Spearpoint Field Manual

This manual is a reference, not a memorization test. Read the path for your role, then come back when the situation demands it. Terms are defined where they matter and collected in the Glossary (Chapter 29).

Tags show which playstyle gets the most from a section. They do not restrict access; all companies can read everything.

FM 0.1 How to Cite This Manual

Every section of this manual carries a field citation — FM 9.4 means Chapter 9, Section 4. Officers quote these like a rule book: "per FM 9.4, explosives stay in EOD." When a rule appears in more than one chapter, every copy carries the citation of the chapter where the rule canonically lives.

We are neutral-good: we give gear and supplies to the less fortunate, recruit, and build alliances before wars. Do not mistake that for weakness—we can and will decimate and destroy if pushed. We never take damage without retaliation and restitution.

FM 1.1 Nine ranks. No more.

Structure: Regiment → Battalion → Company → Platoon → Squadron → Privates. Battalions are one per platform: 1st PC, 2nd PlayStation, 3rd Xbox. Each battalion fields three companies — PvE first, PvP second, RP third — of three platoons each, numbered regiment-wide 1–27 (platoon numbers never reset per company): 1st Battalion (PC): Alpha 1–3 (PvE), Bravo 4–6 (PvP), Charlie 7–9 (RP). 2nd Battalion (PlayStation): Delta 10–12 (PvE), Echo 13–15 (PvP), Foxtrot 16–18 (RP). 3rd Battalion (Xbox): Golf 19–21 (PvE), Hotel 22–24 (PvP), India 25–27 (RP). A platoon occupies one isolated server hive; characters, gear, and alliances do not transfer. A squadron is 8–12 soldiers under a Sergeant. Unit nicknames are optional — Bravo Company is “Bastard Company,” and 4th Platoon are the “Hell Dogs.”

The special forces platoons (4th, 13th, 22nd — one per battalion, each its PvP company’s first platoon) carry higher ranks than line platoons: team member is a Corporal, Team Leader a Sergeant, Squad Leader a Staff Sergeant, XO a Lieutenant, Commander a Captain. Titles are unchanged — only the ranks are elevated.

FM 1.2 Field identification

• Green armband on the left arm outside the wire.
• Squadron-based callsigns are assigned by the Sergeant.
• Challenge-and-password is mission-specific, set by the relevant commander or Squad Leader and passed verbally.
• Night operations use the designated chemlight color for that operation.

FM 1.3 Rank headwear

Private and Corporal: green Chernarussian Military Beret. Sergeant and Staff Sergeant: Red Military Beret. Lieutenant and above: Officer Hat. The 4th, 13th, and 22nd Platoons are the Regiment’s special forces platoons—one per battalion. Special forces platoon members, any rank, wear the black beret instead of their rank headwear — no exceptions. This supersedes the Officer Hat as well as the green and red rank berets: an SF Lieutenant wears black. Headwear is expected off operations, but never mandatory and never worn on operations; protection comes first.

Minimum age is 16. That is the floor, not the standard. Maturity means other people can trust you with responsibility.

FM 2.1 Non-negotiable conduct

• Respect people. No harassment, bullying, slurs, or hate speech. Zero tolerance means instant removal.
• No sexual content or advances. Keep communications clean enough for the youngest member present.
• Protect personal information. Never share a real name, photo, school, address, or location without explicit permission. What is said in the faction stays there.
• No cheating, duping, glitching, or exploiting. In our servers or anyone else's. Instant exile.
• Use the chain of command. Orders flow down; issues flow up. Never skip links or take disputes sideways. Handle them privately, never in public channels.
• Represent the faction everywhere. Your behavior is our reputation in our servers, other Discords, and game chat.
• Treason means removal. Inside-raiding, leaking codes, or aiding enemies means rank stripped, exile, and blacklist from every server.

FM 2.2 Hostile status

A hostile is anyone who ignores safety orders, takes hostile action, or makes threats. On PvP servers inside PvP companies, an outsider must comply and not resist to remain non-hostile — an unknown outsider is more likely hostile than not. The Code of Conduct protects militiamen; it does not extend Geneva-style protections to hostile outsiders.

Every rank's duties, authority, and expectations are written here, public to the whole regiment. There are no locked channels for this: a Private should know what his Sergeant owes him, and a Colonel should remember what it was to be a Private. Ranks run in career order, Private to Colonel — the order a career follows.

The responsibility cascade. Privates carry no responsibility — not for others, not even for themselves; their seniors presume it. From Corporal upward, each rank answers for the failings of the rank below it: the Corporal for his Privates, the Sergeant for his teams, and so on up the chain. Authority climbs the same ladder.

Orders. Below battalion level, all operational coordination travels by word of mouth — voice channels or in-game comms. Codes and coordinates are the exception: they live only in clearance-gated channels (Chapter 22). If an order isn't written down, that is intentional, not an oversight.

Conflicting orders. The superior officer's order takes precedence over the junior officer's — in combat, follow the superior order. A commander owns friendly fire caused by a bad order; a reasonable good-faith call is not punished merely because the result was poor.

OPSEC scales with rank. The higher the rank, the more it holds, the more it guards. Clearance-gated information never leaves its channels, is never written outside them, and never flows downward to the unvetted.

Promotion is governed by the two-rank rule (Chapter 24): a promotion may only be awarded by someone at least two ranks above the rank being granted. Every promotion below is earned — never asked for.

FM 3.1 Private

The Private is where everyone starts: trainee and workforce in one, granted on enlistment. Privates are the muscle that keeps the server alive — shooting, building, supply runs, vehicle work, medical support. Everything a server needs to thrive runs through this rank. The Private holds no official command title: there is no command to title. Backbone is description, not title — and it is accurate.

Duties. Train in every discipline: marksmanship, base building, vehicle maintenance, land navigation, field medical. There are no specialties — the day's work is set by vocal orders and what the server needs, not by a job title. Do what you're told. Learn.

Authority. None. A Private issues orders to no one — not to fellow Privates, not to anyone. Disagreement goes up the chain privately; never sideways, never in front of the ranks.

Expectations. There are none beyond obedience and learning, and that is deliberate. Seniors presume the Private carries limited responsibility: he answers for his own actions under close oversight, but he is not yet trusted to make every decision independently. His failings belong to his Corporal.

Chain. Answers to his Corporal, the Team Leader, then his Sergeant, the Squad Leader. Never skips links.

OPSEC. A Private holds no codes and asks for none in text channels. New Privates operate out of recruit outposts until vetted; codes pass verbally from the Platoon Commanding Officer only.

Promotion. Corporal follows vetting, conferred by Staff Sergeant or higher. Earn it. Don't ask for it.

Handbook weight: real doctrine treats the junior enlisted as the foundation of the force, and discipline as instant, willing obedience to orders.

FM 3.2 Corporal — Team Leader

The Corporal is the first step into leadership and the last day of being only a worker: the base of the NCO corps, and the officially recognized Team Leader.

Duties. Leads a team of 2 or 4 including himself — never 3, because buddy pairs are the smallest element and an odd team cannot pair. Takes the Sergeant's orders on the team's job, then delegates mission responsibility and details to his Privates. Checks his Privates' gear and understanding before anything else.

Authority. Field authority under his Sergeant. In the Sergeant's absence — or an emergency where waiting would cost lives or the objective — he makes the judgment call and owns it. Initiative is the job; recklessness is not. When in doubt, the Sergeant's last order stands. His authority covers his team only: he never countermands a superior and never orders another team.

Expectations. The role model — his Privates will copy what he does, not what he says. Knows the fundamentals cold; he cannot teach what he has not mastered. Leadership here is earned continuously, not granted once. And the hard rule: Privates are not responsible for their own failings. He is.

Chain. Answers to his Sergeant, the Squad Leader, then his Staff Sergeant, the Platoon Executive Officer. He is his Privates' first link in the chain — he handles their problems before they become his Sergeant's problems.

Promotion. Sergeant, awarded by Lieutenant or higher. Earn it. Don't ask for it.

Handbook weight: the corporal leads the smallest unit and owns its individual training — the transition from worker to leader, where responsibility for others begins.

FM 3.3 Sergeant — Squad Leader

The Sergeant is where real command lives — and where real teaching happens. Field commander and instructor both: he plans and leads operations, and he trains the faction — on the field manual, the doctrine, and in-game. His official title is Squad Leader.

Duties. Commands a squadron of 8–12 soldiers: usually two teams of four or three teams of four — sometimes a mix, such as two teams of four plus a team of two. Teams stay buddy-pair-compatible; odd teams don't exist. A server fields at most 20 online at one time, and at most 30 members are assigned to a server in total, including reserve. He leads through 2–3 Corporals as Team Leaders. Trains his militiamen in every discipline of the uniform standard, keeps the squadron sharp, supplied, and ready. Translates his officers' orders into tasks for his Corporals. Teaches his Corporals leadership skills — and answers for his teams' failings and mission failures the way his Corporals answer for their Privates'. Training platoon exception: in the 1st, 10th, and 19th Platoons — the regiment’s training platoons (Chapter 25) — the two Sergeants hold the billet of Drill Instructor: each trains eight Private recruits, with no Corporal team leaders under them. Eight trainees fits the 8–12 squadron scale; the billet exists only in the training platoons.

Authority. Full tactical command of his squadron under his Staff Sergeant and Lieutenant. Day-to-day, the field is his: wide autonomy, his calls, his responsibility. That autonomy ends where poor judgment begins — consistently bad calls, failure to enforce faction policy, or weak leadership, and his superior removes him from command and replaces him.

Expectations. The militiamen's mentor — approachable, but never so familiar it weakens the chain. The standard his squadron measures itself against. He trains constantly: a squadron that isn't improving is dying.

Chain. Answers to his Staff Sergeant, the Platoon Executive Officer, then his Lieutenant, the Platoon Commanding Officer. His Corporals answer to him.

OPSEC. Clearance-gated access. He vets his people before they ever see a code, and new Privates stay in recruit outposts until they've earned trust.

Promotion. Staff Sergeant, awarded by Captain or higher. Most Sergeants never take that step — and that's fine. This rank is a destination, not a waiting room.

Handbook weight: Army doctrine holds that the sergeant very possibly has the greatest impact on junior soldiers of any rank — and that there is no apprenticeship: from day one his authority equals any NCO's.

FM 3.4 Staff Sergeant — Platoon Executive Officer

The Staff Sergeant is most often the platoon XO: second in command of the entire server, directly under the Lieutenant. His official title is Platoon Executive Officer. Enforcer is what the job looks like from the outside — description, not title. Where the Sergeant runs the field, the Staff Sergeant runs the standard.

Duties. Enforces the Code of Conduct and the training standard across the whole server — every squadron, every soldier, no exceptions. Inspects, audits, corrects. Settles grievances and issues reprimands. When the Lieutenant is absent, the server is his. Training platoon exception: in the 1st, 10th, and 19th Platoons — the regiment’s training platoons (Chapter 25) — the Staff Sergeant holds the billet of Senior Drill Instructor: the platoon’s senior enlisted leader, running recruit training rather than the usual platoon-XO duties.

Authority. Speaks with the Lieutenant's authority. May halt any operation, inspect any position, and correct any soldier on the spot — including Sergeants. He doesn't need to be liked. He needs to be obeyed. His authority runs over juniors; to officers, he is an advisor.

Expectations. Knows the Code and every training standard cold — he cannot enforce what he doesn't know better than everyone else. Fair, firm, feared just enough. Corruption or favoritism in this seat is the fastest way to lose it.

Chain. Answers only to his Lieutenant, the Platoon Commanding Officer. Every Sergeant on the server answers to him.

OPSEC. The highest clearance on the server short of the Lieutenant. Codes, stashes, and sensitive data flow through him — they never leave the gated channels and never flow downward to the unvetted.

Promotion. Lieutenant, awarded by Major or higher. Few make that jump — this seat is where enforcers belong.

Handbook weight: real doctrine separates the staff sergeant from the sergeant not by authority but by scope of influence — and holds that the staff sergeant's success drives the Army's success more than any other NCO grade.

FM 3.5 Lieutenant — Platoon Commanding Officer

The Lieutenant is the first commissioned rank and the main authority in the faction: commanding officer, visionary, and planner of one server. His official title is Platoon Commanding Officer. Governor of the server is description, not title. One server, one Lieutenant, total responsibility.

Duties. Sets the goals and missions for the platoon as a whole. Owns everything on the server: its defense, its economy, its alliances, its discipline, its people. Keeps the platoon to regiment standard and passing the Captain's inspection. Every outcome on that server is his responsibility, good or bad.

Authority. His word is final on the server — no one below him countermands it. He adapts global faction policy to his server's local conditions as he sees fit. But autonomy is earned daily: consistently poor judgment, weak leadership, or failure to enforce faction policy, and the Captain removes him from command and installs someone who can. He never confuses independence with isolation — global policy still binds him.

Expectations. An officer in bearing, in discipline, in every decision: the server takes its character from him. Present daily — this rank is a job, not a title. Knows every Sergeant under him by name, strength, and weakness.

Chain. Answers to his Captain, the Company Commanding Officer. His Staff Sergeant serves as his Platoon Executive Officer; every soldier on the server answers to him.

OPSEC. The final authority on who sees what on his server — clearance access, vetting of new Privates, code distribution, all of it. A breach on his server is his failure.

Promotion. Captain, awarded by Lieutenant Colonel or higher. It means leaving the server behind for company command.

Handbook weight: the officer's burden is absolute — real doctrine: a commander is responsible for everything the unit does or fails to do. "Seek responsibility and take responsibility for your actions."

FM 3.6 Captain — Company Commanding Officer

The Captain is company command. He owns every server running his playstyle on his platform — all the PvE servers, all the PvP servers, or all the RP servers under his battalion. His Lieutenants govern their servers; he governs the playstyle. His official title is Company Commanding Officer.

Duties. Supervises his three servers by inspection and presence: logs in, checks his Lieutenants — is the chain of command followed, are bases efficient and to code for security and supply, is the leadership sound, is policy followed.

Command. Three companies per battalion, one per playstyle — 1st PvE, 2nd PvP, 3rd RP: Alpha, Bravo, Charlie on PC; Delta, Echo, Foxtrot on PlayStation; Golf, Hotel, India on Xbox. Same playstyle on different platforms means different Captains.

Authority. Every Lieutenant in the company answers to him.

Chain. Answers to his Major, the Battalion Commanding Officer. He is assisted by the Company Executive Officer — the officially recognized deputy billet for company command.

OPSEC. Clearance discipline across the company is his responsibility — his Lieutenants hold the keys to their servers, and he makes sure they treat them that way.

Promotion. Major, awarded by Regiment Command (Lieutenant Colonel or higher). It means leaving the playstyle behind for platform command.

Handbook weight: company command is the first true command — accountable for the readiness, good order, and discipline of the whole unit, not just its field performance.

FM 3.7 Major — Battalion Commanding Officer

The Major is platform command — and nothing else. He owns an entire gaming platform: PC, PlayStation, or Xbox. Every company, every server, every soldier on that platform answers to him. He is not the Regiment Executive Officer, not a deputy, not staff. Battalion commander is the whole job, and his official title is Battalion Commanding Officer.

Duties. Responsible for everything on his platform: the health of every server, the quality of every Captain, the enforcement of faction policy across companies. Supervises his Captains the way they supervise their Lieutenants — by inspection, presence, and judgment. A Captain with consistently poor judgment, weak leadership, or who won't enforce policy is removed from command and replaced; that call is his, and he doesn't hesitate on it. Battalion-wide administration across nine platoons.

Authority. Every Captain on the platform answers to him.

Expectations. Knows his platform — its servers, its populations, its problems, all of it, all the time. Decisive: three companies look to him for the final word, and dithering at this level rots the whole battalion. Holds the line between companies — playstyle rivalries stay healthy and never become faction fractures. His eyes stay on his platform, not the Colonel's desk.

Chain. Answers to Regiment Command — the Colonel and the Lieutenant Colonel. He is assisted by the Battalion Executive Officer — the officially recognized deputy billet for battalion command.

OPSEC. Clearance discipline across the platform is his responsibility: three companies of keys, codes, and sensitive data.

Promotion. Lieutenant Colonel, awarded by the Colonel and only the Colonel. Be undeniable.

Handbook weight: field-grade leadership — strategic judgment, decisiveness under uncertainty, the level where administration and command fuse into one responsibility.

FM 3.8 Lieutenant Colonel — Regiment Executive Officer

There is one Lieutenant Colonel. He is the executive officer of the entire regiment: second in command — under the Colonel's command. The Colonel outranks him and commands him; that is the hierarchy, full stop. His official title is Regiment Executive Officer. In the Colonel's absence, the regiment is his.

Duties. Shares global command: faction-wide strategy, final policy authority, responsibility for everything across all three platforms. The Majors answer to him and the Colonel both.

Authority. The Colonel's second in practical authority and power — but he answers to the Colonel alone, and when both are present the Colonel's order takes precedence. There is no appeal above him except the Colonel himself.

Expectations. Thinks in the whole faction, always: platforms, playstyles, servers, all of it at once. The Colonel's true second — the one who tells him what he needs to hear, not what he wants to hear. Judgment beyond question; everyone below watches to see whether the top is solid.

Chain. Answers to no one but the Colonel, the Regiment Commanding Officer. Every Major in the faction answers to him.

OPSEC. The keys to the kingdom: every clearance, every code, every secret in the faction is his to grant or revoke.

Succession. There is no promotion above this rank.

Handbook weight: the XO is the commander's principal assistant — empowered to act in his name, and judged on whether the machine runs identically with the commander absent.

FM 3.9 Colonel — Regiment Commanding Officer

There is exactly one Colonel: the faction owner. His official title is Regiment Commanding Officer. Owner of the faction is description, not title — though it is also the plain truth. Everything the light touches is his — every platform, every company, every server, every soldier, every code, every stash.

Duties. Faction-wide strategy, final policy, absolute authority. The success of the faction rests on his shoulders: to be a true and effective leader and administrator. The buck doesn't stop here. The buck lives here.

Authority. The final word on everything, full stop. No appeals, no higher chain, no one to overrule him. The Lieutenant Colonel stands beside him as Regiment Executive Officer — second in daily command, answering to him alone.

Expectations. Remembers what it was to be a Private — it makes him a better ruler. Succession planning is his problem now.

Succession. There isn't one. The only way anyone becomes Colonel is if the owner relinquishes authority and walks away — voluntarily. The manual declines to speculate on the circumstances, dignified or otherwise. If you're reading this as your own section: congratulations on your totally legitimate rise — and sleep with one eye open.

Handbook weight: at the top there is no doctrine left but judgment — ADP 6-22 reduces to character, presence, and intellect, and the owner supplies all three or the faction doesn't survive him.

DayZ hides your raw numbers. You read your body through HUD badges, screen effects, animations, and sound. Learn to read them the way you read a dashboard — by the time something turns red, you are already late.

FM 4.1 The HUD

Bottom right, five icons, left to right: water, energy (food), body temperature, blood, health. An icon turns red when that stat is critical. Temperature can also turn blue — too cold. Keep everything out of the red.

FM 4.2 Health and Blood

Health runs 0–100 and starts at 100. Zero is instant death. Nothing restores it instantly — it regenerates on its own, and only when your blood, food, and water allow it.

Blood runs 0–5,000 and starts full. Bleeding is what drains it, and serious blood-loss effects begin around 3,000. Blood regenerates only if you are fed and watered: with energy and water both above 600 you recover about 18 blood per minute; if water drops below 300, regeneration stops entirely; if energy drops below 300, your health starts draining until you eat — that is starvation.

To put blood back fast: a blood bag IV gives 500 blood instantly but requires a matching blood type — test donor and recipient with a blood test kit first, because incompatible blood causes a hemolytic reaction. O− is the universal donor; AB+ the universal recipient. A saline IV works for everyone: it multiplies your natural blood regeneration five times for about three minutes and restores hydration.

FM 4.3 Shock

Shock runs 0–100. Injury and blood loss drain it. At 25 and below you go unconscious; you wake at 51 and above. You do not get a number on screen — your field of view closes into a black circle as shock drops. Epinephrine restores 100 shock instantly, on yourself or someone else, conscious or not. CPR on an unconscious survivor restores 2.5 per second.

FM 4.4 Food, Water, Stamina

Energy and water each run 0–5,000 and both start at 600 — you spawn already needing a meal and a drink. Your stomach holds 2 liters; cram past that and you vomit it back up. Digestion takes a few minutes, so eat before you are desperate.

Stamina runs 0–100. Sprinting and swimming drain it gradually; jumping and melee drain it instantly; rest restores it. Weight shrinks the pool: the first 6 kg are free, then you lose about 1.75 max stamina per extra kilo. Low stamina means weapon sway.

FM 4.5 Temperature

Cold body temperatures constantly burn energy — roughly 12–27 per minute at the cold stages. Standing near a heat source builds a heat buffer (shown as a + in the UI) that protects you from the cold for a while. Extreme cold inland drops your temperature fast. Stay dry, stay fed, stay near fire.

FM 4.6 Bleeding and Fractures

Bleeding: bandage first, everything else can wait sixty seconds. Use a bandage, rags, bandana, or sewing kit — and use disinfected materials (Chapter 05 explains why an unclean bandage can be worse than the wound).

Fracture: caused by falls, crashes, and heavy hits. Craft a splint from 1 unused bandage + 2 short sticks (or 4 rags + 2 sticks), hold it, and use Fix Fracture. With a splint you walk slowly — no running or jumping — and heal in about 30 minutes. A broken leg drops you prone; trying to walk it off without a splint causes shock damage until you pass out. Morphine or epinephrine keeps you conscious through the pain.

Disease kills more beginners than bullets do. Every disease below is verified against the DayZ Wiki — which itself warns its status page may be incomplete, so treat this chapter as current vanilla knowledge, not gospel.

Your best defense is your immune system: keep water, food, blood, and stamina high. The wiki's prevention thresholds are immunity above 95% against cholera, above 65% against colds and flu.

FM 5.1 Cholera

Cause: drinking from ponds, rivers, or stagnant water; drinking from found bottles and canteens of unknown origin; sharing food or drink with an infected player — including reinfecting yourself.

In-game symptoms: vomiting, blurred vision, dehydration, fever.

Treatment: tetracycline or multivitamins. Eat and drink in small amounts until cured so you stop vomiting it back up.

Prevention: drink only from water pumps (always safe) or purified water.

FM 5.2 Salmonella (Food Poisoning)

Cause: raw or rotten meat, fat, or guts; eating or drinking with bloody hands.

In-game symptoms: vomiting, health damage, pain noises, blurred vision.

Treatment: charcoal tablets (fast) or multivitamins (slow).

Prevention: cook animal products, wash your hands, wear gloves while quartering carcasses.

FM 5.3 Common Cold → Influenza

Cause: cold exposure or contact with a sick player. An untreated cold becomes influenza — its second stage.

In-game symptoms: sneezing (cold); coughing, sneezing, fever, blurred screen (flu).

Treatment: tetracycline or multivitamins for both. Staying warm fights a cold naturally, but far slower.

Prevention: immunity above 65%, keep distance (and masks) from the sick, do not share consumables.

FM 5.4 Wound Infection

Cause: closing a wound with non-disinfected material — or letting it self-heal. Infection chance: unclean bandage 5%, unclean rags or bandana 15%, unclean sewing kit 30%, letting bleeding stop on its own 40%.

Stage 1 (about 20 minutes): periodic pain sounds, blurred vision, 50% slower stamina regeneration. Cure: disinfect the wound directly (disinfectant spray, iodine or alcoholic tincture). Tetracycline does not work in stage 1.

Stage 2: louder pain, fever, shaking hands, constant water and health drain — dead in about 40 minutes untreated. Cure: 2–4 tetracycline pills.

Prevention: use materials with the Disinfected inventory tag. Immune strength does not prevent wound infection.

FM 5.5 Brain Prion Disease

Cause: eating human flesh — cooked or raw.

In-game symptoms: hand tremors when aiming, uncontrollable laughter.

Treatment: none. Permanent until respawn. Do not eat people.

FM 5.6 Chemical Poisoning

Cause: gasoline, burnt or rotten food, drinking alcoholic tinctures or disinfectant.

In-game symptoms: vomiting, water and energy loss, fatigue.

Treatment: none — clears naturally over time. (Some manuals claim charcoal; the wiki lists no cure. Wiki wins.)

FM 5.7 Heart Attack

Cause: rapid blood loss or massive shock. Symptoms: health damage, unconsciousness, possible death. Treatment: epinephrine auto-injector. Community-verified across many sources; not documented on the wiki pages checked.

FM 5.8 Contaminated Zones (Gas Poisoning)

Symptoms: coughing, vomiting, bleeding, unconsciousness, health damage. Treatment: PO-X antidote, or blood bag IVs with clean uncontaminated blood. Prevention: full NBC suit with a gas mask and working filters.

FM 5.9 The Medicine Cabinet

• Tetracycline — cholera, colds, flu, stage-2 wound infection. Not stage 1.
• Multivitamins — boosts immunity; treats cholera/cold/flu alongside tetracycline, salmonella alongside charcoal; boosts tetracycline's effect.
• Charcoal tablets — salmonella (fast cure).
• Epinephrine — 100 shock instantly; heart attacks.
• Morphine — pain; keeps you moving through fractures and low stamina. Codeine is the milder everyday painkiller.
• Saline IV — 5× blood regen for ~3 min + hydration; safe for all blood types.
• Disinfectant / iodine / alcoholic tincture — disinfect wounds (stage-1 cure) and dirty bandages.
• Chlorine tablets — purify water; kills cholera, salmonella, and flu pathogens.

The mechanics of staying alive: hands, kit, fire, food, water.

FM 6.1 Controls — PC

• WASD move · Shift+W sprint · C stance (stand/crouch/prone) · Space jump
• Q/E lean · Alt + mouse look without turning · V first/third person
• Tab inventory — drag items to quickbar slots, use with number keys
• F contextual interact · G throw held item, hold G to drop
• Caps Lock voice chat · Enter text chat (typing gets you killed — keep it short)
• R reload / chamber · X fire mode · PgUp/PgDn zeroing · hold Ctrl hold breath
• L flashlight/NVG (needs a battery) · F1–F11 gestures

FM 6.2 Controls — Xbox / PlayStation

No verified full console mapping was available at writing. The contextual action key is RB (Xbox) / R2 (PlayStation). For the rest, open Settings → Controls in-game and confirm — do not trust anyone's memory, including this manual's, over the settings screen.

FM 6.3 Inventory

Craft by combining items in the inventory screen. Store valuables at the bottom of your backpack — hits damage your worn gear from the outside in, so the deepest slot is the safest — and use protective cases for what matters. Food is edible at any condition except Ruined (but raw, burnt, or rotten risks disease); tools work at any condition except Ruined; worn weapons jam more, so clean early. Repairs bring items back to Worn, never better.

FM 6.4 Your First Blade

Priority one is a blade. Combine 2 small stones (railroad tracks, gravel) into a stone knife. Blades open cans, skin animals, cut rags, and strip bark.

FM 6.5 Fire

Combine kindling (bark, paper, rags, bandage) with fuel (short sticks, firewood) and ignite with matches, a lighter, a road flare, or a hand drill kit. Wind, rain, and snow fight you — and can kill the fire. A dying fire with fuel left can be reignited by blowing on it. Fireplaces and stoves inside buildings take fuel and kindling straight from your hands.

FM 6.6 Cooking

Simplest method: sharpen a long stick, attach one piece of food, stand near the fire and roast — the cooking circle fills in about a minute and a half; hold past that and the food burns. With a tripod and cooking pot you can boil and bake properly. Never put food in the fireplace's 10-slot cargo area — it is destroyed. Raw → baked is good; burnt and rotten risk food poisoning; burnt meat turns visibly black — throw it away.

FM 6.7 Water

Water pumps (wells) are always clean and safe. Ponds, rivers, troughs, and found containers are cholera risks. Purify with chlorine tablets or by boiling in a cooking pot. Wash bloody or dirty hands before eating or drinking — dirty hands contaminate.

FM 6.8 Your First Hour

Head inland. The coast is picked clean and crowded with the desperate and the dangerous; loot improves as you go. Crouch near buildings, because running is loud and burns calories and water you cannot spare. Do not run barefoot — it risks bleeding. Die learning: everyone's first ten lives are tuition.

Before other players are a problem, the locals will try to kill you. Learn how they hunt and you will walk through towns that eat beginners.

FM 7.1 The Infected

Infected see and hear. Noise is what kills you — running, breaking glass, and above all gunfire. A gunshot announces you across a wide area, and every shot after the first announces you louder. If the area is not safe, the gun is the last resort, not the first.

An alerted infected screams and runs — as fast as you, and it does not tire the way you do. You will not outrun a pack while loaded with gear. Instead:

• Break line of sight. Corners, buildings, evergreen trees. An infected that loses you wanders your last known position for a few minutes, then loses interest.
• Get inside and shut the doors. Infected cannot open closed doors. They will crowd the walls and windows — which makes them easy to dispatch through the openings.
• Climb. Ladders, car roofs, anything above their reach. They cannot follow you up.
• Throw something. Infected investigate the sound of a thrown item landing — use it to pull them off your path.
• Slow down. Crouch or go prone to shrink your noise and visibility. Most town deaths come from sprinting through the middle of it.

Killing quietly: sneak up behind an unaware infected with a blade for an instant stealth kill — nearby infected do not react to it. Headshots drop them fast when quiet is impossible. Their scratches and bites cause bleeding — bandage promptly and disinfect the wound afterward, as with any open wound. (Chapter 05).

FM 7.2 Wolves

Wolves tend to hunt in packs, and you will usually hear them before you see them. Do not try to outrun the pack — break away the same way you break infected: indoors with shut doors, or climb somewhere they cannot follow. A wolf bite is a bleeding wound like any other; treat it and disinfect it.

FM 7.3 Bears

Bears are rare and extremely dangerous. There is no clever trick — give them distance, do not engage alone, and do not get between a bear and anything it is interested in. If one charges, you were already too close.

Base-game PC weapons only. Militiamen may use whatever suits them. This chapter covers platforms worth knowing cold. Vanilla DayZ has no enabled light machine guns (LMGs). Do not build doctrine around cut content.

FM 8.1 Attachments worth knowing

Optics: PU; PSO-1, PSO-1-1, PSO-6; Hunting; Sportpoint; ATOG 4×/6×; Marksman. Night vision: 1PN51 eastern and PVS4 western. Red dots: Kobra, RVN, Combat, Baraka. Suppressors come in standardized NATO rifle, normalized eastern rifle, pistol/SMG, and improvised bottle families. Match family to weapon.

Everything the regiment owns lives somewhere, and where it lives decides who may touch it. Learn the locks before you need what is behind them.

FM 9.1 Clothing and Repair: Open to All

Clothing and repair items are publicly accessible. Any member — privates included — may take and use what they need from the open stock. If it keeps you clothed or keeps gear working, it is yours to use.

FM 9.2 Military Kit and Guns: Sergeant and Higher

Plate carriers, vests, helmets — any military kit — plus all guns are locked separately from the open stock. Only a Sergeant or higher in rank may open that lock. If you are a Private or Corporal and you need a gun or a plate carrier, you ask your Sergeant. You do not help yourself.

FM 9.3 Base Building Tools and Resources: Sergeant and Higher

Base building tools and building resources are locked under the same rule: Sergeant or higher only. Hammers, shovels, nails, planks, wire — if it builds the base, it stays behind the Sergeant's lock until a Sergeant says otherwise.

FM 9.4 Explosives and Grenades: EOD, Lieutenant and Higher

Explosives and grenades are locked separately as EOD — explosive ordnance stores. Only a Lieutenant or higher in rank may open EOD. Doctrine requires EOD to be its own separate lock, apart from every other store. Layering EOD inside the armory is recommended but not required — the separate lock is the rule; where it sits is the recommendation.

FM 9.5 Personal Storage: Earned, Not Guaranteed

No member is guaranteed individual personal storage. Only successful and profitable platoons have personal storage at all — it happens naturally, and whether the platoon can afford the resources for it is the platoon's Lieutenant's call. Where personal storage exists, that Lieutenant decides how it is separated by rank: corporals' storage, sergeants' storage, officers' storage. There is no private tier.

Personal storage is not for hoarding. It holds only your active kit — the gear you regularly use — plus a small reserve. Explosives are banned from personal storage entirely, no exceptions. Rare items the platoon could use do not belong in your box: hard-to-find guns like the M4 or the SVAL go to the platoon, not to you. Consumables are not a private stockpile either — you do not hoard duct tape, sewing kits, or the like.

FM 9.6 The Regiment Owns What the Regiment Needs

DayZ is a persistent open-world survival game. You have one life per character. Death removes everything you carry and puts you back on the coast with nothing.

FM 10.1 Joining the regiment

Start at the website's Discord link, submit the join application, then complete server onboarding. A superior will contact you — report to whichever Lieutenant, Staff Sergeant, or Sergeant approaches you. Operation times, server access, gear expectations, and everything else come through messaging, word of mouth, or whatever your superior provides. Details are never posted publicly.

FM 10.2 Your body

Health, blood, shock, stamina, and temperature are covered in depth in Chapter 04 — read it before your first deployment, not during.

FM 10.3 Survival rules

• Unsuppressed shots carry for hundreds of meters and attract infected and players.
• Crouching and going prone reduce noise; a slow crawl through grass is nearly invisible to infected.
• Darkness hides you from infected, not necessarily from players using high-gamma displays.
• Infected see and hear. Lights and gunfire draw them. Fight quietly unless you must go loud.
• Vanilla DayZ has no shops, traders, or currency. Loot is the economy. Modded servers may differ.

Trust your instincts

If you feel like someone might be close, they very well might be. Your subconscious picks up movement, sound, and wrongness faster than your thinking mind can name it — that uneasy feeling is usually your brain flagging something real. Learn the baseline of an area; anything that breaks it deserves your attention. When it hits, stop, get small, listen, and glass the area before you move. A false alarm costs a minute. Ignoring it can cost your kit.

A server is a platoon. Character, gear, and money never transfer between servers. Every platoon starts at zero, and settings such as loot, stamina, and perspective differ.

FM 10.4 What You May Touch on Day One

As a private, the open stock is yours: clothing and repair items, no permission needed (FM 9.1). Everything else is locked and stays locked: military kit and guns need a Sergeant or higher (FM 9.2); base building tools and resources need a Sergeant or higher (FM 9.3); explosives and grenades need a Lieutenant or higher (FM 9.4). There is no personal storage for privates — if you need something, ask your Corporal or Sergeant.

FM 11.1 Shoot

Condition runs Pristine → Worn → Damaged → Badly Damaged → Ruined. Weapons and magazines both contribute to jams. Clean early with a Weapon Cleaning Kit; a Ruined weapon cannot be saved. Set optic zero to the expected range and hold breath to steady. Low stamina means more sway. Use full-auto at spitting distance; use semi-auto beyond it.

Suppressors reduce noise; they do not erase it. They slightly improve accuracy and wear out. The improvised bottle suppressor lasts roughly six shots. Match NATO rifle, eastern rifle, or pistol suppressors to the correct weapon family.

FM 11.2 Treat

1. Stop bleeding first with a bandage or clean rags.
2. Splint a fracture — morphine or epinephrine keeps you conscious through the pain.
3. Use saline after major blood loss.
4. Use tetracycline for stage-2 infected wounds; vitamins or charcoal for illness.

FM 11.3 Navigate

The tourist map does not show your position by default. Match hills, roads, and coastlines to the map. Use map and compass together, pace-count distance, and use the sun by day or North Star by night. Always know your position by two independent methods.

FM 11.4 Communicate

Keep voice short and standard. Contact calls use relative direction from the group's movement vector — front, left, rear, right, combinations where useful — then distance: “Contact left!”, “Contact front!”, “Contact right!”, “Contact rear!” — add range when known: “Contact left, 200 meters!” Call “Reloading!” and “Moving!” when relevant. No chatter during contact.

Voice procedure legend

• Contact [direction]! — enemy sighted. Direction is always relative to the group's movement vector: left, front, right, rear. Add distance when known: “Contact rear, 200 meters!”
• Clear! — no combatants here. Say it only when you mean it.
• Reloading! — you are reloading; someone else covers your sector until you call back in.
• Moving! — you are changing position; friendlies hold fire on your lane.
• Last man! — rear guard’s call at halts; the column is closed up.
• Frag out! — grenade thrown; take cover immediately. Obey it instantly — the commander owns a bad employment decision, not you.

Secure comms run on Discord. Do not talk in game chat unless you are speaking to outsiders — anything said in game chat is heard by everyone in range, including the enemy.

FM 11.5 Joining Regiment Comms

Install Discord and get the regiment invite from your NCO — connection details are never posted publicly (Chapter 22). Set up push-to-talk before your first operation; an open mic broadcasts your breathing, your room, and your position. Discord is for secure comms. Game chat is only for speaking to outsiders. Learn the voice procedure legend above until the calls are reflex.

Positions are temporary assignments given by voice, not new ranks. The point man leads and enters first. The Corporal controls the fireteam from where everyone is visible. The rear guard watches back and calls “last man” at halts. Everyone has a buddy and watches that buddy's sector.

Teams are always even numbers. If a team splits, the smallest element it can split into is a buddy pair — two people who stay in proximity and never lose sight of each other.

FM 12.1 Movement techniques

• Contact not likely: traveling; everyone moves together.
• Contact possible: traveling overwatch; lead element about 50 m ahead.
• Contact expected: bounding overwatch; one moves, one covers.

Crouch near objectives. Sprint only across exposed danger. Avoid flashlights except during interior clearing. Fist means halt, flat hand down means get down, pointing shows enemy direction, tapping helmet means rally on me. Hold 360° security at every halt.

Battle drills are rehearsed reactions. They exist so nobody freezes while the leader writes a speech.

FM 13.1 React to Contact

The first three seconds decide who lives: shoot back, get down, find them.

FM 13.2 Break Contact

FM 13.3 Near Ambush

FM 13.4 Far Ambush

FM 13.5 Knock Out a Position

Treelines provide cover and concealment. Open fields are kill zones; cross by bounding overwatch or do not cross. Hilltops skyline you, so observe just below the crest.

FM 14.1 Build an ambush

1. Choose a road, trail, or clearing with visibility for you and little cover for them.
2. Use an objective rally point (ORP) just short of the target for final checks and packs-down.
3. Security watches approaches; Support pins the kill zone; Assault moves in after.
4. Nobody fires until the leader signals and the target is fully inside.
5. Plan withdrawal before the first shot.

If ambushed, use the near or far drill from Chapter 13. Expect a second enemy position after the first.

FM 14.2 Patrols

A reconnaissance patrol goes to look; contact compromises the mission — but it is not an automatic failure. A patrol that breaks contact cleanly and reports back has still done its job. A combat patrol goes to fight. Decide before leaving whether you are hunting information or the enemy—the two demand opposite behavior. Every patrol reports what it learned.

FM 14.3 Range cards

Before a fight, sketch sector limits, distances to landmarks, dead space, and numbered target reference points for each position.

FM 15.1 Slow Down

Towns compress sightlines, multiply windows, create 360° threats, and distort sound. Slow down. Towns punish rushing.

FM 15.2 Streets and Crossings

• Stay near the building line; never walk the center of a street.
• Cross streets fast, one buddy pair at a time, between hard cover.
• Use upper-floor overwatch before crossing open squares.

FM 15.3 Observe Before Entry

• Observe buildings first. Distant infected can mean another player was recently nearby.
• Open doors suggest traffic or occupation. Stop and listen before entry.

FM 15.4 Walled Compounds

• Treat walled compounds like small bases: recon walls and gates, plan entry and exfil, assume defenders.

FM 15.5 Vehicles in Towns

• Vehicles are loud and trapped in towns. Park outside and walk in.

FM 16.1 The fatal funnel

The doorway exposes you to anyone inside while hiding most of the room. Cross it fast and move to your assigned spot. Nobody stops in the doorway. Ever.

FM 16.2 Four-person stack

1. #1 enters and drives hard to the first corner.
2. #2 takes the opposite corner.
3. #3 and #4 own the middle sectors.
4. Everyone enters moving; nobody blocks the funnel.

Points of domination are pre-assigned slices of the room. Own your sector, leave no gaps, and do not cross a teammate's line. Evaluate the threshold first: door swing, hinges, and what you can see from outside.

DayZ doors may be locked or barred. Frag grenades kill, PO-X poisons and clears — smoke obscures but does not clear, and flashbangs disorient but do not clear. Listen for footsteps and inventory sounds, then check corners for campers.

Call “Clear!” only for a room with no combatants in it. If you say “empty” or “no one here” instead, your team reads it as duress — you are at gunpoint, or you have spotted someone and do not want them to know. Use the words exactly; the distinction is life and death.

FM 17.1 Why Hot Zones Pay

Military bases, crash sites, convoys, and contamination zones offer the best loot and draw the most players. Higher loot tiers mean better gear and more danger.

FM 17.2 Working the Zone

• Use off-hours or post-restart windows when competition is thin.
• Observe from treeline cover with binoculars or rangefinder first. Count movement and muzzle flashes.
• Keep one scout watching while others loot.
• Take medical first, then ammunition, food, and attachments.
• Contamination zones require full NBC protection, gas mask, and working filters. M4-A1 rifles can spawn in static zones.
• Split loot among carriers and set the rally point before entry.

FM 18.1 Five phases

1. Intelligence: numbers, routines, guard rotation, layout, entry. Use planted assets where available. If you cannot answer “how many, where, and when weakest,” you are not ready.
2. Planning: by voice, never written. Set objective, force, timing, entry, rally points, exfil, and abort criteria. Never strip the base.
3. Execution: quiet until contact, then fast. Shooters do not loot; looters do not shoot.
4. Exfil: split loot, rally, count heads, leave before allies arrive. Time-box it.
5. Aftermath: expect retaliation, rotate codes, and change routines.

Abort if recon was wrong, defenders double your force, or surprise is lost. Walking away is better than feeding them gear.

FM 18.2 Defend in depth

Everyone knows fallback positions and rally point before the raid. Alert verbally—“Contact at the gate.” Fall back through layers and make every wall cost them. Afterward, assess, rebuild that day from the reserve, and restock the emergency fund first. Platoon Command plans retaliation by voice.

FM 18.3 Breach response

Assume every known code and pattern is burned. Rotate codes immediately, change behavior, and use a known leak as a weapon by feeding false information and preparing an ambush.

FM 19.1 Vanilla building

Fence kit → shovel-set posts → nail-and-plank frame with hammer or hatchet → clad wall. Add wire with pliers to make a gate, then lock it. A 3-dial lock has 1,000 combinations and is insecure; a 4-dial has 10,000 and is the standard. A watchtower has three levels plus roof and costs roughly four fences' worth of wood.

A raised flag protects a 60 m radius from despawn. Re-raise before the roughly 45-day cycle expires; unprotected structures can begin decaying after about seven days.

FM 19.2 Choose and lay out the site

• Favor high ground, limited approaches, nearby water, tree cover, cleared near-wall sightlines, and multiple exits.
• Layer defenses: outer wall → inner compound → hardened keep. Put valuables deepest.
• Make the entrance an airlock: two gates, never both open.
• Overlap watchtower fire. Separate barracks, armory, medical, and vehicles.
• Do not advertise with visible lights or smoke.
• Keep medical, ammo, and a spare weapon off-site.

FM 19.3 Stand up a new server

1. Lieutenant registers IP and roster in #current-deployments.
2. First 72 hours: hidden temporary foothold, separate recruit outpost, 72-hour cache, and base-site scouting.
3. Recruit only after the outpost exists; recruits do not see the main base before vetting.
4. Build the airlock before valuables move inside.
5. Lieutenant reports by voice when the platoon is self-sustaining.

FM 20.1 Personal kit

Primary with 3–4 magazines; sidearm with 2; cleaning kit; 4+ bandages or rags, saline, morphine, splint; food and water for the operation plus one day; knife or hatchet; heat and light source; 2 chemlights; weather clothing; vest and helmet when available.

FM 20.2 Stockpile target per soldier

• 10 bandages, 2 saline, 1 morphine, 1 splint.
• 6 primary magazines, sorted by caliber. Standardize calibers where loot permits.
• One week of food and water.
• Materials for one wall section plus one gate.
• Spark plugs, batteries, and fuel.

Add a sealed 20% emergency reserve. Touch it, report it, and restock it first.

FM 20.3 Loot runs

Set rally and time-box before departure. Priority: medical → ammo → food/water → building material → everything else. Move in buddy pairs. On contact, break and exfil. Check in and out with the garrison.

FM 20.4 Vehicles

Vehicles are trucks, not patrol cars. They are loud, visible, and announce you from far away. Use them for heavy hauling and rapid deployment. Scout ahead, maintain spacing, and set rally points. Convoy and recovery procedures are set by the Squad Leader or Team Leader for the mission — there is no regiment-wide standing rule. Spark plugs and radiators are replace-only. A clicking starter means dead battery; white smoke means stop immediately. Never put gasoline in the radiator, and never load everything into one truck.

FM 21.1 Armband

FM 21.2 Ghillie

Ghillie suit occupies the backpack slot; hood, cloak, and rifle wrap round out the system. Tan, Mossy, and Woodland variants support reconnaissance and overwatch—not assaults.

FM 21.3 Medical pouch

FM 22.1 Clearance ceilings

• CONFIDENTIAL: gate codes, food and medical storage—vetted Corporals and above.
• SECRET: armory codes, patrol routes, operation plans—Sergeants and above (see FM 9.2, FM 9.3).
• TOP SECRET: explosives, personnel files, server access data—Staff Sergeants and above; most sensitive items stay Lieutenant-only (see FM 9.4).

Clearance is a ceiling, not a right. Need-to-know overrides rank. Platoon Command can grant or revoke immediately, and clearance never transfers between servers.

FM 22.2 Daily practice

Send codes and coordinates only through clearance-gated channels, direct messages, or voice—not public text, game chat, or open Discord. Never screenshot clearance channels. Never discuss operations on stream. “He is one of us” is not a clearance.

FM 22.3 Vetting and response

Recruits begin unvetted at the isolated outpost with no codes or sensitive channels. Reliability is proved over time, and someone vouches for each recruit. Watch for requests above clearance, unsolicited base mapping, activity matching raid windows, or sudden rival-faction friendships.

REPORT → INVESTIGATE → CONFIRM → REMOVE → AFTER-ACTION. Report privately to Sergeant or Staff Sergeant. Do not confront or spread suspicion. Staff Sergeant investigates quietly and may use canary details. One uncorroborated report is not enough. Once confirmed: rotate exposed codes, remove rank, exile, blacklist, and repair the process.

FM 22.4 Planted operators

Only Captains and above may plant or control a deep-cover asset. Lieutenants and below know no identities, numbers, or placements. Assets are diverted from ordinary recruitment — never backdoored through it. They appear in no Discord, roster, file, or channel. We may already be inside their walls, and they may be inside ours. Fear is a security system. Use it. A successful returning asset may begin as Corporal or Sergeant as a reward — subject to leadership discussion and Regiment Command approval, never automatic.

• Lieutenant: server-level truces, trade deals, and non-aggression pacts; report upward immediately.
• Captain: playstyle-level alliances.
• Major: platform-wide commitments on his own platform only — never for another platform. Only Regiment Command may make cross-platform commitments.

Nobody below Lieutenant can bind the faction. A Private promising backup binds nothing and earns punishment. Only the rank that made an alliance—or a higher one—can break it.

Confirm terms through the authorizing rank and log only what that level needs. Keep operational detail out of writing below battalion. Betrayal activates the retaliation doctrine.

FM 23.1 Trade safely

Negotiate through the authorizing rank. Meet on neutral ground with overwatch. Inspect before exchange. Never bring the full stockpile. Treat every first trade as a test. Vanilla uses barter; modded servers follow their own money and rates.

Aid the less fortunate and recruit the willing. Every good deed is a recruiting poster.

FM 24.1 SMEAC order

1. Situation: enemy, friendlies, terrain.
2. Mission: one sentence—who does what, where, when, and why.
3. Execution: intent, assignments, order of events.
4. Sustainment: beans, bullets, bandages—food, ammo, medical, wounded plan.
5. Command & Signal: commander, succession, comms, rally points.

Mission and intent are the two lines that let the group continue when the plan breaks.

FM 24.2 Teach and review

Crawl–walk–run: teach slowly, rehearse at half speed, then use full realism. Running early only rehearses failure.

After every operation, spend five blameless minutes: What was supposed to happen? What happened? Why? What stays and what changes? The moment review becomes blame, honesty stops.

FM 24.3 Authority

Staff Sergeants enforce the code and training standard immediately. Leaders with consistently poor judgment are removed from command and replaced — the billet is the superior's call, but any change of rank itself requires the Promotion/Demotion form and Regiment Command approval. There is no tenure—only performance. Every commanding officer personally chooses a deputy — subject to Regiment Command approval; XO is a duty assignment, not promotion, and gives no promotion power.

FM 24.4 Two-rank promotion rule

Rank is earned by demonstration, not time. Training proves that a member can execute under pressure and can be trusted with people, gear, and information.

Promotion gates must be observed in practice. Leaders keep rehearsing after promotion.

FM 25.1 The Training Platoons: 1st, 10th, 19th

The first platoon of each battalion — 1st (PC), 10th (PlayStation), 19th (Xbox) — is structured like no other platoon in the regiment: each is a training platoon. Their nested headquarters are unchanged — 1st remains the Regiment Command Post and the headquarters of 1st Battalion and Alpha Company, while 10th and 19th remain battalion and company headquarters (Chapter 27) — but their line rosters are built for training, not field operations.

In each training platoon, one Staff Sergeant holds the billet of Senior Drill Instructor — the platoon’s senior enlisted leader, running recruit training. Two Sergeants hold the billet of Drill Instructor, each training eight Private recruits. There are no Corporal team leaders in a training platoon: sixteen Privates total, eight per Drill Instructor, all beginners undergoing training. Eight trainees per instructor fits the 8–12 squadron scale (Chapter 03); the Drill Instructor billets exist only in the training platoons.

New members serve as Privates during vetting, and the training platoons are where that service happens: marksmanship, base building, vehicle maintenance, land navigation, field medical, and the discipline of the uniform standard — under instructors whose only job is turning recruits into militiamen.

The regiment grows by recruitment and survives by retainment. Both are leadership responsibilities, and both run on the same principle as everything else here: clear standards, honestly applied.

FM 26.1 Recruitment Authority

Standard recruitment is a Staff Sergeant and higher function. Any member may bring prospects forward, but the vetting pipeline runs through the NCO chain.

Corporal follows successful vetting by leadership discussion — never automatic, never by elapsed time alone. Recruiting two other Privates, with all three passing vetting to Corporal, may support early promotion to Sergeant — common practice, not automatic or guaranteed, and still inside the two-rank promotion rule.

FM 26.2 The Intake Pipeline

Contact → play-with-us vetting as a Private → Corporal on successful vetting. Vetting is done by playing alongside the prospect — watching how they play and how they interact — not by paperwork. Whoever brings the recruit in is their buddy through probation under the buddy-pair rule. Nobody enters alone.

The pitch writes itself and stays honest: a civilian militia with no mandatory gear or weapons, where members use whatever suits them, and where real life comes first. Recruit where players already are — in-game encounters, community servers, Discord.

FM 26.3 What Counts as a Good Recruit

A recruit counts toward a recruiter's two when they pass vetting to Corporal in good standing, with no discipline issues. Recruits who wash out do not count — quality over volume, no farming bodies for stripes.

FM 26.4 Retainment

Retainment is regular participation, not daily. A member in good standing is active inside a rolling 14-day window — one patrol, op, training, or otherwise meaningful presence. Real life comes first: going dark with a leave-of-absence filed is always fine.

Two weeks dark with no word gets a private welfare check-in from their NCO — “you good?”, not an accusation, never public shaming. Continued silence after that is their answer, not a crime.

The retention engines, in order: a fixed weekly op night people can plan around, recognition that feels attainable (the Merit Medal tier exists for this), progression worth chasing (ranks, and the special-forces platoons as aspiration), and community beyond ops. Coming back is always welcome — departure is not exile unless it was a discipline discharge.

FM 26.5 Leadership Communication

Leadership happens in person (voice or in-game) or by announcement message. Those are the two channels; everything important goes through one of them.

The standard for NCOs, and especially officers: knowledgeable, approachable, likable, professional — in that balance. A leader nobody wants to talk to is a leader nobody follows.

NCOs carry squad-level word; officers carry unit-level announcements; regiment-level word comes from Regiment Command. Nobody jumps the chain to make announcements above their station. Leaders disagree in private, never in front of the militiamen. Reprimands and corrective action stay in the form system — they are not announcements.

These customs keep the faction organized without turning a game into a second job. Keep the process clear, use the right channel, and get back to playing.

FM 27.1 Respecting the Chain of Command

Orders flow DOWN. Reports flow UP. Never skip an echelon: do not go around your Sergeant or your Lieutenant. You may bypass the next link only after that link cannot be reached. Never take an issue sideways across the chain.

The two-rank authority rule governs promotions. A promotion may only be awarded by someone at least two ranks above the rank being granted. Operational duties are temporary assignments given by verbal order, not permanent specialties or titles.

FM 27.2 Headquarters Platoons

Headquarters nest inside platoons. The first platoon of each battalion — 1st, 10th, 19th — is a battalion headquarters: a Major commanding officer with a Captain executive officer. The first platoon of each company — 1st, 4th, 7th, 10th, 13th, 16th, 19th, 22nd, 25th — is a company headquarters: a Captain commanding officer, with the Lieutenant Company XO doubling as platoon commander (no separate second Lieutenant). 1st Platoon (Alpha) is the Regiment Command Post — Colonel and Lieutenant Colonel — and is simultaneously 1st Battalion HQ and Alpha Company HQ. The first platoon of each battalion — 1st, 10th, 19th — doubles as a training platoon: its line roster is the training cadre (Chapter 25), with all headquarters duties unchanged. The special forces platoons (4th, 13th, 22nd) double as company commands: the SF Captain is dual-hatted as Company CO and Platoon Commander, the SF Lieutenant as Company XO and Platoon XO.

FM 27.3 Roster Administration

The regiment roster chart is the roster of record. Titles, slot labels, designations, group headers, and naming conventions are static — they are never altered. Only four things change: base name, server information (server name, IP, port), personnel names, and per-slot ranks. Each rank defaults to the slot’s expected rank — “unchanged from expected” — and any override is recorded.

Publishing. The chart exports roster.txt, which feeds the read-only Command Structure viewer on the website for recruits. All edits happen in the private chart; the website never edits — publishing means uploading a fresh roster.txt.

Display convention. Roster displays color-code by unit: company washes by playstyle — green for PvE, red for PvP, blue for RP — and battalion console strips — steel for PC (1st Battalion), blue for PlayStation (2nd), green for Xbox (3rd). Companies are labeled by playstyle, battalions by platform. The special forces prestige treatment overrides the PvP wash on the 4th, 13th, and 22nd.

FM 27.4 Addressing Superiors

There is no fixed formula. Address a superior however that person prefers—sir, ma'am, by name, or by rank. It is case by case. When you do not know their preference, default to rank; once they state a preference, defer to it.

FM 27.5 The Forms: What, When, Who

FM 27.6 Settling Issues

Formal complaints about suspected internal threats go directly to a Captain.

The fastest answers in the manual. If your question is not here, search the manual — then ask your chain of command.

FM 28.1 Staying alive

I just spawned. What first? Find a blade, head inland, crouch near buildings. The coast is picked clean and crowded (Chapter 06).

I am bleeding. What now? Bandage immediately — everything else waits. Use disinfected material so the wound does not infect (Chapters 04, 05).

I cannot stop vomiting. Eat and drink in small amounts so you keep it down, and cure the underlying disease — probably cholera or salmonella (Chapter 05).

Where is clean water? Water pumps and wells are always safe. Everything else gets chlorine tablets or boiling (Chapter 06).

Zombies will not leave me alone. Break line of sight, get inside and shut the doors, or climb. Do not outrun them loaded with gear (Chapter 07).

A wolf pack is hunting me. Same answer: indoors with shut doors, or climb somewhere they cannot follow (Chapter 07).

It is too dark to see. L toggles your flashlight (needs a battery) — but light attracts infected and players alike. Move, then go dark (Chapter 06).

FM 28.2 Health and medicine

How do I find my blood type? A blood test kit (Chapter 04).

Can I donate blood to a teammate? Yes — test you both, use a blood collection kit on yourself, combine the bag with an IV start kit (Chapter 04).

I bandaged with dirty rags and now I am sick. Stage-1 wound infection: disinfect the wound directly. Tetracycline does not work yet (Chapter 05).

I ate human meat as a joke and now I cannot stop laughing. Brain prion disease. Permanent until respawn. It was not worth the joke (Chapter 05).

FM 28.3 Gear and weapons

My gun keeps jamming. Worn weapons jam more. A gun cleaning kit fixes it — and repairs only ever reach Worn, never better (Chapter 06).

What should I carry on patrol? Chapter 21 covers field gear; Chapter 20 covers the personal kit standard.

How do I purify water? Chlorine tablets, or boil it in a cooking pot (Chapter 06).

FM 28.4 Regiment life

How do I talk to my squad? Caps Lock for voice on PC; Discord for anything secure. Game chat is only for outsiders (Chapter 11).

Someone said "clear" but I think they are lying. "Clear" means no combatants. "Empty" or "no one here" is duress code — treat the area as hostile (Chapter 11).

How do I get promoted? The Proving Grounds, Chapter 25. Vetting and promotions are decided by leadership discussion — no fixed timeline, nothing automatic (Chapter 26).

Where are the regiment forms? Chapter 27 explains what each form is, when it is used, and who can file it. Get the forms themselves through the website homepage; completed forms are copied and submitted to a Regiment Commanding Officer or Regiment Executive Officer.

How do I join the platoon server and operations? Your NCO provides the connection details. They are never posted publicly — that is OPSEC (Chapter 22).

I am new. Where do I train? The training platoons — 1st (PC), 10th (PlayStation), 19th (Xbox) — Drill Instructors train Private recruits there during vetting (Chapter 25).

Can I build my own base? Chapter 19 covers vanilla building. Check with your chain of command before building anything in the regiment's name.

What am I allowed to take from storage as a private? Clothing and repair items — the open stock is yours (FM 9.1). Guns, military kit, building materials, and explosives are locked; ask your Sergeant (Chapter 9).

Where do I keep my own gear? There is no guaranteed personal storage, and no private tier at all. Only successful platoons have it, by the Lieutenant's call, separated by rank (FM 9.5).

I found an M4. Can I keep it in my box? No. Hard-to-find guns belong to the platoon, and explosives are banned from personal storage entirely. Needs of the many first (FM 9.5, FM 9.6).

Can I stockpile duct tape and sewing kits? No — consumables are not a private stockpile. Hoarding hurts the platoon (FM 9.5).

Every term the manual uses, in one place.

Armband — Spearpoint field identification, worn so friendlies can verify you at a glance (Chapters 01, 19).

Beret — rank headwear. Green: Private/Corporal. Red: Sergeant/Staff Sergeant. Black: special forces platoons (all ranks, supersedes rank beret). Officer Hat: Lieutenant and above (Chapter 01).

Bounding overwatch — movement technique: one element moves while another covers it, then they swap (Chapter 12).

Brain prion disease (kuru) — caused by eating human flesh; tremors and uncontrollable laughter; permanent until respawn (Chapter 05).

Charcoal tablets — fast cure for salmonella (Chapter 05).

Clear — voice call meaning no combatants present. "Empty" or "no one here" is duress code, not a synonym (Chapter 11).

Common stockpile — the regiment's shared stores, held under lock by access tier (Chapter 9). What the regiment needs, the regiment owns.

Contact — enemy sighted. Called with relative direction, e.g. "Contact left, 200 meters!" (Chapter 11).

CPR — restores 2.5 shock per second on an unconscious survivor (Chapter 04).

CQB — close quarters battle: fighting inside buildings and rooms (Chapter 16).

Drill Instructor — Sergeant billet in the training platoons (1st, 10th, 19th); trains eight Private recruits (Chapter 25).

Duress code — phrasing that signals the speaker is compromised: saying "empty" or "no one here" instead of "clear" (Chapter 11).

EOD — explosive ordnance stores: grenades and explosives under their own separate lock, Lieutenant and higher only (FM 9.4).

Epinephrine — restores 100 shock instantly; treats heart attacks (Chapters 04, 05).

Fracture — impact injury treated with a splint; about 30 minutes to heal with one (Chapter 04).

Ghillie — camouflage suit that breaks up your outline in vegetation (Chapter 21).

Hemolytic reaction — caused by transfusing incompatible blood; clears over time, no treatment (Chapter 04).

HUD — the five bottom-right icons: water, energy, temperature, blood, health (Chapter 04).

Immune system — your disease resistance; kept high by keeping water, food, blood, and stamina high (Chapter 05).

IV — intravenous. A saline IV boosts blood regeneration; a blood bag IV restores 500 blood directly (Chapter 04).

Kindling — fire starter: bark, paper, rags, bandages (Chapter 06).

Morphine — pain management; keeps you moving through fractures and low stamina (Chapter 05).

Multivitamins — boost immunity; treat cholera, colds, flu, and salmonella alongside the primary cure (Chapter 05).

NBC — nuclear/biological/chemical protective suit and mask, required in contaminated zones (Chapter 05).

NCO — non-commissioned officer: Corporal through Staff Sergeant (Chapters 01, 03).

OPSEC — operational security: protecting regiment information (Chapter 22).

ORP — objective rally point: the last covered position before an objective (Chapter 14).

Personal storage — individual storage, never guaranteed; only in successful platoons by the Lieutenant's call, separated by rank (FM 9.5). Active kit only — no hoarding, no explosives, no rare items.

PO-X — antidote for gas poisoning in contaminated zones (Chapter 05).

Rally point — a pre-planned position to regroup if the team is scattered (Chapter 12).

Saline — saline IV: 5× blood regeneration for ~3 minutes plus hydration; safe for all blood types (Chapter 04).

Senior Drill Instructor — Staff Sergeant billet in the training platoons (1st, 10th, 19th); a training platoon’s senior enlisted leader (Chapter 25).

SF — special forces platoons: the 4th, 13th, and 22nd (Chapter 01).

Shock — 0–100; unconscious at 25 and below, awake at 51 and above (Chapter 04).

SMEAC — five-paragraph order: Situation, Mission, Execution, Sustainment, Command & Signal (Chapter 24).

Splint — fracture treatment; walk slowly while splinted, no running or jumping (Chapter 04).

Stamina — 0–100; drained by sprinting, swimming, jumping, and melee; shrunk by carried weight (Chapter 04).

Tetracycline — treats cholera, colds, flu, and stage-2 wound infection. Not stage 1 (Chapter 05).

Training Platoon — the 1st, 10th, and 19th Platoons, uniquely structured as the regiment’s recruit-training platoons (Chapter 25).

Wound infection — caused by closing wounds with non-disinfected material; two stages, different cures (Chapter 05).

Zeroing — adjusting sights for distance; PgUp/PgDn on PC (Chapter 06).