Menu's should not be used for any movement related activity. It's not realistic, it doesn't feel natural.
In most games climbing is triggered by simply pressing up against the ladder. I don't think there's any reason not to implement it the same way in Arma.
I agree that the movement in this game is excessively obtuse.
I know I'll get flamed to hell and back for this next comment, but I wish they'd take a cue from more modern games with regards to movement and it's animations.
BF3 might be a crappy arcade-shooter compared to Arma, but they've nailed the feeling of actually being in control of your soldier rather than feeling like you're simply a puppeteer who's missing fingers and has broken strings on his puppet.
Could you please post coordinates of a ladder where starting to climb isnt as easy as pressing the middle mouse button?
If this was ArmA2, i would have been in agree with you.
In ArmA3, they actually polished this problem: SPACEBAR always does the most appropiate action for the current situation.
This means that if you are in front of a door and press spacebar > door opens / closes
If you are in front of a ladder > climb up/down
and so on.
It happens sometimes that you are just walking close to the wall by a ladder.. you don't want to get in the climb animation by mistake, do you ?
SPACEBAR method (or middle mouse wheel, it's the same) is way better.
/Downvoted
I think the action menu is more useful then in any Arma game to date and the complex nature of the game requires more then just one button.
But the clunky get-into-pos-to-climb-up-ladder-animation is obsolete. I am already in front of the ladder, there is no need to play a 2 sec animation. Not to mention the floating-while-grabbing-air when one does decide to climb a ladder down.
It's not an issue that requires urgent fixing, a smoother transition would be nice imho.
I thought the whole point of ARMA3 was supposed to remove the arcane control system and make its appeal more mainstream and intuitive. Not that we want another BF3 but a control system that is consistent and easy - that borrows the best control mechanics used in other games. Other games got it right some years ago why can't ARMA3?
i had a problem with the ladders leading out of the water onto the boat docks when trying to climb out of the water in one of the harbors... i finally managed to get out but the rest of my AI squad very much a different story.