Project ASTFOR - Astelandic Armed Forces

[Kristian 47]

Put a PM to your inbox, I will not allow myself to stand idle, while this glorious task is being worked by others!

[j_murphy 10]

Would somebody who is a beginner with blender be any use?

[PTV-Jobo 820]

Hey guys, we're still here and working behind the scenes! I can't seem to get a new poll up so we'll have to do this another way. Basically I've been kicking around the idea of including optional pip-style variants of our optics. Now so far RHS and ACE have figured out two methods of doing it--both with their share of pro's and con's. So we're not sure exactly which approach to consider. So I figured kick the idea around on here and see what our supporters would like, and then go from there.

[R0adki11 3945]

Hey guys, we're still here and working behind the scenes! I can't seem to get a new poll up so we'll have to do this another way. Basically I've been kicking around the idea of including optional pip-style variants of our optics. Now so far RHS and ACE have figured out two methods of doing it--both with their share of pro's and con's. So we're not sure exactly which approach to consider. So I figured kick the idea around on here and see what our supporters would like, and then go from there.

Fixed the Poll for you :)

[deathwatch4 89]

I prefer the ACE PIP optics, kinda gives it the Red Orchestra feel.

[j0nes 194]

Hello everyone!

just thought Id jump in quick with some updates.

The vehicle list has been tweaked from its original, due to some new finds and gameplay balancing. The updated list, we feel, will essentially mirror the structure that has already been put in place by the vanilla factions and make the Astorian faction not just the addition of a couple vehicles and weapons, but a fleshed out military with no supplementation needed.

About half of the land vehicles are at 50% thanks to Lord Jarhead, and mainly need interiors,configs,optimizations, and textures (STILL WOULD LOVE A DEDICATED TEXTURE ARTIST) fleshed out. Not all of these vehicles will make it into the alpha release just because of manpower and time, but there should be enough there to get some solid testing done as well as make it fun for everyone.

Wheeled:

Landcruiser FZJ

Iveco LMV*

-unarmed (FFV turret)*

-manned M2 turret*

-Ambulance*

Iveco LMV pickup*

-manned M2 + passengers*

-manned Mk19 + passengers*

-TOW launcher in pickup bed*

-RBS 70 launcher in pickup bed*

ATF Dingo

-RCWS MG3

Patria Pasi XA203 (non amphibious, with Manned M2 Turret)*

-MEV*

Susi A2045

-flatbed

Susi ETP 8x8

-Radar

-SAM missiles

Susi ETP 10x10

Tracked:

CV90*

-armadillo*

M113

Leopard 2A6*

-Up armoured*

-bridgelayer*

Pzh2000 Artillery*

Air:

AS550*

-unarmed*

-TOW x4*

-Dual .50cal Gun pods*

-1x 20mm cannon 1x 7 FFAR pod*

NH90*

-MEV*

-gunship (details to be disclosed at later date)*

Bell 412 (will not be added until full release or later)

C130J

Saab JAS39C/D

Navy:

Jurmo Landing Craft

-NEMO mortar system

Goteborg Class corvette

Hamina Class missile boat

Kuha class minesweeper

Static:

Ksp m39 .30cal MG

M2 Tripod

-minitripod

Mk19 Tripod

-minitripod

TOW Launcher

RBS70 AA Launcher

Bofors 40mm (1940s)*

-modern*

M41/D 120mm Mortar

FH77B 155mm howitzer

*in progress

If you see a vehicle on this list you would like to help with, or if you would like to Join our team, please contact Yokhanan. A little help can go a long way!

Jones

[oggoeg 3]

I prefer vanilla 3D scopes, I'd even prefer all vanilla long range scopes in 3D too. All PIP and 2D scopes I've seen in Arma look unfortunately bad :/

[PTV-Jobo 820]

WOW! I come back some hours later only to see the votes go in a direction I was certainly not expecting. For me, I love the bigger and clearer sight picture of the 2d pip style we see in ACE, but at the same time really enjoy the feel of the 3d optic method of RHS even though when you zoom all the way in the image is a bit pixelated. If only technology and the engine allowed us to marry both. Oh well. Well the polls already give the team some big things to talk about and consider then.

For those who prefer the vanilla style optics, fear not. This whole PiP thing is more of an added variants thing giving the community a little more in way of choices to enjoy playing with. So don't worry, we won't replace one with the other. :)

[R0adki11 3945]

Ive closed the poll as for some reason, it has been reverting to the previous results of the previous poll. Can forum members please cast your vote by posting in the thread regarding the PIP scope, im keen to see which way people choose, especially as i maybe the one doing the config work to get them to work on the ASTFOR Scopes ;)

[t-800a 151]

...Can forum members please cast your vote by posting in the thread regarding the PIP scope, im keen to see which way people choose...

the ACE pip optics

[Frenzi_ 18]

I prefer the RHS version.

[PTV-Jobo 820]

LJ and I have been going back and forth with this already. It's so damn difficult for me to choose--which is why I decided to poll the community as well for some guidence. For Reference, I took screen shots in the virtual armoury using RHS's 3d pip ACOG and ACE3's RCO (since they only did the RCO and ARCO and offer no ACOG's heh) mounted to our Astelandic AG95kr Galil's:

RHS Normal: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015695/876724E4F58C074D2B67E680989DFD9D47A3D112/

RHS R-click Zoomed: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015821/4F931C99829F01748B505E4975127F68F1F26489/

ACE 3: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015943/DD0502A2E2998C217F8C33458DA0366C20296316/

The way I see it

RHS Pro's

• 3d optic as opposed to a 2d overlay picture
  
• looks nice unzoomed and looks a bit more authentic
  
• Feels like you can react a little quicker than waiting for a full screen overlay
  

RHS Con's

• Framerate hit possible from 3-5 FPS, especially when vehicles also use pip mirrors from what I remember reading when they first introduced the pip ACOG
  
• Sometimes you can't really see much/identify much
  
• When you zoom to try seeing a bit better the pip goes from nice to horrible and pixelated
  

ACE PiP Pro's

• Much bigger and clearer sight picture for aiming much more efficiently
  
• Don't need to zoom to see and identify targets
  
• Even with a larger sight picture, the pip is crisp and clear
  

ACE PiP Con's

• 2d image that fills pretty much most of the center of your screen instead of aiming through a 3d model
  
• while the center picture with pip is crisp and clear, the outside peripheral view is pixelated since which some might find a bit so-so if their eye strays outside the center of the optic
  

Those are so far the pro's and con's that either I can think of having used both, or what I've heard over time from friends who have used both. Either way, it's a tough call. But so far it looks like by the vote count plenty of you out there have tried both and still feel more inclined towards seeing pip optics done in the style of RHS as opposed to the 2d pip method of ACE. Interesting.... :)

[da12thMonkey 1943]

As a player I prefer the ACE method - I feel image clarity through the optics is king when it comes to a scope being usable

In terms of doing it as an addonmaker though; drawing good 2D images to use for the ACE method can be pretty work intensive compared to the RHS method where you simply adapt the 3D model you already have. But I suppose it depends on one's skill as a 2D artist.

Personally I tried making one by rendering my model in Marmoset (or another program with decent PBR will probably do) and using the FOV and DOF sliders to get it looking nice. It was much faster than drawing it all by hand in PS or Illustrator or something, however because it's based on a polygon model it's probably not as smooth as it could be:

Edited June 19, 2015 by da12thMonkey

[John Kozak 14]

LJ and I have been going back and forth with this already. It's so damn difficult for me to choose--which is why I decided to poll the community as well for some guidence. For Reference, I took screen shots in the virtual armoury using RHS's 3d pip ACOG and ACE3's RCO (since they only did the RCO and ARCO and offer no ACOG's heh) mounted to our Astelandic AG95kr Galil's:

RHS Normal: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015695/876724E4F58C074D2B67E680989DFD9D47A3D112/

RHS R-click Zoomed: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015821/4F931C99829F01748B505E4975127F68F1F26489/

ACE 3: http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/519385854236015943/DD0502A2E2998C217F8C33458DA0366C20296316/

The way I see it

RHS Pro's

• 3d optic as opposed to a 2d overlay picture
  
• looks nice unzoomed and looks a bit more authentic
  
• Feels like you can react a little quicker than waiting for a full screen overlay
  

RHS Con's

• Framerate hit possible from 3-5 FPS, especially when vehicles also use pip mirrors from what I remember reading when they first introduced the pip ACOG
  
• Sometimes you can't really see much/identify much
  
• When you zoom to try seeing a bit better the pip goes from nice to horrible and pixelated
  

ACE PiP Pro's

• Much bigger and clearer sight picture for aiming much more efficiently
  
• Don't need to zoom to see and identify targets
  
• Even with a larger sight picture, the pip is crisp and clear
  

ACE PiP Con's

• 2d image that fills pretty much most of the center of your screen instead of aiming through a 3d model
  
• while the center picture with pip is crisp and clear, the outside peripheral view is pixelated since which some might find a bit so-so if their eye strays outside the center of the optic
  

Those are so far the pro's and con's that either I can think of having used both, or what I've heard over time from friends who have used both. Either way, it's a tough call. But so far it looks like by the vote count plenty of you out there have tried both and still feel more inclined towards seeing pip optics done in the style of RHS as opposed to the 2d pip method of ACE. Interesting.... :)

ACE version all the way. RHS variant drops shadows when looking through it, does not load detailed lod for objects you're looking at, etc. In other words, it picks wrong view to have detailed - it's not detailed where you look at, but is detailed elsewhere. ACE3 one has the right focus and hence feels natural.

[PTV-Jobo 820]

da12thMonkey,

Thanks a ton for your input as well as a few pointers. I think at the end of the day its a battle of looks vs functionality. As "cool" as the RHS style is, there's still some big concerns and one of them is functionality. The whole point of a higher powered optic--and correct me if I am wrong here--is that you want or need to see and identify targets much more clearly and efficiently from further away than just relying on iron sights or a holo sight. If the optic looks great but isn't doing just that, then what's the point?

I've ping-pong'ed back and forth over this for days now and you hit it. At the end of the day I have to give clarity a bit more of an edge. During a co-op with a group of friends we tested both optic styles and found that we ended up unfortunately having issues identifying targets and had quite a few civilian casualties with the RHS method of pip optics. It looked great, but.....yeah. But while the ACE method is possibly a bit less glamorous to look at, there was no denying the better clarity and finally able to identify and engage targets in a far more efficient manner.

I'm a bit bummed, and again....hopefully in the future we can figure a way of getting a mix of both that will work and not kill frame rate performance or suffer from current known bugs and limitations. However, until that day, I think I prefer to have something that is actually functional than waste time and hard work on something that might have the majority votes, but once in the hands of the community will quickly hated due to the above mentioned reasons, thus wasted work and effort.

This is also considering the facts as also expressed by DarkWanderer as well (thanks for pointing out even more issues as well that we need to take into consideration!).

Thanks for the tips as well. To be honest, if we get our pip-style optics looking even half as nice as your posted sample, I'd be excited haha. Looks great, mate! :butbut: :D

[PTV-Jobo 820]

Hello all,

We're still busy pecking away with the project as always. In fact things have definitely progressed quite nicely over the past week or so! We've also gained a few members along the way who will be lending their wonderful Norwegian voices to help us put together for some interesting "goodies"/features as well as voice acting job for an eventual campaign/storyline. All I'll say is the storyline will certainly come off controversial tackling issues that show our willingness to push the bar to produce something for the community with a lot of passion that will make us stand out and be quite immersive. That's all I'll say on the matter for project OPSEC sake, haha. :p

With all the positive things going on (for once in our project's life!), we do have some sad news. We will be losing our member TheEvanCat as he will be busy with training and such. We wish him all the best and great success as well as greatly appreciate all the time and hard work he has given our project. :D

Now what this ultimately means is we do have a slot open and in need of someone who can help in regards to infantry development. Namely helping with the modeling of assets. We are also in need of someone who has texturing abilities to help us get the best quality we can into our uniform as well as vests for the community.

So if anyone out there fits into either categories--even if time is limited and cannot be a full time member--feel free to drop us a message! :)

[sanguinius51 11]

Have you guys considered a Eurocopter Tiger as an attack helicopter? I understand you have an AS550 planned, however that wouldn't really fit into the role of an attack helicopter, it would be more of an armed reconnaissance helicopter. The two variants I could envision you using are the HAP (France, more of a conventional gunship as opposed to gun-less UHT) and ARH (Australia, arguably a more advanced version of the HAP due to upgraded optics, weapons systems and engines.) Both are essentially the same, however just using different weapons systems. I think it would definitely provide a unique feel to your mod to have that incorporated.

Or you can just go the Netherlands route and get an Apache, however considering Astoria is an island, it would make more sense to use a Tiger.

[PTV-Jobo 820]

Yeah it's been discussed in the past a few times. Originally back in ArmA 2 when me and StalkerGB started the project and it was more Baltic, we were going to have the Superhind as the attack helicopter of choice. Now that we have Asteland which is more Nordic, things like this are much more tricky. Especially since none of our real-world neighbors have such vehicles in their arsenal and we would be the only nordic country to have an actual attack helicopter--be it Eurocopter or Apache. In addition, Asteland I see more cooperating with other nations that have such equipment. Kind of like the Estonians joined to the British in Helmand and when they needed air support, utilizing the British assets like their apache's.

Don't get me wrong, I would love to see the Eurocopter Tiger patrolling Astelandic skies, but it's just justifying our spending the cash on them and being the only ones throughout the Nordic part of the world to have actual attack helicopters like a Tiger or Apache that's an issue.

[j0nes 194]

Hello all,

Im proud to announce that the AS550 has completed its high poly test in game. It still requires a lot to be any sort of usable, but the model loads, so we can now focus on UV, textures and Animations.

1. the poly count for the exterior LOD is sitting comfortably at 30800 polys, and the interior is looking to be about 26000 upon completion. not to worry, we will have full LODs so as not to kill CPUs

2. the as550 will be the first of our helicopters in game and therefore serves as a testing bed for the following (TESTING strongly empasized)

- advanced rotor animations that carry through blurred rotors

- an aircraft arming system (may not be introduced until beta)

- our NO-HUD approach to vehicles, completely removing the 2d corner of the screen hud for vehicles, and providing all the information in world via gauges and warning panels (this will be an optional client side PBO that will either enable or disable the huds, depending on which we decide to use as default in the future)

- flight simulator level of detail in instruments (no this does not include autopilot or interactive cockpits, just make more usable/readable instruments)

- auxiliary turrets (on this vehicle its in the form of an adjustable landing light that can be controlled by either pilot or copilot)

3. the as550 will also have the armed and civilian variants will appear shortly after the base unarmed 550 completes its texturing and in game config

Jones

[j0nes 194]

http://imgur.com/a/vkeV9

This is my imgur Astfor album to keep you all up to dat with our WIP photos. Everything in the album was created by (or used with permission) by the ASTFOR team, but not all by me (i.e. the helmets shown were created by another team member)

Enjoy! New pictures all the time

[miketim 20]

Wow. Nice work! (Really coming along well) Are all the weapons and stuff still going to come in a separate pack as well? ( I think I remember someone saying that)

[j0nes 194]

@MikeTim weapons will be in a separate pbo, but still require the core modules, the entire ASTFOR mod will be stand alone except small things like CBA, but not cut into individual sections. at least not at this time

[PTV-Jobo 820]

First page has been updated with some screenshots our big fan and team member, Kristian. The uniforms have changed a bit with textures and always in a constant change, but at least they'll give you a rough idea of what they look like in game with some of our weps and whatnot. :)

[j0nes 194]

http://pichoster.net/images/2015/07/22/arma3%202015-07-22%2020-04-32-090.jpg (919 kB)

(creation credit to 19thCypeRevenge)

just going to leave this here

[Cype_Revenge 651]

thank you that I could help you :D