Fifth Element & DayZ Standalone.

Hello brothers, sisters and long lost sons!

As many of you know by now the DayZ Standalone has finally arrived.
In the beginning of it's development stages I used to check up on it regularly, but as time went by I found myself checking less and less.
This somewhat resulted in the fact that the release kinda came out of nowhere for me.

It's awesome to see all the familiar faces back at it again.
I would be lying if I said I did not expected it, but it's still amazing to see how fast and easy this process went.
I guess a big, warm, sweaty, welcoming, re-uniting beargrouphug is in order! Love you guys!
So with that awkward moment out of the way,(let go of me hamskin!) I wanted to share a few words with you guys.

I guess one of the questions on peoples mind right now is 'What's next for 5th?'.
Or at least, it's a question on my mind.
And well, if you ask me, I would say that it is mainly up to you guys.

Many of you have been waving our flag proudly for well over 2 years now.
I like to believe that one of the reasons why the earlier mentioned process went so fast and easy is because
5th's core foundation was built on equality, and one of our golden pillars was that everyone should enjoy themselves in the way they wanted.
Without rules, restrictions and boundaries each and everyone of you returned here out of your own choosing.
Many things are a testament to that, from the earlier expansions into other games, the long lasting bond between members and some of the initiatives taken recently.
It seems one of our lifetime members milkdudz has already set up a server for us to enjoy.

I'm not just talking to our 'old' members here, but sharing a slice of background to newcomers as well.
And with that, more questions rise like 'What about recruitment?'

More than 2 years is a long time.
People's lives might have changed, their situations, their idea's, their interpretations of fun, hell people themselves might have completely changed.
And as I swore on the first day that 5th Element will at least be here until the very day I die, it does not mean it cannot change.
Sure, a lot of my personal visions, norms and values were seeded in 5th's roots and they haven't changed much, but you guys know very well by now that one of those 'seeds' is a ideal that everything is up for debate so if ever the need arises to make a change for the betterment of 5th and it's members, it would be carefully evaluated and democratically voted upon.

As everyone else, these questions lead to a process of thoughts and I shall share a few before we reach the conclusion of this post, which hopefully displays the actual point of "WTF is this post actually about?"
One of my example thoughts: Goddamn forum bots.
I guess one of the downsides of having a free forum compared to a self-hosted one is the lack of proper security updates.
Sure we can blow off the dust and remove them, re-organize and clean everything up till it's tidy again.
But I much rather set fire to it and not having to deal with hundreds of advertisements about penis enlargements or the like.
(And by setting fire I mean, abandoning it and preserving it for memory lane).
Another thought is that I personally don't feel milkdudz should have to chew the server bill on his own. Same goes for Fish whose currently paying for the teamspeak server.
I know these guys don't mind and do not expect anything in return.
And as always, we will never 'force' you to pay anything, it's just that I want to, and I know some others might too.
So, we could look into setting up something similar to the 5th donation pot we used to have, but we'll get to that eventually.

Reading up trough this post it seems I might have digressed here and there as is not uncommon for me,
but I felt it needed a bit of a head-start to properly lead into the actual 'meat' of the post.

Which, quite simply, is a single question: What do you guys like to see in the future of 5th with the arrival of DayZ Standalone?
This can literally entail anything.
To clarify, I shall post a few random examples.

Maybe you want us to have a proper website again?
Maybe you want the concept we had of squads back and you have a shitload of awesome idea's for it?
Or perhaps you feel you have grown a lot and it is about time you take control of a few more ropes?
Ofcourse, you can be happy with the way things are/were, it's not like we have to change things just for the sake of change.

Take note that these are not actual questions, but merely examples to portray the variety of feedback.
Basically, anything you can think of. Every suggestion, idea, brainfart of random creativity, I like to hear it.

It wouldn't be right for me after all this time to just step in and expect everyone to be satisfied with the infrastructure and guidelines laid down years ago.
I think we can say one thing for sure though, and that's that everyone is excited to play together again, and we are gonna have a equally epic time if not more as we used to!

So hopefully you have made it trough this long post and care spare a few minutes to give some feedback.
Per usual you will be updated trough our regular channels of communications and in addition to this post, we will of course discuss things on teamspeak meanwhile as well.
Should the need arise for a more structured 'conference', all the parties involved will be properly notified.


Weeeeeeeeeeeeee! Time to kick some ass!

one thing we gonna have to practise on again is squad play and not talking over one another  in a heated situation.