Maximum number of AI and/or players

[shinhu 10]

What is the upper limit or maximum number of AI and/ or human players in one single mission / campaign / scenario / Multiplayer mission / online combat.

Is this number limited by game software settings itself, or upon to hardware performance?

I have these questions because I would like to organize and design a huge mission or campaign such as BLUFOR Battalion VS OPFOR Battalion, I want to know how many AI could I put in and how many Players can join in, and What kind of PC should I set up.

Many thanks, could you share your experience about these questions, list them one by one. 

For example ;

 

Game type                                  Max AI                             Max Players

Single mission                           xxx                                    xxx

Campaign                                   yyy                                    yyy

etc.                                              etc.                                    etc.

[shinhu 10]

Also with your PC's configuration such as CPU/GPU/Mem/OC Ghz/....

 

Game type                                  Max AI                             Max Players                 CPU/Clock                GPU/Clock               MEM/Clock

Single mission                           xxx                                    xxx

Campaign                                   yyy                                    yyy

etc.                                              etc.                                    etc.

[oldbear 390]

Welcome home 😎

 

The limit is not very high.

My own practical limit is 120 AI for all sides and/or 60 Players.

Arma RV Engine is not built to manage many AIs and players.

 

When I want many AIs in a coop mission, I am spawning them on triggers or using some way to cache them.

You must also add the terrains/islands parameters in your list.

 

[shinhu 10]

10 minutes ago, oldbear said:

Welcome home 😎

 

The limit is not very high.

My own practical limit is 120 AI for all sides and/or 60 Players.

Arma RV Engine is not built to manage many AIs and players.

 

When I want many AIs in a coop mission, I am spawning them on triggers or using some way to cache them.

You must also add the terrains/islands parameters in your list.

 

Hahh! Are you PapaBear from HQ? A good nick name seems to be same as in-game call-sign.

I used to try to generate as much AI unit as I can in Arma 2, it was around 150 AIs since I had put 50 tanks in game, 3 AIs each tank. That map was Chenaurus, and that mission is official scenario or campaign included inside game.

I am very interest in manage massive AIs to fight against each other, the feeling is really fantastic if you control hundreds of soldiers up to Company level, hundreds of gears, weapons, vehicles, armors, utilities etc, all these present not only Military Simulation, but also kind of RPG , SLG , RTS. This makes Arma an epic sandbox game I have enjoyed 6 years.

[shinhu 10]

24 minutes ago, oldbear said:

Welcome home 😎

 

The limit is not very high.

My own practical limit is 120 AI for all sides and/or 60 Players.

Arma RV Engine is not built to manage many AIs and players.

 

When I want many AIs in a coop mission, I am spawning them on triggers or using some way to cache them.

You must also add the terrains/islands parameters in your list.

 

If Arma 3 only limit the max number to below 120 that is really a petty, since nowadays frequently updated hardware do some appealing to me, but the most attractive should be the game content which deserve that great cost to update PC to newest, otherwise it's pointless to update hardware, really looking forward Next Generation of Arma significantly improve its optimization of Multi-core Multi-thread CPU support, also the AI number limitation, AI control etc.

[Dedmen 2691]

3 hours ago, shinhu said:

If Arma 3 only limit the max number to below 120 that is really a petty

Limit is 288 groups per side

[oldbear 390]

Defining the limits is a tough job.

I have done a lot of tests and I can say the 288 groups limit must be used with caution.

I had  made an Arma2 test featuring 288 groups x 12 AIs on a desert map, the load was so huge that AIs were not fighting, too busy with path finding, so the 288 limit must be seen as a theoretical parameter or insane if taken literally.

 

Tonight, I will play "Broken Spear" one of my tank missions on Altis featuring 150 Bluefor (up to 16 players involved) vs 150 Indep AIs at start.

The balance to stay over the 30 FPS limit with a 3500m Visibility parameter setting on our dedicated server, has been difficult and not totally achieved for all our Clan members.

[pierremgi 4850]

64 players (just test Warlords) if not the maximum possible, is a challenge for your network. It's not a simple server capacity but also all data traffic you have to share for global (public) effects and behaviors. As example, people think it's normal to grab a weapon on ground with an half-used loaded magazine. Even basic data as this count must be shared in due time for due PCs. Now, I let you imagine the problem for all weapons' fire, hits in a melee, even if the engine manages things smarter than a rough "each framed whole data", of course. Most of the time, problems often occurs with extra mods/scripts.

[shinhu 10]

15 hours ago, Dedmen said:

Limit is 288 groups per side

That is acceptable number, should be enough for Company VS Company. Thanks a lot, BTW, where could I find this instruction from official site ?

[shinhu 10]

12 hours ago, oldbear said:

Defining the limits is a tough job.

I have done a lot of tests and I can say the 288 groups limit must be used with caution.

I had  made an Arma2 test featuring 288 groups x 12 AIs on a desert map, the load was so huge that AIs were not fighting, too busy with path finding, so the 288 limit must be seen as a theoretical parameter or insane if taken literally.

 

Tonight, I will play "Broken Spear" one of my tank missions on Altis featuring 150 Bluefor (up to 16 players involved) vs 150 Indep AIs at start.

The balance to stay over the 30 FPS limit with a 3500m Visibility parameter setting on our dedicated server, has been difficult and not totally achieved for all our Clan members.

Yes, as I tested, in Arma 2 at once the AI bots amount above hundred, especially bots in the vehicles all blind, can not find the correct path following forward troops, always jammed in some turn or bridges , really big headache.

Arma 3 not test this scale of AIs yet because my PC's cooling fan not strong enough. Don't know yet whether the bots driving skill is improved or still so poor 

[shinhu 10]

My test on 150 AI bots scale on the computer configuration;

CPU            I7-2920XM            4C8T                3.3GHZ

GPU            NV K4000M          4G VRAM        1.1GHZ

MEM          Micron 1600          32G RAM        1600MHZ

Avg. FPS   <30

View distance 5000m             Object distance    2000m               Visual settings    High

[Dedmen 2691]

5 hours ago, shinhu said:

Thanks a lot, BTW, where could I find this instruction from official site ?

It's written on the community wiki on the createGroup page, but it's community made not from BI.

[shinhu 10]

14 hours ago, Dedmen said:

It's written on the community wiki on the createGroup page, but it's community made not from BI.

Get it. interesting thing the community not from BI 🍡

[oldbear 390]

You are killing you FPS with too high view distance level ...

On 9/14/2013 at 8:39 PM, maruk said:

You may try to lower settings heavy on the CPU main thread (view distance could be one of the most important here)

Even if the Intel Core i7-2920XM was the fastest quad-core processor for laptops in Q1-2011, now it must considered as an entry level CPU.

I will strongly suggest setting your Visibility > Overall parameter down to 2200 m.

 

 

[chrisb 196]

If I remember rightly for A2, its around 1447 for each side (single unit). So you would have to work in tanks as three/four (iirc) etc.

But if you round that off and say 3000ap units on a terrain, then just watch the slide show. 😉

 

Of course your likely to be going in with less than your share, so I suppose you could have indie's as enemy and add the remainder for them, then go up against the lot.. Weak knee's time..

[Von Quest 1163]

(Squads) x (Units in Squad) x (3 Sides) + (288 Civs) = 8928+

If using 10-man squads. Official BI documentation is often lacking.

 

Technically it can handle an UNLIMITED amount if using spawn/despawn. It comes down to performance, which will vary wildly on your settings, PC stats, network, mods/add-ons/scripts, urban vs rural, terrains, etc.

 

The short answer is whatever your PC can handle within reason at the time. Being a mil-sim sandbox, I'd recommend smaller battles over the larger Battalion stuff. ArmA is about customization, detail, and immersion.

[oldbear 390]

@Von Quest I am sorry to say, something here is not true.  You could say Technically ... theoretically, it can handle an UNLIMITED amount if using spawn/despawn, garbage collector and empty group delete. Practically, it appears that performance tends to decrease with time spent in game, so, it seems that something is wrong with the technique in the game as it is.

 

Nevertheless, I fully agree with the concept of "smaller battles over the larger Battalion stuff". Arma* is neither TacOps nor Total War. 😎

I will add that I believe that Arma3 is particularly well suited for long missions of small groups with minimum equipment.

 

Edited May 13, 2019 by oldbear
English is not my maternal language, but you had already get it

[chrisb 196]

Yeah, 144 groups per side for A2OA.

Working from the message that pops up in game.  (144 groups per side).

 

Not sure on A3, but a interesting point nevertheless.

🙂

[Dedmen 2691]

2 hours ago, chrisb said:

Not sure on A3

Was changed a year ago to 288.

[joostsidy 685]

On 5/13/2019 at 9:26 AM, oldbear said:

You could say Technically ... theoretically, it can handle an UNLIMITED amount if using spawn/despawn, 

 

You could say Technically ... ̶t̶h̶e̶o̶r̶e̶t̶i̶c̶a̶l̶l̶y̶.... practically, it can handle an UNLIMITED amount if using spawn/despawn. 😉

 

I thought there was a unit max per group, but some research suggests there is not: In 2014 @das attorney created a post where he said he placed a couple of thousand units in one group using a loop to see when the game crashes.

 

So 288 groups x 4 sides * undefined amount of units is infinite until your computer freezes, which is probably after a couple of thousand.

 

[joostsidy 685]

Battalion sized mission on Altis is probably not good mission design, way too many units on relatively small area. You run into problems that BLUFOR and OPFOR have to use the same toilets. WIFI will be slow, who is doing the dishes etc. 

[krycek 349]

Made a few missions with about 200 AI (give or take) per side( 2 sides) without any spawn/despawn, and including lots of vehicles, buildings with interior furniture etc.

Total shitshow on my 4790K & I7 7700HQ about 20-15fps with 3000m view distance, I wouldn't even want to know what fps you get if even 100 vs 100 would start to fight at the same time.

[pierremgi 4850]

2 hours ago, krycek said:

Total shitshow on my 4790K & I7 7700HQ about 20-15fps with 3000m view distance, I wouldn't even want to know what fps you get if even 100 vs 100 would start to fight at the same time.

 

Sure! especially if you have some FPS Killer specialists on both camps. You know these guys who throws smokes just to calm down the FPS, not really hiding behind the clouds of particles.

[krycek 349]

43 minutes ago, pierremgi said:

 

Sure! especially if you have some FPS Killer specialists on both camps. You know these guys who throws smokes just to calm down the FPS, not really hiding behind the clouds of particles.

 

I call them "the bong\chase the dragon guys"