Activate Support Vehicles

[*KEEPER* 0]

in ArmA you sometimes need to use support trucks to rearm/repair/refuel. This usually meant that you would need to position your vehicle in a specific location behind the vehicle that would sometime result in you having to hop in/out of both vehicles over and over again just to get the support function to appear on the action menu. I would like to suggest that the area of effect for support vehicles be expanded a bit. Even maybe a 10-15meter radius around the vehicle.

This would help when accessing both empty and AI controlled support vehicles which are almost unuseable in a high stress fast paced environment.

This is especially important for AI controlled support vehicles that sometimes cant be entered by players and refuse to position themselves in the correct position.

[Praelium 0]

I rarely use the support vehicles in Arma, but I'm going to have to disagree. As long as the "support function trigger" was in a logical place, (ex. pump on fuel truck), then I don't think it's a big deal.

Speaking of which, I think the support vehicles could be taken a step forward in realism by making the player actually get out to do the support function. If I recall correctly, the way it is now you can just sit in the vehicle and choose it from the action menu. The change may promote teamwork, where someones the driver and the passager get's out to support. (Of couse this only applies for some support vehicles)

[ArMoGaDoN 0]

Many newer maps have a 'support zone' to rearm/repair/refuel vehicles, this is done with a trigger and a bit of simple scripting. If you are making your own maps then I'd suggest you dePbo some existing maps that have these inside and look there for some inspiration.

The support radius for trucks is a simple in-cpp pbo setting in the vehicle addon itself or from the vehicle class heirarchy.

Simply changed, but to make it very large would be pretty unrealistic. As-is seems to be about right IMO, when you drive a tank to repair truck you need to be pretty close, feels more realistic that way.

With aircraft it's more of a problem, hence the reason for these FARP/service area triggers being made in missions.

[frederf 0]

See that's what's kind of sad with the A1 (ArmA 1) support system is that it's so fiddly that people make big workarounds to avoid it, which usually turns into stuff like drive through ammo zones and such, making it too easy.

One of my complaints about A1 rearming, refueling, and such is that it is done automatically for you when you're in the zone. This is awful. It removes the player from what's happening. Who here has emptied a fuel truck because it automatically started refueling a leaky-tank AH-1Z? Who has rearmed a UH-60 FFAR without even touching the ground hovering over an ammo truck? So very lame.

As for the AI behind the request support function, a little more coding would have them drive out to you, stop until not needed anymore, then drive back to their station to await another request. Currently they just sit once done and then drive straight to the next job if/when it's called. They usually don't last that long though near the front lines.

Wouldn't it be awesome to call for a M113 Ambulance have him drive up, collect the casualty, then drive back to the aid station? It would also be pretty nifty if they tried to avoid known or suspected enemy positions when driving about. The strength of the avoidance area would depend on time since spot, enemy spotted at location, and enemy type. That last thing is a bit of a pipe dream not that it couldn't be coded.

Also there should be a maximum support range so you can have vehicles that just support on an airbase for example.

Now we get to the how of the actual support so I'll break it down into the four categories of Repair, Fuel, Ammo, and Medical.

Repair

When a repair request is made a support vehicle leaves the holding area to drive close (10-30m) to the need. Once it arrives the truck stops, the AI gets out, and walks to the item(s) that need repairing. He goes through a 60 second repair animation while the damage of the item is reduced, (optional part) runs out of repair ammo, walks to the truck for more, gets more repair ammo, returns to the scene (end optional part), and finishes the job. He then goes on to the vehicle needing repair next farthest from the request point. Once he runs out of ability, runs out of items needing repair (within range 50m?), or is dismissed, he returns to his truck and drives off back to the holding station. This is not super hard to script.

Fuel

Ideally you'd want the driver or co-driver to get out, drag a fuel hose to a designated fuel port point on the receiving model and perform refuels on all vehicles within "hose length."

Ammo

This touches on a big annoyance with vehicle magazines/ammo in ArmA and in fact all vehicle weapons. While the infantryman's rifle can be reloaded at any time, magazines juggled or added, the vehicle weapon is hugely simplified to the game's detriment.

The M2 for a simple example cannot have magazines added or rearranged in any way during play. It reloads automatically at the end of a magazine and cannot be reloaded partially through a magazine. Weapons that require turning out to reload in real life don't in ArmA. This must be changed if the game is going to progress.

If a M2 runs dry you have to press 'R' to reload it, going through the animation. If you want to reload it early, go ahead. If you want to add more ammunition to a vehicle you should be able to walk to an ammo box or ammo truck carrying that vehicle magazine, pick it up, walk to the vehicle, and place it in the vehicle.

Assuming the above the way an ammo truck should respond is by driving close, having a crewman get out, take the required ammo out of the back of the truck, walk to the vehicle, and place it in the vehicle's inventory. Repeat until full or dismissed. Hard? hardly.

Medical

Medical would show up on the request scene, allow injured to board of their own accord, post a medic or two for scene treating, and stretcher non-standable injured. Once dismissed they would return to to the station point at which point they would be given an order to dismount (via script).

[wipman 1]

Hi, i'll like to see things like this:

M-992:

For support the tanks in the rear line and also to serve as targets

to the enemy, to protect 'em from the enemy as the tactical resources

that they're and i'll also like to see recovery vehicles and utility vehicles

as that M1A1 body with a shovel in the front to dig up trenches and

tank's fox holes. They're more common to see in the battlefield than

an ammo truck (that are mostly used to take the ammo from Point

A, to point B and then load it in support armoured vehicles) and

much more uncommon are the repair trucks, that only carry tools

for other two vehicles (soft or hard) armoured which are the ones

that take and replace the big parts using the truck's tools and theyr

own tools. Add a better, more realistic and wider, engineers corp

vehicles could also very well serve for expand the campaign's

length by adding all kind of missions related to this vehicles. Let's C ya