AT/ M136 / RPG7

[max power 21]

Okay, here's the thing. It's not that they CAN'T make a more realistic reloading animation. It's that they decided not to after much debate. Since (to paraphrase Stephan) the animations can't be made realistic practically, they had to decide what other way would best suit the game. They decided to go with the way it is in order to give the infantry some teeth when faced with armoured units. All these complicated arguments about why it's wrong are kind of silly. This is the way the devs wanted to make the game. It's perfectly fine for you to dislike it, but let's be honest here: all it is is a dislike. You're not arguing from a superior platform.

[cain2001 0]

So the idea of hitting a tank is to hit it once, and run away? Why? First of all you will give away your position (he will know what side you hit him on). 2nd, you will give him enough time get in safty or start heating up the area. Even if you manage to survive that, you still need to take the tank out which will be very hard since he knows where to look.

Im talking big boys tanks now and not some small bmps Ofcourse you fire and get behind cover when you only need 1 rpg but as soon you see that m1a1 comming down the hill, you hit 2 quick ones on his turret and disables him. That is if your a good shooter.

Im just saying that it would be good if it was possible to abort reloads because like i said, i always end up dead when he starts firing at me and i cant do nothing about it since im stuck.

[dreday 1]

So the idea of hitting a tank is to hit it once, and run away? Why? First of all you will give away your position (he will know what side you hit him on). 2nd, you will give him enough time get in safty or start heating up the area. Even if you manage to survive that, you still need to take the tank out which will be very hard since he knows where to look.

The "idea" is that OFP/ArmA are so popular with us because they force the players to use realistic tactics in order to survive. Firing off 1 RPG and then running for your life is precisely how things work in the real world. I see no need to re-invent the wheel here.

Peace,

DreDay

[Col. Faulkner 0]

Im talking big boys tanks now and not some small bmps Ofcourse you fire and get behind cover when you only need 1 rpg but as soon you see that m1a1 comming down the hill, you hit 2 quick ones on his turret and disables him. That is if your a good shooter.

The "Ultimate Combat Simulation" (as "Armed Assault" clearly

advertises itself on its splash screens), should be teaching

players that you shouldn't expect to live very long if you

sit in the open and fire a couple of RPGs at the turret of a

modern MBT.

[This is off topic but it also highlights the question of the over-

simplified "damage modelling" on armoured vehicles in ArmA.

You'd be very unlikely indeed to be able to "disable" an M1A1

with RPG hits on the turret (in reality, not in ArmA). Hitting it

in the hull rear or sides is a different matter, though (in

reality, not in ArmA). ]

In any case, anything the AI soldiers do with their weapons

in Arma is going to be a compromise since the AI doesn't

react all that realistically to events on the "virtual"

battlefield. As a partial solution to the RPG reloading problem

why not just make the AI gunners fall prone automatically to

reload, and make the reload time longer than it is now?

If you wanted to be really complicated you could do

something like making them invisible to AI tanks during the

reload (on a random basis - possibly depending on the nature

of the terrain they are firing from).

[sanctuary 19]

In OFP, if you modified the BIS RPG and BIS M1A1 to use the realistic CAVS values, to destroy the M1A1 you would need 23 direct hits (the MBT could be disabled before the 23 direct hits, just not destroyed), while destroying a BMP just needed 2 hits.

Those values were very interesting at making you understand that destroying a MBT was the job of other MBT, Aircraft or very specialised ATGM, not the job of a RPG grenadier.

[frederf 0]

Okay, here's the thing. It's not that they CAN'T make a more realistic reloading animation. It's that they decided not to after much debate. Since (to paraphrase Stephan) the animations can't be made realistic practically, they had to decide what other way would best suit the game. They decided to go with the way it is in order to give the infantry some teeth when faced with armoured units. All these complicated arguments about why it's wrong are kind of silly. This is the way the devs wanted to make the game. It's perfectly fine for you to dislike it, but let's be honest here: all it is is a dislike. You're not arguing from a superior platform.

No one complained about the realism of the animations, just the length of time. A longer reload animation could be made practically. Giving infantry teeth versus tanks to avoid having to go through all the bother of making AGTMs and air support and what you'd really have to use in real life to take out a MBT is a valid point.

The devs wanted to make a game to please their audience. I don't believe they want it "this way and the heck with the customers." The argument (undecided at that of course) is that they have missed their mark. Even from a "fun" perspective, what's the fun in getting hit with a RPG7 in a M1A1 and knowing that you have all of 3 seconds to find the shooter before your several million dollar tank is going to go up in flames due to a pea shooter?

And reality is a superior platform to argue from. Especially in regards to a game that bills itself as it does.

I don't mean to sound hostile, I just want to state things plainly and correctly.

I believe (opinion forthcoming) that the primary factors that limit the fair, real, and fun use of personnel-equipped AT weaponry are:

1. Inflexibility of stance when firing the weapon

2. Inability to quick-drop the weapon and be far more mobile

3. That ammunition inside the AT takes up inventory space

4. Disposable launchers are not natively supported

5. Reloads are not interruptible.

6. AT sights are not adjustable for range

Address the above issues and I don't see any reason why everyone wouldn't be pleased and one couldn't make a fully realistic representation of AT weapons.

On a side note, how hard would it to be to make interruptible reloads? (animations aside) We already have interruptible actions (you can abort mounting in a car mid-animation).

[max power 21]

Quote[/b] ]

No one complained about the realism of the animations, just the length of time. A longer reload animation could be made practically. Giving infantry teeth versus tanks to avoid having to go through all the bother of making AGTMs and air support and what you'd really have to use in real life to take out a MBT is a valid point.

Based on the fact that it's not like that in the real world.... so yes, you are arguing from a realist's standpoint, okay? I think we can agree on this, especially given your comment later on in your post.

Quote[/b] ]

The devs wanted to make a game to please their audience. I don't believe they want it "this way and the heck with the customers." The argument (undecided at that of course) is that they have missed their mark. Even from a "fun" perspective, what's the fun in getting hit with a RPG7 in a M1A1 and knowing that you have all of 3 seconds to find the shooter before your several million dollar tank is going to go up in flames due to a pea shooter?

Unfortunately, their audience that they're aiming for has broader tastes than yours :/ They aren't alienating everyone, just you! ^_^

Quote[/b] ]

And reality is a superior platform to argue from. Especially in regards to a game that bills itself as it does.

Wrongity wrong wrong. If ArmA is the most realistic infantry experience available to the modern computer entertainment consumer, which I believe it is, they can bill it as such. They aren't advertising it as a simulator- but a simulation game. Designing a program with realism in mind is a far cry from designing one with realism as a blueprint.

Quote[/b] ]

I don't mean to sound hostile, I just want to state things plainly and correctly.

I don't mean to be hostile, but check on point a and ex on point b.

Quote[/b] ]

I believe (opinion forthcoming) that the primary factors that limit the fair, real, and fun use of personnel-equipped AT weaponry are:

1. Inflexibility of stance when firing the weapon

2. Inability to quick-drop the weapon and be far more mobile

3. That ammunition inside the AT takes up inventory space

4. Disposable launchers are not natively supported

5. Reloads are not interruptible.

6. AT sights are not adjustable for range

And, I'm sure given a billion years, ten trillion dollars and a bank of crays in parallel computing, they would be able to do so much more than they have. Unfortunately, software development is a ballet between idealism, accessability, and pragmatism.

Quote[/b] ]

Address the above issues and I don't see any reason why everyone wouldn't be pleased and one couldn't make a fully realistic representation of AT weapons.

I could plan a pleasure trip to the moon. This doesn't mean it is within my means. Even if it was, would I rather take that trip, or enjoy myself in vegas 100 times, or buy the remainder of the unsold bugatti veryons.. But would my wife let me? Because some choices preclude others, hard decisions have to be made about what you want and what you can have, and what other people might want.

Just because YOU are harping on this issue doesn't mean EVERYONE ELSE is hung up on the absolute realism hook. Is WGL realistic enough for you? Because, it's not realistic... but it's more realistic than ofp. A friend of mine in the army once said that the thing you don't get in these army games is trudging through the rain forest in the dark, getting twigs in your eyes and smashing your knees on invisible sticks and logs- and then trying to find some place to poop! This, at the most extreme, is not really a game experience worth programming. BI made some decisions about how they wanted the gestalt of ArmA to play, and -and I'm really sorry that they didn't consult you on this- felt that the game plays better the way it is.

You might be more successful arguing from a religious standpoint if you're going to take such a dogmatic stance, because reality isn't so black and white! I'll take the cult of pragmatic game design over the cult of absolute realism anyday.

[Col. Faulkner 0]

Armed Assault is subtitled "The Ultimate Combat Simulation".

Given that the RPG 7 is rapidly becoming one of the most

significantly important and widespread weapons in the world

it is not unreasonable to expect that a self-proclaimed

"Ultimate Simulation" that otherwise goes to some lengths to

represent modern real life military equipment might offer a

representation of this very significant weapon that at least

models its most salient features (this in fact is the meaning

of "simulation"). The RPG currently in Armed Assault

patently does not adequately model the real RPG and people

are entitled to express their displeasure at this and to make

suggestions for improvement that could satisfy both "camps".

[funnyguy1 0]

In OFP, if you modified the BIS RPG and BIS M1A1 to use the realistic CAVS values, to destroy the M1A1 you would need 23 direct hits (the MBT could be disabled before the 23 direct hits, just not destroyed), while destroying a BMP just needed 2 hits.

Those values were very interesting at making you understand that destroying a MBT was the job of other MBT, Aircraft or very specialised ATGM, not the job of a RPG grenadier.

^this deserves to be quoted

To make it short:

It's not realistic. Stepan was talking about the compromise, but It's a "realism vs eye candy" rather than "realism vs gameplay" kind of compromise and the eye candy is clearly winning, so there's basically nothing more to say about that. They should have made a poll and ask ppl.

When It comes to noobs:

noobs always complain about such tnigs first, then when they see that others actually play the game, and use it, they think wow, that's pwns, and then It's again like "wow, I can pwn a tank in such realistic manner, I can do It the harder way, which means I'm a roxxxxor!!!11oneone"

[frederf 0]

While I don't subscribe to the rigid philosophy of realism-as-blueprint in game design, I certainly support the notion of doing a reasonable job of making a game and then standing back at the end and seeing if the end results match your expectations. I believe that the RPG reload time and rapid-fireness is something that any person would reach the sensible conclusion that it is too fast, not just hardcores.

I invite disagreement with this point, as it's not exactly on firm ground logically. You might feel that the end result in-game is justified, but I propose that it is not justified and could be changed for the better. Also I propose that such a change would not just please the diehard if-it-doesn't-hurt-can't-be-realism crowd, but the majority of players. If this was a BF2 forum, you'd get quite a few complaints of it's fast reload and few would come from a real-life-as-example standpoint.

As proof for my neutrality, I'll now provide counter arguments to increasing the time:

1. Represents the carrying of multiple prepared launchers

2. Represents a larger number of shooters than are in the game (why have an enemy force of 100 when 33 with 3 times the "RPG desnity" are easier on PC resources)

3. Represents weapons not modeled that are more powerful than RPGs

4. Compensates for a lack of higher class equipment designed to defeat MBTs

5. Compensates for perhaps some area where ArmA screws over the infantry vs tank fight compared to real life.

6. Avoids long immobile reloads

Quote[/b] ]Stepan was talking about the compromise, but It's a "realism vs eye candy" rather than "realism vs gameplay" kind of compromise and the eye candy is clearly winning, so there's basically nothing more to say about that.

While this quote hits the nail on the head regarding animations involving moving around while reloading, and I adore the person who wrote this...

BIS had the choice of longer immobile reloads vs shorter immobile reloads and have picked the shorter ones. Shorter ones are better for boosting infantry power (if unrealistically), reduce annoyance due to the immobility, but longer ones are better for realism's sake (if that's something to be hounded) and provide relief to those on the other end of those RPGs (calling them AT weapons is a misnomer). So the compromise was between gameplay and gameplay? It's confusing.

And my 6 points about the "bottlenecks" in OFP-ArmA-ATweapon implementation were a more open-minded exercise. After all, there are engine and modability limitations in ArmA (or any game for that matter. Duh.) My thinking was to critically identify those weaknesses for either my own amusement or to get others thinking.

1. Firing from different positions. It's not something unreasonable to consider. I understand there are standard doctrines for use of a weapon, but if someone wanted to make a Panzershreck in a WWII mod, they wouldn't be able to have a prone fire for instance. Rifles can be fired from many positions, why not ATs?

Maybe this is possible, probably isn't the highest priority on the list. I have noted that going prone with the AT4 in your hand allows you to go straight away and brings up the "no weapon" weapon, an improvement over OFP.

2. Standard practice with a lot of AT weapons is to drop them after firing, ArmA has the ability to drop weapons out of inventory quite quickly. The drop item command and the bindable keys are like two very large land masses and a programmer should have a relatively easy time making a "brigde" such as a new key bind that "drops current weapon now." It's just an idea. I've heard a few people want for such a feature.

3. I still find it's an odd quirk of OFP/ArmA that items inside your weapon are still in your inventory. Talking about a M136 round as if you could pull it out and hand it to someone else and they could use it in the middle of the field is... off. (As one can easily do with an M136 round in game) Also is trying to give someone a full loadout when they are the designated AT4 bearer, when an AT4 should be additional (not replacing) the standard load out.

4. A fair % of modern launchers are disposable and OFP/ArmA just plain doesn't attempt to model them. While BIS can fudge reality to get whatever game balance they like, it really hampers people trying to mod an accurate representation of these weapons. This is clearly a new feature that would have to be embedded into the game at a relatively low level (the scripted solutions like WGLs are very awkward), so I can understand BIS's reluctance to involve themselves in such a high-work low-payoff change.

5. We have interruptible actions (boarding car) it seems the next logical step to have interruptible reloads. This idea mainly comes about discussing any reload longer than 2-3 seconds which (apparently, didn't know) involves RPGs. Again this is something that modders could use quite well. Maybe engineers building a wall might take 40-200 seconds? That's an action you might wanna interupt.

6. Adjustable sights are just thrown in for completeness. The AT4 probably shouldn't be targeting anything beyond 200-300m anyway. This would benefit a lot of weapons, adjustable zero's.

There are a number of other things limiting the development of AT weapons like flight path profiles for the Javelin, NVG-like optical enhancement for the Javelin, back blast modeling for most of the AT weapons.

Most of these are the high-work, low-payoff type of changes. The game out-of-the-box doesn't necessarily need any of them, but there is only so far you can go before these limitations cease to be on the periphery and start to come back to haunt.

[Kirby 2]

I didn't read all the posts...

But I rekon we should leave the standard ArmA to the "OMG1337n0Oo0OB CTF!11" guys and wait for WGL:AA

[desertfox 2]

Plaintiff your post failed to contribute anything useful to this debate. You neither need a multi-billion dollar funding to make an animation loop abortable, nor is coding slightly realistic AT weapons compareable with a journey to the moon.

I think one point needs to be clearly stated. Armed Assault has been sold as "Ultimative Battlefiled Simulation" which was "Tested by the Military" (whatever that may mean btw)

So when I ran into the store, the first day it was released, just like I did it with every single OFP version that was released, expecting it to be exactly that: Finally again a game that is NOT created for what is called "mainstream gaming market".

I did NOT expect it to be a faced-paced action-packed shoot'em-all-up-alone game. I expected it to be in the footsteps of the VBS series. A simulation as close to the reality as it can possibly be made.

Let's face it: When BIS is trying to create a concurrency to games like the Battlefield series, Call of duty series - or how all the quaterly released multi-million dollar productions are named - they will fail anyways. They don't have 200 C++ coders or contracts with Hollywood actors that are neccessary to serve the mainstream market. They don't have companies like Dell sending them 50 brand new Latitudes for some product placement in their game. What made them survive the past years is the niche product OFP and contracts with the military. Period.

It's the people who DO WANT a complex simulation of warfare who BUY Armed Assault. You don't seriously think this half-baked singleplayer campaign, or the lagging-beyong-infinity MP engine would convince just about any 'CS player' to change to ArmA and play his DM matches on Sahrani from now on. Get a clue.

It's the people who have played OFP for 5 years who bought ArmA.

It's the modding community from OFP that will keep ArmA alive.

It's the people fascinated by the realism and the DIFFERENCE a game like OFP made, compared to other games, who are the community. OFP was a UNIQUE thing out there compared to 'all the other games that you play for 2 month and then throw away'. If BIS is continueing the 'Eyecandy over realism' and the 'action over realism' stuff, they are running risk to descend into insignifiance.

I am really a bit disappointed about the communication between BIS and the community. Sure - we have the fancy wishlist and buglist and the biki and wiki - but where is the direct dialogue ?

I remember a game I bought last year called "Soldner". It was ripped into pieces by the community after it was released. The forums were full of bitchin' and whinin' people. So they set up a precise list, updated on a day to day base, what they are working on, what they are fixing, making polls what people want, allowing for a direct exchange of thoughts and opinions between the people who make the game and those who buy it. The result was a lot of satisfied people rushing to the stores and buying the first official addon.

Companies spend millions on customer surveys - here BIS can have it for free. I wonder why it's not done in a massive way.

Personally I am still more than statisfied with the product I bought. That clearly has to be said. But the thought the next patches are being made with having the programmers focus set on 'action and eyecandy' is filling me with dismay.

[StepanK 1]

(pardon me, I really can't read whole thread, so I just picked one thing I saw:)

Quote[/b] ]2. This argument I don't buy. So you can't make 100% realistic RPG reload animations, beyond the scope of the game, fine. But the length of the generic animation and the coded reload time value can still be whatever you like.

we have just one reload time for all the rpgs. We decided now to make it play longer, we'll see how it'd work.

as for the rest - the bad thing is that once anim plays, it can't be interrupted in some cases at all. Ex.: if we didn't create extra states, the ugliest effect would be - imagine that one would start to reload and if shot, he'd first finish that move and then would finally die (we avoid these things in most cases for long anims, but it costs some work, as always nothing for free).

Sorry, no chance to store state of the reload anim to stack and revert to that state and continue on. This also means that getin/out cars looks as you see because player would have to finish whole complicated realistic (eg into tank) getin move prior he'd again be able to decide what to do next. If someone started shooting at him, there'd be no chance to interrupt the move at all, which'd be bad. Actually, these things tend to create so complex space of states that it tends to result in completely physically+behaviorally simulated characters - and just one engine I am aware of can handle this, Endorphine from Natural motion, LucasArts licensed that. But - it is so CPU expensive that we hardly could go that way as you'd probably want army simulation rather than one perfectly simulated character and the rest of the world dead because of CPU overload

(again, sorry I couldn't read whole thread so I probably missed some interesting opinions)

Regards,

Stepan

[Blanco 0]

I rather have a character that dies at the right moment then a superfluid transition between a reload & a "die_when_I_reload" anim.

A "die_while_crouching" anim will do for me.

[cain2001 0]

This reminds me of the times when you enter a vehicle and just as you pressed enter. You see a guy spawn (BF1985 Maps) infront of you and theres nothing you can do when he shoots you trying get into the tank. Its not too common but it does happen. I guess its more too it than just easy break commands

[Average Joe 0]

Thankyou Stephan,

[funnyguy1 0]

Companies spend millions on customer surveys - here BIS can have it for free. I wonder why it's not done in a massive way.

Yeah, they could just tell us

"no that is just not going to happen because we don't have time/money/the engine doesn't allow for such changes now"

Look at the closed ArmA heli flight model topic, one post from Suma and ppl are happy, no more "what's wrong with the ArmA helis" topics.

Official polls on the wiki would be a great idea also! Let's say they have to chose between two thins, they make a poll and that's all.

"we are working on this, that won't be changed until game2 etc." such official statements would also prevent speculations and pointless discussions.

[Sniperwolf572 758]

...long post...

Hello StepanK.

As I realize you guys can't store progress of animations, that actually is not necessary, because, if you reload the RPG in real life, it's not like you're going to leave it half loaded and run with it on the back.

For breaking up animations, it would be good, if user pressed any movement key during any AT reload animation, weapon would just drop on the ground, along with the rocket to be reloaded, and the character would be placed in any similar running state (since current look of AT weapons places primary weapon on back, it would be good to use generic civilian running animation with the weapon on back). Alternatively this could be, instead of the movement keys, be done trough a specific action menu entry for the AT reload animation.

Anyways, I'm overall pleased that we can now choose between slowly moving, and running when with an AT weapon, so after firing an AT weapon, I usually run for my life, rather than sticking around for the MG burst from a tank, so aborting the reload animation is not a priority in my eyes.

[Blanco 0]

Quote[/b] ]Look at the closed ArmA heli flight model topic, one post from Suma and ppl are happy, no more "what's wrong with the ArmA helis" topics.

I think you better check that closed topic again, Placebo added a video with the updated flight controls.

[funnyguy1 0]

I was reffering to the official statemet by Suma. He just said something like "we're working on it, It'll be improoved in the nearest patch" locking the topic, and therefore stopping the discussion/demands/complaints etc. There's simply no need to post such topics untill the next patch is relased.

[max power 21]

Quote[/b] ]

I invite disagreement with this point, as it's not exactly on firm ground logically. You might feel that the end result in-game is justified, but I propose that it is not justified and could be changed for the better. Also I propose that such a change would not just please the diehard if-it-doesn't-hurt-can't-be-realism crowd, but the majority of players. If this was a BF2 forum, you'd get quite a few complaints of it's fast reload and few would come from a real-life-as-example standpoint.

I wasn't arguing that fast reload times are justified, just that there are other considerations than if it's realistic or not. I've never played the game

[bardamu 0]

Balance? Balance should never be the job of the Programmer. Balance is the job of the mission maker. Infact, IMHO asymetric forces are much more fun to play with than warring sides with exactly the same strengths and weaknesses.

Can't agree more on this point

Sure realism has limits as it's only a game after all.

But for ofp/arma the best is use real values and let the community handle them.

But(again) market is here and imho devs take a wrong path with those balance compromises; especially for sims...

My AT can't kill the tank in this town/position?

Let's call proper support to handle it, now just hide or run away!

those game moments are great too, i'm tired of rambo/speshaul forces wtfpwntLOLOLOL...

[madrussian 347]

we have just one reload time for all the rpgs. We decided now to make it play longer, we'll see how it'd work.

Thanks for the impending update!

That is, thanks to those of you who spoke your mind about the horribly short RPG reload time, and thanks to BIS for listening.

For the patch, IMO the RPG reload times from OFP seemed sufficient... please nothing any shorter than that!

[Sturmwolf 0]

In ArmA I learned to avoid driving tanks. simple reason: Its more dangerous than runnin around as infantry.

This shouldnt be the case.

BUT as player u still have no chance against a tank because AI can react fast enough, which a human would never be able too.

And the thingy about the animations is still in it. It happened in ofp, but also with short reloadin anims in arma it still happens. you shoot a guy who is currently reloading, and he is not annoyed by you. when he is finished though, he dies. thats confusing, since u sometimes fire 50 shots at him in that time

to the one who stated about a button to cancel anims. what about R? pressin reload while reloading aborts it...woulda be nice.

I furthermore think the reloadin for small arms is too short, too, especially for MGs like the SAW (which has btw a way too low recoil making it uberweapon :P)

So, obviously, the fast reloadin of rpgs was not done for gameplay reasons, but to avoid cs kiddies and magazines discovering it too early and making bad PR.

i though find it nice that from time to time a dev answers to our senseless discussions

greetings

[Col. Faulkner 0]

[...] the SAW (which has btw a way too low recoil making it uberweapon :P) [...]

And the M16 rifles kick too much