Daytime thermal use - 'cheating' ?

[walker 0]

Hi all

We played an even sided Urban PvP mission in Zagabad on Zeus last night; with me leading the OPFOR team of twenty or so, which had no Night vision and only a couple of dodgy Russian thermal sights for snipers and few flares.

I just told every one to get inside the buildings away from the windows and doors cover a lighted zone and set up two free fire lanes on major streets with cover teams.

Despite the enemy having all the high tech, we won both times. No matter what defense, is always tactically superior to attack by a generally accepted factor of between 2 and 3. And if you are behind hard cover sighted on a corridor that allows silhouetting you have surprise on your side.

Kind Regards walker

Edited July 19, 2010 by walker

[EDcase 87]

Thermal sights are NOT as effective during the day as ambient heat levels are much higher and so there is less distiction between human body heat and surroundings. In hot countries (like Takistan) the ground would be at a higher temperature than a human.

This reduced thermal bandwidth means the image should have much less contrast during the day (Everything will be towards the white/hot end of the spectrum). Humans will still be visible but not as contrasty as it is now.

Its hard to find examples of daytime use but I think

one is.

one is dawn/dusk and even so the people blend into the surroundings quite alot.

You can see that the people have similar thermal levels to the surroundings. This is how it should look in OA daytime.

VOTE if you agree: http://dev-heaven.net/issues/12134

Edited July 19, 2010 by EDcase

[Sheepy 10]

In player vs player combat, is there some sort of modifier that makes up for OPFOR having no thermal imaging? To be honest I keep having the same problems where I know there is definitely an enemy in an area but I dont even get much time to look as with thermal imaging they can spot me clearly from a 1000 yards away.

I love how cool it looks, and its awesome for co-op, but people tend to flock to BLUEFOR to get the better stuff.

[walker 0]

Hi Sheepy

As I pointed out just create a mission or use tactics where the advantage is either negated or mitigated.

In close combat any form of optical sight but especially thermal is at a disadvantage.

War ain't fair and neither is ArmA. It is up to to ensure that it is unfair for your enemy by your strategy and tactics.

Kind Regards walker

[Daniel 0]

IR suffers problems with at least two IR crossover periods per day. Suffers badly in rain. And have cheap counters in form of masking yourself with a blanket. None of these problems exist in A2OA. TI/TWS overpowered? I think it ruins the game, and mission designers should be extremely cautious in making these devices available.

I'm of exactly the same mind set. Which is problem when you want to operate as a pair of Apaches supporting ground troops. Far too difficult to come up with a challenging mission without resorting to placing loads of enemy units or loads of AA. The AI is no where near good enough to start introducing tech like FLIR.

Some setbacks and counters would be greatly appreciated.

[celery 8]

As I pointed out just create a mission or use tactics where the advantage is either negated or mitigated.

Having to take an enemy advantage into account in your tactics is a disadvantage in itself because otherwise you wouldn't have had to do all those extra things to achieve your goal.

War ain't fair and neither is ArmA.

Are all those missions that were designed to be fair just a myth?

[walker 0]

Hi all

One of the things which easily defeats the Apache's FLIR advantage is false positives. Just mix your OPFOR assault force in with lots of civilians and friendlies with similar weapons. OA comes with those forces as standard. Add in some MANPADS and other Anti Air assets and all of a sudden the Apache has problems. In PvP the players can pick up and drop MANPADS to be covert and a simple script can have AI in coops do the same.

Kind Regards walker

---------- Post added at 06:51 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:47 PM ----------

...Are all those missions that were designed to be fair just a myth?

Nah Celery

They are just boring.

It is the differences, in tactics weapons and people that make a game interesting. Other wise you might as well play pong.

Kind Regards walker

Edited July 19, 2010 by walker

[stk2008 14]

HEHEHEHEHE sorry just the abbreviation

MANPADS what have we started to have man periods now?.

[mrcash2009 0]

Other wise you might as well play pong.

*puts down pong hand held to type a reply on the pc* ....

:mad:

[Daniel 0]

Good shout on the false positives Walker, I had mixed them in with some cows but they still stuck out. I'll look into adding more civilians, allied forces with AKs and ManPAD weapon scripts.

Still think we should have AI hiding in fox holes and under blankets. :D

[Sheepy 10]

Hi Sheepy

As I pointed out just create a mission or use tactics where the advantage is either negated or mitigated.

In close combat any form of optical sight but especially thermal is at a disadvantage.

War ain't fair and neither is ArmA. It is up to to ensure that it is unfair for your enemy by your strategy and tactics.

Kind Regards walker

Well, that would be a whole lot easier if Arma actually did CQC well, but its really still an open game. With the change of enviornment to eastern european woodlands to hilly sand dunes. About the only thing I can do is make sure im not sihouletted and travel by valley.

Buildings arent really used that much, (I'd say in part due to the controls which work amazingly well in open terrain but nowhere near as good in tight spaces).

Do Arma servers allow for auto balancing? As im not really against the disadvantage, but more peoples tendency to go more BLUEFOR than OPFOR, leading to regularly unbalanced teams. (i assume this is just the servers ive played on but doesnt hurt to ask)

[EDcase 87]

Its true that tactics can overcome technology but the fact remains that the OA IR scopes are more effective than the real thing.

[caravaggio 0]

In a game where militia can hit you with iron sights from 200 metres i wouldnt worry about taking a virtual leg up .

[rekrul 7]

Having to take an enemy advantage into account in your tactics is a disadvantage in itself because otherwise you wouldn't have had to do all those extra things to achieve your goal.

Military strategy is the planning and execution of the contest between groups of armed adversaries. It involves each opponent's diplomatic, informational, military, and economic resources wielded against the other's resources to gain supremacy or reduce the opponent's will to fight, developed through the precepts of military science.

Hate to use wikipedia for this but : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_strategy

[celery 8]

Hate to use wikipedia for this but : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_strategy

Are you trying to say that an enemy's superior equipment is not a disadvantage at all because you can plan a tactic against it? That assumes that adapting to a situation like that doesn't impede your ability to do things as you could have done them without the advantage that your enemy has, and also that your enemy is unable to formulate its own tactics to fully exploit its advantage.

In the case where only one side has IR equipment, the other side's units will be easily spotted and eliminated unless mobility (units have to stay in hard cover) and suitable areas of operation (Takistan has little cover aside from settlements) are greatly decreased. I count that as a huge disadvantage.

[walker 0]

Hi all

North Vietnam vs USA who won?

Afghanistan vs Russia who won?

Gandhi against the might of the British Empire who won?

Neither technical nor numerical superiority nor physical might win wars for they are all just tactical advantages.

All wars, without exception, are won by political strategy.

North Vietnam lost every major tactical battle against the US military without exception yet it won the war decisively.

I suggest you read:

Sun Tzu's: Art of War.

Niccolò Machiavelli's: Art of War and The Prince.

Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz's: On War

If you have not allready. If you have read them I suggest you re-read them.

The concept of strategy is that you set an achievable goal that forces your enemy to fight on your chosen ground for the purpose of your choosing.

In Vietnam the concept was simple win the land and people.

America had not the numbers of soldiers to ever control the land without alienating the people.

Kind Regards walker

[Michael Withstand 10]

The lovely M110 with the TWS is making daytime missions quite easy , particularly as I used to find the biggest challenge of this game was looking through the thick brush to find my target.

Do thermal cams work as well in the day ?, and are they used in real combat in day time ops ?....would seem like a no brainer to use if they did to scan large areas for hidden targets.

yes they do they are used both in daylight and night time. It's not cheating. They won't make everything transparent though just pointing heat signature. Yes they can see past smoke but unable to see past trees rock or buildings.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

They are not technically cheating, but they're far too good compared to real life, so I see them as cheating and will not make them available in missions. See the videos posted earlier; they can bring contrast back to an already washed out image in the visible spectrum (blinded by the sun), but conditions can exist making contrast very low if ambient heat is about as high as human body temperature (which would be the case often in Takistan), instead of glowing white all the time.

[Sheepy 10]

Hi all

North Vietnam vs USA who won?

Afghanistan vs Russia who won?

Gandhi against the might of the British Empire who won?

Neither technical nor numerical superiority nor physical might win wars for they are all just tactical advantages.

All wars, without exception, are won by political strategy.

North Vietnam lost every major tactical battle against the US military without exception yet it won the war decisively.

I suggest you read:

Sun Tzu's: Art of War.

Niccolò Machiavelli's: Art of War and The Prince.

Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz's: On War

If you have not allready. If you have read them I suggest you re-read them.

The concept of strategy is that you set an achievable goal that forces your enemy to fight on your chosen ground for the purpose of your choosing.

In Vietnam the concept was simple win the land and people.

America had not the numbers of soldiers to ever control the land without alienating the people.

Kind Regards walker

Lets not forget Musashi's "Book of Five Rings", however to behonest, I do not have sound faith in your approach to be honest. If Arma WAS reality, it would be valid, but its obviously not the case.

Also you're citing some pretty outstanding amazing achievements. Winning a casual battle or Arma shouldnt take a lifetime amazing performance if the other side is performing just alright. Im sure you're aware that those examples you used had plenty of factors that lead to their success that are not exactly viable in a game.

Furthermore, the entire BLUEFOR side has access to thermal imaging, where more reasonable games will usually have thermal limited to squad leaders and special ops. It makes sense and is more accurate.

To be honest, I LOVE the fact that OPFOR has to work a bit harder, to use more cunning. But I'd prefer if it was balanced closer to reality. (OPFOR would normally have local knowledge, or more inside contacts, use of the people, secret paths etc)

Cheers,

Sheepy

[el_muerko 0]

I'd suggest mission makers think hard about the weapons available to units. How many TWS scopes would a unit or platoon have on them?

Also scopes are good but creating close range action mitigates them some, so roving patrols and enemies coming at you from unexpected locations are worth adding.

Also adding civilians and wildlife to the mix to add some non hostile IR to the map.

Edited July 20, 2010 by El_MUERkO

[OldFossil 0]

I had always used my PAS-13B and PAS-13c 24 hours a day in Iraq. I wish they had been as clear and easy to use as the ones in game but in reality they are not. Not even the CROWS systems were that clear during the day. During a hot day the sight obviosly blends things together whiting them out. in the end though a well trained gunner can be very very effective using it to differentiate between heat sources and pick moving or slightly different temperature objects out of the background.

Hi wld427, I ask this question directly to you that are a professional:

are the thermal visors useful into heavy foggy weather?

Thanks a lot for your attention!

[Sheepy 10]

I'd suggest mission makers think hard about the weapons available to units. How many TWS scopes would a unit or platoon have on them?

Also scopes are good but creating close range action mitigates them some, so roving patrols and enemies coming at you from unexpected locations are worth adding.

Also adding civilians and wildlife to the mix to add some non hostile IR to the map.

Man, some more non-combatants would be awesome. Maybe roaming tradings and civvies. Too bad a lot of people already struggle with performance :(

[T.S.C.Plage 0]

Something you guys may want or should read.

http://www.flir.com/uploadedFiles/ENG_01_FOG.pdf

[OldFossil 0]

Something you guys may want or should read.

http://www.flir.com/uploadedFiles/ENG_01_FOG.pdf

Thanks for your exhaustive reply!

[vinc3nt 10]

Real Life FLIR:

Arma 2 OA ULB FLIR:

Both of animals in a forrest, both at around 14:10.