TMR Modular Realism

[Taosenai 11]

0.3 release video showing some new features

What is TMR?

TMR is a modular, open-source modification for Arma 3 aimed at increasing realism and complexity without sacrificing engaging gameplay and accessibility. Currently it includes only a small number of features, but more are being developed. TMR is meant to be used in all environments: single player, multiplayer co-op, team vs. team, even open-world scenarios.

You can find more information on the TMR homepage.

Current Features Summary

Theory of TMR

Download

GET TMR 0.5alpha3

Developed for the current stable build of Arma 3.

Required:

- CBA for Arma 3

Recommended:

- ASDG Joint Rails

You can find more information on the TMR homepage.

Edited July 24, 2014 by Taosenai
0.5alpha3 released

[HitmanTwoActual 188]

Well done! What other features do you plan on having in this? From what you have released so far, I can already tell this will be a must have for Milsim Communities. Thank you for this!

[da12thMonkey 1943]

PLOS Guidance for the NLAW/PCML sounds awesome: Have wanted that since BAF for Arma 2.

I notice you've made new reticles for the sights on these weapons. Are you striving for replicating the real-life weapons here too, or just something more practical than the BIS reticles? I just noticed that the PCML reticle is similar to the real-life NLAW one is all, but not quite 100% accurate.

I've got a pic of the reticle we use on NLAW here in the UK if it's any help (ACOG TA41-NLAW-CW):

Sight Picture

[thedudeabides 40]

Looks good. Testing beginning soon

[roberthammer 582]

Very nice mod :)

[Taosenai 11]

I notice you've made new reticles for the sights on these weapons. Are you striving for replicating the real-life weapons here too, or just something more practical than the BIS reticles? I just noticed that the PCML reticle is similar to the real-life NLAW one is all, but not quite 100% accurate.

I've got a pic of the reticle we use on NLAW here in the UK if it's any help (ACOG TA41-NLAW-CW):

Sight Picture

It's a bit of combination of both. Where I can find good information and pictures, I prefer to have it reflect the real implementation. I couldn't find anything for the NLAW/SRAW -- with your picture, I will update it to reflect the actual reticle. (The in-game PCML has some kind of thermal sight on it which I couldn't identify. I'm sure it's a real thing...) On the RPG-42, everything I found said that it (the RPG-32) used a collimator-type sight. The BI model has a scope on it, so I made up my own reticle with ranging and lead marks -- the tutorial explains how it works. It's based on real AT weapon reticle principles, though.

So on one hand I want to be true to life where it works well in the game world, but on the other I'm willing to change things/make stuff up if it will be superior from a gameplay perspective or will fit more appropriately in Arma 3's near-future setting.

Well done! What other features do you plan on having in this? From what you have released so far, I can already tell this will be a must have for Milsim Communities. Thank you for this!

I'm not really pre-planning features too extensively at this time, mainly because I don't want to do something and then have BI implement it at the engine level in the next dev patch because they were already working on it, too. I figured the AT weapons were a safe bet; these don't seem like features BI is particularly interested in (or rather, they are lower priority from a player experience perspective).

As an example, something I will do is rework the Titan to have different locking behaviors when the AA warhead is loaded versus when the AT warhead is loaded, and to implement a Javelin-style top-attack flight path for the AT warhead.

I think the interaction of infantry AT and vehicles is one of the most critical parts of the sandbox, which is why I did it first. Up until the last patch, every AT weapon could tab lock. That was terrible for the feasibility of armor. Now, the RPG-42 and PCML are perfect mirrors -- dumb fire, reloadable, soft-launch weapons. Mirroring makes balance easy and minimizes player confusion, but it doesn't create compelling gameplay for experienced players. In my system the PCML AT is superior for attacking heavier armor thanks to the top-attack EFP, and of course the guidance system increases the PK for moving targets. But you only get one chance. The RPG-42 deals less damage to armor (where the PCML will mobility/weapons kill a Namer in one hit, the RPG-42 usually only knocks out a track), but it is reloadable and the operator can have a variety of rounds for different targets. This is a way to balance (maybe) without mirroring.

Some small arms stuff is probably next.

Edited July 27, 2013 by Taosenai

[Kommiekat 11]

Wow, just wow. I'm looking forward to more of your work!

[Guest]

Release frontpaged on the Armaholic homepage.

Tao Modular Realism (TMR) - Light AT Update [bETA] v0.1



Community Base addons A3

===================================================

We have also "connected" these pages to your account on Armaholic.

This means in the future you will be able to maintain these pages yourself if you wish to do so. Once this new feature is ready we will contact you about it and explain how things work and what options you have.

When you have any questions already feel free to PM or email me!

[CameronMcDonald 146]

Great stuff!

With the disposable weapon variants, it'd be nice to have an auto-drop function added, a la Inko's disposable mod, so that the player doesn't have to go into their gear menu to drop the used tube manually. It also works for AI, so they aren't lugging used tubes around.

[scorch_052 127]

You planning on doing backblast simulation and applying that fragmentation to grenades and M203s?

[Taosenai 11]

Great stuff!

With the disposable weapon variants, it'd be nice to have an auto-drop function added, a la Inko's disposable mod, so that the player doesn't have to go into their gear menu to drop the used tube manually. It also works for AI, so they aren't lugging used tubes around.

Because the PCML has both integrated NV and magnified optics, players may want to hold on to it. So I prefer to let them choose to drop it by hand. If there were a context-sensitive action key in Arma 3, I would show a quick-drop function on it when the empty tube was held, so players don't have to fool around in the gear menu.

You planning on doing backblast simulation and applying that fragmentation to grenades and M203s?

Both weapons are soft launch (although the real RPG-32 is not, my futuristic RPG-42 is -- seems like the sort of trait that would be standard in future AT weapons designed for urban combat) so backblast was a low priority, though I'd like to add a blast zone in the future. I am hoping BI will give us a command to put units into a ragdoll state.

Yep, frag script will go on grenades and 40mm soon, as part of the small arms set of updates.

Edited July 28, 2013 by Taosenai

[CameronMcDonald 146]

Because the PCML has both integrated NV and magnified optics, players may want to hold on to it. So I prefer to let them choose to drop it by hand. If there were a context-sensitive action key in Arma 3, I would show a quick-drop function on it when the empty tube was held, so players don't have to fool around in the gear menu.

A good point, no problem!

[cartel 1]

...

Both weapons are soft launch (although the real RPG-32 is not, my futuristic RPG-42 is -- seems like the sort of trait that would be standard in future AT weapons designed for urban combat) so backblast was a low priority, though I'd like to add a blast zone in the future. I am hoping BI will give us a command to put units into a ragdoll state.

...

Would be nice to have a light visual and audio affect similar to the Flash bang that was released for arma 3. The ragdoll affect sound very cool. Great work!

[Trauma.au 10]

Training missions are broken for me, the don't show a name in the menu and when launched they hang on the UAV view from main menu background with no menus at all.

How exactly do I hit targets with the NLAW AT? I hold over moving target with tab held down and fire, always miss. Target was about 650m, I've tried varying amounts of tab/track time also.

[[lb] boggler 10]

Fantastic mod, having disposable launchers again is a great pleasure.

But please be so kind and make v2 signatures, it's useless without a proper bikey.

[josche 11]

Training missions are broken for me, the don't show a name in the menu and when launched they hang on the UAV view from main menu background with no menus at all.

How exactly do I hit targets with the NLAW AT? I hold over moving target with tab held down and fire, always miss. Target was about 650m, I've tried varying amounts of tab/track time also.

The same at me.

[mantls 2]

Can we expect keys for this?

Looks sweet as hell, will check this out ASAP! :D

[Taosenai 11]

Training missions are broken for me, the don't show a name in the menu and when launched they hang on the UAV view from main menu background with no menus at all.

How exactly do I hit targets with the NLAW AT? I hold over moving target with tab held down and fire, always miss. Target was about 650m, I've tried varying amounts of tab/track time also.

Regarding the training missions, I will fix this and release a hotfix shortly. If you binarize an addon which has a mission folder in it, the mission will not be loadable. I don't know why this is the case, and I'm not sure if it's a bug, but in any case I forgot.

The PLOS guidance of the (real) NLAW/PCML is only good out to about a maximum of 200m against moving targets, and 600m is the maximum rated effective range against stationary targets. This is because of physics essentially -- since it cannot know the range to the target you are tracking, there has to be a hardcoded range that it uses for flight time assumptions in the guidance code. You will get the best accuracy against moving vehicles at about 170m, as I recall -- this is a good compromise value which I found to give good accuracy against moving targets from 100-200m. This is info you'd've gotten in the tutorial, if it were working :- /

boggler;2451331']Fantastic mod' date=' having disposable launchers again is a great pleasure.

But please be so kind and make v2 signatures, it's useless without a proper bikey.[/quote']

Realized I forgot to sign it last night. I'll sign the hotfixed version.

Edited July 28, 2013 by Taosenai

[gliptal 25]

VERY nice!

Yay!

[mantls 2]

Regarding the training missions, I will fix this and release a hotfix shortly. I had this issue in the previous beta stable release, chased and resolved it, and it seems that the new dev build being pushed to stable has reintroduced it.

The PLOS guidance of the (real) NLAW/PCML is only good out to about a maximum of 200m against moving targets, and 600m is the maximum rated effective range against stationary targets. This is because of physics essentially -- since it cannot know the range to the target you are tracking, there has to be a hardcoded range that it uses for flight time assumptions in the guidance code. You will get the best accuracy against moving vehicles at about 170m, as I recall -- this is a good compromise value which I found to give good accuracy against moving targets from 100-200m. This is info you'd've gotten in the tutorial, if it were working :- /

Realized I forgot to sign it last night. I'll sign the hotfixed version.

I want to make love to you right now :D

[da12thMonkey 1943]

The PLOS guidance of the (real) NLAW/PCML is only good out to about a maximum of 200m against moving targets

The stated user requirements for NLAW have a threshold Single Shot Kill Probability against moving targets covering an envelope from 20m to 400m.

http://www.official-documents.gov.uk/document/hc0809/hc00/0064/0064_ii.pdf#page=100

The exact percentage required for SSKP isn't publicly known (it's redacted in the document), but it'd be very unusual for it to be any less than 50% when the envelope goes right down to the weapon's minimum range (effectively that would suggest that the weapon might only kill half the time when fired from minimum range - which would be shit for a weapon with a max range 30-times that). Very often the stated requirement thresholds for equipment are as much as 75-95% though, and if they are not met it tends to be the threshold ranges etc. than change rather than percentages, since a figure for maximum effective range is more important to the end user.

This user requirement was "Forecast to be Met" in the NAO reports for several years right up until the weapon was accepted into service, so it's extremely likely that NLAW had demonstrated an ability to achieve a reasonably high SSKP up to 400m, some time before the weapon was put into service.

To confirm it though, you'd have to ask someone trained to use the weapon what distances they are told to engage moving targets at. Unfortunately I don't think I now anyone who's knows that.

[Taosenai 11]

0.1.1 has been released:

Fixed: Tutorial missions will not load.

Added: Keys and signatures.

Get it now: http://www.ryanschultz.org/tmr/download/

Thanks for the fast bug reports guys.

The stated user requirements for NLAW have a threshold Single Shot Kill Probability against moving targets covering an envelope from 20m to 400m.

http://www.official-documents.gov.uk/document/hc0809/hc00/0064/0064_ii.pdf#page=100

The exact percentage required for SSKP isn't publicly known (it's redacted in the document), but it'd be very unusual for it to be any less than 50% when the envelope goes right down to the weapon's minimum range (effectively that would suggest that the weapon might only kill half the time when fired from minimum range - which would be shit for a weapon with a max range 30-times that). Very often the stated requirement thresholds for equipment are as much as 75-95% though, and if they are not met it tends to be the threshold ranges etc. than change rather than percentages, since a figure for maximum effective range is more important to the end user.

This user requirement was "Forecast to be Met" in the NAO reports for several years right up until the weapon was accepted into service, so it's extremely likely that NLAW had demonstrated an ability to achieve a reasonably high SSKP up to 400m, some time before the weapon was put into service.

To confirm it though, you'd have to ask someone trained to use the weapon what distances they are told to engage moving targets at. Unfortunately I don't think I now anyone who's knows that.

I would love to hear from someone who has fired one at a moving target. In some senses my PCML is a hybrid of the NLAW/MBT LAW and the Predator SRAW (hence the inclusion of the MPV Blast-Frag warhead without OTA). The FM for the SRAW (page 1-6) only gives an effective range of 200m against a moving target. Both use the same PLOS guidance system. That's why I misremembered the 200m. Good catch!

It's certainly possible to get kills against moving targets at ranges out to 400m with the PCML as implemented -- I've done it. But it's difficult, especially in Arma. As in real life, the target must be moving at a very consistent speed on very consistent terrain. And your track/angular v must be rock-steady. I have damping code implemented which helps, but for me at least it's difficult to track a target very smoothly with a mouse compared to 'real life.' You have to use the 'Hold Breath' key to counteract the aim wobble, too. Real NLAWs have a little monopod thing that folds down onto your hip to help steady it as well. (It's modeled on the PCML, but not animated.)

Part of the problem is that my PLOS system is imperfect as is. The real one works like this:

"These weapons use a method of guidance known as predicted line of sight. In order to "target" a tank using the missile the user will track the target in the optics for a few seconds and then fire it. During the three second targeting period a ring laser gyroscope in the missile measures the average angular velocity the user is spinning the missile launcher around at as the target is tracked. It then programs a curved flight path that will intersect with any target regardless of range as long as the angular velocity of the shooter's line of sight to the target remains the same for the entire firing sequence and flight of the missile. Once fired the gyroscope is used as part of an inertial navigation autopilot for the missile to keep it on the pre-planned curved flight path in order to hit the target."

My implementation does not have the 'curved flight path' implemented. It flies directly using a 'magic number' for the flight time of the missile. That's probably the key difference. Does anyone know off-hand how I would calculate such a curve? (lol) I'll look into this more later.

For now, the PCML's PLOS is pretty solid out to 200m against a consistent-speed target, and I'm happy with that from a gameplay perspective. I will work on a more real PLOS later, though. I have some other stuff I want to work on as part of TMR first.

[da12thMonkey 1943]

Does anyone know off-hand how I would calculate such a curve? (lol) I'll look into this more later.

I did try and plot the curved flight paths and tangential velocity curve needed for a missile to intercept a target at various ranges, based only on azimuth and assuming the missile could achieve a constant over-range velocity away from the point of launch. I've got an Open Office spreadsheet with it somewhere if you want it.

Process was to use the change in gunner's azimuth during the tracking phase to work out the possible horizontal distance moved by the target while tracking, for a series of possible ranges (calculated as chord length = 2r*sin(φ/2) with r as an array of possible ranges and φ our change in azimuth).

From this array of horizontal distances you can work out the potential horizontal velocity of the target by dividing the horizontal distances by the time spent tracking them.

Now, if you assume the missile moves away from the gunner at a constant velocity you can work out how long it would take to travel to all the ranges in your array, and using the possible horizontal velocity of the target you worked out earlier, you can work out how far the target would have moved horizontally in the time it takes the missile to travel that to that range - this is the distance the missile needs to deviate from its initial straight-line flight path to intercept the target.

If you graph this horizontal distance against the target ranges you get a plot of the curved flight paths.

Dividing that required horizontal distance adjustment against the time needed to get to the target range gives you the horizontal velocity component that would be needed to cause that adjustment in the missile's flight. So if you plot a distance-time graph of those two you can see the acceleration curve.

I'm sure writing all the steps out as a single equation would cancel down some terms but I wanted to be able to plot all the data points of every stage of the process, for analysis purposes. Also, my idealised system (i.e constant missile velocity away from gunner) probably isn't too realistic, and it kind of assumes fairly constant tracking (would probably better to sample the azimuth changes every second then calculate and average over the whole tracking period than use total tracking time and total azimuth change) but you can look over my workings if you want:

Spreadsheet in .ods (Open Office) format. Sheets "Data1" to "Data5" are the datasets calculated for a variety of changes in Azimuth over a 3 second tracking period. Sheet "Distance-Range" is a line graph comparing flight paths of those 5 data sets. Sheet "Time-Distance" compares the horizontal acceleration curves.

[Taosenai 11]

Wow, thanks so much. That makes perfect sense. It should be perfectly possible to implement this. My only concern, and one of the reasons I originally went with the straight path, is that under circumstances of heavy script lag or poor client frame rate, the missile's flight path might be updated quickly enough to ensure a smooth 'interception curve.' I'll have to try implementing it and see what happens. Won't let your math go to waste.

[Nikoteen 24]

Good job on the addon ! it's great !

However I am on dev build and your RPG42 is actually broken as BIS actually implement a new ballistic system for it (red tracer round instead of rocket, etc.)

Just for that you know... :)