Some UAV questions

[longers 10]

say you are patrolling an area and you come up to a town and would like some air recon...

1. can you call in a uav to automatically scan the area for you ?

2. if it does scan the area how exactly does it tell you where the enemies are?

3. does it mark them on the map for you ?

4. do they also appear on your hud or just your map ?

5. can you switch to it somehow so you can see what it's seeing in realtime or is that only possible when you are controlling it from your base ?

sorry for all the questions, id just like to get an idea of how it works :)

[Thirdup 0]

1. Yes (but)....if the pilot sees anything, he'll go into spaz-mode and swoop down for the nearest tree to crash into. The module needs to be re-worked so the pilot isn't in "attack" mode.

2. It depends. If the UAV and it's "pilot" are in your squad (again, mission-dependant), you will get map makers and radio chatter.

3. See above.

4. Just the map unless you're viewing in "camera operator" mode).

5. Depends on the mission design. If the controlling object is mobile (ie: the module is assigned to a truck, etc) then you could use the UAV camera interface anywhere.

Until the module is "tweeked" (either by BIS or a modder) it's pretty pointless to use right now. It can't fulfull it's attack role nor it's observation role. The pilot goes completely stupid and dives the instant he sees a target. And the camera is so unstable, it serves no purpose as a laser designation platform (*you can totally forget about the Hellfires onboard being of any use).

Right now, it's a neat toy for flying around an empty map.

What it looks like when it's not near any target:

How to set up the module and use the UAV interface:

Edited July 1, 2009 by Thirdup

[longers 10]

thanks for the answers, so is there no other way of getting recon on a town/area before you go into it ?

[Thirdup 0]

Oh, you can get recon. A helo bobbing up. A jet doing a high-speed pass. Even a squadmember in a chute. Manually mark the map.

The UAV itself could even be of use for that....just not the remote-access module.

[longers 10]

but can you get the ai to do that ? i realise its possible in multiplayer as you can just ask another person to fly over but say you are doing singleplayer and are stuck on the ground just outside a town... is it possible to ask for an ai chopper/plane etc to come and scout out the area for you and then report back to you with any targets (either via radio chatter or the enemies being marked on the map). If so... how do you do this ?

also i thought you just said the UAV was useless for recon as it just crashes as soon as it spots enemies ? how could it be of use if this is what it does ?

sorry for the noob like questions, im just trying to get to grips with this game... it's really quite confusing !

[Thirdup 0]

There is a slick little UAV module built into the editor. Watch the videos I linked. The problem is, it's totally useless.

But the UAV *itself* (just the aircraft) is still useful (at least for recon). Just depends on the mission design.

Yes, you can get AI (in your squad) to fly any plane to a location and just loiter (do not fire). They will chat about what they see. You will get markers on the map as long as they have eyes-on. What you won't get is the cool little camera operator view (seen in the above videos). That's part of the module.

As you get more familiar with how to command AI and how they interact with you, it'll make more sense then.

Edited July 1, 2009 by Thirdup

[Inviktus 10]

Well that is handy.. I was just playing the campaign at the point where coops takes control of the squad and you have to hunt down those two dudes (no idea wtf I'm sposed to do there either) and I used the UAV only to find it crashed into the ground.. thought I was doing something wrong. weird game.

[IanUK 0]

The only way I can get the UAV not to attack is to set it's ammo to zero.