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Well there are a few issues with the way missiles work in ArmA 3, at least according to missile effectiveness and lethality. And there are still some glaring issues with the way aircraft and other vehicles take damage.

 

While offering a much deeper and varied damage model than most games on the market, there are still some issues that may be there for gameplay reasons, but throw away realism. This may throw off players because it doesn't always apply to our expectations.

 

In real life, shoulder fired missiles are often successful because they are hard to detect, and therefore hard to counteract. Most pilots resort to timed flare schedules that constantly release flares at intervals, in case a missile has been fired. Hollywood wants us to believe that you get a "missile warning" for all missile types and that they are best "shaken off" by slick maneuvers. Reality is quite the contrary. We enter a hostile area, we anticipate surface to air threat, and drop flares preemptively.

 

In arma, however, pilots have the major advantage of being warned (partially realistic as such systems exist today, but also most likely for balancing reasons). This allows the pilot to conserve flares until the warning sounds, then spam flares to shake the missile. Seeing that the success probability of shaking Titan AA is rather high, jets and helicopters become very untouchable).

The other way of avoiding missiles is by outmaneuvering it. Since engagement ranges in arma are often unrealistically short, missile speed, range and maneuverability are adjusted to fit the scope of the game. This means that missiles can be hard to shake without flares. This also leads to a very black-and-white scenario each time: Either flares are dropped and your missile is defeated, or the target doesn't drop flares and the target is defeated.

 

But that is not all. Missiles are very often proximity detonated, which means that if the missile does not score a direct hit, it can detonate by proximity sensors up to as much as 10-20 meters away from the target. This ensures that even if flares are used or the target outmaneuvers the missile, it can still detonate and cause fragmentation damage. This is much more common in real life, because hitting a moving target at such high speeds with very sensitive controls/sensors can be extremely difficult. Therefore many times the missile will proximity detonate and shrapnel will eat up the aircraft.

 

Then comes the damage model part. Arma is lacking a major damage feature that severely effects aircraft: engine and fuel system fire. Any damage caused by incendiary, explosive or fragmentation warheads is very likely to perforate the engine or fuel tanks and cause fires. Engines are extremely delicate and prone to causing fires. Fires are accelerated by all the oxygen available when flying through the air, and are the most common cause of aircraft loss in combat.

 

 

So why are aircraft tanky?

 

well.. they are warned of incoming missiles and can deploy flares at the right moment every time

the missiles are so far off course when tricked by flares, that proximity fuse doesn't always work

proximity fuse causes indirect damage type (ArmA HE damage) and works kindof strange.

they cannot catch fire, and damage to engines usually only decreases thrust a little bit.

 

 

 

I think that for both realism and balance reasons the following tweaks are a possible solution:

  • Titan AA spoofed by IR easily, but only select aircraft have missile warning system (unarmed aircraft for instance).
  • Titan AA missile less maneuverable, to balance against no pilot warning and make the lock-and fire more skill-based (you have to wait for the right moment to fire).
  • When missiles are spoofed, they don't deviate course very much (to increase hit probability on stationary aircraft, or head on attacks)
  • Proximity detonation range = splash damage outer radius (if you see the missile explode, then the aircraft has sustained some level of damage)
  • Proximity detonation mechanic (missile explodes when distance to target stops decreasing, and starts increasing) to insure detonation as close as possible to aircraft.
  • Aircraft in general, should be damaged beyond saving at 1 direct hit (impact detonation). They should be able to sustain one close proximity detonation but still fly home badly damaged.
  • Introduce new missile for Anti-Air vehicles. Like a SRAAM or something radar guided. A missile with much higher hit-probability, but warns the pilots at time of lock/launch.
  • Fires.

I think that would force aviators to plan their attacks, and loiter less. When lining up for a strafing run or bomb run, they should start using flares in "continuous mode" where they drop flares once every 1-2 seconds. Then deactivate upon leaving the threat area (just like real life). They no longer get "free warnings" to alert them when to use flares. Damage has greater consequence and as such you have to be more careful. Anti-Air vehicles would generally "scare away" aerial vehicles like they are intended to, rather than just spam missiles at them and hope for a shot where the pilot forgets to use flares. Shoulder-fired anti air threats should be a haunting feeling for pilots, that you never know when you will be fired upon, just that it's very likely to happen if you expose yourself too long. Therefore you launch flares at intervals to survive.

 

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58 minutes ago, Strike_NOR said:

-snip-

I agree with pretty much everything you said.

 

Though I will point out that due to the much shorter ranges the reaction times are much lower.

That's why IMO most air vehicles should get some warning of IR missiles, a more interesting approach would be to have the missile detected after a delay, (missile fired from 3KM will get a warning when it's 1.5Km away).

 

I also think that titan AAs shouldn't be an instant kill against jets/helicopters but should force an emergency landing.

 

And don't forget cannons, that's why I brought this up in the first place, with the recent accuracy corrections the time to kill with cannons has increased even further.

 

When experienced jet pilots on koth prefer to rely on their 2 missiles or dumb fire rockets over their 20mm cannon, you know there's something wrong.

 

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1 hour ago, Strike_NOR said:

Introduce new missile for Anti-Air vehicles. Like a SRAAM or something radar guided. A missile with much higher hit-probability, but warns the pilots at time of lock/launch.

These already exist, the Centurion has radar guided missiles that are very hard  to counter even with chaff, and almost impossible to maneuver. Additionally, the Centurion launches something like 4 missiles by the time the first one has hit or been evaded (The Spartan has even more)..

 

In my experience one centurion is enough to kill a plane with all the missile spam. To make it worse, it seems to be locking on without actually turning its radar on, so it keeps flicking it on an off while firing missiles almost continuously. All in all the CAS planes will probably run out of countermeasures before the centurion runs out of missiles.

 

Problem is compounded due to the lack of SEAD mechanic, but oukej has hinted at some possible developments there, if I understood him correctly.

 

I think MANPADs/IR being easy to lose is realistic though, and given the engagement ranges and view distances in Arma, it's hard to balance without giving the pilots a warning.

 

That said, the AI seem to too effective in countering missiles - be that SAMs, Air-to-Air, or ATGMs (with smokes... makes the PCML even more useless...).

EDIT: Well this is timely
 

Quote

Fixed: Missile locking behavior was not correct 

Any further details on this?

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40 minutes ago, SuicideKing said:

Any further details on this?

Could be 3 things;

  1. Kajman scalpels don't need to lock when used by pilot in manual mode and don't lose lock.
  2. "Preflaring" seems to not work anymore
  3. Something else?...

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7 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Kajman scalpels don't need to lock when used by pilot in manual mode and don't lose lock.

what do you mean? I had to lock them the other day. By manual mode, do you mean manual fire or SACLOS?

 

8 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

"Preflaring" seems to not work anymore

Yeah, could be for this too...

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4 minutes ago, SuicideKing said:

what do you mean? I had to lock them the other day. By manual mode, do you mean manual fire or SACLOS?

 

Yeah, could be for this too...

Currently, if you go in pilot seat with a gunner and enable manual fire so you can use scalpels as pilot, you don't need to lock, you can simply fire straight away and the scalpel tracks even through smoke.

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Since it seems like a lot of the smaller things are being fixed, e.g. textures, will alpha sorting for insignias on most uniforms get some love? Currently, there's a blue halo around most insignias, especially on uniforms like the CSAT officer, CTRG stealth uniform, etc.

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That's probably manual guidance (that's why I always wanted separate missile types for manual, visual and heat guidance). It's effective because the AI gunner always knows where the target is and will point at it regardless of smoke. It's a bit more difficult IRL (though if you just pop smoke and don't move, the missile will still hit you if the gunner doesn't move the sight).

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2 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

That's probably manual guidance (that's why I always wanted separate missile types for manual, visual and heat guidance). It's effective because the AI gunner always knows where the target is and will point at it regardless of smoke. It's a bit more difficult IRL (though if you just pop smoke and don't move, the missile will still hit you if the gunner doesn't move the sight).

The problem with that is that normally smoke would obscure the vision and thus the missile should miss.

 

Also, in KoTH you can do the same without a gunner....

Which makes me think the helicopter is spawned in with AI and then the AI is removed.

 

Anyway, I'm still trying to recreate the occurrence as best as possible and make a bug report.

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Smoke does not work at all. You can lock and regain lock through smokecreens all day depite not beeing able to see through wit TI. (1.80, all kinds of Titan AT platforms)

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1 hour ago, scavenjer said:

The problem with that is that normally smoke would obscure the vision and thus the missile should miss.

 

If you don't move, the gunner will in all likelihood just keep the missile pointed where it was and may still hit. That said, smoke could probably use some tweaking. I never found it that effective at obscuring much, TBH.

 

1 hour ago, scavenjer said:

Also, in KoTH you can do the same without a gunner....

KoTH is not BIS' concern. The missile goes where the turret is pointing. If the turret works without a gunner in KoTH, then missiles will, too. 

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19 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

If you don't move, the gunner will in all likelihood just keep the missile pointed where it was and may still hit. That said, smoke could probably use some tweaking. I never found it that effective at obscuring much, TBH.

 

KoTH is not BIS' concern. The missile goes where the turret is pointing. If the turret works without a gunner in KoTH, then missiles will, too. 

Yes, I know, however, it's still a good game mode to test the way vehicles work.

The turret doesn't work without a gunner.

 

I was merely pointing out that it probably does have something to do with AI. (Although I doubt it has anything to do with the AI looking at the target and the missile simply following)

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47 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

. I never found it that effective at obscuring much, TBH.

well, currently smoke acts as a countermeasure. Stuff like the PCML or Titans react as if they've seen a flare. At least when the AI use it.
 

27 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Although I doubt it has anything to do with the AI looking at the target and the missile simply following

I thought SACLOS mode only works with human players controlling the turret anyway?

 

That said, Scalpels guiding without a lock is something that i haven't seen before, so i assume this got introduced relatively recently.

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6 minutes ago, SuicideKing said:

I thought SACLOS mode only works with human players controlling the turret anyway?

It works just fine with AI. RHS even has SACLOS-only missiles which also work fine, at least if the player is doing the flying (some devs have mentioned problems, but I haven't ran into them yet).

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Fixed: Missile locking behavior was not correct 

This only relates to recent changes which we'll try to provide info about asap :)

Taking this discussion over here

 

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14 hours ago, Night515 said:

Since it seems like a lot of the smaller things are being fixed, e.g. textures, will alpha sorting for insignias on most uniforms get some love? Currently, there's a blue halo around most insignias, especially on uniforms like the CSAT officer, CTRG stealth uniform, etc.

Could you message me on Discord with a list?

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7 hours ago, Redphoenix said:

Could you message me on Discord with a list?

Sure thing!

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this might sound silly . but as the bi pods are non adjustable. can the grass flatten times be extended . might lessen at least some of the annoyance. at moment it stays flat for about 40-50 seconds and starts popping back up, fully back up at approx 120 seconds. maybe 120 flat and start popping back up. if its not a big dealt to extend.

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2 hours ago, teabagginpeople said:

this might sound silly . but as the bi pods are non adjustable. can the grass flatten times be extended . might lessen at least some of the annoyance. at moment it stays flat for about 40-50 seconds and starts popping back up, fully back up at approx 120 seconds. maybe 120 flat and start popping back up. if its not a big dealt to extend.

You are right and that issue is a big annoyance since ArmA II, I dotn think 120 seconds is enough. More like 5 minutes would be suitable.

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4 hours ago, teabagginpeople said:

can the grass flatten times be extended

Agreed. Don't know how much this would tax the system (keeping track of flat grass when many players are prone and crawling about), but it would sure be nice with 5 minutes.

 

Also, on the topic of grass I have noticed a few things regarding helicopters:

 

Up until recently, I thought helicopter downwash only affected smoke and trees/large vegetation (see them bend/flutter) when the helicopter is above. But by coincidence I noticed that the grass does flatten when a helicopter is subjecting it to downwash.

However, the effect is much like when infantry is laying prone, it just "warps" downwards to become more flat.

Is it possible to tweak the effect to be more "wavy"? I mean, like ripples from a pond, but with high frequency. Kind of the same effect you can see on large wheat fields when wind is swooping over them. 

That would be extra cool immersive :)

 

You can see the effect I am talking about really well at the mark in this video:

 

 

It makes the grass "ripple" like waves, wafting back and forth.

 

By the way, this seems to be your typical russian party. Random chicks, disorganized, Adidas, some random military guy and probably a lot of vodka. Helicopter for extra USSR feel. Shame it wasn't a Mi-24.

 

PS. Dslyecxi, is that you? ;)

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When using the Garage during a scenario, the "Try" button has no text.

 

yZcRGGE.jpg

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Tweaked: Sound configs of the Offroad, MB 4WD, HEMTT, Zamak, and Tempest were overhauled (WIP)

 

Could you guys take a look at the hatchback configs? It has an annoying sound when in movement : it sounds like a short audio of wheels rolling on dirt or asphalt, but badly looped - it's constant and never vary in intensity (I reckon it's one of "tires" sound files).

 

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Tempest, Zamak, HEMTT, and Offroad audio is broken and doesn't work anymore. Only the MB 4WD survived this patch. :>

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1 hour ago, lexx said:

Tempest, Zamak, HEMTT, and Offroad audio is broken and doesn't work anymore. Only the MB 4WD survived this patch. :>

well they said it's WIP so i assume it's not done yet....

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The Hatchback and SUV have also been caught up in this broken audio issue.

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