Question about specifying teams

[grey 0]

hi

two quick questions about commanding a squad (singleplayer)

First of all, what exactly is the point of being able to assign your men to a colour (select man then go team > assign team > red or whatever) when u cannot quickly select this team in battle? in fact its more time consuming to select them by going through the extra menu, there seems no point. I would really like to split up a 12 man platoon into 4 squads of 3 and be able to just go "green flank right" etc quickly. Did i miss this bit in the manual ?

Also, what about making your man watch a specific direction without going to the menus? At the moment if i say, want to make a man watch down a street or something, i have to select him, go to the map and find out what the heading is that i want him to look at (eg north west etc) and then go through the command menu and select the right direction. Why cant you just select the guy and then click in a direction to make him face that way? Again, have i missed this bit in the manual? Cos setting up defences would be so much quicker with a feature like this.

Thanks all

[ralphwiggum 6]

first, assigning colors will be faster than selecting each squad member one-by-one. imagine that you are in a situation where a BMP is rolling down the hill, and you want to have AI LAW to shoot it, but have Machine gunner with him for protection. if you made arrangment before, than you can just order that color(LAW and Machine gunner) to go to advantage point and take BMP out.

also, pressing 9 and then assigned color is faster than pressing f2, f4, f3, and f5.

2. there is a way to do what you asked to do.

choose some squad members. press 'Alt' key(your cursor will change to a square with arrows pointing to four directions) and click on the spot you wish them to see. the draw back(AFAIK) is that if you are standing east side of a town and make your grunts look using this way(looking west), when your squad moves on to the west side of the town, your squad will look at town(looking east)

[IceFire 0]

You're telling me I can simply tell my men where to look by clicking on a location with alt?

This completely adjusts my tactics for team movement!!!

Now when I point at an area I want a unit to look at, would that just be like quickly telling him to look in that compas direction, or would that make him look at that direction more specifically?

I mean I remember times where I didn't quite want my men to look north, but not quite look north-east. I wanted them to look in between. Is this more specific??

Also, will this control the distance that they focus on? Like can I make them focus on a spot 500 yards aways one time, and then 200 yards another time?

If this is true, then I can make my men cover certain "danger spots" that the enemy is likely to pop out of, therefore making them quicker to react!

They have this feature in the game "Swat3". It was the only feature that I wished OFP had.

[Gaswell 1]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (IceFire @ Mar. 19 2002,13:52)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Now when I point at an area I want a unit to look at, would that just be like quickly telling him to look in that compas direction, or would that make him look at that direction more specifically?<span id='postcolor'>

He looks at that particular spot, which may be a spot on the ground terrain or a spot on the sky box (which in effect makes it seem like he's looking in a compass direction). You can also tell them to look at an object, such as a truck.

Use "no target" from the command menu to cancel any "look at" orders (including "scan horizon").

[grey 0]

Its a shame they didnt include hotkeys to select team red/blue/green etc (or did they?)

Also, will the ALT thing still work if i dont use the default function for ALT? (i have bound it to something else and forgot what it originally was bound to)

[ralphwiggum 6]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (grey @ Mar. 21 2002,10:03)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Its a shame they didnt include hotkeys to select team red/blue/green etc (or did they?)

Also, will the ALT thing still work if i dont use the default function for ALT? (i have bound it to something else and forgot what it originally was bound to)<span id='postcolor'>

you have to assign colors, after choosing specific unit, using 9-and then color number

[PitViper 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (grey @ Mar. 21 2002,04:03)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Its a shame they didnt include hotkeys to select team red/blue/green etc (or did they?)

Also, will the ALT thing still work if i dont use the default function for ALT? (i have bound it to something else and forgot what it originally was bound to)<span id='postcolor'>

I agree completely. I'll put it in the "features wanted" thread

[PitViper 0]

BTW, coming up with a true tiered command system would solve this.

imagine assigning a few guys as a group. Their individual icons disappear and a new single "group of soldiers" icon appears in the list (now with the appropriate F key). they are a squad with a leader. now, 2 of your other guys enter attack choppers. now you assign both choppers to their own group. their individual icons disappear and are replaced by a "group of helicopters icon" assigned a single F key (with its own leader). You should be able to "name" the groups as well (aliases in exchange for colors) In cooperative play, the leaders of the subgroup will have the appropriate members show, just the people in his group, but he will get messages from his "higher". If you wanted to get more complicated, messages down the chain of command could only come through radios which are in each vehicle and with a dedicated radio man (RTO) or whoever has a radio in their inventory. Man, the squad game would be incredible if BIS implemented that system. I would like commanding much better than the current system and we would be able to command virtually much more than 11 other guys.

[grey 0]

yeah that would be awesome

the only drawback that i could see would be a higher learning curve/greater complexity which BIS might want to avoid however

btw, the alt direction thing works no matter what alt is bound too, and it works great too! so much quicker setting up my men now