Bouben

Better AI.

Hi, is there any way how one can change LOD of buildings so that the most detailed LODs are never used? Buildings are the main cause of low FPS in my experience and I would like to tweak it. The rest of the scene should be unaffected. There used to be PROPER tweaks for that, but unfortunately they don't work in OA 1.60 as far as I know. Thank you.

Thanks domokun, but the mods are ARMA 2 only if I am not mistaken. Thanks anyway.

MS Windows 7 64-bit AMD Turion X2 Ultra ZM-82 Griffin 65nm Technology 2.20 GHz 4.0GB DDR2 @ 335MHz MSI MS-1721 Motherboard ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3850 (MSI) Western Digital WDC WD32 00BEVT-00ZCT0 SATA HDD It is a 3 years old gaming notebook by MSI.

Hello guys, I have recently installed OA 1.60 after few months of not playing and was very surprised that AI is not performing bounding overwatch when ordered by player to move both alone or in teams in either stealth or danger mode. They don't peak from corners anymore, don't look around, don't check their mates. They basically move very fast and close to the careless mode even in area with many buildings. Everything is allright when moving with their leader (player or AI). Is this a new "feature" or some bug? I found this behaviour quite unfortunate. Has anyone the same problem as me? Thank you! Edit: they don't even stop to kill an enemy they've spotted even if very close (few meters) and just continue moving to ordered position. I would understand this behaviour in hold fire with aware mode but in stealth or combat mode this is really a problem.

I perfectly understand your point but sometimes I would really like to send my men somewhere without me. I mean one bounding overwatch command would solve it all because apart from this problem I have an amazing experience with new betapatches. The game really is responsive and squads are moving great while engaging. Just that dedicated overwatch command is missing. That way I would decide if I need them to go as fast as possible or if I need them to search every corner. My experience is that bounding overwatch often saved an individual's life because it gave him time to react.

Well I am getting used to the new behaviour and I really got my team more under control than before, but I would really appreciate a special bounding overwatch command especially in urban areas when I need them to go as carefully as possible. A special command for this would be a blessing and I would have no other prompts. That would solve many situations. Right now when I send a squad to do a search in urban areas they absolutely ignore enemies they encounter. I cannot make them engage them without targeting them first and giving them engage command. Often a whole squad is killed by one enemy because everybody is moving and ignoring the enemy. That sucks a lot.

Well, what I have observed recently was not what you are saying. They simply continued moving without any reaction after spotting an enemy soldier when ordered to move somewhere. And I am talking about aware, combat and stealth modes. None of the modes has any effect on that. They simply move and move and shoot only when reached their destination. They will go to danger mode automatically only if in formation with you. While ordered to move, they ignore it completely and dont go to danger mode at all even in combat or stealth mode. I hope we are both talking about the same thing.

Allright then imagine that I am moving with a team A and a team B is moving alone on the other flank while a team C is covering everybody. I simply need the team B be able to take care for themselves. But I understand the issues connected with bounding overwatch (crossing a street and so on). I think it would be good to have two MOVE orders then. One for quick movement and one with bounding overwatch. How would you solve the problem that your AI mates are now ignoring enemies while moving? This way I can't send them anywhere alone even in teams of 10 soldiers because no one will shoot (very often). Thanks for tips. Edit: and wouldn't be enough to disable bounding overwatch only when told to move while in aware mode and not in stealth or danger mode? This way a player would decide when to use it and when not. I would like this solution, really.

But they actually do overwatch when in danger or stealth mode and moving with you and are actually very fast. Much faster than they have used to be so I dont see any problem in the overwatch behaviour itself. I think this is a too radical change, because now you cannot send a team A to flank the enemy while you move with a team B because the team A would not cover at all. I dont understand this "solution" of taking it away completely and I think that with the actual fast and responsive overwatch it should be used when in danger and stealth mode. Moreover, they ignore enemies while moving and that is a serious problem that is reminding me of old OFP days. I can not send them to do anything anymore.

Thanks for the reply. I think we should not search for a workaround then but for a fix, because this makes the game worse than before. It used to work quite well but now it is not working at all. Also I don't understand why is it working when AI is moving together with a leader and not when moving as a part of a team. I think this should be considered as a bug. I wait for some more comments from you guys and then consider making a ticket on devheaven.

That leads me to a conclusion that there should be grass and shadows too in Arma while zooming through a scope. Good point.

I actually like the idea of disorientation now! You have a good point there. :)

Another idea I have is that the transparency (or something) could be applied on a model only where grass provide an obstacle between player and a unit in distance. I don't know if its technically possible in ARMA, but this way only some parts of a model would be affected exactly where grass is covering the model. The visible rest should be only distorted in order to simulate imperfections of human eye under circumstances of temperature, wind and so on (hard to simulate, I know). In real world human eye could have some real trouble in order to focus on a particular object while a cluttered surrounding is moving or have insufficient contrast between light and dark or contrast between colours etc. There is also a need for better simulation of perspective on units = objects in distance have more pale colours than objects near to you. This will also bring more depth to the picture. All of this would make things more real (in terms of behaviour, not visuals) while not sucking our GPU power dry (no need for more textures and objects in the picture). As for the grass suddenly visible while zoomed in, while I understand the purpose, the contrast between non-zoomed and zoomed state may be so distracting that it may be hard to realize where are you looking actually, but I don't have any idea for a workaround right now. Anyway, there should definitely be something implemented in A3 in order to deal with this problems. It is a real PITA sometimes in both singleplayer and multiplayer games. It would make a combat much more thrilling and engaging. (sorry for my non-native English)

There is no need for increasing draw distance of grass in order for effectively camo units in distance. There is a need for some kind of workaround - for example a shader that will be applied on units in distance and distort their models enough so that human eye would not notice them. Maybe even some kind of gradual model transparency would work.

I voted YES. It is the most effective solution for dealing with idiots and casual gamers yet. And it wasn't any problem to pass the training in AA2, because I REALLY WANTED TO PLAY THE GAME. The result of it was that I was playing with other ones who REALLY WANTED TO PLAY THE GAME and not bored casual ones who wouldn't have any problem with spoiling it completely just for few minutes of "fun". So it is not so much about gaining skills - it functions mainly as a good FILTER. My two cents. Hello all! PS: and if it would be optional per server then there is absolutely no point in not having this in the game. Serious servers would get serious players and everyone would be happy.

Voted yes. Of course.

I have never noticed such issue with prone units. Strange.

I am very excited! If I get new PC I will definitely buy the game.

Sound absorption would be pretty much everything we need to get believable experience. Because that is the number one factor creating environment around you with distance and height. It needs engine capable of changing frequency ratio of sounds in real time. Edit: Ok and some reverbs calculated by objects around a source of a sound (but that would be CPU heavy I think)

I would like to have as many settings as possible in some kind of separated "advanced" mode so that it would not scare casual players who are important for BIS too. Especially LOD details like in the first OFP would be great.

Yes, that is it.

Well, another feature that would make a huge difference would be various animation styles for different characters. Look at the GTA4, every character (and I mean every single model) in the city has its own animation style. That would be a huge step for ARMA with its otherwise robotic characters. But I don't know if it is possible for the Virtual Reality engine.

Amazing. Finally some extensive AI tweaking. AI is the key element of the game. Keep it up!

I believe that the length of certain reloading animations was modded to be longer even in the old OFP days. It worked well but it looked awkward. CSLA mod was the case.