Idea for Ghillie suit viewing at a distance. Snipers can be spotted TOO easyly.

[koroush47 10]

IN AAS I remember walking for miles just to get to a spot so I can start sniping for a squad who wanted some help killing the enemy and calling the movements of them out. So I get in a bike, ditch it half way and then go to a spot and hide there for a few minutes. I tell the squad I'm in position and everything is going fine until I shoot at a squad running about 600 something M away. I shot one guy but he didn't die. Next thing I know they all whip out their binocs and in about 10 seconds their entire squad spots me and I am raped.

Seriously, this ruins the whole sniper experience. It is a bit unrealistic also.

Response to this thread: http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=78634&page=4

So:

At long ranges.. players with gillie suits will be the same color as the hill texture, so they look just like a part of the mountain. This would make the most sense seeing as they cannot make the grass grow that far. if grass worked the sniper would look something along the lines of what I'm describing.

And when another sniper or normal rifleman looks at him with a binocs, then they can see him normally and the grass also. So when being shot a random rifleman cannot just scan the horizon and find out your position instantly.

Ideas guy?

Edited September 12, 2009 by koroush47

[randir14 10]

As long as servers only allow one ghillie suit per team I'd be ok with this.

[That guy 10]

would be cool if the ghille had a different distance LOD to make it appear "flater" like the terrain around him

[Alex72 1]

Were you lying in a bush or between some concealments at all OP? Or just in grass on a open field? That will ofcourse not work good - and wouldnt be done in real life either normally without gear to cover yourself up better. Always good with some debris/objects in front of you to the sides so you shoot out through a small opening. Hard to see you and some bullet stopping objects in front IF they do see you and return fire.

DMarkwick did a cool thing for ArmA1 where you could build up a semi transparant camo net/hideout. It would build up around you and made you invisible to AI - and super hard for human players to see you. I remember if you moved a lot when AI passed you close they would see you and kill you. If you were still they passed you just some meters away.

DM any chance for some sniper concealment in ARMA2? :)

Alex

[dmarkwick 261]

DM any chance for some sniper concealment in ARMA2? :)

Alex

I do have a working version of the Hide for ArmA2 :) Perhaps we should release it. The reason that it's not released yet is that the AI is still in a lot of flux with each patch, and various small details about the hide need to be tweaked for the AI. 1.02 the AI were super-sharp, now they seem a little dumb again.

*edit*

Ah, yes, here is a picture of an early version (remember this is SEMI-transparent):

And a couple of tests with a slightly different camo-net texture:

Edited September 13, 2009 by DMarkwick

[koroush47 10]

As long as servers only allow one ghillie suit per team I'd be ok with this.

Those big AAS servers have like 2 or 3.

But there are 100 players, so it would work.

[galzohar 31]

Any game where something that is included needs to be limited because "if everyone could have it they would want it" is bad gameplay. If you want to keep realism while not messing up gameplay, make your mission so that the "overpowered" stuff will no longer be overpowered for realistic reasons and players will no longer choose them.

Artificially making snipers invisible over a certain distance and then limiting ghillie suits will make snipers be the deciding factor in games. Especially in Advance And Spawmcamp.

[koroush47 10]

Any game where something that is included needs to be limited because "if everyone could have it they would want it" is bad gameplay. If you want to keep realism while not messing up gameplay, make your mission so that the "overpowered" stuff will no longer be overpowered for realistic reasons and players will no longer choose them.

Artificially making snipers invisible over a certain distance and then limiting ghillie suits will make snipers be the deciding factor in games. Especially in Advance And Spawmcamp.

The game is suppose to be realistic, it's called a simulator. When you can see a sniper in a ghillie suit from miles away in tall grass... that is not realistic.

The snipers are suppose to be "invisible" anyways.

Ghillie suits are already limited, and you cannot spawncamp in the 100 man servers (which is the only server people play on). They have a huge red\blue circle that blows enemies up if they get too close. Have you even played AAS before?? :rolleyes:

All we are doing is making the game work like it is suppose to. Pretty much Don't render the sniper... the same way the grass isn't rendered, but only when he is not moving and prone. Maybe after 10 seconds of laying still the sniper will become unrendered. but IDK that is for BIS To decide.

Oh and the deciding factors in AAS are the tanks/apcs when ever one of those shows up... be sure that the objective will be raped.

Edited September 13, 2009 by koroush47

[NoRailgunner 0]

koroush47 do you really want that ghillie snipers will be invisible - regardless of their position in terrain or in urban environment?

Kind of magic nanotech-suit for players that dont care about concealment?

Btw. 10 seconds are way too fast (gamey) for making yourself invisible.

Wouldnt it be better if player/AI could build different foxholes or something similar? Maybe not fully invisible but close. ;)

[Evil_Echo 11]

...

The snipers are suppose to be "invisible" anyways.

Ghillie suits are already limited, and you cannot spawncamp in the 100 man servers (which is the only server people play on). They have a huge red\blue circle that blows enemies up if they get too close. Have you even played AAS before?? :rolleyes:

...

A good sniper uses cover and concealment. The suit is just an aid to that effort. Perhaps you have the wrong set of expectations about what snipers are.

Even concealed properly, if a player is stupid enough to just camp in one spot all game the AI and human players will find you via sound and muzzle flashes. As part of the simulation, A2 encourages you to learn about proper movement in combat.

[koroush47 10]

koroush47 do you really want that ghillie snipers will be invisible - regardless of their position in terrain or in urban environment?

Kind of magic nanotech-suit for players that dont care about concealment?

Btw. 10 seconds are way too fast (gamey) for making yourself invisible.

Wouldnt it be better if player/AI could build different foxholes or something similar? Maybe not fully invisible but close. ;)

Where are you guys getting this crap? Do you even read the posts?

We said nothing about urban or anything like that. All We are saying it that to make the snipers look like the grassy terrain from far away. Not like some kinda weird thing that can be spotted instantly. In real life when you are in grass and your ghillie suit looks like grass you will be hard to spot, but in ARMA 2 that is not true. It is too easy to spot. I'm suggesting that we make the snipers look like the green terrain from far away as a substitute for this problem.

This guy is hiding in grass. You cannot see him, this is how gillie suits are suppose to work in real life. In arma 2 everything is fine in close range, but that is not the point... snipers do not work in close range. When you zoom out in arma2, the gillie suit remains but the grass doesn't.

Now look at that picture, imagine the grass not there.. Not very effective now is it? By removing the sniper in extreme distances (300 m and over, when prone in the forest areas ONLY!) this can be achieved in a way. Because rendering grass that far is not possible... and some people turn everything down to low so they can spot them 20x faster.

A good sniper uses cover and concealment. The suit is just an aid to that effort. Perhaps you have the wrong set of expectations about what snipers are.

Even concealed properly, if a player is stupid enough to just camp in one spot all game the AI and human players will find you via sound and muzzle flashes. As part of the simulation, A2 encourages you to learn about proper movement in combat.

Yes that is true, but this is just not realistic. The reason MANY if not all people bought ARMA2 was because it is realistic. We already have COD4 for nubs who don't want realism.

Now I've been shot many times just sitting in a spot... observing the town. Not even moving my body, but just using trackIR. Never took a shot, never even moved. Just doing recon for my team. Then all of a sudden I'm being shot at and I die. Why? Because some guy takes his Binocs and scans the forest.. then spots me instantly. In real life this wouldn't happen.

That is how it is. It should be fixed. BIS is genius, I'm sure they can figure out a way to fix it.

Edited September 13, 2009 by koroush47

[whisper 0]

Use bushes and trees. Problem solved

[koroush47 10]

Use bushes and trees. Problem solved

It is suppose to be realistic.

[whisper 0]

It is suppose to be realistic.

Your guy in your photo, in the forest just behind him == visible like no one else.

Ghillie suit != invisibility suit. It's completely situation dependant

It's supposed to be realistic? Your solution ain't

[galzohar 31]

This thread is trying to solve a lack of realism issue by asking for implementation of even more lack of realism. That is not a proper way to fix things. Also if you want to show sniper camo you may want to also take a photo from where the direction sniper is observing. If a sniper isn't fully concealed (that is, behind something and not visible regardless of his camo) from the directions he's not supposed to shoot at then he's doing a bad job.

The terrain in Arma does not allow for proper sniper actions. In fact, it does not allow for proper actions of any type. The terrain structure in Arma 2 is totally lacking, and that can be said even if you completely neglect the grass issue. Hills are "flat"/"smooth". In Arma 2 you have about 1% of the cover you would have IRL. That combined with the difficulty to see distant enemies with default FOV and zoom, makes it so that a non-scoped weapon is borderline useless on non-urban missions, and even on most/all urban missions is probably inferior as well.

As for Advance And Spawmcamp, I don't know what version you're playing, but the ones I played that turned me off that definitely had "AAS" in its name allow you to spawn at any base under your control, including the one that the enemy is just attacking. As long as they don't outnumber you in the zone you can keep spawning there, and the only way for them to outnumber you is kill people in the zone faster than they respawn, and the only way to do that is to keep killing them as soon as they spawn. Who cares about protection of the "home" base when nobody ever spawns there anyway (unless he wants to take some vehicle which may or may not have respawned and not taken yet)?

Edited September 14, 2009 by galzohar

[maturin 12]

Your guy in your photo, in the forest just behind him == visible like no one else.

Ghillie suit != invisibility suit. It's completely situation dependant

It's supposed to be realistic? Your solution ain't

The ghillie transparency would vary depending on the type and length of grass you're hiding in, obviously.

I would also suggest that effect gradually wear off the longer someone focuses on your location with a scope or binoculars. So if you somehow knew where the sniper was, you could see through the camo after a while.

[Alex72 1]

Did anyone even see DMarkwicks addon previous page??

It does what you want. It conceals you on grassy plains. Either keep bitch or hope for DM to relase it and go play and be happy. At least for now. When there is a solution to a problem i dont really give a flying f**k if its from the dev team or a modder. It works equally good in game. ;)

DM's concealment in ArmA1 was superb. Just so you know.

EDIT: Important note on DM's addon. Remember it is SEMI transparent so with binoculars or a scope searching grassy fields you will eventually find him. Add ACE2 muzzle smoke from high powered sniper rifles and you still have to be on your toes in your concealment. But a glance around or in stressed situations it will be hard to notice - and thats the point in'it. :D

ARMA2 is moving fast towards awesome gameplay thanks to BIS and our superb community of talents.

Edited September 14, 2009 by Alex72

[speeder 0]

IMO a solution would be that the Sniper should be able to change the color of his camo according to the enviroment which he is in ATM. This should take about ~15 minuts to change the entire camo, but only 3-4 minuts if he only want to "update" the face/helmet.

But that's just an idea, which is proporly not easily implemented.

PS: Sorry for the spelling. It's monday, and I'm tired. :)

Edited September 14, 2009 by speeder

[JackandBlood 10]

I think I watched a documentary on snipers on the History channel, as I remember it the Ghillie suit is only as good as how well the sniper is able to make it for that particular terrain that he will or anticipates will be operating from. So I agree with most of these suggestions. Ghillie suits in all flavors of ARMA 2's terrain, and a use function for Ghillied soldiers to take some time (i'd say 15 seconds) to change to the local flavor.

Course it could be much simplier than that, ppl could simply be cheating. That's why I don't play adversary MP modes for games with questionable anti-cheat devices.

[dmarkwick 261]

Did anyone even see DMarkwicks addon previous page??

LOL, I'm beginning to wonder :D

If you refuse to use map cover/concealment ingame (that is, bushes and trees and not grass and other clutter) then you can expect to be seen at distance. You KNOW that, and if you KNOW that, you must change your tactic. Use a bush. Get inside it. It will mean your view is impaired and you might need to shuffle about, but, that's what you got to do as a sniper. Simple.

Now, if you want to insist on hiding in plain sight, you've got to use an addon to help you do that. That's what my Hide addon does - it helps you hide at distance. If you wish to blend in at distance then you've got to use a texture that is used for the terrain at that distance, and so I've been using textures that are very similar to the textures you see when you scope in on grass at large distances. I use semi-transparent textures so that it helps you blend in, but also means you can still be seen by sufficiently detailed scanning.

That's just the visual, human player part of the addon. The AI part of the addon is a doughnut-shaped AI viewblock object, invisible to players but hides whatever is inside it to AI units. It's doughnut-shaped so that an AI unit, looking for you, will find you if he gets sufficiently close. Each time you fire, the Hide lowers by half its height, and slowly rises up again. Repeated firing will lower the hide sufficiently for it to become useless, and it is deleted. Initialising the hide takes about a minute for it to fully deploy. Moving more than a meter in any direction deletes it. People firing close to your position will delete it (so you cannot cheat by hiding inside a buddy's Hide ;))

The Hide is not meant as a cheat addon, it has a purpose and limitations. I think, that considering the limitations of the BIS gameworld, it's as good a solution as any other currently in use ;)

Edited September 14, 2009 by DMarkwick

[koroush47 10]

LOL, I'm beginning to wonder :D

If you refuse to use map cover/concealment ingame (that is, bushes and trees and not grass and other clutter) then you can expect to be seen at distance. You KNOW that, and if you KNOW that, you must change your tactic. Use a bush. Get inside it. It will mean your view is impaired and you might need to shuffle about, but, that's what you got to do as a sniper. Simple.

Now, if you want to insist on hiding in plain sight, you've got to use an addon to help you do that. That's what my Hide addon does - it helps you hide at distance. If you wish to blend in at distance then you've got to use a texture that is used for the terrain at that distance, and so I've been using textures that are very similar to the textures you see when you scope in on grass at large distances. I use semi-transparent textures so that it helps you blend in, but also means you can still be seen by sufficiently detailed scanning.

That's just the visual, human player part of the addon. The AI part of the addon is a doughnut-shaped AI viewblock object, invisible to players but hides whatever is inside it to AI units. It's doughnut-shaped so that an AI unit, looking for you, will find you if he gets sufficiently close. Each time you fire, the Hide lowers by half its height, and slowly rises up again. Repeated firing will lower the hide sufficiently for it to become useless, and it is deleted. Initialising the hide takes about a minute for it to fully deploy. Moving more than a meter in any direction deletes it. People firing close to your position will delete it (so you cannot cheat by hiding inside a buddy's Hide ;))

The Hide is not meant as a cheat addon, it has a purpose and limitations. I think, that considering the limitations of the BIS gameworld, it's as good a solution as any other currently in use ;)

that is a horrible solution. Just using bushes? What if there are none?

"Oh look! My guy can't run! Might as well just use cars!"

Atleast the addon you made makes it work.

The ghillie transparency would vary depending on the type and length of grass you're hiding in, obviously.

I would also suggest that effect gradually wear off the longer someone focuses on your location with a scope or binoculars. So if you somehow knew where the sniper was, you could see through the camo after a while.

Yes. But if you are looking at a sniper w/ your binocs or scope... and you can see the grass also.. Then you should be able to see him normally as you would if you were 5 feet away.

Did anyone even see DMarkwicks addon previous page??

It does what you want. It conceals you on grassy plains. Either keep bitch or hope for DM to relase it and go play and be happy. At least for now. When there is a solution to a problem i dont really give a flying f**k if its from the dev team or a modder. It works equally good in game.

Relax on the profanity. This is just a forum.

[galzohar 31]

Looking through your scope doesn't make much difference when it comes to grass. It still doesn't get drawn after a rather short distance.

[koroush47 10]

Looking through your scope doesn't make much difference when it comes to grass. It still doesn't get drawn after a rather short distance.

ARMA 2 is a great combat simulator.

But it is really lacking in the sniper department.

The experience isn't what it is suppose to be. I hope they can somehow fix this.

[Evil_Echo 11]

And your experience koroush47 in sniping IRL is...???

All I've seen from a couple of players here is complaints about how they can't camp like in some run-n-gun games.

That's not sniping in the real world. Gunshots give away your location, your camo is not perfect, you are not some invisible god handing out death with impunity.

While the game is not perfect, and never will be, overall it works just fine if you use good technique.

[Jaenus 10]

I don't mind snipers in small doses (or numbers), but seriously? This game is not really intended for "sniper" play.

If you're going out alone with 1 or 2 other sniper NPCs, you're WASTING the potential of having 13 guys in your squad (depending on MP server, of course!)

So really? I'd rather have no one on my team being a sniper because snipers are rarely, RARELY ever team players and they rarely help with objectives because they're often doing their own thing.

This has been proven time and time again in other FPSs and Milsims - snipers are typically young teenage boys who enjoy the rambo feeling and rarely contribute.

No thanks.

As for your idea for camouflage, I think it's a good idea, but not exactly how you're suggestion. How fair is that to me if I'm being shot at by an invisible foe and even if I get lucky and look directly at his direction with my scope, BECAUSE OF GAME MECHANICS, I can't see him? Nah. Changes need to be made, but not the way youre saying.

Edited September 15, 2009 by Jaenus