precisionEnemy in 1.60

[bigpickle 0]

Got to say I'm disappointed that BIS would change the system this late in the day.

[eggbeast 3673]

@sB - that's actually quite a good idea - roll back to 1.59. the only problem is some of our dumb clan mates bought the game on steam lol

[styxx42 0]

How so?

• Skill can be overall adjusted in the arma2oaprofile.
  
• setSkill scripting command can be used in an addon and applied to all or specific units.
  
• ASR_AI addon with configuration files is available so you can tweak things easily.
  
• ACE has everything tweaked towards realism/authenticity, including AI (But I suppose you still need to put a techy on the linux server issues with many mods+missions)
  
• Worst case scenario; install back a 1.59beta and enjoy the aiPrecision ability, but loose the other 1.60 enhancements. Perhaps until it makes its return.
  

Plenty of options, none involve editing missions, and these are just off the top of my head.

Lastly these are just things you can do right now, as workaround or permanent, but there's still no final word on if the Precision setting will make it's return, and how.

With much respect, Sickboy I just don't understand how it is alright for them to make a change and say it didn't work to begin with. Well something was working or not working and it was great.

1.59, it was playable and some of the most fun with ACE we had ever had.

But 1.60 comes along and my small group cannot make a fun game of it.

How did this not get caught during testing that what ever was done has a drastic impact on all servers for coop

I was shot out of the air by a static grenade launcher at over 200 meters while parachuting during a game of domination (YES I WAS TOO CLOSE in my drop)(Yes my team mates laughed their arses off) but come on. A grenade launcher. NEVER has that happened before.

Sure, if we down load this, or look up this and tweak that(notice I am not saying what because it is beyond me right now without reading more and asking more questions.)

Frankly should a patch change a game so much that we have to come back and learn how to tweak it all over again to be fun?

We have used ACE as presented, we never fiddled with skill or dispersion or precision before this. We didn't modify the AI levels beyond how a BASE server was to be configured (I read how to setup a standalone server here on the forums and went from there).

We where slaughtered in the field for three weeks with most of the group giving up on the game and calling it a night the last time we played. It has been two weeks now and there is no plan on going back to the killing fields. Hell I caught one of our team mates playing TEAM FORTRESS 2..... We are losing them. :butbut:

I think Eggbeast and Icebreaker are speaking for the silent coop peeps and saying loudly, please correct this over sight.

I work 40 hours, I have 2 children, a wife that demands I spend time with her, then there is the swimming lessons, , scouts and my own attempt at Gym time. I don't want to have to do a bunch of work to get my server play able for the other gaming fathers in my group when prior to the patch it was perfect. I don't have the energy left for it, ARMA OA was to be my release, not my labor.

IF IT AINT BROKE, DON'T FIX IT.

BIS fixed it and now it is broke.

I am not arguing that there are not ways to over come this, but really should we have to?

No I don't think we should.

Loyally Styxx42, ARMA\BIS FOREVER.

[eggbeast 3673]

hey styxx, i hear ya bud. SB has some good points too - he's on our side really!

the changes did cause a bit of a clan killing wave - which we all needto work on to fix.

if you want to play some workingco-op - come by our server with your guys and see how we play with the changes i made.

it's reasonably ok now.

took a while and the enemy lost some of the cool tactics they had but at least its playable

filter for GITS and drop in - add me on xfire (eggbeast) to get mod link if needed

we're playing evo RACS sahrani right now and its great

still needs work though - the issue remains lol

[xx-LSD-xx 10]

Yea I've been using the ASR_AI and I'm very pleased to have not been shot in the head at 500 yards from a Taki running with his AK. Best part is I don't have to hear players bitching about it. Running your own server can be a pain at times (NO FUN). I'm grateful that BIS is so dedicated to the community and is constantly improving on their product when other developers (not all) produce garbage. Just read thier forums OMG! There is not another community out there like ArmA. For this I am thankful. But like Styxx42 said and I agree with. I work crazy hours and having to fix something I didn't think was broken is not how I want to spend my time. BIS is like rotten child you love them but sometimes you just want to beat the crap out of them. LOL!

[jedra 11]

I added something to the ASR_AI thread here which helps you work out what default skill values Robalo set for the units, which in turn helps when setting skill values for additional units. I found it useful myself setting up skills and precisions and understanding how different classes behaved.

[maturin 12]

With much respect, Sickboy I just don't understand how it is alright for them to make a change and say it didn't work to begin with.

It didn't work to begin with. It was perfect for you and your clan mates because you are experienced ArmA players. But it was rough on new players, because the AI were too accurate by default. And the problem was, you had to go through the stupid bullshit of closing the game and fiddling with text files you shouldn't even need to know exist.

This game has a control and options menu the size of a short novel, and yet you couldn't control the most important aspect of gameplay from within the game itself. Absurd.

Not making this change on the first patch years ago was a mistake. Not publicizing the change now was also a mistake.

And isn't everyone being really dramatic? Doesn't unit skill control accuracy now? So unless I am completely mistaken, just turn down the server difficulty settings and quit moaning.

I can't say for myself, because my ACE is bizarrely glitched out so that I'm stuck on low AI accuracy settings.

[styxx42 0]

First off, I really hope that SickBoy and the other Professionals here didn't take my comments to be an attack on them ( including BIS.)

I really mean with the utmost respect when I made those comments. SB made perfectly good suggestions, and I am pursuing them today(had a good rest). (Of course I have to go into work to upgrade a server first then I am going to steal some time to do some reading.

Thanks Jedra on your post in the Robalo AI thread.

OMG, I need to sit down for that.:butbut:

And EggB thanks for the offer I really appreciate it and might take up up on that. .

Maturin, Ya, you are right it kind of sounds like our posts could be taken as blowing it out of proportion. TEXT sucks to get points and emotion across.

I think for the most part that the popular voice is really just that we liked how we controlled AI in 1.59 and we would like some way to balance AI Tactics as well as shooting ability. BIS is and has always been great listening to us and making changes. I see that there is a 1.61 data for a fix of some sort.

So that is cool.

And Ya we are long term players and we love how the AI flanks, peeks and shoots etc, so dumping them down is not really what we want or have come to expect from our AI opponents.

Anyways. I didn't want to come across as a poster that doesn't appreciate constructive advise from the Wise builders of this awesome game. I use your advice and suggestions and direction way to often to come off looking like I don't appreciate your talent and depth of knowledge you freely share.

I was just voicing, that I am constricted for time, not that talented or gifted at server admin and I would honestly rather be playing this game then fiddling again with it.

That is all.

Tried it last night with 2 of my other clans mates with Default Robalo and it was not too bad just putting it in the mix with no changes. At least it didn't seem to bad. We played on Lingor so the range of sighting was also a factor, so it wasn't a true test. It is when we played on Zargabad that they were killing us really bad.

Thanks again everyone. Will look at the Robalo thread and see what I need to do to my server to tweak.

Styxx42

[Sleep 10]

Thanks again everyone. Will look at the Robalo thread and see what I need to do to my server to tweak.

Styxx42

Just make sure you add the unit names youre fighting against into the settings.hpp

[icebreakr 3105]

We lost three(!) choppers this Thursday in coop that were put down with RPGs(!), not AA missiles. Enemy managed to hit all 3 choppers in flight, each with single precise shot. So, 3/3 accuracy. So I'm not suprised that they use grenade launchers in similiar fashion. All skills were default, so 0.5 out of 1.0 I guess?

[styxx42 0]

We lost three(!) choppers this Thursday in coop that were put down with RPGs(!), not AA missiles. Enemy managed to hit all 3 choppers in flight, each with single precise shot. So, 3/3 accuracy. So I'm not suprised that they use grenade launchers in similiar fashion. All skills were default, so 0.5 out of 1.0 I guess?

CIA Trained RPG INSURGENTS...... :638:

[maturin 12]

Holy mother of god!!!!

I guess that ACE accuracy bug fixed itself, because the AI are wiping the floor with my ass.

I mean, we're talking accuracy rates going from 5% to 60%.

I retract me earlier post to freak out with everyone else, lol. I don't want to get aimbotted all the time, but I don't want to fight against braindead conscripts who can't stay in formation or flank, either. Did someone post a solution in these twelve pages?

I'm, even using ASR.

Edited January 30, 2012 by maturin

[jedra 11]

I'm, even using ASR.

ASR_AI by default may make it harder actually! You may need to change the settings in the skills array to tone them down a bit. Been testing this for a few days now, and it most definitely makes a difference when you reduce the AI accuracy in the skills array.

[maturin 12]

Hi Jedra, could you post your skills array, please. And difficulty stats too. I think a lot of players besides me would appreciate it.

[jedra 11]

Hi Jedra, could you post your skills array, please. And difficulty stats too. I think a lot of players besides me would appreciate it.

Yes, I will do - I am still tweaking stuff (Takistani's/Insurgents at the moment). Should have something by the end of tomorrow and I'll post something for people to try! Got a bit sidetracked testing some other stuff (ToH beta for one) today - not to mention having to do some real work!

[eggbeast 3673]

can confirm that our server which sets skill in range 0.2 to 0.7 must have set it at 0.2 tonight - the enemy stand with their backs to us and spin around looking confused as we run up to them and shoot them... so 0.2 is not advised lol

[maturin 12]

Yeah, I felt like I was playing against braindead gophers with a skill of 0.5.

They would just walk right up to me and stare for five, ten seconds.

Default settings will convince everyone that the AI is the worst ever programmed. And they still shoot too good. Aimbots with IQ of 50 instead of decent AI will variable accuracy.

[icebreakr 3105]

So basically BIS broke this by removing a precisionEnemy and precisionFriendly settings that worked flawlessly before? Great. Skill 0-0.5 makes AI dumb, while 0.51 makes them shoot more accurately than "American Sniper". Thanks for testing.

I'll probably take a few weeks pause as even playing has become a hassle in a similiar way as addon making is...

[jedra 11]

As some of you may be aware, I have been pissing around experimenting with both vanilla CO and CO with ASR_AI to try and improve (or at least understand) the situation with precision and the 1.6 release. Up until now I have been doing it in a somewhat non-scientfic way and couldn't really get a grasp of wether I was improvinh things with ASR_AI or not. Anyway, today I decided to try and approach it from a more scientific viewpoint.

What did I do?

I set up a test mission that had me fire upon a group of three Insurgents from about 50 meters. I then calculated the following over a period of 60 seconds;

Shots Fired

Shots hit

Percentage of shots hit

Reaction time (time between enemy hearing the shot and beginning to fire)

Rounds fired per minute.

I ran this test 5 times each for skill 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1.0 for both vanilla CO (beta 88738) and vanilla CO with ASR_AI loaded with default values. The results were based on an average of these for each run (full results are in the spready in the download).

What did I find?

vanilla

Well, as you have already found out, it seems that the AI is pretty deadly in vanilla regardless of the skill level. As the skill level increases, the units fire off more rounds per minute, but interestingly the accuracy decreases with the hit percentage getting lower as the skill levels rise. Also, the skill levels seem to affect the performance of lower skilled ranks more, i.e a lower rank soldier gets much better as the overall skill level rises. Still, a reasonably skilled unit is pretty good at low overall skill levels.

The other thing I noticed is that because the skill tables are defaulted to the overall skill level of the unit, they have less of an effect in vanilla. This became apparent when testing ASR_AI which populates the skill tables.

ASR_AI

Overall, the accuracy was dramatically reduced. Percentages dropped from a 50% hit rate in vanilla to a hit rate of between 10 and 30% in ASR_AI. As ASR_AI builds th skill tables, it is apparent that this has a dramatic effect on the overall precision of the soldier, with the overall skill having a lesser effect.

Reaction times were also vastly better with ASR_AI - this is likely to be because of the gunshot hearing system in ASR_AI (I forgot to switch it off!).

Conclusion

It seems to me that regardless of whether you want to use ASR_AI or not, it is of value to populate the skill tables with appropriate values. Unfortunately I don't have a client anymore with a pre 1.6 build as it would be interesting to run the tests again using that. But, I am starting to think that maybe more needs to be done to the skills array to fine tune the AI rather than just relying on a overall value, even if they do bring back the precision setting?

If you are interested, then please have a look at my full findings in the attached download, which also includes the test mission. You may draw different conclusions than me, and I would be interested to hear them. At the weekend I am going to try and do this again, but identifying where the subject gets hit and how much damage is taken - I'll see how it goes for time!

Download my jibberish here

I'm going for a lie down now...

[eggbeast 3673]

thanks Jedra - this is EXACTLY what I was hopingfor in this thread... good effort mate.

[maturin 12]

Слава!

Thanks for the post.

[KeyCat 131]

Nice test Jedra!

Haven't had a chance to run it myself yet.... Here still hoping BIS will reconsider and bring back the old way to fine tune AI :)

/KC

[Banshee 9]

Status Quo on 1.60 + ACE, AI Skill 0.98 with a multiplier from the missions of 0.5:

All test with player laying prone on little hill. AI on the airfield.

Test #1 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 1000m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: None

Time to reaction: N/A

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: None

Time to reaction: N/A

Time to player dead: N/A

Test #2 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 900m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: None

Time to reaction: N/A

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: Getting crouched, then advancing on players position flanking and shooting at him after some time.

Time to reaction: Not much. He instantly knew where the shot came from.

Time to player dead: Didn't wait long enough

Test #3 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 800m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: None

Time to reaction: N/A

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: Started to flank Player

Time to reaction: 1 Second

Time to player dead: Didn't wait long enough

Test #4 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 700m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: None

Time to reaction: N/A

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: Getting prone, standing up, getting prone. Looked like he wants to shoot me, but is unsure if he can. No rounds fired. Stopped waiting if he's advancing after 2 minutes.

Time to reaction: 1 Second

Time to player dead: N/A

Test #5 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 600m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: Getting prone, looking at Player. Advancing after 15 seconds on Players position. Starting to shoot at Player from 500m distance, landing pretty close shots but no hits.

Time to reaction: 5 Seconds

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: None

Time to reaction:

Time to player dead:

Test #6 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 500m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: Detecting player, getting prone, advancing after some time, shooting at Player from 400m, getting very close hits.

Time to reaction: 5 seconds until detection

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: Advancing/shooting further

Time to reaction: 1 Second

Time to player dead: N/A

Test #7 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 400m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: Dectection of Player, getting prone, advancing and shooting

Time to reaction: 1 second

Time to player dead: N/A

Reaction to teammate down: Further advancing/shooting

Time to reaction: 1 Second

Time to player dead: N/A

Test #8 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 300m with M4

Reaction to weapon sound: Player detected

Time to reaction: 1 Second

Time to player dead: 5 Seconds

Test #8 Isla Duala 3x Russian Soldier @ 200m with M4

Time to player spotted: 3 seconds

Time to player dead: 10 seconds

Test #10 Isla Duala 1x Squad @ 400m with M4

Reaction to weapon sound: Detecting Player

Time to reaction: 1 second

Time to player dead: 3 seconds

Test #11 Isla Duala 1x Squad @ 500m with M4

Reaction to weapon sound: Detecting Player

Time to reaction: 5 seconds

Time to player dead: 2 seconds

Test #12 Isla Duala 1x Squad @ 600m with M4

Reaction to weapon sound: Detecting Player

Time to reaction: 8 seconds

Time to player dead: 3 seconds

Test #13 Isla Duala 1x Squad @ 700m with L115A4 LLR

Reaction to weapon sound: Detecting Player, shooting back

Time to reaction: 10 second

Time to player dead: 35 seconds

Conclusion: The AI gets aware of the players position quite fast and if they have the weapons to engage, they will do so or if they lack the weapons for the long range engagement, they will try to flank, allways beeing aware of the players initial position. This setup is pretty deadly. Test have been conducted at day.

Will now go and have a look at ASR_AI. Because that's a serverside mod, even communities with a "no mod" policy could adapt it.

[eggbeast 3673]

thanks banshee - this is very useful intel mate

the main bad thing we are experiencing with anything higher than 0.3-4 skill is when engaging enemy at say 10-250m in a built up area. They shoot you in the head with first shot every time even if they are looking the other way, and no matter what weapon they are carrying, sometimes even as they go down because you got the shot in first.

having grenades landing right on my rifle barrel is a first (funny though!) and being hit with UGL's - nice to see this, shame it couldn't be made more accurate at lower overall rifle accuracy...

we don't normally ever get hit by UGL's.

[jedra 11]

@Eggbeast - are you experiencing this in Evo? If so, I'll drop it on my server and give it a go.