SLX Mod WIP

[spangg 0]

@Solus, Snkman: it would be great to add a more defensive minded behaviour what could keep the ai in bay. An example: it's not really possible to position a sniper to stay on the highground beside me the spotter or a rifleman behind corner to give cover. Maybe one of the ingame behaviour(stealth for example) would convince the ai to go exactly where we send them and if we give the stop order it stays there until we change his behaviour back or die. Also it could keep them shooting from cover without trying to constantly move to a better position. A highground far away from enemy should be considered a safe spot for my sniper to help the squad and not to start running up and down, the corner of a house could give enough cover not to leave when fighting against a few enemies in the open. The friendly ai is good in manuevering but we need an option to tell them not to do so. Yes lean out of the corner, but stay there.***

So lets say in stealth mode when you give move order it goes exactly there and if you say stop it will stay there maybe change stance or lean adopting to cover. It would help us position them for ambush, defense and so on.***

Other oppinions?

[kremator 1065]

I remember seeing an addon (unreleased) where they author was able to stack a series of troops exactly how he wanted them along a side of a building. I CANNOT remember what it was called but that would sort of help. I remember seeing rotating markers where you could change the position and angle.

[Solus 1]

Thanks for the mirror Miller and ArmA2Base.de!

Hunter123: Try decreasing the difficulty setting to normal or novice in the game options, see if it's more reasonable, then we'll see in what circumstances it's too far.

Myshaak: Thanks I'll look into it!

spangg: I tried tweaking the AI a lot to do that more, but it's a problem with the default AI behavior, unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any way to change it. Sometimes they will look around a corner for a second and then go back into cover and then run around the corner and stand there, usually getting shot in the process, other times they just run around the corner and get shot. Try setting them to combat mode and tell them to disengage if they keep running forward.

Kremator: You might be thinking of full spectrum warrior, another game a few years back that had that stuff. A2 AI are usually terrible at getting anywhere they are told to in combat, let alone close to anything like a particular position along a wall or next to someone else. On their own they do like to stick to walls though, unfortunately the walls are the nearest wall after running around a corner which is usually exposed to the enemy. Many times they also seem to stand with the edge of far cover between them and the enemy, with the inner edge of their body aligned with the edge of the corner, exposing their whole body, almost in cover but not in cover. These all seem to be part of the default AI that can't be changed. The AI dodge addon is called a lot by the AI fsm to try to keep them going back into cover.

[spangg 0]

Is it not possible to modify one of the built in behaviour(safe, aware, combat, stealth) to make them at least ignore everything and stay where you tell them stop. Kind of force move and stop, only shooting and leaning is permitted?

Snkman's gl4 has a kind of forced move, I haven't tried yet, but the readme said it ignores the enemy. Can't we have a forced stop as well? Or a defend waypoint?

Sry no coding skills so I just throw these ideas from the back of my head. No clue whether it's possible or not.

Edited April 22, 2010 by spangg

[Solus 1]

Try the "wait for me" or "stop" commands to make the AI hold a position, although the SLX AI will often tell them to move to a cover position directly behind the object if the enemy sees them. Actually when they end that move they should be told to move back to the original position they were told to move, although that might be only if they were just told to "move to that position". So try just selecting them and telling them to move to the position and ideally the AI will move them out of the way of danger and then back to keep firing.

---------- Post added at 03:21 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:19 AM ----------

This should be a quick fix for the WarFX+Undead bug:

https://download.yousendit.com/THE0YlJkNmM5eFh2Wmc9PQ

Edited April 22, 2010 by Solus

[kremator 1065]

Nope - it was in Arma2 (as I distinctly remember the author having his troops line up at one of the building on Utes airport. I'm going to have to do a lot of digging on these forums to find it.

I do understand what you are saying Solus about the AI - it is great that addon makers like yourself are trying to get around some of the limitations of the engine.

[Hunter123 10]

I just played seal six 2 ace campaign with ai settings on novice. In the second mission you have to get through a wood occupied by snipers. They had me killed in the first 2 seconds i entered the forest. I did try to hide, but they saw me through every terrain. This way all the black-ops missions become impossible, because you lose your advantage over the enemy, which is your ability to surprise them.

[Solus 1]

Kremator: If it's just a straight line of markers that can be rotated like the construction stuff in WF mode of where to tell them to go then that's possible, but I don't have time to do anything like that. In combat they'll have a hard time getting there but eventually they would make it.

Hunter123: Thanks I'll try testing it. If they're full skill snipers then they should be really hard though, since they're only going to have the abilities that you would want your own full skill snipers to have. Also the SLX AI detection skills are basically the same as the Zeus skills. Right now you could also try setting the skill slider all the way down, and if they're not full skill then it will reduce their skills even more. Otherwise try removing Zeus skills if you have them and SLX_AISkills.

Edited April 22, 2010 by Solus

[Hunter123 10]

@Solus: Thank you for your answer! I agree, it's a good thing that snipers are though. But it's also almost impossible to surprise normal infantry. In this mission you have to sneak up to some riflemen who have no idea you are there, but thats almost impossible. I'm not using Zeus ai. I just think it would be more realistic, not to run around with a sniper rifle and to be engaged by a guy with an ak47 without knowing where that sucker is.

Anyway thank you very much for your efforts with this cool mod!

[Solus 1]

Here's a fix for the AI skill with the full skill spot time from Zeus AI, I didn't see the comment there about it ("upper limit 0.595 otherwise AI can spot when moving using cover at 400m+"):

http://www.filefront.com/16227005/SLX_AIskill_ArmA2_1.983.rar

The new SLX AI skills are very dependent on the person's skill level, low skill people can barely hit a building, high skill people are as good as snipers. Their relative accuracy is also now correctly determined by the game difficulty settings: novice (about .6, fewer shots hit), normal (about .7, not too difficult and they will hit after a few shots), expert (about .8, good accuracy, harder but not crazy), or custom (can be set from 0-1). A full skill person will still be pretty good though.

In that mission there's one guy at the radar that is full skill and will AK snipe you (the sapper), the rest are about .6 skill. Around the airfield the rest of the guys are also very skilled.

Edited April 24, 2010 by Solus

[Hunter123 10]

You are soooo my man!

[verde13 0]

Can't thank you enough Solus

[manzilla 1]

Can we get this thing moved to the Complete section, please? I kept missing these releases.

Well done Solus, this just keeps getting better and better. Bravo for the ACE2 compatibility!!!(or vice versa ;)) Thanks for all the hard work.

[dayglow 2]

Just wondering what causes the AI to issue itself a move command? Is that them moving to cover? I find that I miss that they went into move, then ready so they no longer stick in the group. As I manouver through a battlefield I can lose a guy or two as he had issued a move then he is no longer in formation.

[Solus 1]

Manzilla: Thanks! I'll have it moved for the next version.

DayGlow: How about if they don't go to cover when they're following you and in formation and not told to be in combat mode? So you can put them in aware mode and they will follow you in combat even if the enemy sees them. Try this one and see if it seems ok.

http://www.filefront.com/16240139/SLX_AI_ArmA2_1.983.rar

[dayglow 2]

will do. It's not really an issue, but the better I understand why something happens, the easier it is to have better control.

Edited April 25, 2010 by DayGlow

[spangg 0]

i find the only issue the detection. I try to sneak upon the ai or just find the last 2 in a village and they shoot me with 1 shot as soon as I look out from a corner. But I guess it's an arma issue anyway. :(

By the way a new zeus ai is on the way it will try to address the CQB spotting issues. I hope you can implement them if they work fine.

Edited April 26, 2010 by spangg

[jpinard 10]

I'd like to comment on the SLX dismemberment as the current system is fantastic and done very tastefully - (for blowing someone apart). I can't figure out why some people want it worked on more since it's wonderful is.

[-=Firewall=- 10]

Please could you tell me, which module(pbo) is accountable for the issue, that the group will not wait for members which fell apart?

[Solus 1]

DayGlow: The move command should only be them going to cover or going to help someone, btw. Sometimes if someone in your group is wounded and they're close then they might still move even if they're in aware mode.

spangg: Try this one, it's similar to the ACE upper skill detection range and time and it seems to work pretty well: http://www.filefront.com/16265583/SLX_AIskill_ArmA2_1.984.rar

jpinard: Unfortunately I don't have time to work on it more to get it repulsive enough.

Firewall: I'm not sure what you mean, maybe you could describe the situation more.

Edited April 26, 2010 by Solus

[Liam!!!! 10]

I would love to see that lower rifle animation for the player :p

[M.Andersson(SWE) 4]

@dev: How often do you update this?

Is it safe to put on dedicated?

[the.d 0]

I tested the latest SLX some more and I am more and more impressed - amazing work, Solus!

One thing I noticed, while using ACE2 + SLX: the healing is still a bit weird (or maybe I am doing something wrong). As soon as the ACE2 wounds module (ACE2 "Enable Wounding System" Module) is active, I am not able to heal any wounded soldiers back to "1.0". Generally (not just as medic), I am able to provide first aid whenever they are incapacitated but as soon as ACE2 healing should kick in the option is missing. Surely, that's the "slx_removefirstaidaction.pbo" and/or "slx_removehealaction.pbo" kicking in to prevent wounded enemy soldiers from not surrendering after being healed by any non-SLX healing options.

There are two solutions I could think of:

1) Would it be possible to specify the "remove healing option XY" for enemy soldiers (somehow "bind" it to the surrendering feature?) only?

2) (This might seem naïve, as I do not know how much work would be involved) Could you isolate and separate the healing features from the slx_wounds.pbo or let ACE2 wounds overwrite SLX' healing system, as soon as it's active?

Sorry if these ideas seem silly - I am a complete idiot when it comes to scripting. Needless to say I highly appreciate your work here :-)

[spangg 0]

@Solus: thx for the quick reply, will test it! Any plan to check the new zeus values?

(just because you implemented them in slx if i'm right and a new version is out, no offense here)

@The.D: just remove the "slx_removefirstaidaction.pbo" and "slx_removehealaction.pbo" as well so you get back both the first aid for everyone and the heal command for the medic. I think the readme is wrong here, but this way works for me.

Oh, and THANK YOU FOR SLX, it is one of best one.

just had an hour, so did a little testing with the new one and it seemed great! need more testing..., thx!!

Edited April 27, 2010 by spangg
done a bit of testing

[-=Firewall=- 10]

Firewall: I'm not sure what you mean, maybe you could describe the situation more.

Sure. If you move on normal or fast speed, the tanks are not able to hold formation. In vanilla arma2 they try to keep formation, sometimes they get stuck at trees or something else, but it works quite good. But with SLXMod the vehicles do not seem to be able to maintain formation, they get stuck easier. I just placed a tank platoon in the editor with a fast movement waypoint. Instead of moving together they moved there one by one!

Keep up your good work! :)

Regards