Fatigue Feedback (dev branch)

[Bouben 3]

No in real life we don't ALWAYS know when entering the threshold of fatigue when engaged in high intensity anaerobic movements -thats why we are often surprised that we need to stop and lean on a wall, or lean over hands on knees to catch breathe. It's a fallacy to believe we have pinpoint knowledge during these activities whereby one could always just keep himself out of any sort of fatigue by merely looking at a bar.

False. You are surprised only when you aren't prepared (because you had to do something unexpected that you have not planned or something extreme) but you always know your limits. You are perfectly able to tell how long you are able to continue in a given tempo with a given load. You can simply tell "I am not going to make it with this load" even before you even get fatigued. That is impossible in the game before you really try how your avatar with a given load behaves. And that information come too late. It therefore prevents prevention.

I am really shocked how much false information is spreading in this thread. It so easy to load yourself with stuff and go try it out outside. It is then so utterly clear that the game does not provide you with the same amount of information the real life situation does. And if that is clear then it is clear that the game needs some way to provide you with such information.

Of course, you aren't able to tell your limits in really extreme situations of really extreme fatigue when you are constantly pushing your limits because you have never encountered the situation before (drowning for example). But that is not a topic we are discussing here. Right now, we aren't able to tell if we are able to sufficiently slowly jog to a final destination before we actually try it and get fatigued. We also are not able to tell how will our weapon behave after we finish the trip before we actually see what the game visually provides us (amount of shaking). In the game, we don't immediately feel changes in our loadout before we actually move and I can tell you, I can immediately feel changes in my loadout IRL situation even when I am completely stationary. Simply because my muscles and bones together with gravity provide me with information about weight of the loadout. I don't have to move to figure it out. I can immediately feel "OK, climbing up there with this load is going to be hard".

Why is it such a problem for people to let others to have an official option to clutter their HUD as they (not you) please? An option would be a win-win situation. Nobody wants a fatigue-per-distance calculator here. Just a basic indicator that is able to tell us the minimum information compared to the information we get IRL.

Simple as that.

[machineabuse 11]

@Machineabuse: I like the idea, but to some extent it sounds like it'd make the default jog/run feel redundant? Namely since we could jog/run with the weapon fully lowered for lesser Fatigue gain but then still 'immediately' bring up with the weapon, whereas right now the default jog/run has greater fatigue gain but enables the latter via combat pace.

I think the utility of the "ready" (for lack of a better term) position is still fairly applicable. After all when you bring the weapon up into ready you can still shoot from that position. As a personal bugbear I don't like that you must left click to quickly bring the weapon back up to ready from the lowered position. To me that feels like pulling the trigger with an unchecked muzzle.

As for the redundancy; even if I had to right click twice that would still be cool with me.

[bad benson 1733]

False. You are surprised only when you aren't prepared (because you had to do something unexpected that you have not planned or something extreme) but you always know your limits. [...]

totally agree. that's why i personally really dislike how long distance jogging is handled the same as sprinting. if you go jogging in the park you adapt your breathing and your whole body pretty quickly to the increased effort, unless you are a fat ass :D it's quite different to sprinting to catch a bus.

[das attorney 857]

totally agree. that's why i personally really dislike how long distance jogging is handled the same as sprinting. if you go jogging in the park you adapt your breathing and your whole body pretty quickly to the increased effort, unless you are a fat ass :D it's quite different to sprinting to catch a bus.

That could be quite a cool mod, having aerobic and unaerobic endurance. So that it's handled differently for both sprinting and jogging.

[chortles 263]

I think the utility of the "ready" (for lack of a better term) position is still fairly applicable. After all when you bring the weapon up into ready you can still shoot from that position. As a personal bugbear I don't like that you must left click to quickly bring the weapon back up to ready from the lowered position. To me that feels like pulling the trigger with an unchecked muzzle.

As for the redundancy; even if I had to right click twice that would still be cool with me.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, Arma 3 doesn't let you shoot from the jog/run (which if anything makes it akin to a COD/BF-style "sprint") so I don't see it the same way as you here, and though I'd agree that "left-click to quickly bring up the weapon" would be smoother if you didn't stop moving, but that's presumably due to legacy animation system issues (a hilariously entangled mess, based on a previous OPREP's depiction). I'm keeping in mind that there's separate combat pace (hold), combat pace toggle, and combat pace (3 sec.) keybinds, the latter of which causes the weapon to come up and the character to go to combat pace for three seconds...

[froggyluv 2130]

False. You are surprised only when you aren't prepared (because you had to do something unexpected that you have not planned or something extreme) but you always know your limits..

Uhm...no you don't. Not when engaged in repeated activity that are at or close to maximal intensity. Trust me, I both train people and participate in many mud runs, adventure races and crossfit events spending nigh 10 hours a day coaching breathing patterns. The activity doesn't have to be new to throw off your gauge of when that anaerobic fist punches you in the gut, alls it requires is a little extra effort than usual such as a broad jump a little bit further, a grappling throw a little more muscled, a vertical leap just a little bit higher to get hit. What your talking about far more relates to aerobic activities such as long distance running or swimming.

The current setup is pretty close to a common sense level if any liberties are given, the soldier is the recepient. I've run full speed sprint for 200m with a rifle, binocs, gps, map etc.. before the noticable breathe came into play. At that point I kneeled and fire hitting targets almost without effort. You talk about loading yourself up and going outside, well then, lets see it :) Go head to your nearest track with the equivalent weight of the equipment above and sprint at 100% for 200m -thats two full sides of the tracks worth and note your breathing pattern.

Edit: After further testing it appears that it is actually the aerobic, slow jog pace which is a bit limited. Jogging at 13kmph/ or 8mph, my soldier with a very bare loadout of 16% capacity got to the heavier breathing, 40 % fatigue mark at only 900m jog. Thats a little more than two times around a track or about a 1/2mile and seems perhaps a little out of shape. On the other hand thats better than an 8 minute mile pace but I have no idea what speed the military generally run their 5 mile jogs at. In reality interval running in a combat situation would make the most sense.

Edited September 2, 2014 by froggyluv

[roshnak 41]

Uhm...no you don't. Not when engaged in repeated activity that are at or close to maximal intensity. Trust me, I both train people and participate in many mud runs, adventure races and crossfit events spending nigh 10 hours a day coaching breathing patterns. The activity doesn't have to be new to throw off your gauge of when that anaerobic fist punches you in the gut, alls it requires is a little extra effort than usual such as a broad jump a little bit further, a grappling throw a little more muscled, a vertical leap just a little bit higher to get hit. What your talking about far more relates to aerobic activities such as long distance running or swimming.

While this may be true, it sounds like what you are describing is an exception, not the norm. I sort of feel like you and Bouben are talking about two completely different set of circumstances. The problem is that in Arma 3 it's always difficult to tell what your fatigue level is and how much you have left in the tank. Without a stamina bar, you may be jogging for a few minutes with a heavy load and not have a good idea if you are somewhat tired or very tired or bordering on completely exhausted.

People have already brought up arguments for why it can be difficult to take in the cues the game is giving you and understand exactly how they correlate to your fatigue level, as well as how this particular method seems to run counter to Arma 3's standards for displaying the rest of this sort of information. Those are good points and I agree with them.

But I have another question: What is the point of making this information so indistinct? How does the game or player benefit from forcing people to experiment to learn how the fatigue system works and how these audio and visual cues sync with fatigue levels? What value does this add to the gameplay? Especially if it's not necessarily realistic in the majority of situations (those in which the player isn't pushing themselves to their absolute limits).

[bad benson 1733]

That could be quite a cool mod, having aerobic and unaerobic endurance. So that it's handled differently for both sprinting and jogging.

yea sure. i could imagine though that it would be quite easy to solve it by setting a limit on the jogg animation (or anything but sprinting and crawling for that matter) that doesn't allow more than a certain degree of sway. i'm totally fine with being fatigued in general it just bugs me to no end that my avatar's body is in the same state after doing an aggressive sprint until all stamina is used up, as after a long jogg. it doesn't have to be complicated or anything. just a different possible max value for jogg than sprint. no need for complex simulations.

i mean one has to ask oneself what sway actually is and what real behavior it's supposed to simulate. sure if you are tired you might have "soft" arms but how is that comparable to having your chest frantically expanding and contracting to get your oxygen levels up after going all in? the latter is something that actually causes wild sway since your body is in motion, if you want it or not (i mean you could jsut stop breathing and pass out but who does that? :D) and that translates to your arms.

so i guess one could say my problem is not really with the fatigue but with the sway and what causes how much of it.

[Bouben 3]

Uhm...no you don't. Not when engaged in repeated activity that are at or close to maximal intensity. Trust me, I both train people and participate in many mud runs, adventure races and crossfit events spending nigh 10 hours a day coaching breathing patterns. The activity doesn't have to be new to throw off your gauge of when that anaerobic fist punches you in the gut, alls it requires is a little extra effort than usual such as a broad jump a little bit further, a grappling throw a little more muscled, a vertical leap just a little bit higher to get hit. What your talking about far more relates to aerobic activities such as long distance running or swimming.

The current setup is pretty close to a common sense level if any liberties are given, the soldier is the recepient. I've run full speed sprint for 200m with a rifle, binocs, gps, map etc.. before the noticable breathe came into play. At that point I kneeled and fire hitting targets almost without effort. You talk about loading yourself up and going outside, well then, lets see it :) Go head to your nearest track with the equivalent weight of the equipment above and sprint at 100% for 200m -thats two full sides of the tracks worth and note your breathing pattern.

Edit: After further testing it appears that it is actually the aerobic, slow jog pace which is a bit limited. Jogging at 13kmph/ or 8mph, my soldier with a very bare loadout of 16% capacity got to the heavier breathing, 40 % fatigue mark at only 900m jog. Thats a little more than two times around a track or about a 1/2mile and seems perhaps a little out of shape. On the other hand thats better than an 8 minute mile pace but I have no idea what speed the military generally run their 5 mile jogs at. In reality interval running in a combat situation would make the most sense.

But the weight and physical activity we are talking about are indeed extreme. Read my reply again, please:

False. You are surprised only when you aren't prepared (because you had to do something unexpected that you have not planned or something extreme) but you always know your limits.

IRL, I would not be surprised of the outcome (tired, fatigued, heavy breathing). And that is the point. I would immediately know what to expect the moment I put the load on me because I would feel the weight and every step would indicate that.

I don't have the information in the game, though - therefore I need a colour-blind-ready stamina bar.

[froggyluv 2130]

Clicking and holding the Sprint key for any length of time while carrying heavy loads is extreme. Sprinting is hard enough, why do you think we dress so light? Add 85% max carrying load and that is indeed an extreme exercise situation. Spent the last couple hours dicken around as an AT guy loaded up to 85% carrying capacity, had no problem surviving in a heavy combat moving, ducking, walking (very cheap mode of transport!) and running. I listened to the varying breathing voices in the VR a while and can pretty well tell where i'm at as they change up after the first inital heavy breathing at around 33% fatigued -your first cue. At around 41-42%, more of a light gasp is added and so on. It's not that hard except maybe when loud music is playing but thats not really realistic either now is it.

@roshnak:

But I have another question: What is the point of making this information so indistinct? How does the game or player benefit from forcing people to experiment to learn how the fatigue system works and how these audio and visual cues sync with fatigue levels? What value does this add to the gameplay? Especially if it's not necessarily realistic in the majority of situations (those in which the player isn't pushing themselves to their absolute limits).

Well now thats just general preference of game type now ain't it. For me , less GUI explicit infro and more deciphering from in-game cues are simply more rewarding. I like learning how to move my guy around with physical restraints using only 1st person information as opposed to a certain bar in the GUI -but thats just me.

[roshnak 41]

I listened to the varying breathing voices in the VR a while and can pretty well tell where i'm at as they change up after the first inital heavy breathing at around 33% fatigued -your first cue. At around 41-42%, more of a light gasp is added and so on. It's not that hard except maybe when loud music is playing but thats not really realistic either now is it.

The problem with this is that it requires players to test it out in the VR world with a stamina bar in order to tie various visual and audio clues to actual fatigue levels. I would argue that is bad game design. You want the player reacting to the game world and their state within it. Not trying to decipher what their state actually is.

Well now thats just general preference of game type now ain't it. For me , less GUI explicit infro and more deciphering from in-game cues are simply more rewarding. I like learning how to move my guy around with physical restraints using only 1st person information as opposed to a certain bar in the GUI -but thats just me.

Obviously I can't argue with this if it's just your opinion, but at the same time you have to recognize that everyone has their own opinion and opinion alone is not a great argument for including or not including a game feature.

I can certainly appreciate the value of that style of feedback, but I also think that it's more suited to exploration or survival type games where those things are kind of the focus of the gameplay. In Arma there is frequently a lot of other stuff going on that the player has to think about. Certainly you can't deny that vignetting is a less than ideal indicator at night or in dark conditions. Or that it may be difficult to hear the sound of your character's breathing over the sound of a gunfight and other players talking in your ear and heavy vehicles moving about. And that if both of those things are going on at once it can be unrealistically difficult to know what our fatigue levels are in the game, since in real life we have the ability to understand what is going on with our bodies beyond just what our eyes and ears tell us, making the current indicators an imperfect solution at best.

Also, if you just straight up don't like HUD elements, I imagine you also don't like the stance indicator and turn that off as well. And if that is the case and you are just going to turn off your HUD elements anyway, why even bother arguing against having a stamina bar as long as the other indicators stay in the game? Isn't that just like having stance indicators?

Edited September 3, 2014 by roshnak

[DancZer 65]

I think that UI elements which help to "feel" the avatar status isn't immersion breaking(stanima bar, stance indicator, body status). Because there is no user interface(physical) for it only the display. Showing how many ammo do you have in the weapon is a joke for example.

Heavy breathing and weapon sway is a consequence of the fatigue. These should not be the things that i decide that i'am fatigued based on. In real life you simply know as you know how you are standing.

[TSAndrey 1]

What's up with the overdone fatigue? Even with only a rifle and a belt your character gets tired after 100m and needs to rest for a century! Come on, these are trained soldiers, not fat civillians. Even if it was realistic, this is a game, tone it down a bit!

[machineabuse 11]

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, Arma 3 doesn't let you shoot from the jog/run (which if anything makes it akin to a COD/BF-style "sprint") so I don't see it the same way as you here, and though I'd agree that "left-click to quickly bring up the weapon" would be smoother if you didn't stop moving, but that's presumably due to legacy animation system issues (a hilariously entangled mess, based on a previous OPREP's depiction). I'm keeping in mind that there's separate combat pace (hold), combat pace toggle, and combat pace (3 sec.) keybinds, the latter of which causes the weapon to come up and the character to go to combat pace for three seconds...

Overthinking it a bit there :) What I mean is that if you right click from a lowered weapon it'd be nice if you brought the weapon up into ADS, if you were moving then you'd go into Tactical Pace. Right now the process is left clicking once, then right clicking to go into ADS/tactical. It's the left click in that sequence that I'm not at all fond of.

And now, back to fatigue! :D

[froggyluv 2130]

What's up with the overdone fatigue? Even with only a rifle and a belt your character gets tired after 100m and needs to rest for a century! Come on, these are trained soldiers, not fat civillians. Even if it was realistic, this is a game, tone it down a bit!

Really? A 'century to rest'?

I'm assuming your talking about a 100m sprint and not a jog, right? Just tested a lightly loaded soldier with rifle, ammo, and the basics loaded up at 26% and fatigue level after a 100m sprint was 23% -barely noticeable sway at all and within 5 seconds standing recovery, was at 14% in which no noticeable fatigue effects were set in. With a kneeling recovery it was a mere 3 seconds to no noticeble fatigue effects.

Starting to wonder if this is really just a crimp into players who like to sprint everywhere they go. If you run that same 100m in a sprint/jog interval pace you'll get there with negligible fatigue and that is far more realistic for the majority of tactical firefights. When's the last time you've seen footage of soldiers sprinting everywhere? Controlled bursts is more like it.

@roshnak: Yes, we are all only 1 opinion's worth no matter what are backround but this conversation is probably better off in the GUI thread in General.

[twisted 127]

Really? A 'century to rest'?

I'm assuming your talking about a 100m sprint and not a jog, right? Just tested a lightly loaded soldier with rifle, ammo, and the basics loaded up at 26% and fatigue level after a 100m sprint was 23% -barely noticeable sway at all and within 5 seconds standing recovery, was at 14% in which no noticeable fatigue effects were set in. With a kneeling recovery it was a mere 3 seconds to no noticeble fatigue effects.

Starting to wonder if this is really just a crimp into players who like to sprint everywhere they go. If you run that same 100m in a sprint/jog interval pace you'll get there with negligible fatigue and that is far more realistic for the majority of tactical firefights. When's the last time you've seen footage of soldiers sprinting everywhere? Controlled bursts is more like it.

@roshnak: Yes, we are all only 1 opinion's worth no matter what are backround but this conversation is probably better off in the GUI thread in General.

i think thats it exaclty. some people ike to sprint everywhere in games.

for those people there are missions where fatigue is set lower or off. and ive found the cure to not knowing exactly what your fatigue level is, is to rest. on the rare occassions fatigue is so noticable as to influnece my shooting i already have heavy breathing sounds which are a clue that says, this fellow might be tired, so ease up there a little. knowing whether my character is 42% or 50% wont change the amount of rest needed to recover that much as it goes down very fast anywhay - well if people actaully pause to rest or slow down the pace a bit. As for that comment about dayz by Chortles, you funny guy, dayz does not icorporate fatigue right now, although it has outsold arma3 so it just might be doing something right (i like dayz but like arma3 much more.) and dayz is actually cluttered with feedback trying to tell people the exact state of there heat, hunger, sickess, etc and those messages do reduce immersion. imagine the cluster fuck if all those running people actually had to deal with fatigue...

i prefer not having a fatigue bar, maybe a subtle indicator like the player stance icon changing from normal colour to light grey, but really thats no more information than the breathing and other cues give now.

[roshnak 41]

knowing whether my character is 42% or 50%

Why do people keep throwing this kind of thing out there as if it's the only situation people are talking about? Knowing whether your fatigue level is 42% or 50% might not change what decision you make, but knowing if it's 30% or 60% probably will.

i prefer not having a fatigue bar, maybe a subtle indicator like the player stance icon changing from normal colour to light grey, but really thats no more information than the breathing and other cues give now.

That is significantly more information than breathing and vignetting.

[bad benson 1733]

i don't get why you would oppose a HUD element like that. if you don't want to use it, just don't look at it. it almost seems like this is coming from a realism point of view which is kinda funny since the way it's displayed to you isn't really gonna change the way it's simulated. it's still just a value that goes up and down. considering that we have a HUD for knowing exactly how many bullets are in the current magazine this it's kinda ridiculous that you would be that opposed towards a simple subtle HUD element to gives you information about something you'd have much more knowledge about since we are talking about your actual own body here.

[miketim 20]

If they make it a optional hud element, I am fine with that, hopefully something that cannot be controlled by servers though... I feel like too many would disable it in the name of realism, when it really is a useful tool especially to show noobs, if arma 3 had a stamina bar option, I guarentee it will be easier for noobs to not act like idiots carrying tons of gear, also its probably the least unrealistic hud element to add, its much more realistic then , for instance: knowing how many bullets are in your mag, your magazine isnt attached to your nervous system, but your hands and legs are.

[-Coulum- 35]

Really? A 'century to rest'?

It makes it hard to actually take them serious when they don't even bother to actually test the system out and stick to the facts, rather than exaggerations.

Regarding the fatigue bar, I want a better way to see how fatigued I am, but I have to agree with froggyluv that "feeling" how tired you are is not nearly as accurate as a fatigue bar. It's easy to think you know exactly how tired you are, but in my experience it is actually quite difficult to precisely know how much juice you have left. For runners (as well as soccer, rugby, boxing and I am sure all other sports), it is one of the things that you need alot of experience at, before you can know exactly what your limits are and how you must pace yourself to maximise your potential.

A personal example: I was running a provincial 400m final. I was favoured as one of the top 3 to win. Had tonnes of adrenaline on the start line. Ran the first 200m at 49 seconds pace, which was really great for my age at the time. Was a good 10 metres ahead of second. And I was feeling like I could do it all day. When I hit the 300m I knew I was tired but was still going strong - didn't feel I would have any trouble completing the race. It wasn't till I hit 10 metres before the finish, that I realized how tired I really was and how poorly I had paced myself. I simply lost all control and barely stumbled over the finish line and promptly fell flat on my face. In the last 5 metres I went from first to third.

Anyhow moral of the story is, knowing how much you've got left in you isn't actually that accurate a science. Infact it is something athletes have to train for many years to get the hang of. And even then they still don't get it perfect.

In the chaotic conditions of combat, with various loadouts, environments and levels of training, it is not unreasonable to say that a fatigue bar gives the player too much information. I am not saying that you would be as clueless as currently ingame. I do want something more than what we've got (though personally I don't find it all that bad because I am very frugal with my fatiguing actions). But you certainly don't have as an accurate idea as a fatigue bar would give.

All that being said, I think more people need to do a mission with a fatigue bar just to get a better idea of how the fatigue system actually works.

[machineabuse 11]

Frankly speaking, I believe most of the discontent with the new fatigue values stems from the insufficient feedback in vanilla and the abstract quantifying of loadout weight in the inventory. Speaking of which, it's funny how the people who would balk at the idea of a stamina bar are not asking for the ability to disable the weight bar in the inventory. :rolleyes:

It's a big picture thing. It's not that anyone likes having a new HUD element, it's that there are more interesting challenges to be had in the game than the rote memorization of which sound file and animation represent X value of stamina.

The concerns of my own ArmA community are the recruitment, training and retention of members. The more people we can get over the hurdle of adopting the basic game in the first place the better as we want to get players into the more interesting bits of learning infantry maneuvers. It is just as well we have tools like ST_Stamina_Bar and BW_LoadCalc to help out our members do that.

But again, if the fatigue feedback was better by any other means it would obviate any need of a stamina bar. After all, we didn't need it while we were playing ArmA 2 ACE.

[roshnak 41]

All that being said, I think more people need to do a mission with a fatigue bar just to get a better idea of how the fatigue system actually works.

This is the problem. If the average player needs some extra element to be able to figure out the system in the first place, then the feedback the game is giving you isn't very good.

I think that Machineabuse is probably correct in that many complaints about the fatigue and sway systems are rooted in a lack of understanding of the mechanics of the fatigue system and that better feedback could do a lot to alleviate the problems many players are having with it.

[Greenfist 1863]

In my opinion, a game like Arma is allowed to require players to learn the system without constantly holding their hand. That's why they made the Bootcamp. Maybe they should just add one more tutorial for the fatigue.

I'm not against implementing a stamina bar in the vanilla game, but I just think it's not very necessary.

By the way, this whole discussion about the bar is going around for the third time in this thread. The first match started about here: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?168240-Fatigue-Feedback-(dev-branch)&p=2724120&viewfull=1#post2724120 (July 7th, 600 posts ago) :D

[roshnak 41]

In my opinion, a game like Arma is allowed to require players to learn the system without constantly holding their hand.

Sure, but that's not really what we're talking about here. When the game asks players to learn how to counter weapon sway, that's not holding their hands. When the game asks players to learn to manage weapon inertia, that's not holding their hands. Those things can also be learned during the course of normal gameplay. When people are suggesting that players play the game outside of typical mission scenarios with a stamina bar active, either via mods or the Virtual Arsenal, in order to learn to recognize how various audio and visual cues correspond to different fatigue states just to be able to figure out how tired their character is, that is going a bit beyond not constantly holding the player's hand.

And I ask again, to what end? How does this improve gameplay or the average player experience? It's not necessarily more realistic. It's certainly not more realistic in all or even most situations. There is reason to believe that it actively hurts some players' understanding of the fatigue and sway system. It doesn't mesh with Bohemia's previous decisions to use UI elements to provide the player with feedback about the state of his or her body such as the weight bar or the stance indicator.

And to the people who are arguing that a stamina bar would give an unrealistically detailed depiction of stamina levels: Do you think that this bar gives a very detailed status report?

[Greenfist 1863]

And to the people who are arguing that a stamina bar would give an unrealistically detailed depiction of stamina levels: Do you think that this bar gives a very detailed status report?

http://i.imgur.com/XIjkNGu.png

If we're talking about something as simple as that, then no; that's not too detailed. But it's pointless, because those levels would probably depict the very obvious states:

Green: 0-30% fatigue. No significant sway, light breathing and sway at most.

Orange: 30-60%. Heavy panting. Visible sway. Still able to sprint.

Red: 60-100%. Huge sway. No sprinting, slowed down jogging. Vignette.

People seem to asking something much more accurate. Maybe 10 different states. And an indication of how fast you are recovering/tiring, maybe +2, +1, ±0, -1, -2.