When are the locality issues getting fixed?

[Jinef 2]

Locality issues are a very large part of cooperative gaming.

Especially when using combined Arms and AI.

When can I expect my mechanised infantry squad with humans and AI to just work together flawlessly?

BIS knows about these bugs and issues because they are in the wiki, and my community (Zeus) has been moaning about them for 4 years.

ArmA MP is just so much trouble in MP when using AI. If you don't use AI you don't get the scale to make it anywhere near a realistic simulation.

[russin 0]

ya i feel the pain too hopfully somthing in the next patch to help the AI move around the maps better... they get stuck a hell of a lot

[Jinef 2]

Obviously noone cares about this ...

No wonder it has remained utterly broken for 5 years.

I wonder if it fixed in VBS?

[SeppSchrot 0]

Can you please explain? Maybe more people care but I have no idea what you mean with 'locality issues'.

[azdood 0]

some of ya might have noticed this but heres some info bout ai problems

in many tests (meaning we noticed an error and tried to solve why its happening) we found what the biggest problem is with the ai.

they appear to of been, if you will 'copied' from ofp given a new painjob and 'pasted' into arma...

a good example is something anyone can try to repeat. simply have an AT soldier like the rpg fire at an enemy tank like an M1. remember how all the AT weapons drop a little when fired? well the programmers seemed to of forgotten that detail.

in ofp when law ai solder is targeting he aims at the xyz middle of a tank. so from a side view of a t72 a little above the tread, directly in the center. if you copy that exact way of targeting in arma. the rocket will hit the ground right before it hits your tank. but close enough to of received indirect damage.

another good example is how ai do not recognize buildings like the raised plazas in corazol. the ones with buildings on them and ai are stuck on em

[ArMoGaDoN 0]

Dudes in tanks / apcs cannot navigate corazol at all well, especially if a blown tank is only 1/3rd blocking a road.  theres enough space there for 2 m1a1s to pass each other, but can the ai navigate past? nah.

Even without partly blocked roads, they do a hopeless job, many times the tanks/apcs just decide that they love kissing a wall or fence more than driving anywhere, they get stuck all the time.  Stupidest thing is the AI 'hard coded path' to get into a vehicle - if there isnt 5 metres clearance all the way round the side that they HAVE to get in from, then they run around like idiots refusing to get into vehicle.  Between the fences in NE Corazol is best place to view these antics.

Tried to move a tank column today from South to North Sahrani. OMG, I had to get out of my vehicle, order the artifical idiot out, and drive their tank myself 3 times going through corazol cos they got stuck, and the journey north up to bagango then masbete was more than painful.  The APC refused to keep up, even at speeds lower than 'w' speed using joystick as 1/4 speed thruster.

What should have been a 10 minute dash up to the target to clear the path for the aircraft turned into a 3/4 hour nightmare.

Tried formation column travel AND just giving em waypoints.

I really want to make some maps that use AI far more under player command, to scale the battles up etc., but given the current state of idiocus artificialus that just cannot sensibly happen.  ArmA's main winning-point IMO is the sheer scale of the thing, but unless the AI can navigate through it rationally UNDER PLAYER COMMAND then I don't see how this scale can ever be used to the full.

At least they DO now follow you over a bridge (unless there's a nice handy wall to get stuck behind first) so progress has been made - but now the rest of the AI routefinding through towns or even just a few twists in a country road, need fixing up properly - and the fixed-ai definitions of get-in-vehicle routes etc needs to be addressed too.

I am also getting frustrated at the AI's ability to 'glitch' by moving into locked buildings, and through invisible gaps in stairwells in Ortego for example - many times an AI or 2 has managed to walk into Ortego, and finish up inside of a building with no doors, or even underneath not only the buildings, but under the vast concrete plinth that the buildings sit upon. They can move through a small invisible gap in the side of the stairs - I have seen them emerge from the gap twice now, and twice I've seen them walk out of the wall of a door-less building, when they thought it was safe to come out and shoot me...

I must admit, that having seen the way that AI works in VBS2 from their promo-video:- sprinting to cover, moving in formation while covering each other properly, using cover and superior forward planning etc., it leads me to ask: what the ** went wrong with the AI in ArmA?  I now think the only sensible thing for BIS to do to fix this would be to upgrade the AI behaviour in ArmA using the VBS code as a more solid foundational basis, oh and perhaps use the second/hyper- or other processor core(s) to great effect by allowing those extra processing resources to drive the AI decision making processes.  That wouldn't then impact the main games performance much, and the new code thereby evolved could then be used to further improve the VBS product too - so there would be wins/gains on both sides of their market.

I for one wouldn't mind being a beta tester for such development, bearing in mind the gains possible. Would you?

[sickboy 13]

Jinef aint referring to AI pathfinding if im not mistaken.

He simply means the issues that AI doesn't get inside a tank/vehicle if a player is behind the wheel, but suddenly do get in when player get's out etc. and that sort of issues

About the other problems, there's quite some bugs indeed, let's all pray that when Queen's Gambit is released, they put some proper effort into the issues.

[.kju 3245]

http://bugs.armed-assault.net/main_page.php or PM Suma

[ArMoGaDoN 0]

Ah locality - client/server/peer etc.  Doh shoulda known better - bit frazzled now today..sorry..

note to self: engage brain before typing.

However irrelevant though to the original topic, maybe it was worth saying all that anyway. I can see the amount of effort BIS have already put in, am not grumbling about what they have achieved. Think Im getting impatient 'cos I am starting not to enjoy the gaming so much lately, all the plonkers, TK, etc on top of the AI frustration just about fried me today, hence the post content above.