Arma feedback thread - based on 1.09

[Undbat 0]

My thoughts:

Recoils are OK except for the MGs. Now, M240 = n00b c@nn0n (on maps where the M249 isn't available :P ).

I've fired a 7.62 weapon (albeit it wasn't an M240 or PK) and the recoil is much more ferocious than 5.56 guns, which I have also fired (and agree that they have extremely mild recoil). Check on YouTube for people firing the G3, for example, or the FN FAL. It's a hefty punch. The fact that the M240 and PK can be fired accurately when standing is, in my view, nuts.

Can't wait for 1.09, in any case. I do love patches.

I have fired thousands of rounds with the MG-3...is simply never ever had the idea to try this out while standing or kneeling...the 1150 rpm would throw you off.

The one and only time I fired the MG-3 from "the hip" since firing this 11kg Machine gun from the shoulder is simply insane, was an retreat battle drill exercise... this is more spraying rounds all over the place rather than aiming at something.

Btw... 1.09 still has no option for players to holster pistols... it's still A.I. only.

I was a M249-gunner and received a lot of training with both the FN MAG (M240) and Minimi Para (M249). This is how I used the weapon systems during my military service in the swedish army, I have no idea about how you americans do it (=how it should be in ArmA) but I suppose it works just as well.

My experience from shooting the MAG from the shoulder in standing position is that it works quite well on the range but that it's not really practical in combat. As long as you keep the bursts short, about 2-3 rounds instead of the normal 4-8 rounds, you can easily hit a standing whole-figure at 100m. The problem is not the barrel climb but rather the weight and size of the weapon that makes it unsuitable for sustained fire from the shoulder. 100-200 rounds can be fired with enough accuracy to suppress the enemy but then your supporting arm gets tired

More common usage of the MAG was first and foremost in the defensive or support role (prone and feeding ammo straight from the assistant gunners' rucksack) but it worked well in the assault role as well (fed 100 or 150 round cassettes and fired from the hip as means of suppression), did a great job increasing a rifle squads' firepower and breaking the enemy psychologically with it's heavy, chugging sound. IMO the MAG should be improved even further in ArmA in the prone position. It is an incredible weapon in means of firepower and psychological effect. How about implementing the benefit of assistant gunners into MP?

Regarding the Minimi, it's just as easy to control at full auto as an assault rifle. A wonderful weapon that works just the same in real life as in 1.09, should be kept unchanged. Not as manly as the FN MAG though

I also noted that assault rifles behave alot better in 1.09, for the first time I'm actually possible to fire nice and smooth double-taps and quick follow-up shots like in real life.

[Balschoiw 0]

Quote[/b] ]Nope. But if I were a soldier and had to swim, I'd sooner loose all other items from the 20+ kg backpack than my gun and ammo. On enemy territory, your weapon is your life.

Sure, that´s why you pack regular weapons into sealed bags before you go for a swim. They don´t like water. In fact a wet weapon that has been "flooded" is a serious danger for your own life.

You just don´t jump jump into water with your gun and blaze on. That´s hollywood at best. There are specific designed guns that can be used underwater or have higher resistance to humidity but the regular grunt does not carry such.

From my own experience as a soldier who used quite a variety of guns ranging from M16 to G3, G3 ZF, G22 to MG3 to G36AG to AK 74, HK169, and various handguns I certainly can tell you that all of them are sensitive to humidity.

You don´t even have to "drown" them. In tropical conditions you have to oil them very fat to avoid rust after one day. On the other hand in tropical conditions you can also have sand. Sand everywhere. That´s why you can´t keep the gun oiled in some of those countries.

So it´s up to you to decide:

- keep the gun oily and have no corrosion problem but a sand problem

- keep it dry and polish it dry multiple times a day to avoid rust

Swimming with a weapon means drying it like a fart once you left the water and that means at least 20 minutes service time once you left the water. Still there will be parts you cannot dry and rust will find it´s way.

Keeping in mind that there are situations where you can´t change your weapon for a better one once it gets rusty, it´s better to pack it up dry before going for a swim.

There´s a reason why soldiers hold their weapons above their heads while crossing shallow rivers.

For "game" reasons it would be suffiecient for me if BIS just lengthened the time interval before one drops his gun unless they implement a dry-sequence after you´ve left the water

Quote[/b] ]I'd sooner loose all other items from the 20+ kg backpack than my gun and ammo.

In an ideal scenario you pack your backpack into a sealed plasticbag put your weapon ontop of it and use the sealed backpack as a swimming aid to cross the river.

[xxbbcc 6]

Balschoiw, [APS]Gnat: even though I was never a soldier, I realize what you're talking about. That is, however, real life. In the game, no matter how much I'd like to put my weapon in a waterproof bag, I cannot, because the whole concept is missing. I cannot even try to hold the rifle above my head, because there is no such animation. I also cannot lighten the load of my in-game character, because it has no load: it's just a bunch of colored triangles.

My whole point is that the game tries to be "realistic" in a totally insignificant part of the game, which is still very annoying. It happened to me multiple times that in some missions I end up in water (for whatever reason - not always my stupidity) and I have to swim. In many missions there are no weapon/ammo crates lying around, so this is pretty much the end of it: I must reload, because I lose the most important items imaginable (in the game.)

Keep in mind, in RL even if the gun goes rusty from salty seawater, you can still grab a heavy branch and have a chance of clubbing an enemy (however small.) Or you might have a knife, etc. In the game, you're totally screwed.

So while upping the time limit from swimming might work, I'd only accept something so long that they might as well remove the whole thing. I fully consider weapon dropping in water a bug.

And if you're going for realism, how about getting the NVGoggles not turn black when there is a miniscule light source far away, as one example?

[-Puma- 2]

weapon jamming mechanism could come handy in situations like a wet gun. it should just jam more often when wet.

[Xenios 0]

I appreciate the better game performance, improved recoil, and most of the high points others have pointed out here. But I see a new problem and one old problem:

The old problem is the Mk 19--it still makes the Strykers and HMMWVs jump and sends up an obscuring cloud of smoke. This is completely wrong: the whole point of the Mk 19 is that it has very low recoil and produces hardly any smoke, allowing it to be used where an autocannon would be ungainly or impractical. I don't understand why this simple fix hasn't been done a long time ago.

The other thing is that its ammo type is listed as the same 40mm HE grenades used by the M203. It is not. The Mk 19 uses a longer 40mm grenade (40x53mm HEDP rather than the M203's 40x46mm HE), and it is high explosive dual purpose, meaning it has a shaped charge which can penetrate 50mm of armor. That's more than enough to penetrate any IFV. When it hits directly, the Mk 19 should be as dangerous as a 30mm autocannon to light armor. The secondary blast damage is probably comparable to the M203 and doesn't need to change.

The disadvantages of the Mk 19--high dispersion, shorter range and slower velocity compared to an autocannon--are already present in the current model. I don't know about the AGS 30's ammo, but I'm sure it also has low recoil and produces little smoke.

The new problem is that an AT rocket will only put a BMP in the yellow now, even if hit from behind. It can still drive and shoot just fine--and that's ridiculous. It should be disabled, in the red, and the crew should be at least wounded. I know it was annoying before when any AT weapon instantly killed everyone in an IFV every time (which also isn't realistic), but now we have the other extreme. Speeding up the AT reload time to a comical rate is not a solution.

[LFO 0]

after playing quite a while and getting used to 1.09b i just want to add a few things:

- despite the better performance, especially in wooded terrain the lods are to "close". in convoy ambush it is possible that you see a truck roughly 50m away in it's 3rd(?) lod, with square shaped tyres. that`s not good. a user definable lod and shadow lod setting like in opf (gold) would be nice.

- also i appreciate the beefed up armor, i think its overdone for the m113/m163. i may be wrong, but i always thought they are designed only to withstand small arms fire, and not multiple hits from a 30mm ka-50 cannon firing he. on the other hand, now switching between he and ap is also necessary for the m113. maybee it's not that bad...

[FrY 0]

There are no signs with Streetnames. Some Vehicles and untis moving through any others and houses or walls without get an collision with there. The command "setunitposweak" does not works. The objekts on the map (like a watch, walky talky, gps or notices ) cannot be fixed and scaled for ever like in operation flashpiont.

[Placebo 28]

restored files. started arma 1.09:

poor performance without mods (no framerate increase for me ...with GF 6700 GS, 1GB RAM in case someone wants to know)

very VERY sluggish performance with some of the more popular mods (ArmaFX, DM Smoke, VFAI, Soundmod) activated. Shows very poor LOD loading. Trees come first with trunks and branches shown only (no leaves or smaller branches), then pops up more detail after 1-2 seconds. especially in the northern forest areas with lots of pine trees on screen. Seems I am one of the only few that would say that 1.08 worked WAY better and smoother, despite lots of important fixes.

I had similarly ugly textures/LOD loading issues when using 1.09 with my system (3700+ GF 6800, 2GB ram) when using normal for all settings, increasing textures to high removed 90% of the texture/LOD issues and barely affected FPS negatively (I reported as such in this or the troubleshooting thread IIRC).

[Maddmatt 1]

I had similarly ugly textures/LOD loading issues when using 1.09 with my system (3700+ GF 6800, 2GB ram) when using normal for all settings, increasing textures to high removed 90% of the texture/LOD issues and barely affected FPS negatively (I reported as such in this or the troubleshooting thread IIRC).

I also noticed that a while ago. Haven't tested this in 1.09 though, only 1.08.

AMD3800+ X2, 7800GT, 2GB RAM.

I got even worse LOD/texture issues on 'normal' than even on 'very high'. High seems to work best though.

Something weird happens with the way ArmA handles normal textures I guess

[rundll.exe 12]

I can report the slow texture/LOD loading too (X1950PRo 512, 2GB ram) wich i never seen in 1.08. I have the texture setting at "default" wich seem to work best, but still in (not pre-loaded) cutscenes I only see the first LOD and my hdd goes crazy. Never seen this in 1.08. (I did see it in 1.04)

[Undbat 0]

weapon jamming mechanism could come handy in situations like a wet gun. it should just jam more  often when wet.

A properly maintained and operated weapon doesn't jam, at least not the M240 or M249. Don't know about the M16 but I assume that reliability has improved since the Vietnam era and is nowadays on par with other modern assault rifles. Can't really see any reason for adding a jamming mechanism. Also, a wet gun doesn't jam by itself or rust to the point of jamming, at least ours never did.

[Balschoiw 0]

I had multiple jams with a M16 that was properly serviced in desert and tropical areas, same for G3, MG3. It´s natural that you get jams when riding in an open vehicle through sandstorms or sand that is been brought up by the vehicle you follow. Sealed chamber guns are more immune to that but open chamber guns have a weak spot there. Humidity can be a big problem when operating in such conditions longer than a regular drill-phase as most of your personal equipment also will be "wet" after a while. This also includes your personal cleaning and maintenance set for the gun. So basically speaking you can´t keep it dry there unless you want to send out smoke-signals when firing an overoiled weapon.

[Placebo 28]

This thread is not for discussing which weapons jam and when, etc. etc. please stay on topic

I can report the slow texture/LOD loading too (X1950PRo 512, 2GB ram) wich i never seen in 1.08. I have the texture setting at "default" wich seem to work best, but still in (not pre-loaded) cutscenes I only see the first LOD and my hdd goes crazy. Never seen this in 1.08. (I did see it in 1.04)

And if you try changing to high/V high?

[Balschoiw 0]

Quote[/b] ]This thread is not for discussing which weapons jam and when, etc. etc. please stay on topic

Funnily enough I was just thinking the same when posting but forgot to include it in my post

It´s just one of these "One thing leads to another" - discussions.

On the 1.09:

I experienced something strange yesterday. When I was watching a firefight in the woods from quite a distance ( about 300m´s away) the bullet impacts in the ground appeared superlarge on my screen. They were almost double the size of the men who had the firefight. This looked very surreal. They used regular rifles but the bullet impacts on the ground were extremely huge.

[kuIoodporny 45]

Just noticed it - Manual fire control key works in 1.09

At least for Cobra and Sukhois. M1A1 driver still must use action menu to enable this.

[TrevorOfCrete 0]

hey guys, not sure if anyone else has noticed this, since ive started running 1.09 the sound inside veicles is really quiet, and for example in a helicopter, can hardly hear anything. I like the effect of it being a little quieter but for me at the moment its just a little to quiet. is anyone else getting that?

[Misfit Leader 1]

Yes same thing for me, and i think it is the same for recoil.

Like others said, BIS heard the community but has change from a point to the opposite.

So now there is no more recoil when firing (even kid can use a M136 rocket launcher ), we don't hear any sound in vehicle (can we have the same car in the real life ) , the game run much smoother.. ah no, the last thing isn't bad

[xxbbcc 6]

As I understand, the problem with sound is that people who play online (PvP, etc.) had to scream to hear each other in vehicles (just as in real life.) This is not very convenient when the above happens in one's home, with the wife and kids already fast asleep, so BIS decided to turn down the volume.

It'd be nice to have a separate volume control for vehicle sounds, but if it's too much work, I prefer the current (1.09) volumes, for the above reasons. Some of the previous vehicle volumes might have been close to real life volumes, but they were way annoying while playing, even in SP.

[Anunnaki 0]

Advertising a server has nothing to do with 1.09 feedback.

[Correction 0]

Looks like wooded areas and rifle scopes are still off limits for me. :(

[Misfit Leader 1]

As I understand, the problem with sound is that people who play online (PvP, etc.) had to scream to hear each other in vehicles (just as in real life.) This is not very convenient when the above happens in one's home, with the wife and kids already fast asleep, so BIS decided to turn down the volume.

It'd be nice to have a separate volume control for vehicle sounds, but if it's too much work, I prefer the current (1.09) volumes, for the above reasons. Some of the previous vehicle volumes might have been close to real life volumes, but they were way annoying while playing, even in SP.

I don't say it is stupid to have quiet "in-vehicle" sound, but there is a difference between very loud volume & very quiet volume.

A volume where you can hear the vehicle in the background while speaking and hearing people without having to say them to shout.

It is a simple task to do some test and find the best "in-vehicle" sound volume.

ps : I say "in-vehicle" because if you use third person camera the volume is louder (and i think this is not a bad idea to keep that like this)

[mrn 0]

I had an oddity yesterday, the game went kind of black and white:

Quite trippy seeing my footsteps as bright green though:

Never seen before and not sure I'd be able to replicate it. The only thing that was different to normal is I was using it in a window with the nopause switch.

X1950 Pro 256mb PCI-E, Cat 7.12, C2D @ 2.9 2gb RAM etc

FWIW- 1.09 is a huge leap for me, performance is improved, the AI is improved, I don't need the DVD in the drive and that damn variable gamesave bug is fixed so I'm one happy chappy.

Thanks BIS

[MehMan 0]

Overheating perhaps? Dx error?

[mrn 0]

Quote[/b] ]Overheating perhaps? Dx error?

Not overheating, I got one of those Sapphire Ultimate 1950's with the fancy Zalman heatsink that rarely goes above 50 degrees. Don't think it was a DX error as I just shut down the window, started it in fullscreen and carried on editing for another 2-3 hours without issue. I could be wrong but it doesn't matter anyway because the game works fine.

[Dwarden 1124]

hmm is there way how order in-squad AI to disable vehicle engine ?

option is missing from menu

same like disable lights

yes i'm aware that if order unit to change status to danger and stealth they disable lights

but they still burn fuel and reveal position by engine sound

i would swear it was in menus in prior version(s)