Helicopters in AA

[low light 0]

One thing is for sure is that there is the smallest possibility that with a patch and or a Expansion pack we will get a lot of new Toys to play with. It happened with OFP so the chances of this happening with ArmA are relatively high. We could see a AH-64 and a Chinook (which is not present either) in a Patch, or more likely an expansion pack...plus there will be a flood of Helicopters from the modding community.

Lets wait and see what happens. We might be all surprised by what we get, BIS have shown a tendency to surprise people in the past.

[Heatseeker 0]

Those were diferent times and OPF was an imediate success, creating content for Arma must be much more time consuming and hard work than OPF .

Im not rulling out the possibility but there is so much stuff that is missing. Maybe they already have ideas for a possible expantion...

[2006noob 0]

Quote[/b] ]I'm just like   at the current joystick aesthetics, sci-fi and chrome hell extravaganza with neon lights and what not

Yeah, I'm not a fan either. Two sticks I did like are the Thrustmaster Cougar (tho that is like Å250/$400) and the Suncomm F-15 Talon sticks, but they went bust years ago and you can only find them on ebay once in a blue moon

Yeah I saw that HOTAS Thrustmaster Cougar when I was buzzin around webshops seeing what was available.. F-16 replica and all made of metal

Goes for $200 here in scandinavia. Still a hella lot, even with the price drop. A shame they can't sell the stick on it's own as well.

So how about introducing Veteral and Caded modes in the flight model? In the Caded mode, choppers can easily be controlled only by mouse and keyboard just like OFP. In the Veteran mode, joystic is the best device to control choppers. Some delicate and skillful technique is needed but realistic maneuvers such as barrel roll, loop and emergency landing are able.

Have you tried BF2? You do barrel rolls by strafing the mouse hard and working the throttle correctly, loops by pushing the mouse forward multiple times and so on. If there was caded and Veteran modes they shouldn't have to be locked down, precise maneuvres are possible with mouse if the sensitivity is crazy high - something you can get accustomed to.

The flight model should be able to work in junction with different well.. input modes.

edit: date and name tagged Pierrots quote

[Mogley 0]

I like to consider myself an expert pilot as far as gaming goes. Lets see, I have been flying since the DOS days. I have played many flight sims from Chuck Yeager Air Combat, F117A, F18, A-10 Thunderbolt #1 and #2, USAF, Lock on, Gunship, Combat flightsim #1 and #2, Bf1942, BF Vietnam, BF2, OFP, and many others I forgot to mention. So basically I have been flying in games for over 10+ years. I can dominate in OFP or and of the BF series of games with all air vehicles. Helos or planes it doesnt matter.

I never thought of flying choppers in OFP or BF series anywhere near as hard as the sims. Gunship was the most realistic helo flightsim I have ever played. Very hard compared to BF or OFP.

I beleive ofp's flightmodel was not hard at all. I can fly a chopper in ofp with the same precision as in BF2. There really are some advantages to flying in ofp. Hellfires actually track targets and are fire and forget. Whereas in bf2 your gunner has to steer them to the targets. This alone makes ofp way better.

I really dont think there was too much problem with the flightmodel in ofp so I think in arma it will be just fine. Yes it could use some more realism to make things alot harder. I would like to see it where only the best pilots can even think about trying to fly. I mean the BF series I am the guy on the server raping everyone cause its so easy(and ofp).

Even in Ofp I can use the mission editor give my self an ah1 or ah64 and an ammo and repair truck. Set the enemy to the max no of units of shilkas and its way too easy.

So to me the flightmodel is too easy. If you have trouble flying in ofp you need more practice.

[Monkey Lib Front 10]

Well the actual flight model looks like it's pretty shit to be honest, and the rotors still don't actually have a collision model. I'd really hoped for more than just pretty graphics and multi crew gun positions.

[lee_h._oswald 0]

Set the enemy to the max no of units of shilkas and its way too easy.

Try the same vs. a group of 4x DKM Tunguska.

Good Luck!

MfG Lee

[Journeyman 0]

IMO the OFP chopper flight model was a perfect mix of realism vs. playability and the flight dynamics felt right except for some wobble and collision detection problems.

The new videos of ArmAs chopper flight dynamics looks crappy though, and I hope that this will be fixed as flying choppers in OFP was a pleasure and I want to be able to enjoy it in ArmA too!  

[max power 21]

I think that simply having a collision detection model for the rotors that is perhaps unnecessarily brutal would solve a lot of their problems. I think that I remember some article claiming that in vietnam, huey pilots would actually cut down small trees and stuff with the rotors, but I don't know if this is true. In the videos I've seen, when helicoptors clip their rotors on stuff, the end result is usually that they fly apart in mid air :/ I think that BIS didn't model this because things don't really 'come apart' in the OFP engine. In order to break the rotors of the helicopter, you'd need to replace the whole model with one with broken rotors, have the thing spazz out from the unbalanced, spinning mass and assymetric lift, then crash and explode... maybe they could do this is a texture replacement? Just alpha out the ends of the rotors? I think this would be pretty cool!

[franze 196]

A helicopter's blades *might* be able to trim small trees (and I mean *small*), but it's still going to damage the rotor. Don't forget that the blades are going pretty fast, and they're all linked to a central point. The stress from even a minor impact can be very hard on that point.

It might be possible to mod in rotor blade damage, including losing the blades, with some scripting. We'll have to find out if that's possible at all.

For those of you who like the way default FP choppers handle: The general rule of thumb is larger = more stability, not necessarily less agility. It's when you throw weight into the equation that things start getting sluggish.

I always found the BIS choppers unduly sluggish for the designs they were made after - except for the Mi-17 and Mi-24. Those felt about right.

[johnwilso007 0]

going back to the initial point about fixed wing aircraft i think that they will be much easier to fly in ArmA. The A10 was probably added so that people could go about making fixed wing aircraft and you wernt limited to the choppers for Air support.

they were very difficult to fly when you first started in ofp and i hope that with a much faster, fast jet included in ArmA that the flying the harrier will be much more realsitic and may have more avionic controls.

one question though. Is the harrier VTOL +STOVL capable?

also yeah id like to see someone straff the DKM Tunguska used them in test flying the SG F302A and its beta Anti missle capabilities. they were a bitch to take out before they got you the best way to avoid the missles was to hit the afterburner and head upwards.

[Pierrot 0]

I never thought of flying choppers in OFP or BF series anywhere near as hard as the sims. Gunship was the most realistic helo flightsim I have ever played. Very hard compared to BF or OFP.

I have ever also played GUNSHIP2000.

It was very hard to maintain constant altitude. When I tried to stop, my helicopter easily got hopped to expose myself to many enemies.

[Pierrot 0]

I'd like to have realistic weapon control as much as realistic flight model. A real gunner of AH-64 can control its 30mm chain gun with his helmet. When he sees a target, the gun barrel also sees the target. Now we have TrackIR in ArmA, why don't you use this usufull device instead of the helmet sight?

[max power 21]

I think that would be difficult to use... and the current flashpoint gunsight moves to where you're free looking... so I don't think it would be a problem from an implimentation standpoint. The problem with track IR is that you're not 'looking at' the target by moving your head, you're moving around a reflective IR strip... with your eye fixed at the screen. It's an unnatural movement, so for precise moves, you'll have to be getting constant feedback from the screen and feeling around with the angle of your head to get the reticle on the target. This difficulty would diminish as you get used to the track IR, and start forming synapses for it, but until then the sensory / motor feedback loop would be very slow, I think.

[Shashman 0]

I'd like to have realistic weapon control as much as realistic flight model. A real gunner of AH-64 can control its 30mm chain gun with his helmet. When he sees a target, the gun barrel also sees the target. Now we have TrackIR in ArmA, why don't you use this usufull device instead of the helmet sight?

Yeah and while we're at it, let's also get ArmA full motion simulator-compatible for the legion of players who own one

[Hammer Schultz 0]

Attack choppers are exteremely powerful weapon systems so I hope controlling them is made as realistic as possible because otherwise it's BF2 all again with all the n00bs blasting tanks away at will.

Realism is why I ordered 2 pieces of this game.

[Pierrot 0]

Real attack helicopters can fire machine gun and other missiles simultaneously. And rocket is mainly commended to pilots. Why isn't this style adopted in ArmA?

For example,

-Gunner

Left mouse : various missiles (cyclic)

Right mouse : machine gun (fixed)

-Pilot

Left mouse : rocket (fixed)

But right mouse is reserved for lock on? Hmm...

[KingC 0]

Real attack helicopters can fire machine gun and other missiles simultaneously...

But right mouse is reserved for lock on? Hmm...

Just add some keyboard button for secondary fire, and if users have special mouses they can assign it to mouse 5 for example.

But as the game is as far as it is on development terms, such wishes might be too late for implementation.

[uncle reiben 0]

Attack choppers are exteremely powerful weapon systems so I hope controlling them is made as realistic as possible because otherwise it's BF2 all again with all the n00bs blasting tanks away at will.

Realism is why I ordered 2 pieces of this game.

although a great thing it would be I doubt the level of realism you describe would become a part of ArmA.

Helicopters unlike fixed wing aircraft don't like to fly... They require constant inputs from the pilot just to maintain straight and level flight on a set track. in a non-flight simulator game genre this could become frustrating to casual or non-flyers (I personally would love it)

Modeling them properly in a game requires a lot time on the developers side and a lot of processor power from the client to calculate all of the factors. While modern systems could easily handle it, in a game like ArmA which revolves around the Infantry aspect, putting too much into the flight aspect is a waste.

As much as I like to think of OFP/ArmA as a combined arms Sim it's really just the closest thing to an Infantry Sim with vehicles and stuff to play with on the side.

Flying in combined arms games like this is great for Flight Sim enthusiasts... even if things aren't modeled to the same level of fidelity and realism the environment itself and the interaction with ground units gives us a better feeling of flying with the purpose of using our skills to support people and help them achieve a team goal.

That being said I don't lament the fact that flight modeling doesn't meet simulator complexity. But I totally agree in that I'd like to see some level of difficulty which naturally prevents every n00b and their uncle from becoming the doombringer from the skies.

[whisper 0]

Real attack helicopters can fire machine gun and other missiles simultaneously. And rocket is mainly commended to pilots. Why isn't this style adopted in ArmA?

For example,

-Gunner

Left mouse : various missiles (cyclic)

Right mouse : machine gun (fixed)

-Pilot

Left mouse : rocket (fixed)

But right mouse is reserved for lock on? Hmm...

Aww aww aww this is assuming.

I wouldn't place my bet that this is possible on russian helicopters, where, AFAIK, the button to fire is the same for all weapons.

Having a gun specific trigger and a different missile-pickle button is specific to US air units.

[colligpip 0]

Be good if we could have a longbow that could track all targets and fire the hellfires and cannon at same time - i bet that would look good popping up over the hill yes.

[Balschoiw 0]

Quote[/b] ]But right mouse is reserved for lock on?

You have no free mouse cursor in helos, airplanes unlike OFP and therefore you are not able to lock on with right mouse button as far as I remember.

[dm 9]

Real attack helicopters can fire machine gun and other missiles simultaneously. And rocket is mainly commended to pilots. Why isn't this style adopted in ArmA?

For example,

-Gunner

Left mouse : various missiles (cyclic)

Right mouse : machine gun (fixed)

-Pilot

Left mouse : rocket (fixed)

But right mouse is reserved for lock on? Hmm...

Actually, that makes a lot of sense.

Theoretically it should be fairly easy to impliment in a patch, since the pilot still has a logical fire button (which usually issues the "Fire/Cease Fire" command to the gunner) which could be re-slaved to a "class PilotWeapons" and the gunners controls re-slaved to a "class GunnerWeapons"

The only thing there is that you'd have to make use of the Fire/Hold Fire/Engage At Will options in the command menu a lot more (especially for AI gunners).

[Messiah 2]

remember there's always the middle mouse button

[dm 9]

remember there's always the middle mouse button

Not EVERYONE has a mouse with a scroll wheel, let alone a scroll wheel thats clickable

(I do, but thats beside the point )

[Messiah 2]

yeah, but im one of the people who never buy something new unless its totally required to... hence why i still own the basic microsoft keyboard that came with my first pc...

if i own a mouse with a clickable middle button, then anyone should (well, it seems like a vast minority wouldnt have a clickable middle wheel)