The Man Without Qualities

I see it from the life-cycle POV. A3 is 2011 til 2020 I would say, if A4 will see the light at all. I consider A3 playable from 2013-2016, rest was recovering from to early release and poor attempts to add functionality or fix things but making it worst. 2011/12 was busy to get worst bugs ironed out. Since 2016 BIS is busy to destroy all achievments by adding new functionality to a poor base. If BIS is leaving A3 as it is it would mean that I can play A3 3 out of 9 years in a somehow acceptable manner. Rest is f&%$ and pray. I definately tried to use A3 as a game, seriously, but in 2011-2013, even in 2014/15 I returned to A2 for CTI games because there the overall package was working. In 2014/15/16 and even2017 I was playing A3 CTIs which are meant to last hours. But if many tactics and strategies are constantly wrecked by bugs, the frustration level becomes to high. BIS you can get my cash and my support - but only for a minimum level of quality.

Radar sensors are able to detect submarines 5m below surface?

Now we might have a persistent "Keeping up with the Spanels" - show taking place at this map.

For 1.): A kind of watchdog is necessary for every moving unit: "if predicted moving distance per time unit was much bigger then real distance or real distance was zero THEN use reverse gear for xxx meter same path you came and try an alternative path" For 2.) When I browse through the entire object library of A3 it is just 2-3 weeks of focussed work to go through and review all parameters and check collision behavior with 2-5 types of mobile units. Example: a.) object "bush"; human body should clip through or trigger "grass flat" like animation, car and tank should do same b.) object "traffic light pole"; human body should rebounce, maybe trigger voice sample "ouch!", car should receive damage, but pole too, depending on mass vs. pole resistance relation, tank should simply make it flat.

Well, it is easy for you to say that masses of new weapons are the major wishes of the community and not quality in terms of reliable functionality. BIS does not offer a kind of reliable information/opinion gathering platform (no, your forum is not the one, your tracker could be used as such, but isn't) so you answer the requests of those players where the wish fits what you had in mind anyway, that's it. And no, it is not "for free", you cross-finance that with cash I gave to you since 2002. Or maybe with cash from somewhere else which you must get back from me when trying to sell A4 or the next pay - DLC. That cash is missing for other developements. That "releasing a building block" is the 1st real commitment by BIS that they basically abadonned all kind of quality assurance. I would agree with you if it would mean BIS would release fully functional models/examples and the community would adapt configs and would model all different types of tanks of one perfect working example tank. But that is not the case. Your building blocks are so buggy that it is hard to see any real value add. And there are many "old" building blocks to be fixed, do that before you add new buggy building blocks. BIS dragged down A3 to a quality level (IMHO) where it is hard to use it for any "serious gaming". It became a buggy shooter with excellent modding capabilities.

If you don't have a proper engine, simply stick to 1985 weaponary as in OFP. But wait! We had cruise missile even back in 1985, right? Then don't add Überwaffen! The current fashion to add current and future weapons that cannot be proper simulated by RV and even other game dev engines really sucks. My fav CTIs end up that peps trying to get as soon as possible jets with huge bombs/nukes/arty and then the wankin when it strikes. Booooooring! F§&$% off vessels / VLS / UAVs .... stick to old school rifle/AT/some tanks, make it perfect and we have a game. Nobody needs all this half-working crap that was added in the last 2 years.

There is no excuse, just explaination. Disembarking crews or hit enemies in general magically know the exact position of your head the same moment you hit them and send a bullet through - with a scope-less rifle over 100m - hip-shot style. That way the crew of an hit tank kills you before the animation allows you to store or throw away the launcher to run away or hide. Like that since OFP. Will be solved when BER is ready for service.

I see, I thought overlapping trigger areas would break some game logic. On the other hand...would it be to much redesign to get the "factory" asset under the umbrella of the "city" trigger and related forces coverage? In a way that related assets (lets say 2 factories and 1 military base) changing also the occupation status together with "city"? 1 Generic trigger area and several assets of different type related to.

Would it totally break your mission's global design when having production facilities rather in urban areas as in real life? I love the idea to conquer cities like Elektrosvod so that I gain the ownership of Citi+factory and maybe also military assets in one go. Minimum distance of 600m is rather hindering.

THANKS Icebreakr! Always good for a surprise! Perfect map for weaponary before 1985. - Flat (almost 2D warfare only if one does not own any airbourne assets) - no place to hide (well, few dry bushes & trees) - no bullet-proof cover Indeed it could be interesting to simulate low-tech warfare on such terrain. As soon as one side can efford a 1k$ drone, the game is over. Orchestered maneuvering of low-tech assets could bring victory. Playing with full year 2035 A3 weaponary is rather boring.

Maybe you missed the point: As cure for BIS failure to provide a working AI in terms of vehicle driving, some of the forum members suggested to do some manual workaround by fiddling around with unit behavior parameter as well as with convoy setup parameter. My point is that those WAs are not accessible for the casual gamer. Your point that some missions are broken but others work so...fine? ...is void IMHO since this discussion IS ABOUT the fact that many beloved missions ARE broken as soon as working convoys are necessary. Your point that non-devs should stick to playing is void...they can't without problems if flawless working convoys are necessary. May you rephrase what you wanted to say? Maybe I did not understood the intention of your comments.

You ever thought about how that should work in a "user friendly" MP Mission? You do that eighter with one config set valid for all type of convoys or you create a telling GUI that enables the random user to select the convoy (or even to rearrange / regroup) and to set space/speed on the fly. Don't make the mistake assuming that the random gamer is a game developer or even just someone with some basic coding knowledge. They wanna play - that's it.

A tank DLC that prevents the microsecond-synchron bailout of the crew at the same fraction of second the tank is receiving damage above a certain level would be a big step for human kind....well, for BIS. And NO, that parameter that should stop bail out at all is not the solution. The rest of the bling-bling BIS can keep until they fixed this. And stop tanks from going airborne.

Already from design it does not even come close.

This is just the link - forwarding to discord. Just another way to shrink the community.

For this bug and many before: 1.) done 2.) done 3.) done 4.) now you made me laughting

Not sure what you wanted to express. I did not blame BIS for odd spawn area management, proper routines were coded even during OFP lifetime. I mentioned the combination of inability of AI drivers to empty the area by finding a valid path which makes a spawn collision more likely. Indeed, AI driving was never acceptable, but A3, current status leaves me stunned. As you mentioned the speed, I do not get the point why BIS is not trying to solve the issue partly by slowing AI driving in general alowing more calc cycles for interaction with the environment. It is standard that even single AI driven vehicles driving behind you smashing into your rear because they always using bakes to late. This is not the exception, this is the standard. And right, the use of streets does not bring a real strategic advantage since driving offroad does not bring any real time loss that matters nor wrecks it vehicles properly except those broken wheels cus AI does not recog any stone. I wrote it very often, in the very beginning of A3 the vehicles did not have this magic auto-back-to-wheels feature as it is now that turns you slowly back to wheels. I loved it. Also driving downhill pressing "W" constantly lead into a crash, there was no magic auto-break. All that is gone and driving even by humans is messed up by strange auto-pilots making this game more arcade-shooter style.

Now imagine the consequences for a CTI: - in very old versions, the transfer of "supplies" was simulated by trucks transferring virtally supply points to the occupied towns. That was given up loooong time ago because you lost lots of supply due to AI truck drivers - AI commander "buys" depending on the CTI mission complex sets of vehicles to form some useful squads (e.g. few tanks and 1 AA vehicle if > 2tanks in group), they are send by mission logic to the next town to occupy - depending on actual alert setting via roads or straight across landscape. With current AI driving - as often mentioned by me - most vehicle losses caused directly or indirectly by AI driving in combination with flipping tendency of vehicles and sensitive tires. - some CTI missions do not utilize proper routines to empty the closer factory environment nor checking the spawn area for new purchased vehicles. Result: vehicles and everything explodes in a huge fireball if the 1st vehicle spawns into another. Until that, AI driver have huge problems to leave the area in a crowded situation. This was not the case in 2016 by using the very same mission files.

HCs are required to run missions like massive SP-missions using DAC or massive CTI missions with several hundred active AI....BUT shifting AI to HC often kills the AI brain and they stop moving - would be fine if BIS would support the community by debugging some CTI missions together with the mission maker and use it as show-cases how massive it could be if HCs used correctly.

Not so much information...and I do not want to switch to discord (just another odd fashion) to get information. My Qs: The mission, does it support also "old shool" AI commander and AI squadleader and all routines as designed by holy Benny? Does mission+server support HC?

By judging the actual ability to play certain CTI missions by using AI, I consider the game A3 as broken. I hope BIS does not intend to leave A3 as it is now. Even at release of A3 - this out of my mouth/hands! - A3 was working better in terms of AI handling. If a possible new customer of A4 is confronted with an A3 as it is right now - I have doubts that he would be very attracted.

Well, I am not confident that we got nuff detailed information (or even a manual) how exactly all those parameter interact/interwork with each other. Otherwise it would be very time-consuming blind trial&error. So is there someone in BIS who could pamper those community members with very short response time for questions??

Could it be that the majority of the younger community is not aware that it ever existed before? That you could watch AI commanded armies battling each other (and join at any time any side)? So even here we have the evidence that mankind is loosing knowledge over time :-) .

Good that I can qoute myself :-) So if anybody is stumbling over a CTI with following WORKING features: - 3 factions - full AI commanders for 2 sides - AI squad leaders - selectable amount of AI squads - selectable amount of AI squads that can be played by humans - AI routine "transport duty" for AI squads - AI routine "take towns" for AI squads - AI routine "S&D" for AI squads - AI routine "Patrol (waypoints/area)" for AI squads - AI routine "Guard (WP/unit)" for AI squads - AI routine "rearm if xx% of any ammo type is reached if an asset marked as rearm capable is in xx m range" for AI - AI routine "refuel if xx% of fuel is reached if an asset marked as refuel capable is in xx m range" for AI - AI routine "heal if xx% of health is reached if an asset marked as heal point is in xx m range" for AI - tons more.... ...then PLEASE send me a PM! THEN we would have the functional set of what we had WORKING in OFP - currently I am not aware of any CTI supporting at least this. Would say crCTI was more or less the top of AI support we ever had. OFPS is pretty mature, but devs are not so much behind getting independant AI routines back to work. And there is the tendency of adding more features rather then getting existing bug-free.

while back in OFP someone linked up assets by scripts so that addons like DKM-Tungushkas were fed by radar sites. When the network was up, no plane could even start cus the available islands were pretty small at that time.