying). All survivors can carry about 6 kg of load weight with no issue. After that, they will begin losing maximum Stamina; losing about 1.75 Stamina for every 1 kg of weight carried. It is important to note that a character's load weight does not affect sprint speed or Stamina recovery, only maximum Stamina.

If a character is carrying enough equipment, they will begin to become overburdened; losing so much maximum Stamina that they are unable to perform some actions. This Stamina penalty does have a cap, with no character able to lose more than 95 maximum Stamina. Still, having a total of 5 Stamina (with the maximum penalty) doesn't leave many options available to the survivor.

If at any point, a character drops some or all of the load weight they are carrying, their maximum Stamina cap will instantly increase (the character's Stamina will need to regenerate back to the new maximum value).

#### Blood Type

 *See Also: Blood*

A blood type is a classification of blood, based on the presence and absence of antibodies and inherited antigenic substances on the surface of red blood cells. In *DayZ* every character is randomly given a specific blood type on character creation. This blood type is unique to that character, does not transfer when a new character is spawned, and is not carried over to other characters created in separate lives. A character's blood type affects their ability to donate or receive blood transfusions.

Blood Type Compatibility Table

2. AB+ is the universal recipient; can receive from anyone without checking.
3. O can transfer to O, A, B, or AB
4. A can transfer to A or AB
5. B can transfer to B or AB
6. AB can only transfer to AB
7. (-) can transfer to (-) or (+)
8. (+) can only transfer to (+)

#### Specialty (Soft Skills)

Soft Skills apply a modifier to your character. Its level can be seen in the bottom corner of the inventory view. Towards the threaded needle, the player is able to complete certain "precise" actions faster, and towards the hammer do more "rough" actions, such as cutting down trees and building structures faster. Nearly all actions shift the level to either direction as they're performed.

At the moment, the soft skills are effectively useless due to the skill level intermittently resetting to zero.

## Conditions

Conditions are changes, either temporary or permanent, to a character's state or body that differs from the norm. Conditions are typically the result of an action, but can also be the result of a stat change or even another condition. Most conditions also tend to cause one or more modifiers.

### Illness & Disease

Beyond the more obvious physical injuries, Survivors are also subject to contracting various illnesses or diseases. Infection can occur in a variety of ways, ranging from drinking dirty water to contact with another infected survivor.

The following chart gives a basic overview of the ailments. Visit their pages for more detailed information.

#### Stuffed Stomach

Eating too much food or drinking too much water too quickly. Can lead to Vomiting.

#### Hypothermia

The player is freezing due to a lack of warmth. Loss of body heat is caused due to prolonged exposure to cold weather, not wearing warm enough clothing or getting wet. It results in rapid loss of energy and, if left unmanaged, the player could freeze to death.

Treatment for hypothermia includes increasing your body temperature and re-energizing yourself. Get out of the cold and into warm, dry clothing. You can also use a heatpack. Fire from fireplace, torches, and flares, are, by far, the most effective method. Increased activity, reducing wetness, and avoiding wind also help.

#### Wetness

The overall level of water saturation affects a character's clothing and possessions. Characters get wet when they are exposed to rain or when entering a body of water. As a character's level of wetness rises, a status indicator in the HUD appears to warn you of your character and your items being wet. After leaving the body of water or getting out of the rain, the character's level of wetness will decrease gradually until they are completely dry.

A character's level of wetness has no direct effect on their health, instead, it affects clothing by reducing its heat insulation value as well as equipment by making saturated items heavier (and this reducing maximum stamina). This will also cause a reduction in the character's body temperature, which can be beneficial if they are suffering from hyperthermia, otherwise, it may cause them to eventually suffer from hypothermia.

If a character has gotten wet, there are a few options for getting dry again.

* **Run around for a while.** If you keep moving, especially at a quick pace, you will "air dry" over time.
* **Wring out your clothes.** If you open the inventory screen and drag wet clothing to your hands you will have the option to wring them out (twist them to get the water out). Each spin of the action timer equates to a reduction in one level of wetness (Drenched -> Soaked -> Wet -> Damp), dramatically speeding up the drying process. Wringing does not progress past damp.
* **Sit next to a fireplace.** This is by far the most effective method. Placing wet clothes near a fire will also dry them.

## Modifiers

Modifiers are effects that normally cause changes, either gradually or instantly, to character stats. Modifiers can also cause changes in everything from character animations, to control or even visual effects. Some modifiers may have a visual or audio cue, while others are represented in the HUD.

### Injury

Injuries can be caused by a wide variety of actions and events; from attacks by the Infected or wild animals to falling to violent encounters with other Survivors, injuries come in many forms. The effects of these injuries can range from minor inconvenience (pain, limping, etc.) to life-threatening (severe bleeding, unconsciousness, etc) and everything in between. Some injuries, such as falling several stories from a building, or sustaining a gunshot wound, will kill a character instantly.

### Regeneration

All stats can be restored or treated through natural regeneration or medical treatments. Medical treatments are much faster, but require the use of medical supplies.

#### Blood

 *See Also: Blood*

* Saline Bag
* IV Blood Bag

#### Health

 *See Also: Health*

Health recovers slowly, over time on its own. While Health is always regenerating, the rate at which it does so depends primarily on your Blood level, which is in turn affected by your Energy and Water levels. Additionally, every part of your body, including your overall health, regenerates at the same speed at the same time.

Much like in life, however, natural regeneration is the only way to restore Health. There are no items or treatments that will cause your character to instantly regain missing Health.

If a survivor is injured, Codeine Pills and a Morphine Auto-Injector can be used to reduce shock and allow a Survivor to gradually or immediately gain back some if not all stamina. Codeine Pills and Morphine help little with broken bones.

#### Shock

 *See Also: Shock*

Unlike Health & Blood, Shock regenerates relatively quickly and, with one exception, all of the time. Taking Shock damage will stop the regeneration effect for approximately 15 seconds. Regeneration speed is affected by the character's state of consciousness; with slower regeneration occurring while a character is unconscious.

#### Stamina

 *See Also: Stamina*

As long as a character is not performing an action that is physically exhausting, they are regenerating Stamina. The speed of its regeneration is dependent on what the character is doing at that moment.

As Stamina is more or less a representation of a character's current level of fatigue and already has an extremely quick recovery time, there are no medical treatments available to restore Stamina.

## Trivia

* Previously in the DayZ Mod, *Blood* was used as a way to indicate overall health.

## See Also

1. Medical Supplies
2. Survival
3. Survivors