I think the distinction people are missing is comparing other kinds of MMOs to MMORPGs. DayZ is actually more of an MMO than most post WoW "MMORPG" games, but its far LESS of an RPG. In fact its not really at all.

RPGs are games where you act out the role of a fictional character. Character based naratives often involve "character progression", where the character changes throughout the story. In many RPGs, this is implemented by an XP or "levelling" system. So, XP is a common trope in the RPG genre, but it in no way defines it. What defines it is role play.

For example, Realm of the Mad God is a perma-death MMO with experience/levelling/inventories, but there's no real role playing. Your character makes progress, yes, but the core mechanic is a "bullet hell" game. At no point do you have to act our the role of a character.
DayZ's core mechanic is a survival horror FPS, with character progression via an inventory. However, whenever you encounter another survivor, the game is all about role play. Unlike most FPS games that just let your control your body/arms, it also lets you independently turn your head from your arms, and talk from your character's mouth, which allows for a great deal of acting. Some people choose to role-play as bandits who rob others for essentials before letting them go with their basic gear, others role-play crazed axe murderers, others role-play heroic medics responding to calls for help, others role-play the selfish loner who shoots his new friend in the back for a can of beans, others role-play kidnappers...
Searching for DayZ stories threads brings up so many interesting characters, plots and quests, for a game that's supposedly not about role playing ;)

There is really nothing a week or month old player in DayZ can't do that a 5 year player can do.[/quote]Yes, so basically you can hit the "level cap" in about 12 hours instead of 12 months. That's a somewhat sensible design choice when you're making a perma-death game where the average life expectancy is 1 hour. If it took 12 months to reach the 'level cap' it probably wouldn't be very popular.

It might work in a Mad Maxx style world, or zombie scenario because everything is in ruin, and it's all finders keepers.

But the concept is flawed for several reasons.

First off---

The so called victims are supposed to be scavenging stuff. Well, that's an investment. People in general make low risk investments that are likely to pay off in the future. Saving up and buying a house is a safe investment because even though anyone can kick down your door and burn it to the ground, we have checks and balances to stop that from happening. The odds of losing your investment here are low, and even then, you have insurance. Any investment that has a high risk of not paying off down the road, or is likely to just disappear, is a bad investment, and a waste of time, energy, and resources.

Second---

There is no reason for the behavior of the PVP player, online or off. It's behavior that is incompatible with the concept of of any life form. The goal of any life form is to survive, adapt, and reproduce. Any time something stands in the way of that goal, the life form will band together and eliminate it. Doesn't matter if you are a person,an ant, a polar bear, or a virus. The second a member of any community goes into business for itself and takes any action that is contrary to it's survival or reproductive abilities, it's over for them. The only exception is when there is some kind of artificial barrier that stops nature from taking it's course.

This is anti-social, defective behavior, and the consequences are permanent.

So you'd have a situation trying to simulate people taking on high risk, no payoff investments for the amusement of people who enjoy consequence free incorrect behavior. It doesn't add up, so it doesn't catch on.

I can appreciate a high-risk game environment, that's what most FPS multiplayer is based on anyways. I think Hodgman put it best when analyzing DayZ: the level cap doesn't represent a huge investment by the player, so having accomplished something in gameplay only to lose the avatar of that accomplishment doesn't come with quite the sting of losing the embodiment of 6 months of your life.

The takeaway from this whole discussion should include: permadeath/open pvp/free looting CAN work, but it needs specific environmental and gameplay factors to foster a continuous playerbase.

Your standard MMORPG fare (at least, before the F2P boom) rewarded people for longevity of playtime, because the developers made more money the longer you paid for your account. That meant a lot of the trophies and sought-after "wins" were cleverly disguised time sinks. Ridiculously low drop-rate items, 250-step recipes and raid ladders, etc. No one (without the guarantee of victory) would take that much of an investment into a battle with the potential of losing it, or wear it around if a poorly timed connection lag coincided with a bandit raid on their house. So for most MMORPGs, full-on pvp just doesn't fit.

Designing specifically for the potential of unrestricted hostility means lowering or recalibrating the investment level. In DayZ you can revel in a long-lived character that's been around for *gasp* an entire day! Another thought is to have short-lived persistence: the game world resets every month, bringing everyone back to 0, and perhaps your accomplishments in the last life net you some manner of (non compounding) bonuses but nothing overpowering.

I think the resistance by most "carebear" players (a group I'd easily fall in 9 games out of 10) stems from the thought of unchecked infliction of loss on their achievements. People do primarily play games for the escapist element: challenges and heroics in a system you can learn and eventually master without losing anything but time, with no repercussions in reality. Getting mopped up in an FPS deathmatch is a loss of up to an hour or so. Getting your 3-year strong-bond MMO hero wiped out because someone found you while you were mining or up getting a sandwich: that potential just adds stress to a recreational activity.

Those are some loosely connected thoughts, I'll just stop here.