Try driving in a formation across a field. Very soon at least half of the vehicles will be disabled because of hitting the rocks and trees. Like if the drivers were blind.
Positions in a formation shouldn't be so strict and should allow for some room to maneuver.
The most obvious example are pickups, which sadly are two person only transports. At the same time, Arma2 hatchback had the capability to carry an additional person in the trunk. Go figure.
A possible method of having improvised transports, would be to have two types of passenger seats in a vehicle: normal, as we have them now and additional, like in the proposition. Mouse wheel would have two options, "get in as passenger" and "get in as passenger (emergency)". The rest would work as it works now, with characters taking the seats in sequence, until the vehicle is full.
@CXN2615:
It's not about TrackIR when it comes to non-powered sights. The issues with reflex sights, are lack of manual brightness control and reticle bitmaps' resolution. The issue with ironsights, is lack of precise zeroing.
It is, as if the sensitivity of TrackIR was greatly increased, when zoomed in. I know it isn't, but this is how it looks. Slightest head movement causes the scope to disappear from the screen. SOS scope is OK, because it disables TrackIR.
The same effect is also visible, when firing a rifle, as the recoil causes the scope to jump up significantly, while the view remains where the head is being pointed.
And because of some issues (or lacking features) with reflex sights, currently my aiming device of choice are ironsights, which too aren't perfect.
@CXN2615:
Thanks, voted up.
What CN2615 said. Current 3D scope implementation makes the game unplayable with TrackIR. I'll stick to Arma2, until this is resolved in a satisfactory manner. I was completely happy with the old 2D black-edged scopes and would like to have it as an option to choose.
Well, maybe if it would be like on the less_peripheral.jpg photo, it could still work. But not like on the other pictures above! I remember PiP scopes back from the old Delta Force days, then there was a sniper game, which title I forgot, that had the same feature and I never liked it. Also, for your situational awareness, you have a spotter or a squad (if playing designated marksman). And with the introduction of widely used scopes with a small red dot on top, I have all the tools I ever needed. Dev's time is needed more elsewhere, at least for now.
Vote down. I already have problems hitting 2x5 pixels sitting 1500m away with fullscreen scope and I like long range shooting. Human eye has much more resolution, than the best monitors we have, so you can see relatively more through real life scope. Think of current gunnery from a Hunter: would you prefer picture in picture or rather a full screen, when in trouble? PiP is fun and cool and what not, but not very practical.
"any TRAINED person"
In real life it would be rifle training, in Arma its "mouse training". Fast shooting does require some degree of effort to keep the sights where they should be. I fired 5.56 and 7.62 (plus 9mm pistol) and neither of them magically returned to where it originally was. It required a bit of effort to keep the sights on target, gravity or not.
In Arma3 I have succesfully engaged targets up to 200m with single shots and short bursts, from a crouched position and with reflex sights. For 300m I lay down, where the recoil is absolutely minimal and negligible.
@Tovarisc: ANY recoil simulated on a screen of a computer game is arcade. Want a real thing - get a gun and visit your local shooting range. Which I did, by the way. If you have a problem with learning things or a learning curve, it's your problem, not mine or others, who, like me, are with the series since Operation Flashpoint. The beginigs back then were a big "WTF?!". I was familiar with a concept of dying from a single hit (I had the first Rainbow Six), but Flashpoint was sometnig else. I just hope that we'll get another Arma, NOT "call of arma", "medal of arma" or "armafield".
My first reaction was "wtf?" but now I started to like the way the guns are. It's just a question of training and getting used to it. The recoil has some advantages. Yesterday during a mission I saw a guy aiming at me, immediately followed by a sound of a bullet passing by close. There was no time to aim properly and I had rifle on full auto. I just aimed at the general direction of his feet and shot a quick burst. Muzzle went up and at least 3 bullets out of 5-6 hit him. The range was about 150m, I had ACO mounted and I was crouching.
Setting up a killhouse in the editor and trying to beat one's best score helps :)
Since I like playing against AI, my only worry is, if they also have to compensate for the recoil? I hope so.
Vespa, thank you for looking at the issue and doing what you could.
Would it be possible to stop player's character movement and allow him, depending on a situation, to either manually crouch-up or crawl back and search for a better way?
It would require a detection system, which wouldn't allow crawling over and onto difficult terrain in question, so that the player would be stopped just before entering the spot and thus wouldn't cause this haywire prone behaviour.
I actually have muted the music. It's missionmaker's fault, because on numerous occasions the music was playing and playing and playing and playing - try to listen for enemy revealing sounds in such environment. A music background during a cinematic shot is welcomed. A SHORT tune, to underscore an important event, is also fine. But listening to whole, several minutes long, tracks, while sneaking through a forest, is unacceptable.
Regarding the original issue, the most annoying are constant "go, I got you covered" in various iterations. Especially with Stealth behaviour.
I've found the following data for real rockets:
Hydra 70
Motor burnout velocity: 2,425 ft/s (739 m/s)
Velocity at launcher exit: 148 ft/s (45 m/s)
Burn time: 1.05 - 1.10 sec
CRV7
Dispersion: 3-4 miliradians, which means that rockets will hit inside a 3-4m circle, when fired from 1000m away.
Ka-60 is especially resistant to 7.62 miniguns. Three AI minigun boats needed 14 minutes (!) to bring me down, while I was hovering 100m away, with the tail towards them, to protect the crew, who is rather vulnerable to being killed. Three Hunters HMG took me out reasonably sooner in the same situation.
While dogfighting the KA-60 from an AH-9, I needed almost 3000 bullets to disable its engine. Most of them were on target, as I was shooting at point blank and saw the hits.
What is even more interesting, I never saw any HULL damage on Ka-60, only rotors, engine and sometimes instruments. Most often I was shot down because the crew was killed, rather than the aircraft was disabled.
Ka-60 is a civilian helicopter, only adapted to perform combat missions. Even if it had some kind of armor fitted, it shouldn't be too tough. Think UH-1 here.
I have yet another setup for movement:
W - general forward movement, with default jog speed
W + left shift - as long as I hold the shift, I slowly walk
W + side mouse button - as long as I hold the button, I run (until I get tired)
A, S, D - sidestep left, backwards, sidestep right, respectively; to make the picture complete
C - combat pace toggle and I know if it is currently ON or OFF, by watching how I hold the rifle during movement; also having a special procedure limiting the use of combat pace to a single situation, helps with knowing when it's active
Z - toggle between stand and prone, if crouching this lays me down
X - toggle between stand and crouch, if laying prone, this puts me into a crouch
It's basically the default setup, with only minor changes and it works perfectly. I always know precisely, which movement mode or stance I'm using and I have never pressed the wrong button or had any other unexpected outcome with it, because each function has it's own logical keypress. I never used W+S.
Edit: I forgot one thing. The fact, that the combat pace doesn't speed up walk, is very beneficial. Now I can stealthy and quietly walk around, while the combat pace allows for having a rifle with IR laser to be at the ready, without the need for actually aiming the weapon. When I need to quiclky move out, with the rifle still at the ready, I just relese the walk key and combat pace takes over.
If combat pace was overriding walking, I'd have to constantly toggle both the combat pace and walk - now it's enough to turn the combat pace ON and use only the press-to-walk key. This actually simplifies movement.
It is there already:
"GREEN" (Hold fire - defend only)
When a player orders his units to "Hold fire", the units are set to combat mode Green.
They will defend themselves and automatically exit hold fire mode. But it could be made more obvious and clear. I too worried about my AIs and managed them manually, until I've accidentally found that they can open fire when in trouble.
Looks like the indoors sunlight was fixed. Unable to reproduce in Dev build 0.57.105210.
However, the issue of ambient light value in buildings remains.
The light level inside buildings appears to be the same, as in outdoor shadows, while buildings' interiors should be visibly darker. Now you can easily see what is going on in a building, when watching from the outside. Real windows and open doors appear to be almost black and you can't see if there is someone inside, unless he wears white clothes or stands next to the window or door.
Also there is no difference in indoor ambient light level, with regards to different parts of the building. A room with a window has the same indoor ambient light level, as a windowless one.
It's not only a visual and cosmetic issue. If such rooms were dark, it would be much more difficult to clear them and they would serve as hiding and ambush points. If we had darker building interiors, buildings would be more effective at providing concealment.
Another related thing: NVG are blinded in a room with no lights, no windows and closed doors, like if the room was full of sunlight. A small corner room in the building from the screens, for example.
I think it's because there is not enough room in the wetsuit to accomodate the mag taken out of the gun, before loading another one from the pocket. Try that on land and you'll find dropped mags on the ground. SCUBA showcase works well, because there is a backpack with additional storage space.
Helmets are invisible, while NVGs display properly. Not sure about tactical glasses.
In flat terrain and no cover available situations, attacked men should deploy smoke grenades and break contact. Lying in the open won't do them any good.
Even if it is possible, there should be some limitations, like max depth allowed or max range to the receiving unit. I expect more than just visual improvements over Arma 2.
The same is true for a bank angle indicator on the helmet mounted display. Now it mimics the horizon, but it should display aircraft bank instead, just like on DCS screenshot (on the HUD).
Sure, it's http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=5374
"Allow rifles to be equipped in both the primary and secondary slot"
I believe, that currently while climbing a ladder, the rifle looks like if it was hanging on an invisible 3-point sling. All we need, is to have that posture instead of "on the back" and a few visual straps added.
Another thought, it would be nice to be able to pick another rifle on the field and put it into the RPG slot. The main gun on the strap, ready for a quick access and the second one, on the back, just in case. Sniper rifle + backup carbine or a battle pickup with plenty of OPFOR ammo to be looted from around.
There is one and I've voted it up already.
AI seems to have limited turn ability, while prone. Why not the player? We have a very athletic character anyway, for the sake of maneuverability and smooth gameplay. And turning while driving and turning while prone, are two different matters.
Reloading a weapon is also too quick.
I had 250+ infantry fighting over a small part of the airport, framerates dropped to 1 per second (initially), but the CPU (AMD FX-6100 3.30GHz) never went above 50%.
I was surprised, when a quick search revealed, that indeed there are underwater NVGs. However, they are limited to 20m depth.
It really hurts, when I play without HUD waypoints and try to navigate in a boat without compass.
Maximum speed is a tricky term, when it comes to aircraft. Is it maximum permitted speed in a dive? Maximum indicated airspeed or true speed? If true - at what altitude? Or maybe it's a maximum level flight speed, that can be reached without overtorquing the rotor - mast - gearbox assembly? I'm familiar with Bell 206 and maximum possible cruise value was 85% torqe, usually it's set between 70-80% TRQ.
Either way, Wikipedia states, that AH/MH-6 cruise speed is 250 km/h. This is level flight speed, which gives the best balance between speed and fuel economy and can be reached without overstressing the bird. In Arma 3, with a use of climb + turbo, I'm able to fly level at 200 km/h, faster only in a dive.
It seems, that it's too slow indeed, however it may be a design choice, because of tiny (by aviation standards) dimensions of maps used in Arma. Even 20 km is like nothing for an aircraft, so the speeds may be limited to have a kind of more right proportions between the map size and a time required to fly between places of interest.
Yes, you're right. I was thinking about the terrain not directly shined by the sun.
I've upvoted this issue, however the issue #0004043 tells more accurately, what really happens.
Objects cast shadow on other objects.
Terrain cast shadow on itself.
Terrain doesn't cast shadows on the objects, even if they should be in a deep shadow.
It looks really awful, when brightly shining people try to sneak through a darkened valley. Since early morning and dusk are important from a military point of view, we'll bee looking at it rather often, until a fix arrives.
Also the AI is generally unaware of its own inventory contents and won't automatically reload 5.56 STANAG rounds when on land. Even if ordered to do so by the player, the AI still closes to 30-40m before shooting the opposition. And even there is random chance, that the AI will use a pistol instead - even with SDAR loaded with 5.56 ammunition.
Under water, the AI won't automatically switch to the UW ammunition and will try to shoot enemy divers with 5.56, if this is what they have loaded.
As a side note, SDAR loaded with 5.56 ammunition is an efficient weapon in player's hands. No problem with beating SCUBA Showcase with SDAR alone and without calling the artillery.
Tested with Arma 3 Alpha 0.54.103957
The mission attached clearly shows, that player is "invisible" to AI while behind the bush. The same is true for trees and foliage.
But the original poster also mentioned grass and I'm not sure about it. While peeking over a hill, I'm being shot at with my head still well below top of the grass and I can't see anything, not a smallest part of the AI on the other side. Just like there wasn't any grass for AI.
Similar peeking from behind a bush or tree is possible - I need to show up a larger portion of myself in order to get AI to shoot at me. Currently peeking over a grassy hill or ridge and setting up a covered firing position there is next to impossible and it's better to have a bare soil, than concealing grass - which is wrong.
If you can confirm, that grass has the same properties as trees and bushes and that the AI's vision is blocked on the grass by Arma's engine, then you can close the ticket.
Combat isn't fair. I play on regular, but with most of the HUD turned off, and depending on a situation, I can kill, without trouble, much more than 7, or quickly die, without even spotting anyone.
I dont't mind demanding and hard to beat AI, as long as AI do not cheat.
Yes, I did an experiment in the mission attached. I jumped out to the side from behind the bush, then hid again and watched the tracers. I saw that he was predicting my movement and leading with bullets for a few seconds. Then he was waiting. Jumping from the right side of the bush provided me with a split second to target and shoot, before he reoriented himself. Jumping from the wrong side got me killed. This is also correct behaviour, but it also puts the AI into tunnel vision.
Arma3 AI is really good and I see lots of tiny, but important improvements. I understand, that they won't replace human players and that this is Alpha release. But there are some areas, where AI could perform even better - the bahaviour is there, but it isn't used to its full potential.
Summary of the following part:
What I meant, was to have AI to use an area of probability, instead of a spot. When AI is firmly focused on my bush for too long, I can flank him easily. He shouldn't lay there for too long, but, with time passing by, he should start considering a growing area where I could be, while keeping an eye for the bush, just in case.
Also AI should care for its own survival first and destroying the opposition second, like a soldier would do. In the example mission here: when I'm hidden again, he is just laying there, while without a clear view of me, he should have moved either to try to flank my last known position, to check out what's going on, or, more likely, to break contact and run away from uncertain situation, maybe to a spot with a better view of the situation or cover. When he is sure about me being behind the bush, he flanks and attacks violently. When unsure, he is too idle.
Another example from a community mission. AI infantry squad chased me down for 1 - 1,5km. It's OK, as I was alone and they could have thought I'm going to be an easy prey. But I've used the terrain to my advantage and killed them all, in a series of ambushes. After seeing, that I'm a hard nut to crack, they should have given up the chase and saved their lives. The range between me and their group was maintained between 300-400m and frequently I was completely hidden from them, yet they were still following me along my last known movement track, like the guy did with the tracers. But this time "attacking violently" didn't do them any good.
In other experiments I've seen AI running from overwhelming enemy forces and this is correct. But the AI seems to consider only quantity advantage and doesn't think about quality of the opposition. Sometimes lonely marksman can be more than a match for a whole squad. After loosing a couple of men, the AI should be more cautious - now it's often only last man standing, who runs away in panic.
The current AI DO run for cover or away, it's OK. Buth it's after they are in the killing zone already and getting out of there alive is simply impossible. They should be more cautious, when approaching and attacking known or suspected enemy position.
Maybe it should be scalable outside of a skill value found in editor: members of a faction which represents trained army, should behave more cautious and tactical from members of a guerilla faction?
AI marksmen are another story, but it was covered in other tickets already.
Arma3 AI doesn't see through bushes and trees' foliage. Tests in editor showed that. But the AI is very good at keeping track of player's position and movement exactly in a similar way, as we have slowly vanishing symbols of enemies on the map (with the option extended map info enabled). It's only that AI's tracking is better and more accurate, than those symbols are.
I'm not sure about the grass. While laying prone appears to significantly increase camouflage factor, the grass itself doesn't appear to block AI's view. You can crawl through a grass close enough for a pistol kill, but once you've been spotted, it's game over.
Still, by using tactical movement and changing position frequently, it's possible to confuse the AI about where you are and to flank them. Laying behind a single tree and picking them off doesn't work and honestly that's how it should be. It's either flank the AI or they will flank you.
AI doesn't see behind its arc of vision. It's possible to approach very close to them, until they actually hear you and only then turn at you. Based on my observations and tests, I think that "seeing" through walls is rather orienting towards heard sound. Try sneaking on them with slow movement and see the difference.
Stealth approach is very usefeul, when setting up for an attack or performing recon. But after "going loud", you'd better be on the move! AI is hard to beat and smart, but in tests designed to check it's capabilities and used skills one by one, it appears that it doesn't cheat. I do suffer from the situations, when I'm being fired at from behind the trees, but I do the same, when I have a suspicion or report that the AI might be or is hiding there. Actually I'm worse, because I throw grenades blindly, just in case, while AI doesn't.
I'm not sure about effectiveness of the silencers in Arma3. It appears, that they do have some value, but I haven't played with them enough to say anything for sure. As far as real life goes, silencers don't make you absolutely silent and undetectable, so don't expect shooting anyone in a room, without alarming the guys behind the wall. A silencer may delay finding you, if used from a distance, but they will find you eventually, unless you change the position.
Maybe there should be some more tweaking to the AI, so they only will know a general area where you could be, instead of a specific spot, so they will loose track of you sooner or are less willing to pursue to the death, but in general I find the AI to be quite good and challenging. Tricks from Arma2 (and I used addons that upped AI there) no longer work. Arma3 is all about maneuver warfare.
Have a look at a mission in the attached zip. Unpack it to single player missions. While ingame, run to the bush ahead and stop for a couple of seconds. Then walk past the bush and see what will happen.