Some things I wish Arma 3 did differently.

[TheMrNATE 0]

First off, I love Arma! It's my most played steam game and it's where I've met most of my best friends on steam. However, there are some things that I really dislike about Arma and I wish were done differently.

 

[THIS WILL BE A LONG POST, SO I'LL PUT A TL;DR AT THE END]

 

• Overall polish and attention to detail isn't very good. The damage models need a complete rework. It would be cool to see blood where I actually got shot or to see dents/scratches on a vehicle where I hit something. Actually seeing the rocket being loaded in your RPG and seeing the medkit when you use one, having proper animations for ladders and stairs and more fluid animations that affect what your character is interacting with, like opening doors on houses and vehicles, and Having your character pull his gun closer when hes near a wall so your barrel doesn't stick through. These things seem so little and useless, but they can actually go a long way in making players feel more immersed and like they're playing a more fleshed out game. Tarkov is a great example of good fleshed out animations.

 

• Vehicles. They're good for getting you from point A to point B if you take the main road, they're a deathtrap if you use them for anything else. Hitting a bush shouldn't destroy my tires and headlights while almost killing me in the process. PLEASE, just turn off collision for any bush that's smaller than an offroad!  Also, why does your vehicle explode after hitting enough things? Literally no vehicle does that. I play a lot of wasteland, and sometimes you have to use a vehicle as your main weapon, whether it be a hatchback or an offroad. If I ram into another vehicle, it's RNG whether I live and the enemy dies, the enemy lives and I die, we both live, we both die, or one or both of us goes flying off into space. It's extremely annoying. My solution is to make a new damage mechanic for vehicles. If I ram into the driver side of an enemy vehicle going less than 50KMH, the enemy should die and I should be severely injured. Anything over 50KMH and we both die. Something like that. Things should be switched up for armored vehicles as well. Nothing should be completely destroyed by 1 rocket or missile unless it's from a jet or a helicopter. Ifrits, Hunters, and Striders are completely useless if the AI or enemy has an RPG. Instead of having 1 rocket blow up the vehicle and killing everyone inside, make it so that 1 rocket just disables the vehicle and also make it RNG on who dies and who gets severely injured. Each launcher should have their own damage multiplier and each APC and tank should have a multiplier on every side (Front, back, left, right, top, and bottom). Hitting a specific part of a tank or APC like the track or turret should always disable it. IMO, this will make the combat between players and vehicles so much more balanced and fun.

 

• Animations should be interruptible and be able to be performed while moving. If I'm healing and hear an enemy walking up, there's nothing I can do but spin around and hope they have the worst aim in existence. It would be nice if I could stop the animation and take my gun back out to take care of the enemy, then start healing again. If I could move while healing, then I could walk into a room or around the corner in order to finish the animation. Let me pull out my pistol to cancel the reload animation if I need to kill another player quickly. Also, this is something I saw on one of Crowbcat's videos, lets say that I just killed an enemy in KOTH and I only have 8 rounds left in my mag, I go to reload and then another enemy rounds the corner. It would be awesome if I could left click and have my character quickly put back in the mag that has 8 rounds left in order to finish off the enemy, rather than taking the time to get a new mag. Speaking of left click, that would be a good keybind to cancel animations.

 

• This is kind of small, but having preferences for each gun and scope in the options so that each time a player picks up a gun or attaches a scope, it will be suited to their play style. If I pick up an MXC, I want it to be on full auto and zeroed to 200m, and I don't want that to change unless I change it manually in game or in the options. If I drop the weapon and pick it back up, it should be just the way I left it.

 

• The AI is mega dumb. I shouldn't even need to explain how bad they are. There's literally more improvements you could make on the AI than you could on the actual game! They have god like aim, they just sit there and crawl around, they see you through bushes and walls, and they can even magically walk through solid objects. Not even full Lvl 5 armor will protect you from getting 1-tapped by these gods. My fondest memory of them was on Wasteland on the Stratis map. Me and some friend were driving to a mission when an AI on the airfield 1-tapped me out of the back of an offroad going 40KMH from over 600m away.

 

• Weapon sway is unrealistic and annoying more than it is immersive. The sway is so slow and all over the place when it should be more controlled and shaky/twitchy. I mean, come on. You're a highly trained soldier and you can't even walk 10 feet in your gear and still have accurate aim? You literally need to stand still for 2 minutes or have a bipod to be accurate in this game. The current sway animation is just a handicap for gameplay and immersion. It should be reworked.

 

• Player damage and Armor. Each armor piece should have a multiplier for each type of round, and the armor should lose durability each time it gets shot and have less protection the lower its durability is. Players should have a set HP that goes down every time they get hit, and it should continue to drop unless they use a medkit. If I get shot in the arm, my aim should be extremely shaky, if I get shot in the leg then my movement should be slower and I should have a limp. The slow painful limping animation your player gets when they take enough damage needs to go! With no armor and an MX, a player should be dead with 1 shot to the chest, head, and stomach, and 2 to the legs and arms. With All level 5 armor and an MX, a player should die in 2 shots the the helmet, 4 to the chest, 3 to the stomach, 5 to the legs, and 6 to the arms. There are times when I've killed players with level 5 armor using a TRG faster than I've killed players with level 3 armor using an AK-12. That's dumb. Damage and armor should be consistent.

 

• Aiming and shooting should take priority over any other keys held. The delay from when you stop sprinting and ADS is a bit much IMO and one of the many annoyances in PVP. The moment I right click, my character should stop sprinting and ADS. Same with firing.

 

• I'm all for extra content, but NOT if it offers a blatant advantage. The best guns in Arma 3 are DLC. The AK-12 outperforms all other assault rifles. Period. The Cyrus and Mar-10 are the highest caliber weapons that can be silenced and easily outperforms the MK18. Don't even get me started on the MMGs. There should have already been an AK style rifle in the game to begin with and they should have gave us at least 1 gun in .338 and 9.3 before or closely after they released the marksmen DLC. I know that a skilled player with an MX can easily beat an amateur with an SPMG, but not every gunfight in Arma is between a nub and a veteran player.

 

TL;DR

•Polish and detail is suck. Tarkov style animations and a better damage model would be nice.

•Vehicles should have a different damage mechanic and tanks/APCs should have better/more consistent damage multipliers for each side of the vehicle.

•Animations should be interruptible with a left click.

•Having gun preferences in the options and having a gun stay the same after you drop it and pick it back up (Zeroing and fire mode.)

•AI...

•Weapon sway is OP

•Armor and damage should be more consistent.

•Aiming and shooting should take priority over any other keys held.

•DLC is a bit on the P2W side.

 

 

I'm sure there are more things I could mention and I could have elaborated better on some things, but It's late and I'm tired. Sorry if there are any spelling or grammar mistakes. I'd love to read what you guys think should be different or why some of the things I mentioned should not be!

[Ex3B 266]

regarding P2W, I think it was just fine until Jets DLC.

The larger caliber marksman rifles fall in between the dedicated sniper rifles (M320 and GM6), and the Rahim/mk 18 ABR. They sit in a gap between Vanilla weapons.

The mk1 EMR is significantly better in some parameters than the other 7.62 rifles, is a bit heavier. Overall I think its the best one, but not OP'd.

The machine guns: Intermediate between Zafir and a mk 30 HMG that requires 2 people to move. My bigger problem is that the Navid is so much better than the SPMG (the SPMG's fire rate is terrible, IMO) exacerbating the CSAT vs NATO balance issues. The Zafir is quite potent, and a 2 man HMG team cannot rush a building. The Zafir is quite heavy though and the speed that you can aim with it makes it not great for CQB... so meh, overall, I'm fine with the marksmen DLC

Helos: didn't add any new combat craft, not really a balance problem (although a bit unbalanced that the Taru can lift CSAT zamak logistic trucks, but the Huron can't lift NATO logistic trucks).

Tanks DLC: The Rhino is a glass cannon, its an intermediate between vanilla stuff (with the laser guided non line of sight missiles being potentially problematic).

Nyx: fun, intermediate, more like an MRAP, not OP or P2W

Angara: probably the best tank, but its got some downsides and isn't as tough (particularly its turret) as one might think. I don't think its P2W (especially since the Slammer up got a bigger gun with the DLC).

Laws of war: surely not P2W

 

Apex: added mostly 5.56 and 5.8 weapons (moving on), the only weapons worth considering are the AKM/AK101, the CMR, and the type 115. The type 115 is basically a katiba with a 50 cal round to single shot infantry targets... an interesting combination, intermediate between a normal rifle and the large caliber sniper rifle (the 50 of the 115 is too low velocity for sniping)... not really P2W.

AK-101... yes... its good, but it did get nerfed from what it was, because it was too good. It mostly makes the faction balance worse because of how easily it kills by shooting target extremities that are unarmored for all except CSAT.

CSAT "all over armor" was OP'd from the start, and the Special purpose suits with even more armor made it even worse.

 

Jets: these jets are the "apex predators" of the game. In a team vs team scenario with these available, one needs people on the team flying these.

 

Of course P2W depends on the setting, and the gamemode. BIS doesn't make KOTH and such.

If there is an official game mode that you feel the DLC makes P2W, mention it. For unofficial ones, that depends on  the assets put at our disposal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[EDcase 87]

While I agree on some things, this is kinda pointless since ARMA3 will have no further development.

Some of these have also been requested for many years (eg better damage model) but not possible even when development was ongoing.

Hopefully ARMA4 will have all the improvements requested over the years.  We'll have to wait a few years to see how that goes.

 

So we have to try and enjoy ARMA the way it is for some time...

[TheMrNATE 0]

Just now, EDcase said:

While I agree on some things, this is kinda pointless since ARMA3 will have no further development.

Some of these have also been requested for many years (eg better damage model) but not possible even when development was ongoing.

Hopefully ARMA4 will have all the improvements requested over the years.  We'll have to wait a few years to see how that goes.

 

So we have to try and enjoy ARMA the way it is for some time...

Well, this was more of a discussion starter than a suggestion post. As for the damage model, that could have 100% been changed during development.