Men are not birds

[pathetic_berserker 4]

Thanks BIS for the hard work in improving AI animation and behavior. But there is a little thing that stood out like dogs balls in some of the latest Arma II videos.

I saw an example of a squad in wedge formation that zigzaged about like a flock of birds. Holding thier individual positions perfectly in both distance and time.There needs to be a little lag in the way units follow the lead. It kind of spoiled the atmosphere and great work thats gone into improving the appearance. Though I'm more or less used to this from years of playing your games, I think it would be great if you could include more natural looking animations for the formations.

[The_Captain 0]

One weakpoint I've noted in arma/ofp AI is that AI are seemingly obsessed with following a fixed point in formation, finding it even more important than staying alive sometimes. A bit higher tolerance would help them stay alive longer, imho.

I ran a few tests a while back where AI would get low level moveto/domove commands to their formation point whenever they were commanded to stay in formation. It was buggy (they would freeze when given rapid move orders for too far of a distance, etc), but in close formations Arma AI's individual pathing did a better job of keeping them in combat ready positions than the "formation flock" AI. Also looks WAY more realistic and convincing.

I'd like to see changes like this to formation AI in arma 2.

[wipman 1]

Hi, will also be very usefull if we could place each unit in a squad

where ever we want, in urban enviroments for example; where you

don't have a fixed formation due that you've to change your attack

or defensive tactic acording to the terrain and cover at your disposal.

So you may have 2 men in a roof, other 35º at the right of this two

and you and another rifleman or the SAW at your side at the ground

height. That will be great, without the need of write anything on the

Init Boxes of those units. So the units will spawn & stay right where

you've placed 'em in the editor. Let's C ya

[funnyguy1 0]

That's exactly what caught my attention while watching that vid. Everything was cool, almost like watching tv, untill that funny moment..

If it's not a crapload of work (and of course a matter of wip), they should do something about it, because it looks awful.

[Commando84 0]

yeah a sort of spread out formation or something.

[aus_twisted 0]

And when you play with a AI group leader if you stray off formation he will let you know pretty quick "2, Return to formation"... "2, Return to formation"... "2, Return to formation"...

[Barely-injured 0]

I agree this is one thing that is minor yet annoying.

I dont know how difficult it is to change it, but I hope that this is something that is easy to change because i would assume that if the formation positions are relaxed a bit it could improve a lot of the AI path finding problems. It would also reduce some of the weird movements of vehicles in formation like when a tank platoon is traveling in wedge formation and the lead suddenly stops there is always one or two tanks that make a quick stop by turning sideways ice skating style  

[The_Captain 0]

I think the obsessive AI formation following is to help prevent 'formation lag': the leader would move ahead, and the rest of the squad would notice that and move to follow after they took the time to recognize that. With Arma instant following leader's position changes they start moving the second you do which is unnatural, but it does keep them in formation.

I think part of the problem is that a military unit doesn't move with simple "blind following": the SL would tell the men where to move (giving them a heads up to move 100m forward) and they would all move in a group, instead of waiting every second for the SL to move a few meters, and follow him forward a few meters as well. In addition, as soon as you change your standing/crouch/prone position the AI units do instantly as well, equally unnatural.

This scenario happens frequently to me: I run from one side of the road to the other and go prone. The AI following me hit the dirt not when they reach their formation position (now on the other side of the road), but right where they are, causing them to hit the deck in the middle of the road and crawl to cover (and probably get shot).

There's a difference in the pathing algorithms when units are in 'follow mode': it seems they aren't getting normal move commands, instead their destination is being changed by the game to be exactly the correct formation position. If they rely on their own pathing they take much longer to make a plan, and have to replan every second/split second, and their formation position ends up being only within arma/ofp precision (2-3m).

The exact pathing also causes ai to seek the EXACT position they are supposed to, instead of say, cover near their position. In cities this means they might try to find a path to the middle of a building (if their line or wedge position puts them off the road and inside one), and they get fairly confused.

So it seems BIS uses some sort of 'exact' flock pathing/AI movement when units are in formation (changing the units destination constantly) to prevent constant replanning/inexact movement/whatever, but it is exactly this which is really unnatural.

If AI are automatically given game-engine move commands instead of the formation-following, they end up acting slightly smarter and more natural overall (since they are relying on normal move commands), even if their movement speed and reaction to SL changes is slower.

Maybe I will dig up my old tests and try to streamline them.

[pathetic_berserker 4]

@ The_Captain when you put it like that it sounds like BIS would have their work cut out fixing it. But there are already some signs that BIS have develpoed less rigid path finding for Arma II, as shown with thier scanning and seeking cover. And even in Arma1 the formations SEEM to fall apart in full blown combat (as they should). So maybe its a matter of defining a tolerance within a danger or combat mode.

I know I'm clutching at straws here, but I still have wait and hope.