Arma 3 too small for fixed wing

[LuckyArma 3]

Altis is the largest map in all of Arma 3, sure it's fine for helicopters and ground troops, but get in a fixed winged aircraft(even a small Cessna) and Altis gets small really fast.  

 

I long for the day when someone combines Arma 3 with Google Earth.  Arma 3 graphics with Google Earth full world terrain.  Yes, that's what I want.

[Grumpy Old Man 3546]

VBS3 features something similar:

 

 

Pretty fleshed out as of now:

 

 

Imagine that in Arma, die, respawn, have to fly 250km to the AO for an hour.

 

Cheers

[road runner 4344]

I bet there's no issues with AI following WP's or being unable to cross bridges either!!

I agree with the OP, Fast Air is wasted within Arma 3, unless you have a map like DCS world(s)

[ElectroEsper 14]

I wouldn't mind giving up a bit of graphical fidelity for something like that!

[Tajin 349]

150km viewdistance ?

 

My pc would implode if I tried that on arma.

[HazardousJay 83]

someone made real world data terrains and posted here in the forums, this might interest you OP

you can also increase your view distance abit more by typing this on the debug menu

 

 

setViewDistance 25000;

 

good luck though with the frames. especially so in maps that have buildings like altis. but on empty maps like what i linked youll have fairly decent frames

[Redphoenix 1540]

2 hours ago, Tajin said:

150km viewdistance ?

 

My pc would implode if I tried that on arma.

Can't even watch that far IRL lul

[semiconductor 309]

People, just install a DCS already.

[Ex3B 266]

The best I've got is to put carriers/LHDs on opposite sides of altis "off the map".. ie in the black area of the map. In this case, the "ships" can be over 60km away without problems... which is still rather small, but at least it takes a few minutes to get places. At 1200 km/h, that is 1 km every 3 seconds, so being 30km away from the center of altis means that it takes 1.5 minutes to reach the center, and 3 minutes to reach the other Carrier/LHD.

[LuckyArma 3]

On 11/17/2017 at 6:48 AM, semiconductor said:

People, just install a DCS already.

 

I have DCS World, but the terrain just doesn't compare to Arma 3

 

It would awesome being able to fly the helicopters from Arma 3 in Google Earth with ground view terrain like Arma 3 has.  Maybe in another life, or a parallel universe. 

[road runner 4344]

34 minutes ago, LuckyArma said:

 

I have DCS World, but the terrain just doesn't compare to Arma 3

 

It would awesome being able to fly the helicopters from Arma 3 in Google Earth with ground view terrain like Arma 3 has.  Maybe in another life, or a parallel universe. 

Do you have the Nevada, and Normandy maps?
The problem is people get fixated on the actual terrains, unless you're flying NOE, and under 300 knots, even top spec flight sims the terrains are designed for flight, not for jumping out and going into combat.

It's comparing apples to oranges really, as A3 terrains were designed for Infantry style game play, as much as people laud VBS3, again it's optimised for the role it's playing.. stunning groundwork, but piss poor models.

DCS fits the role perfectly, enough ground detail to make your flights interesting, whilst  A3 has terrains perfectly suited for slow moving rotary assets, and mechanised warfare.

Google Earth is just sat resolution, it lacks proper elevation, there was some decent MS flightsim terrains a good few years ago, that had decent elevation, but lacked detail, and again, it was optimised for flying at altitude, I was tempted to try prepar3d but needed a beast to run it at the time.

[x3kj 1247]

On 12.11.2017 at 6:33 AM, LuckyArma said:

Altis gets small really fast. 

Which is why Arma traditionally never really focused on supersonic Jets (and in the past, jets ingame would always have a speed handycap compared to RL). They changed it with the DLC somewhat because of popular demand and because the situation with Saul gave the opportunity.

[LuckyArma 3]

On 11/19/2017 at 3:46 AM, road runner said:

Do you have the Nevada, and Normandy maps?
The problem is people get fixated on the actual terrains, unless you're flying NOE, and under 300 knots, even top spec flight sims the terrains are designed for flight, not for jumping out and going into combat.

It's comparing apples to oranges really, as A3 terrains were designed for Infantry style game play, as much as people laud VBS3, again it's optimised for the role it's playing.. stunning groundwork, but piss poor models.

DCS fits the role perfectly, enough ground detail to make your flights interesting, whilst  A3 has terrains perfectly suited for slow moving rotary assets, and mechanised warfare.

Google Earth is just sat resolution, it lacks proper elevation, there was some decent MS flightsim terrains a good few years ago, that had decent elevation, but lacked detail, and again, it was optimised for flying at altitude, I was tempted to try prepar3d but needed a beast to run it at the time.

 

I'm looking for the total experience,  realistic graphics for aircraft and terrain and buildings, and a realistic flight model as well.   I mean, if company A can do one, and company B can do the other; why isn't there a company C that does both?

[Rich_R 1087]

22 hours ago, LuckyArma said:

 

I'm looking for the total experience,  realistic graphics for aircraft and terrain and buildings, and a realistic flight model as well.   I mean, if company A can do one, and company B can do the other; why isn't there a company C that does both?

 

Just spitballing here, but because it's not possible to do both using the average gaming PC currently being used?

 

Or maybe finite resources leave gaming companies to produce the best title their good at?

 

I think conversations like this are interesting. Flashback to the release of Tanoa and the forums were filled with posts complaining not all of the buildings were enterable. Yet looking at the graphically rich Ghost Recon Wildlands, not only are there just as few enterable buildings, it appears the open world is small compared to the terrains in Arma 3.

 

Short version of a long answer, if it could be done, I'm pretty sure BI would do it.

[cas 41]

I would like the Maps to have a bigger area of sea surrounding the islands!

You could park the carrier long away from the island. And there would be enough space for air combat.

 

 

[Harzach 2517]

7 hours ago, Rich_R said:

Yet looking at the graphically rich Ghost Recon Wildlands, not only are there just as few enterable buildings, it appears the open world is small compared to the terrains in Arma 3.

 

Maybe I'm misreading you, but the Wildlands map is actually quite large. The frame is apparently 24km x 24km, with the playable area at about 20km x 20km. It's a beautiful terrain with boatloads of detail, too bad the gameplay doesn't measure up.

[Rich_R 1087]

I've just started playing Wildlands but from what I read, the terrain is smaller than Atlis (200 sq km vs 270sq km) but has many, if not more limitations placed on it than Arma. We're getting slightly off-subject but the point is players have come on here  complaining about what they felt were shortfalls, lack of furniture and in the case on Tanoa, enterable buildings and finally this thread of bigger more detailed terrains.

 

Wildlands had far fewer enterable buildings, incredibly unrealistic flight control, etc. and was produced by a much larger gaming company.

 

This should tell us that you can't have your cake and eat it too, otherwise game makers would be more than happy to serve it up, priced accordingly.

 

In a way @Harzach proved my point with his complaint about Wildlands gameplay :)

[Ex3B 266]

On 11/27/2017 at 9:10 AM, cas said:

I would like the Maps to have a bigger area of sea surrounding the islands!

You could park the carrier long away from the island. And there would be enough space for air combat.

 

 

But you can already do this to some extent. You can place carriers "off of the map" where the map displays black not blue. I haven't found any limit to how far out they can be placed, but I did run into limits with static objects not displaying (but their collider is still there) if they are placed too far away

 

So the for Tanoa before the above starts to happen, I can get LHDs (Atlas LHD plus) 50km apart. For Altis I can get over 60.

I haven't tried with the USS Freedom, but I have tried with other forms of offshore base (like so:

Spoiler

And those run into the same issue... so water bases 50km away from each other on Tanoa, and 60km on Altis, seems to be the best one can do.

[squirrel0311 16]

I agree that the maps are too small at least for the Jets dlc.

 

I wish they would have focused on something more like COIN aircraft.

 

NATO:Textron Scorpion - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textron_AirLand_Scorpion

 

AltFor: Buzzard

 

CSAT / CSAT E: TO-199 Neophron (Since China/Yak worked together to build almost the same plane.)

 

CSAT/E Heavy Ground Attack aircraft: Stealthier/ modern / sleeker version of the SU-25 frogfoot 

Or

The IL-102 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilyushin_Il-102

 

Anyone: EMB -314 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano

And or Machete Concept attack aircraft - https://www.funker530.com/machete-attack-plane/

 

Depending on the flight models and capabilities implemented, you could still have fun and challenging air battles along with an arguably more fitting aircraft for CAS missions. Something like the Super Tuscano or Machete would have been great for Tanoa, I think. 

 

[Ex3B 266]

CSAT Yak-130... the Neophron is already based off of the Yak-130. That is very redundant. We already had CAS fighters. COIN aircraft are pretty redundant with CAS aircraft around.

It would be like an AH-6 vs an AH-64, they do the same role, the AH-64 is just better. I suppose there'd be a role for COIN aircraft if a Wipeout would be overkill, but with the Buzzard and custom pylon loadouts, I think mission makers could already make a suitable aircraft. You can also (crudely) take the Apex DLC prop aircraft and add weapons to them, like miniguns/HMGs, mk82 bombs, rockets, etc.

[squirrel0311 16]

6 hours ago, Ex3B said:

CSAT Yak-130... the Neophron is already based off of the Yak-130. That is very redundant. We already had CAS fighters. COIN aircraft are pretty redundant with CAS aircraft around.

You're right, I just forgot to add that it was already (in Game) next to the description. It was a late night post and I had to get to sleep. Haha

I couldn't remember the names since I havent been able to play for sevreal months because my computer was stolen.

 

I'd like to also add that I do in fact like the wipeout.

 

Since we have a bit of artistic freedom, I wonder what a stealthier-ish-looking SU-25 frogfoot would have been like... Or maybe The plane that was actually supposed to be more of a Russian CAS aircraft like the A-10, The IL-102.

 

I get that coin type aircraft could feel a bit redundant but I also think that would mainly come down to mission makers ability to keep it fun and challenging. 

 

Forgot to mention that the L-15B might be just a knockoff version of another aircraft too. I haven't been able to do much research on it. 

 

Does Arma let you fly and dogfight with other players online in the black parts of the map? I cant remember.

[Ex3B 266]

15 minutes ago, squirrel0311 said:

Does Arma let you fly and dogfight with other players online in the black parts of the map? I cant remember.

Yes, it does. Static structures seem to disappear if they are too far away. See my post in this thread showing craft on an invisible LHD.

 

I can place these about 50km away from each other with no ill effects on the Tanoa map:

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

But if you put the static objects too far away (I had everything else moved there with the setPosASL command), this happens:

Spoiler

 

So.... yea, the units are still showing up, the colliders are still there, so I don't see why you couldn't have jets dogfighting in these black areas.

I can get the LHDs over 60km away on the slightly large Altis map, so I guess there's a certain amount of "black" around a map that static objects still show up just fine.

[squirrel0311 16]

On 2/19/2018 at 11:55 AM, Ex3B said:

Yes, it does. 

Ah I see! Yeah I saw your post from earlier, thanks.

 

I just wasn't sure the server would track what players were doing off the map. I wonder if that's more taxing on it.

[Ex3B 266]

ah server issues... I actually haven't tried on Mutliplayer... I'd like to try though, to get about 32 people, 16 per side, each based on a carrier like that, none of the vehicles set to respawn except for a single littlebird on each side, and then play for sector control on Tanoa or Altis. I've made some maps like that. 

(I also had AAF forces on the map, hostile to both sides, guarding some empty vehicles that either side may want to seize)