New AH-64D Pack

[cbfasi 4]

Slap a Royal Army roundel on there and wham!

There is no such thing as Royal Army  Its just ARMY  (a amll things but its reallly annoying that peps assume that if its UK then its ROYAL...)

Btw nice addition for Army Air Corp Fans maybe they will be operational in OFP before the real ones...

Havn't had a full look at it yet but intial impressions are promising

[Nemesis6 0]

Bug spotted - I can damage the chopper by shooting well under the chopper itself. Try shooting some rockets or something below the chopper. It'll hit something.

[dabitup 0]

I really like the chain gun sounds and model. Great work!

[marco-polo-iv 0]

nice chopper,

but

model

LOD 0.000 = 8720 poly, 9238 points

LOD 1.000 = 6652 poly, 6891 points

LOD 2.000 = 3307 poly, 3264 points

ViewGunner = 6272 poly, 6863 points

ViewPilot = 4474 poly, 4994 points

ViewCargo = 8461 poly, 8948 points ??

its too much for Multiplayer and AH-64 and cargo???

[-HUNTER- 1]

Ok, did an MP run with it, it went well. Only think that sucked was my (non-AI!)board gunner, that guy should stick to the ground work. Even while i was busy evading hills and RPG's i could still notice an opfor lining up his Strela for a shot, sadly my gunner did not..........

Elite chopper though, good job.

hahaha I wasnt there....

And ehh damnit I have to wait for some days before I can play, guys SCREENIES plz!

[Stelios 1]

@ manhunter : Nah man, the time we went out with the apache we were pwning the roofs off. I made a quick MP fix of that ambush mission only then with 2 apaches. By the looks of it we will both have crappy gunners when we're gonna do the mission this week. So elite flying is required, i'll plug in my joystick again too.

@the addon maker : i expierenced too that you dont even have to actually hit the apache in order to...... well to hit it.

I was using the command view too check how elite the chopper looked when some dude with a PKM opened fire and i saw rounds impact below the chopper....... Hope you can fix this. Makes dodging RPG's a whole lot harder, and i think it might have been the reason of a crash too, or it might just be my flying skills.

[somebloke 0]

Royal Army

Ain't no such thing as the Royal Army

[franze 196]

Thanks for the testing and input, fellas!

I've got the Fire Geo lod fixed now... surprised I didn't see that before.

Bonko the Sane - I've tested it as much as possible in MP, but only with a couple people and never on a dedicated server. It should run ok in MP, but the main purpose of this beta was to figure out how well it'd run in MP. You might notice the bird is a lot tougher in MP than in SP.

WAH-64 - As far as I know, there are some massive differences between the AH-64D and WAH-64, especially internally. I'd be happy to do one, but I'd need some information on the cockpit(s) and loadouts for them.

Shadow - The system MFD only registers when critical hits (like being hit by a RPG) happen. I've tried to find a way to get the systems MFD to activate when damage is reached or recieved, but this usually results in the entire thing running the damage script more than once per amount of damage taken.

Some MFD pages are pointless because I didn't really know what to put in there. Mostly the MFD pages are eye candy, except for systems MFD. I thought about a ASE and TSD page, but both of those are a little too complex for me.

Ranger44 - The blue color on the FFARs is because the HE Hydra warheads are a blue color:

Hydra warheads

gandalf the white - just fixed the missile deception script to work only when the helicopter's engine is on. Thanks!

cornhelium - I'll have to look into that. For all intents and purposes, I used the laser designator as a target hand-off tool, but I'll check out DKM's 2S6M and see how they did it.

[-HW-] Marco-Polo-IV - I can try to merge the pilot and gunner LODs and see if that helps, but the detail on the primary lods is the main reason for the bird.

A question for you all: I gave the AH-64 the capacity to ferry two very vulnerable guys hanging onto the side, but does anyone think I should keep them?

[Spartan 163 0]

Just so you know blue = training. That is a practice round. The blue is to show that it is inert and for training only.

How I know? 4 years of loading bombs, missles, m61a1 guns,........if it went bang or boom I loaded it. I also trained other ordnace men on how to load, assemble, disassemble, and repair all sorts of wpn system related stuff.

So blue = training. Just remember that.

A wide selection of warheads, most of which were originally developed for the MK 4/40 FFARs, is available for the MK 66 Hydra 70 rocket. These include:

M151: 3.95 kg (8.7 lb) anti-personnel fragmentation warhead

M156: White phosphorus smoke warhead

M229: 7.3 kg (16.1 lb) anti-personnel fragmentation warhead (elongated version of M151)

M247: Shaped-charge anti-armour warhead

M255: Flechette warhead; contains about 2500 28-grain (1.8 g) flechettes (M255E1 has 1180 60-grain (3.8 g) flechettes)

M257: Parachute-retarded battlefield illumination flare

M259: White Phosphorus smoke warhead

M261: High-explosive MPSM (Multipurpose Submunition) warhead; contains nine M73 anti-personnel/anti-materiel bomblets, which are released in mid-air, and drag-retarded to fall vertically to the ground

M264: Red phosphorus smoke warhead

M267: Practice warhead for M261; contains three M75 practice submunitions

M274: Practice warhead for M151; contains a smoke signature charge

M278: Parachute-retarded infrared illumination flare

MK 67 MOD 0: White phosphorus smoke warhead

MK 67 MOD 1: Red phosphorus smoke warhead

WDU-4A/A: Flechette warhead; contains about 2200 20-grain (1.3 g) flechettes

WTU-1/B: Inert practice warhead

That should do it.

[ag_smith 0]

No offense meant, mate, but you can achieve much better visual quality by improving textures and not skyrocketing polycount. Your current polycount is overkill for the most PCs.

[franze 196]

Prototype 001 - Notice the M151 warhead and fuse on the far right? It's a glossy blue, isn't it?

There's a difference between a cannon shell and a rocket, I'd think.

ag_smith - The polycount for this thing is actually quite low when compared to other addons, but I would kill a lot of the polies if I had better textures. What kind of system are you running? I only ask because I've got a big bottleneck for my video card and I don't notice much in the way of slowdowns when using the bird.

[@cero 0]

Lol, I like your disclimer in the readme

Quote[/b] ]DISCLAIMER: If your PC blows up, you get overweight, or your dog dies from using this addon, you can't hold me responsible. You know the drill. Use at your own risk!

Nice chopper, thanks for the Beta release, I been trying it out and its very good, I like it.

One thing I noticed is the change of texture in the rear gear when you are looking from "Comanders view" and you zoom in and out, the textures on the gear stiledge is a brighter green than the camo, and the tyre seams to be untextured, that must be one of the first lods, but to be onest with you, I wouldn't bother much about it, it's hardly visible.

And for every body reading, this is just testing feed back, ok?

Regards

[Bobcatt666 0]

After a few hours of really givig this bird a good abuse session in single player mode I have started gathering up information about this addon.

Overall flight model is good but a lot of issues in the cockpit which might be dealt with in the next release.

The consoles are for the Model A and B in both stations. Seats are in correct, and sit a little too low in the cockpit. Too much head room in the AH64D. Common a 6 ft tall guy sititng in the gunners station had his knees up near his chest and bent over slightly. The clear partition also was forgotten that seperates the stations from fragmentations injuring both crew if the canopy is breeched.

Textures are the main thing that brind this bird down, only half the model is textured in any detail. The panels and rivet work is too large, the AH46 is made up of smaller panels, makes repair easier only needing to patch smaller sections.

rotor mast rework was good, also didn't flop around like the BIS one. Flir wasn't slaved to the chain gun. Need to fix the weapons proxies, FFAR launch from Hellfire postions, nore do the FFARS show being used in the pod. The wing pylon for a D with a stinger is off they made a block they attached to so the missile dosen't strike the hull durring launch while flying. I can supply the tech drawing for when we upgrade the birds. The bottom of the fiuselage was enlarged causing this issue because the wing pylons had to be moved do to the width of the new sponson boxes which also is where a man portable Stinger and the weapons for the crews to use if shot down are stored along with rescue gear. .

Bird is not FlashFX compatable

wheels seem a little too large, landing gear deflection was rather wrong. the strut system works more like shocks on cars and it telescopes, and doesn't bend back that far. Not sure two points like that can be animated for the scripts on the suspenssion.

Brush guard for chain gun too thin in guage, also missing cutters above and below the gun, barrel seems rather short.

This bird is better as a A model with the upgrades than a D model. Thats what most of the Apaches are in the Army the A updated to be like the D, with the RADOME

Doing this bird is a real pain in the rear, having messed with making a new model from the ground up more than once.

It is off to a good start, I leave the landing gear alone other rescaling the tires. Too thin and slightly too tall. The seats need to be raised higher in the cockpit, the gunners helmet should nearly touch the bottom of the windscream as the toops of his thighs should be seen through the window. Both crew are really exposed main reason the seats have the extra armor long the sides to protect against small arms fire.

Add scripts to the tailwheel as well, it does move also. Cool noticed you can get ammo and stingers when you dismount from the bird. The gun should also be stored in the chopper with the stinger, and the pilots equiped with a M92AF. Thats what I did with crew pack for AH64.

[Spartan 163 0]

M151 is green if u look real hard u can see that. ALL practice ammo is BLUE. The defence rests.

If ur going on the cutaway views they are blue for class room stuff. I had the same things when I went to ordnance school and EOD school.

[franze 196]

I stand corrected - the same olive drab color as everything else.

Perhaps though, M261 warheads would be better? Anyone?

(That's multipurpose sub-munitions for those not in the know)

[Spartan 163 0]

Would be nice to see the FLECHETTES make an aperance. Or the ability to chose the warhead for the rocket pods.

[SM_Azazel 0]

how the heck are you goin to simulate the 9 sub parachuted munitions?

oh and btw the gunner and flir views are int he wrong place they should be off the nose not the gun..

[franze 196]

I'll look into rocket type selection, that's not a bad idea.

SM_Azazel - I have a idea for modeling the submunitions.

I used to have the gunner view looking from the TADS, but I had to move it to just above the gun position due to the inability to slave the TADS to the gun rotation. There were a lot of wierd effects with the view set to the TADS position.

[Spartan 163 0]

Simulate it or make it like cluster bomb but lower the damage.

[SM_Azazel 0]

that would not work clust bomb is set off at an cert hieght and rockets don't fall very fast and the rockets would explode all to early and blow up the helo.

it is kinda an bitch to script that stuff..

and there shouldn't be any problem with movign the sight there i did for the lost brothers apaches and it works great no issues

[franze 196]

Completely different model for the Lost Brothers AH-64s, so don't forget that either.

It looked pretty wierd to be staring at the gunner's feet when aiming the gun upward...

[ag_smith 0]

ag_smith - The polycount for this thing is actually quite low when compared to other addons, but I would kill a lot of the polies if I had better textures. What kind of system are you running? I only ask because I've got a big bottleneck for my video card and I don't notice much in the way of slowdowns when using the bird.

As a matter of fact, almost 9000 polies in first LOD is not so common among addon models. Eg. BAS UH60 has about 6000 and is considered hi-poly. Don't be fooled by plane models, using pseudo-proxy scripting, as even though all the weapon models are built in the plane model (see Footmunch's F-16 - it's about 10k polies), as a huge number of these faces is not visible in-game at once. 4000-5000 polies is more like the values you should stick to in first lod. You can also improve general quality by making proper lighting (sharp&smooth edges), which will make 3d mesh look much more round that it really is. Regarding textures, for starters you could try to use textures made by Silesian some time ago. They are really good. Hope that'll help you improve your model.

Regarding my system, I've got 3 diffrent machines:

Athlon XP 2.6+, 512mb, GF5600FX;

Centrino 1.5, 512mb, Radeon9200m laptop,

Duron 800, 256mb, GF2MX

Sure they can pull a processing load of a single Apahe, but I think about performance mission-wise. Consider that your Apache will be used in misson toghether with a number of tanks, APCs, soldiers and whatever else being rendered at the same time. Then the 9k poly model will have a HUGE impact on performance. That's why it's so important to watch this aspect carefully.

[SM_Azazel 0]

the models don't have anything to do with it you just move the gunners and drivers view memory point up to where it should be. you don't see any gunners feet or anything...

[lukemax 0]

OOOOOOOO some competion for Kyle! chopper

[xnodunitx 0]

It's a good beta,but still needs some major work,textures definatly.