CarlGustaffa

Good point Mr_Tea. I'm not sure how the M136 or RPG-7 operates in real life, but all soldiers are here tought in basic understanding and operations of the M72. I'm sure if the carrier were incapacitated, another unit would assume responsibility of the weapon, even without being told. Same goes for ammobearing and assistant gunners etc. They *know* their duties, while in ArmA we have to tell them, and even then it's not sure it will work. I hope too, that Arma2 will improve on this.

But don't expect AI to behave properly regarding Javelins A Javelin unit will never reload unless he has two rockets in his inventory. And I haven't been able to script it yet, but I'm sure it can be done, somehow. I'm able to make him have a rocket in his inventory, I just can't make him reload the damned weapon. I'm going maaaaad about this

Also, read this: http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....t=56505

Ehhm, how? Yes, I'm again trying to work with this. _target = _this select 0; (the detected unit) {player sidechat format["%1 is possible unit that detected enemy.",_x]} foreach list tEastAriFriendlies; How do I find in this list the unit which is closest to _target? My coding skills are not that great, to say the least.

Hi How can I obtain the unit that set off a "Detected by Trigger"? It shouldn't have to be player, but any of my sides unit, or a specific type of unit. I want to send a patrol to the position the unit causing the trigger to go off was last spotted. Is this doable?

The micromanagement needed today really gets to me. In a mission I made (personal use only), there was a bit of travelling. Both in vehicle and on foot to reach the objective area. Because of the foot distance, I opted to use 20rnd magazines and not too much of it. The suprice was the objective was heavier guarded that intel suggested (not uncommon). While in the middle of battle, having to tell guys to rearm at so-so is unneeded micromanagement if I don't particularly want to do it. If I was a leader in real life, I would order my men to get the gear ad-hoc. A leaders job is to designate targets and positions. A good leader is one that doesn't need to lead his men. I guess in real life bonds exists between members in the squad, or at least fireteams. One member knows what the other is thinking. Current leading implementation doesn't really undermine this. But I sort of agree, if someone wants to micromanage everything, by all means let him. Bit if some other guy (like me) thinks there is way too much hazzle, please let us simplify leading by setting a switch in the game config or whereever. Another thing is how the engine prevents you from doing your stuff. Such as having to select from a text menu where a unit is supposed to re-arm. In real life you would just point. Why no just implement a point interface for these sorts of commands? Also, cargo members of vehicle can't be "geared". If anything, it should be the other way around. But IF there was supposed to be this kind of limitation, you should be able to make a "plan" for your soldiers that they executed once they disembarked (unless they disembarked into contact). I think I've spent 30-60 minutes rearming 12 men properly while in a mission, just because of the controls and limitations in the engine. It wouldn't in real life

So, if I made a mission and published it, I would use binaries for optimization reasons? And since it is "secret", no others can view my code? Sorry, but that does NOT benefit the open community that exists today. De'pbo'ing a mission is the first thing I do when downloading it, looking for ideas and solutions. And then there would be "hacks" around to defeat this encryption or whatever method was used. Maybe only elite guys would be able to use. No, I'd rather have on-the-fly compiling ONLY. Precompiled files should not be possible to use. XML<->Binary converting is also a bad idea since something is bound to get lost in the process. Gives the greatest openness. Sorry, but I couldn't disagree more strongly when it comes to "secrecy". I'm all for XML, if the tools would be available on game purchase. But I really can't see it happening for Arma2. I used to use RPN based XML when I "coded addons" for Flight Simulator. Easy to learn, especially if you're used to RPN (reverse polish notation, think HP calculators here) and gets rid of all use of paranthesis based arithmetics. For newcomers, it does take a little bit of getting used to though. That being said, sqf syntax works very good for me, why fix it if it ain't broke? My only complaint about sqf from a newbie point of view, is that it is very hard to grasp that if only a single parameter is needed it comes after the command. And in front when there are other parameters behind. Confusing stuff. Ex: removeAllWeapons this this removeWeapon "Binocular" Agreed on the ray.intersect. Call with [3D position (from), width of cone, maxdistance or to 3D position (to)], and return [3D position, object id]. Maybe an accuracy number would be needed to tell how many random rays to test within the cone. Greater accuracy and distance would take longer to check though. Someone wrote, "even idiots can script". I think "idiots" actually can script today if needed. The problem isn't always with the scripting itself, but also how the engine tends to overrule what you want. Ex, vehicle light discipline follows combatmode, and no matter what you do the command won't work ingame. Another one, there exist an allowGetIn command, but no allowGetOut command in case you as a scripter wants to create an attempted getaway instead of the default disembarking upon contact.

Are anyone able to "break out" of these "types" of animations? If so, how do you do it? I mean, I have set up two triggers, synched to player with these in activation field (u1 is another unit I will watch): on act 1st trigger: hint "first move"; u1 playMove "AmovPercMstpSlowWrflDnon_talking" and on act 2nd trigger: hint "second move"; u1 switchMove "," For the animation, you can try with the kata and several (if not all?) of the QG animations as well. For the break out attempt, I've tried u1 playMove "Stand" (acc. to biki example) u1 switchMove "FXStandDip" (acc. to biki example) and even u1 switchMove ","; u1 enableAI "ANIM" (acc. to  this thread and personal experiment). But I'm just getting NOWHERE with this When second is activated, it just restarts the first instead. Heeelp Animations are just sooo cool, but pretty unusable if you can't break out of them.

Military spec Night Vision Goggles Please note that this one comes with a feature called autogain. I think ArmA is trying to replicate this. Not sure how autogain computes the illumination level in real life, but it seems logical to me that any bright lightsource would dim the device as it does in ArmA. Meybe there should be an action that says "lock to current level" or something? But only IF that option is available for real. A friend that used this while in the army (I never got to try them), says they are quite awkward to use. First of all, the field of view is narrow (more so than the field of view in Arma, for the type he used). Secondly, while using it in a wooden area for a sneak attack at night, he would be constantly looking straight down in order to avoid stepping on any twigs that would give them away. But then, he also had fun. He snuck up on a guard in complete darkness and sat within a meter from him. He stole his weapon and left Imagine the surprice Anyway, considering the "twig factor", having to look down all the time to avoid being heard, I have no issues with this device having also a negative factor in ArmA. I think it is up to the mission designer to leave some sort of light available so that these aren't needed; dusk/dawn, some moonlight, or flare usage.

I'll have to agree. The ArmA interface is probably the most configurable around for a game, but I kind of fear for this if it has been decided it should be console friendly. How could you possibly do all this with a console? Never had one, never want one, ever, just because of this limitation. And yes, I guess I belong to the group that is afraid the controls will be made stupid in order to be possible to do on a console. Other games have done it, but done it successfully? And I don't think no games have ever even scratched the possibilities that are available in the ArmA engine. As for suggestion - drop the action menu once and for all for all in-game functions such as get in, reload, switch to gunner and all that. It should be available for mission specific options only of the type get documents, surrender and so on, or a sort of back-compatible function -- old systems that use action menu for its options doesn't have to be recoded (although they could be). Instead, bring in the compass menu. I use this in several applications and it's a blessing to use. Hold a key that is mapped to a certain type of functions (i.e. all vehicle related functions) for a certain type of situation (i.e. one menu while outside a vehicle, and one while inside). Now a compass menu shows up in the middle of the screen and all you need to do is move the mouse in the direction containing the item you need (i.e. get in as driver) and release the key. Certain "dangerous" items (i.e. detonate satchel charges) should be highlighted in a danger color and might require holding shift as well in order to be executed when you release the key. Sometimes certain actions might be unavailable (i.e. get in as commander on a truck), in which the item should still be there but in a shaded (unavailable) color. A typical compass menu is supposed to be easy to learn and remember. If done right, it will be extremely intuitive to use within just a few tries, because *the hand learns*. In order for this to work, any given menu must be consise; i.e. a vehicle interaction menu must ALWAYS be arranged in the same matter. Get In as Driver = NE, Get In as Gunner = N, Get In as Commander = NW, Access Inventory (gear) = E, Quick Refill (rearm) = W, and so on, NO MATTER THE VEHICLE, even if this option is not available. Vehicles may have in common that they have special abilities. Make it so that these specialities (Reload HEAT, Switch to KVP) is located in the same place. Easy and logical! Compass should have 8 directions, and could be used with numpad if desired. So, NW = 7 on the numpad. The compass should have a needle, dynamically indicating (resizing depending on distance from center, and obviously rotating) depending on mouse position. In certain cases, an 8-way compass is insufficient. In my application I use (Realsoft3D), bigger menus have an additional ring outside of the inner ring with additional menu items. Now you have 16 items to choose from. On keypad, this would be a double tap on whatever direction (7 7 for the NW item on the outer ring). In other cases (not within my app, but I can see the possibility), it might instead expand to a secondary ring with one or two rings while the key is pressed. Means, the first compass menu is replaced with a new one once an item is selected. The bonus here, is that this might actually work pretty well even on a console. But this was only suggestions on how to improve the current, outdated, horrible-and-dangerous-to-use, action menu. Squad and team (and hopefully even platoon) commanding is also something that needs to be adressed. I like the idea of being able to micromanage if I feel I need to. However, I *need* to do this a lot more than I wish to do while playing a mission as a leader. I.e, if my guys are running out of ammo, I can't use the rearm function most of the time, because units seem to rearm according to class. So I need to select one guy, have him move to the vehicle, and hopefully he will use the vehicle when I hit the gear option. This might be very hard with vehicles not properly configured (ammo truck is loaded as standard with 300000, but have a capacity of only 200 I think). Now, move this guy out of the way and repeat for the remaining 7. IF there is 7 remaining, because in order to check my buddies health, I need to use commands to make them report back. Okay, so this is kind of realistic, but fiddling with the commands takes soooo much more time than simply asking everyone by voice in real life. Same thing for ammunition, I really don't know until I ask. This is to me too much micromanagement involved for even the simplest tasks. What I would like to see instead, is indicators for many things: * Current stance. * Assigned role should be MUCH clearer. * Ammo below half (of default or if changed during weapons selection). * Lightly injured, typically bleeding (can fix self if has a medikit). * Severely injured (need a medic). * Incapacitated (need a medic, and cannot move, maybe extraction needed with replacement available from vehicle). * Deceased (yes, do NOT remove him, more in this later). * Team color (if assigned to a team). These should be shown for all units in squad level (if leader). If NOT a leader, I'd still like myself to be highlighted at my position in the squad, and show status of team mates. This is because finding out this info is usually shared within the squad. If someone is hurt in real life, you will know about it from others. Furthermore, it will ease team switching since you can hold a key and simply click on the unit in the unitbar you want to become, for easy switching within that squad (or whatever level is chosen). What I ment with leave the dead one there, is that when I get reinforcements, I can pick from the available dead guys spots for him to replace. That way, I maintain my squad in the setup I like without any fuzz. The new team leader I can exchange my #2 team leader. And the marksman I can exchange my dead #9 marksman. So, yes, I would like a squad commanding key, similar to commander mode today. However, I'd like it seriously improved. While holding the key, it should be possible to i.e. rightclick on a unit for a menu. OR, and here is the clue, left click and drag a line to any position on the map. When you release the button, a context sensitive menu (compass again?) should show up giving you the options available depending on what the mouse was over when you release it. Get it? Here are some examples: Drag a line from the unit to an empty position will get you options to i.e. Move To in different types, defend area, look at, find cover, scan, search&destroy and so on. Drag a line from the unit to a car, a vehicle specific menu should pop up with all its menu items; get in as driver, rearm self, rearm vehicle, repair, use radio, defend, take cover behind, attack, sneak towards, target and so on. Drag a line from one unit to another, a unit specific menu shows up with menu items; exchange items, change formation position, cover this unit, aid this unit (if specialist), recieve aid from this unit, and so on. Also, shift right clicking should open menu that are specific to this type of unit. I.e. if the unit is an AT soldier, a menu should appear that are specific to AT soldiders. If this AT soldier happens to be team leader because team leader is dead, this menu should also have a "command menu" item. If this is a compass menu, this item should always be in the North position, and here is when "expandable menus" comes into play. When you move the mouse to north, it instantly replaces with a new compass menu with a commanding specific menu. Furthermore, while in "command mode" (via the spacebar), you should be able to drag directly from your units on the battlefield to anywhere else or other units with this same menu system. But only in command mode, since it would otherwise hinder friendly fire by you. Or, again, maybe a modifyer key (holding space). It could also work well on the map. Drag a line from a unit on the map to a vehicle, and the vehicle interaction menu pops up. Another great feature that would help the scanning part of using a compass menu system, would be to have it color coded backgrounds into sectors. That is i.e., N NW NE is colorcoded red because they might be offencive in nature. E & W is colorcoded yellow because they are dealing with vehicles. SW & SE colorcoded Green because they are squad based in nature. And S is colorcoded White because this direction always opens up a new menu. But naturally it should depend on what compass was being used. And finally, in opposite of today, fully compatible with AI (AI should actually use this system automatically), and scripting; //unit select compass.Select [unit1, unit2] compass.Select [unit1, "markerName"] compass.Select [unit1, groupname] compass.Select [unit1, location] You get the idea; compass.Select is the input paramters, the line you drag from one unit to another, the first one being the one you command. //compass execution compass.Execute ["N"] compass.Execute ["N2", "NE2", "SW"] The first one being a simple compass selecting the north cardinal direction as you would with the mouse or numkeys The second one is an excessively complex menu system, where you first select the north direction on the outer ring, then the north east direction on the outer ring of the first menu expansion, then the south west direction on the inner ring of the second expansion. Or as a mixed array: unit1 || group compass [[target unit || target group || "marker" or location], ["N2","NE2","SW"]]; I wouldn't reccommend having to perform the last menu execution though, because having such a complex menu surely defies it's purpose of making things more simpler. It does mean however, that the system knows what would be the appropriate menu automatically based on what the compass.Select gave as input. Some other tips: 1. The engine today should be easily enough upgraded so that it would be possible to set a hud background color and hud background opacity level. 2. Organizing the squad should be done in a graphical interface. Assign teams and leaders, positions in squad. Also a level based formation type should be available, such as platoon moving in a staggered column, squads in a line formation, and teams in echelon. That way, an attached armored squad told to operate with an infantry squad, can move in formation properly without the higher ranked tank platoon officer going first just because of rank. 3. Squad strip on the bottom of the screen should be level based. Arrange a squad in the editor (or while in game) into chain of command. Double clicking on a team leader brings you further down in the command and allows you to command that team. Hitting the backspace instead, bring you UP in the chain of command, listing each platoons leader pluss any attachments leaders. Double clicking on one of these again, lets you see (but maybe not command without teamswitch) their units. This gives you the possibility for a highly increased situational awareness that modern soldiers take for granted. Communications within a Stryker team and the rest of the force is EXTREME compared to the cold war. 4. Btw, regarding point 3, I'd also like to see the possibility of automatic info sharing among different forces, AS AN OPTION (don't force it). 5. Also regarding point 3, I'd like to see A LOT of more ranks available. I've noticed that Arma2 campaign is set to be a USMC unit, does this mean that other branches are gone? I suggest having any type of unit belonging to any kind of branch, but that ALL ranks within a branch is included to select from, at least up to general ranks. Punchline: See the link toward todays system, with an expandeable menu? Sure, you do loose one option to choose from in an 8-way compass. But the pros: 1. Much easier to navigate, as you select with a mouse movement. 2. OR select with numpad, BUT now number corresponds to a direction. 3. Easier to search and look in if properly grouped, as you only have to search in a certain part of the compass, because you know instictively that the south directions may deal with defencive orders, i.e. 4. Expandeable, as today. 5. Propely linked to scripting functions, which is not the case today. 6. Possibility to become context sensitive. Have unit(s) selected, aim at a vehicle, and the default compass becomes that of vehicle interaction for the selected unit(s). 7. In a double ring compass, you can see two sets of options withint the same compass, instead of having to enter two different menus as you would today. Conclusion: I'm confident that BIS is fully capable of programming and do the necessary brainstorming required for such a system. But is this something the general gamer, mission designer, or addon maker would like to see? I don't see it realistic for Arma2 though, but maybe Arma3? Or are you all happy with the way things work? I REALLY think many engine systems -- especially the interface -- are extremely out of date, painful to use, and simply feels and looks bad.

disableAI "MOVE" i.e. is still broken in that it cease to work after saving a game. I had some kind of strange control over my BMP2 or M113 as a driver after it was flipped on is back in an, ehh, "accident" I couldn't drive it around (good), but I was able to turn it around. Forgot to check it I could still move the turret, aim and fire.

I'm not too concerned with volumetric clouds per se, but nicer 3D looking clouds is always welcome. However, the weather system in general is quite a limitation. I know Arma2 now supports ground fog, and it looks extremely cool. To the foot soldier, this might be the one that has greatest impact combat wise. But it would be nice to setup 4 or 5 different "layers" of clouds: Low altitude cumulus (can rain as showers) Low altitude stratus (can rain as steady precipitation) Medium altitude cumulus (no rain usually) Medium altitude stratus (no rain usually) Cirrus of random type, just define coverage Stratus clouds are "sheet clouds", that cover a widespread area, indicating a stable airmass. Rain from these are called rain or precipitation and is considered quite stable. These are relatively easy to create in a game just using a few "layered sheets" of textures (with alpha transparency) Cirrus are the easiest to create for a game; just mix in some textures and paint a sky with it, unreachable for all aircraft. Cumulus are those cauliflower looking clouds, lumps of clearly defined white lumps of cloud appearing to be very local. These clouds will be by far the most challenging to make from a programmers standpoint, I have really no idea how to make these efficient AND good looking. If these rain, it is called showers and can go on and off quite rapidly. Showers are often an indication of unstable air masses, and thunderstorms may be frequent. Only thunderstorm clouds (cumulunimbus) can produce hail, and these are developed cumulus clouds that has gone through the towering cumulus stage. A quick sidenote; flying in cumulus clouds is more bumpy than flying in stratus clounds. Thunderstorms are extremely nasty and usually avoided if possible. Maybe this should be reflected in aircraft handling? For easiness, reduce effect near ground to avoid crashes. That's a little of the background in weather. In ArmA2, I'd like to see seasonal changes. That is, date determines texture mix; snow/dry surface and snow altitude. Collecting snow might be bit too much though Another ArmA2 specific thing I'd like to see is temperature; too high and it affects your endurance/stamina. Too low and it affect your aiming shake. Proper outfitting should reduce these effects. Pretty simple. Now, in the editor, have a timeline where you can set how long the timeline is (in minutes), with a random factor at the end of the scale. Create "weather keyframes" here. Under this there are the following graphs, and a governing random factor for each, on the right: Fog density; 0-1 (how dense the groundfog is) Fog altitude; 0-1 in thousands of feet. Fog halfheight; 0-1 (in thoughsands of feet, how thick it is). Haze density; 0-1 (this is todays style of fog, affects distance only) Haze altitude; 0-1 in thousands of feet. Lower remains same. Haze halfheight; 0-1 (in thoughsands of feet, how thick it is). Low altitude cumulus, 0-1, 0.7-0.8=TCU, and 0.8-1=CB Low altitude stratus, 0-1 Medium altitude cumulus, 0-1 Medium altitude stratus, 0-1 Cirrus of random type; 0,1 Cumulus precipitation amount; 0-1 Cumulus precipitation type; temp based or rain, snow, (hail only if CB) Stratus precipitation amount; 0-1 Stratus precipitation type; temp based or rain, snow, drizzle (nearly fog). Temperature 0 feet MSL: -40°C to +40°C Temperature 1000 feel MSL: -40°C to +40°C Temperature 2000 feel MSL: -40°C to +40°C There might be a temperature inversion going on allowing increasing temperatures with altitude. These are just my ideas about how an extremely good weather system might be in Arma2. Hey, it's my dream, don't ruin it

Sound is to me a live or let die for a game, even more so than bad graphics. OFP and ArmA has a reaaly long way regarding sound modelling before they can even start calling themself proper developers in this respect. Remember OFP aircraft? OMG, what were they thinking? And default ArmA aircraft leaves much to be desired as well. But often it is not only the sounds themselves that is the problem, but the whole engine. I've tried some addons and some makes really natural sound when played at proper pitch, but an ArmA vehicle makes use of a "linear rpm<->single sound" model that simply doesn't work. Guys, this is 2008! Consider Flight Simulator from Microsoft, and how their sound engine works for an airplane. For many rpm and/or power driven sounds, these can be i.e. four different sounds for four different rpms or power settings. The rpm input curve drives a pitch and volume curve for each four sounds. This is the engine rpm sound. Then you have another curvebased system for propeller sound, i.e. how a propellers noise changes with different power settings and propeller angles; a feathered propeller at full speed makes more noise. Then there is engine rumbling sounds. And the list goes on. There are huge amounts of sounds that make an aircraft sound like an aircraft. Not a single sound driven by rpm. Another great example on how a sound system really makes the game work, is Sin. Here, most (if no all) the sounds are stereo sounds, and of extremely good quality and design. It really adds theatmosphere to the game. So, here are my sound advice, so to speak: 1. Use stereo sounds of very good quality. 2. Prevent ALL kinds of clipping. Even if a sound doesn't clip, who knows what ingame reverbiation will do to it. 3. Use multiple soundcurves similar to what I showed for Flight Simulator. It can be simplified a little though. Instead of so many kinds of sound per engine, have 4 sounds that driven by rpm modded by pitch and volum curves. Have one of these for close sounds and one for distant sounds. The actual mix is these two stereo sounds mixed by the distance from the vehicle. This would allow for howling jet engines close by and typical jet sounds far away. This also goes for gunfire and reloads -- record them at different distances. 4. Stereo can be utilized in a cool fashion. OFP/ArmA have a very cool sound feature that not many others take fully advantage of, namely doppler effect and I believe live EQ'ing. But this should be expanded into stereo. First of all, the recorded stereofield is dependant on distance. While near a sound, it has very wide stereo effect which narrows down to nearly mono at maximum distance (or curve based). With live EQ'ing I mean that the "ear" pointing towards the soundsource have no EQ'ing, while the "far ear" has a slight reduction in the higher frequencies. Turning away from the sound would have dampened the frequencies on both ears. Using live EQ'ing, indicating how you are oriented wrt the soundsource. Using doppler, you can also tell how you move wrt the soundsource. Using stereofield, you know how close you are wrt the soundsource. These may be subtle clues in real life, but if you try, you'll find that you can actually tell the difference, even though you may not be able to explain it. Would be soooo cool. Enviromental sounds such as wind, critters, frogs, birds, trees etc should also be stereo and these are very easy to obtain for any soundcrew, or even sound "downloaders". Take any mono sound and just be creative with software. Thunder might have yet another type of stereo setup, maybe dynamic curves that shapes the sound in terms of panoramic placement and EQ'ing, simulating how it appears to travel through the sky. But again, stereo as a basis. Oh, and those bumper sounds? Any car in my country having those ArmA sounds during a "fitness exam" would have had its plates removed by government

And canals and otherwise depressions in the terrain. Would make for great cover (AI should also use it though), and the strykers should be able to traverse some of them. If we needed smaller vehicles to cross, there should be brigde building capabilities from engineers, maybe even a brigde vehicle. If doing walkable ponds, please make suitable sounds for it. If walking in a stealthy manner, I do not want to hear a big massive splash as I swiftly but quietly put my feet in the water. Water missions in the game Vietcong were my favourite, but the huge splash really stole a lot of tension and stealthy feel. The AI couldn't care less, but it actually made ME jump skyhigh in my suspended state

If playing as a squad leader, I would like to have the possibility to control, by clicking on the lower unitlist strip at the bottom (which should popup a menu on him, not fire the weapon): * Each unit individually by clicking on him. * Color selection by clicking on the color. * Team selection by clicking on the team leader. Or better yet, if I double click on i.e. the team leader, the unit list will show me him and his units only, in which I can give specific orders to individuals. This would enable me to operate as a platoon leader as well, giving precice coordination for all teams. A possibility to cancel or activate certain aspects of an AI leaders abilities would also be welcome. Actually, when it comes to ranking system, I tend to fall short while designing missions. I would have hoped the next Arma2 will include basically a shitload of new ranks. Here is my suggested new ranks for Arma2. Note that each rank is associated with a paygrade, and all ranks should have either a tooltip or a desciption somewhere on what their typical duties, leadership capabilities, and responsibilities are within the military organization. Note that this list is for army personell only. If it actually became possible to set what "branch" a unit came from (army, marines, naval, airforce etc), this list would be individual for each branch. A naval captain is a lot higher than an army captain. The army doesn't have a lance corporal and so on. Well, here is my suggested list (based on wiki information): Enlisted           Ab.  Pay   Responsibilities   Recruit         PV1, E-1   Cannon fodder, basically. Does not have ANY insignia.   Private         PV2, E-2   Enlisted. Cannon fodder, basically. Have a single chevron insignia. Auto advancement after 6 months.   Private First Class   PFC, E-3   Possible to start at this rank, depends on education, assigned role, and skills.   Specialist        SPC, E-4   Specialist such as AT, AA, Medic, or Engineer attachment to a squad.   Corporal         CPL, E-4   Can command a team if he has highest rank in squad. CPL rank is often skipped, and few exists. Leaders, NCO's   Sergeant         SGT, E-5   Team leader, can control squad as 2nd in command. A team is typically 2-4 units.   Staff Sergeant      SSG, E-6   Squad leader, can control platoon as 2nd in command. A squad is typically 2 teams, or up to 13 units.   Sergeant 1st class    SFC, E-7   Platoon leader. Platoon consists of 3SQ, 1WS, HQ, and 4 Strykers.   Warrant Officers This rank is a special kind of ranks between NCO's and CO's. Can be called Senior Leaders or Senior Specialists and Advicors.   Warrant Officer 1    WO1, W-1   Technical leader, trainer, operator, manager, maintainer, sustainer, and advisor.   Chief Warrant Officer 2 CW2, W-2   Responsibilities at the detachment through battalion levels.   Chief Warrant Officer 3 CW3, W-3   Advanced-level experts. direction, guidance, resources, assistance, and supervision. Detachment through brigade.   Chief Warrant Officer 4 CW4, W-4   Senior-level experts, supporting battalion, brigade, division, corps. Special mentorship responsibilities for other WOs   Chief Warrant Officer 5 CW5, W-5   Master-level experts, supporting brigade, division, corps, and major command operations. leader development, mentorship, advice, and counsel to Warrant Officers and branch officers. Officers, CO's.   2nd Lieutenant      2LT, O-1   Platoon leader, but officer. 16-44 soldiers.   1st Lieutenant      1LT, O-2   Speciality platoon leader, or XO (Executive Officer) of a company sized unit.   Captain         CPT, O-3   Company commander, combat training centers or staff at battaljon level.   Major          MAJ, O-4   Battaljon XO, or staff officer at brigade or task force level.   Lieutenant Colonel    LTC, O-5   Battaljon commander (300-1000 soldiers), or brigade or task force XO.   Colonel         COL, O-6   Infantry brigade commander (3000-5000 soldiers), Generals   Brigade General     BG,  O-7   Deputy Commander to the Commanding General of a division or division-sized units.   Major General      MG,  O-8   Commanding General of a division or division-sized unit.   Lieutenant General    LTG, O-9   Commands a corps-sized unit (20,000 to 45,000 soldiers). High-level staff officers at command centers.   General         GEN, O-10  Commands i.e. all landbased corps. Also holds certain positions. Currently only 11 of these.

I have to say that I really concur. But I don't think formations (and other behavioural aspects) should be driven by behaviour. I mean, sometimes it is the mission designers wish to have light and engine discipline even though the formation is to drive in a safe and delta formation. I love the sling-back patrols from OFP crossing a great patrol cycle, but I similarly need the combat aware readyness shown in urban areas in ArmA. Let me have my safe mode with lights off, having the possibility to turn off the engine at a waypoint. Currently, the engine makes some of these deciscions waay too automatically for my liking.

I'll have to go quite a bit further than these suggestions. First of all, you shouldn't have to *select* a base unit (soldier, medic, sniper etc), you should instead *build* him. Select camoflage texture, face texture, and glasses. Give him voice and identity. Set "class" which defines limitations and behavioural FSM. A set of "skills and abilities" should be displayed as sliders and colored bars. Sliders set the desired level, while the colored bars show the effect that various equipment has on these "skills and abilities". These include stability, speed, strenght, agility, accuracy, weight, and so on. Attachments may increase weight and decrease stability, while a handgrip adds a little weight but gives far better stability. More on this later. The point is, avoid having to use description.ext, make it editor based. Now start *equipping* this unit with placeholder and equipment. I.e. headware is a placeholder for some types, but for others it is only an equipment, such as this: Nothing is nothing obviously Scarf, berets, and hats are only equipment as they can't be expanded. Helmets are placeholders since they can carry additional equipment, such as "glowing in the dark" backmarkers (to mark friendlies to squadmembers), and a frontal mount where you can equip i.e. night vision goggles. Caps however is a placeholder since it can be further expanded with a lucky card. But this is of course going extreme. As I mentioned, "class" defines a rule on what kind of placeholder that can be used. Today, only the medic has limited carrying capabilities. Expand this so that class makes limits on what kinds of vests can be used. I.e. a medic can only choose between a couple of medic vests. A rifleman can use most except the specialities types, which can give him high carrying amounts. I.e. a riflemans vest might consist of 6 magazine holders and 4 grenade holders. You could also equip the rifleman with the squad leaders vest, with less magazine holders and more for other equipment. A rifleman might be limited by his class unabling him to be equipped with a pistol holster (and ammo). Also a detachable sack could be configured in this way. Now that the basic unit and setup has been done, it's time to place weapons on him. Drag i.e. an M4 into his hands. The M4 is a two handed weapons and should be used dual wield. Dual Mp5's though could be quite fun although the accuracy would be terrible Certain points on this weapon is placeholders, describing logical attachment points compatible with that weapon. A SOPMOD M4 has a hell of a lot more attachment options than an Mp5 i.e. Attach the mounting rails to the placeholders, which themselves are placeholders, by clicking on the mouseover highlighted position on the gun. A descriptive field about the placeholder show update. Hold it an various mounting rails show up to choose from. Attach the full sight rail. Two new attachment positions show up. Now you can attach the red dot sight as well as a magnifyer. Similar to the underbarrel attachment point. Attach either a rail for certain types of equipment, grenade launcher, or a shotgun. Similarly, choose between different types of supressors, flame arrestors, and recoil dampeners appropriate for a given type of weapon. Here you would also choose buttstock type. Configurability gone mad, but I think most will love it. As for weaponry, I suggest two slots on the hands (one twohanded gun or two singlehanded guns, or two mines or grenades), one on the back. However, not limited to tube based weapons. Handguns would require a holster setup, even if placed in hands. Heavy weapons might still be only a one main weapon though, such as an M240/M249 could not carry an additional personal weapon. Maybe sacks shouldn't be able to carry guns, maybe exceptionally handguns? However, as each item is configured madly and things placed into the characters inventory, the weight starts to build. Stability, speed, and endurance is affected negatively by weight encouraging smart use of character setup. You can then add a handgrip to counter the stability, but since it adds weight it still affects speed and endurance. I talked about getting back to skills and abilities, so here goes. Every single item should have all values defined as "in hand", "in inventory", "when used", "when fired". I.e. having a supressor mounted on a gun, should have a small "in inventory" weight penalty which in turn affects other skills that make use of this attributte. It should have a small stability penalty "in hand", and affect the bullets fired with a decrease in muzzle velocity and accuracy "when fired". Similarly, using a ghillie suit should affect the character with a high stealth bonus "when used". There could be motion detectors with added reveal bonus "when used". Suggested "skills", but 1 should always mean a better value. aimingAccuracy - how accurate your aim is aimingShake --> aimingStability (not shake, let 1 be a *good* value) aimingSpeed - how quick you readjust aim endurance - how quickly weight adds penalties spotDistance - how far you can spot enemies and mark them spotTime - how long you must see them to positively identify courage - used mostly by AI, determining fleeing i.e. reloadSpeed - can also be used by players, acting as assistants or loaders. commanding - AI's ability to give useful orders. Or their ability to follow yours based on your value. general - not sure what this is supposed to become. But also, here are some of my own "skills and abilities" strenght - defining the maximum encumbrance values runningspeed - how quick you can run agility - how quick you can change stance, change weapons etc encumbrance - mostly an indicator stealth - how easy you are to see and spot friendlyness/charisma - would be nice against neutrals This stealth factor should be automatically handled ingame though. Using a snow camo while in a tree area at daytime spring would actually give you a penalty in stealth. And finally, ammunition configurability. Select the magazine type, such as 20 or 30 rounds, taped or not. Taped magazines should not be possible with over-under belts, but would help on reload times. Click on a magazine to "open it". You have to unload it from the weapon so that it can be opened. While opened you have access to the excact number of rounds in the magazine and how it is configured if using mixed ammunition types (tracers, armor-piercing, incendiary, multipurpose etc). Ammunition comes in "boxes", not ready to use magazines. While "opened", you can select to reload the magazine into several preset configurations (for ease of use), and it will load the magazine based on how many rounds are available in boxes. That leaves us with two ingame r-key commands: r = reload; does what it does today, and R = refill; brings up the magazine config, where round availability is based on your closeness to nearby ammo crates or vehicle storage. I think 1 meter should suffice. The model of the sack should be dynamic depending on the configuration and fillings. A three room sack with two additional sidepockets should "deflate naturally" while the player is using from the backpack. To summarize. 1. Editor where you create the whole character from scratch. 2. Skills and abilities on parts, weapons, and accessories. 3. Skills and abilities cross-affect one-another. 4. Weight as a very serious consideration. 5. High configurability on loadout, weapon, and even ammunition. 6. Combined use of modifiable size/slots, and weight. Many games have tried and only with limited success handled loadout very good. Stalker was pretty good where it combined slots with weight causing penalties. But it failed in configuring how space was used. Crysis was pretty good as far as weapon attachments is considered, but failed in having weight an issue. But all of this has been issuing the single unit. It MUST also be possible to define proper squads without having to use any initialization lines in the editor. That is, given a pregenerated squad setup, go in and setup the initial waypoint giving it a speed, behaviour, formation type and all that. You should be able to generate your own formation types which you can call and use both via scripts and as a leader (should show up in the formation menu, and ALL menus of this kind should have scripted equivialents). I.e. if it was not already defined, you could define a left and right stack formation to be used later. Each unit in the formation should be able to be given a "default angle" compared to the formation direction, and draw in his scanning sector. I.e. the rifleman in a team sized left stack would look backwards and to his right, while scanning a slightly greater area. In a defensive ring formation (i.e. while exiting from a chopper), scan area per soldier is set to be bigger). If a soldier dies, his neighbouring units adds his scanning sector. It should be possible to set a formation spread, both while setting it up and while ingame. Furthermore it should be possible to set formation on a per team basis (color) or even hierarcically, as you can with the combat mode. I.e. have blue team in a line formation as defence holding position, while red team is split up into a fire and movement team using right and left echelon formation. Having this kind of hierachy flexibility would allow for commanding info-sharing bigger units than a squad. Today, I would say the leading abilities is limited to controlling a team at best. It requires too much scripting to have units perform "tasks" such as going to a position and defending it. It should be possible to describe this behaviour within the waypoints themselves. With a hierarchy system, it could be possible for a leader to control whole platoons or maybe even companies if done right. With a hierachy system, you would as a leader only directly command the commanders directly below you. I.e. as a Sergeant 1st class or 2nd lieutenant, you might control a platoon sized infantry unit, and control where each squad would move to, as well as any attachments on that level. It would then be up to AI how this was performed. Think about the possibilities missions would have if combined with an improved teamswitch feature. A new command would be required here on the battlefield; cancel and resume various AI states for the leaders. And these were only my "place unit" editor and group/formation options, as well as some ingame thoughts about how the system should work in this respect. Hey, one can dream, no?

Bringing back this old topic as I'm getting nowhere with this Javelin stuff As far as I've figured out, AI will only rearm if told to do so, and that happens when they call out "Ammo Low". AI leader will then tell them to rearm at position. Javelin guys carry a single tube, hence there will never be a rearm order, it goes straight to "out of ammo". Actually, it doesn't even do this for these guys. I have tried using reveal to make sure all guys are aware of an ammo crate... No joy. I have tried the action "REARM": unit action ["REARM", crate]... No joy. I have no means of ordering a unit to drop his weapon, as far as I know. Someone know scripting methods to "have him drop it then pick it up again" trick? As leader, you have the option of ordering this unit to rearm, except that he won't. If not leader, there is no way of scripting this order -- I mean the orders is not there as script functions, only when playing leader. How on earth do other mission makers make AT units actually behave like AT units using Javelins? Really detailed help here would be appreciated.

Hi I'm trying to setup a Javelin team. Not sure how they are setup in real life, I'm going for a team leader with M203 for close quarter security, a rifleman as backup and bearer, and two Javelin specialists (AT role, as others won't fire Javelin when ordered). However, when I'm commanding the team, I have to order the guys to the car, hit gear, and manually tell them to reload before they can fire. But the AI will never do this... at all... I've tried an empty vehicle, a loaded vehicle, both with added Javelin ammo. I've tried ammo crates, and even dead guys with ammo... AI just won't issue any reload commands. I even tried regular AT instead of Javelins, but same there. This should be done quite automatically without the need for any scripting, i.e. within the FSM system. Anyone had any luck with getting an AT squad behaving like an AT squad?

The teams and singles will re-join to a complete squad once they spot an enemy. Unfortunately, they <b>need</b> to spot an enemy afaik I've tried various means of cancelling or completing the dismissed waypoint, or switching to another one -- nothing seems to help. Not quite happy with how this one is implemented really. As far as I see it, the only means to cancel it is to create an ememy near their location (and in their field of view). The other real usage I see for this wp is to wait until proper time/events has elapsed before making them go into dismissed mode. I.e. a switch trigger synched to the move wp just prior to the dismissed wp. Not sure, gave up on dismissed long time ago.

Well, if you actually click the link for the array version, this is what it says in the top row: This is a reserved keyword for future implementations. In Armed Assault it is not implemented yet. So... Sorry, couldn't resist

Hi I'm trying to add some music to my mission. As it involves a bit of driving around in the start, I want it to fade to near minimum when I exit the vehicle and back up when I reenter. I've tried event handlers attached to the vehicle: this addEventHandler ["GetIn", {0.1 fadeMusic 0.5}]; this addEventHandler ["GetOut", {0.1 fadeMusic 0.02}]; And I've tried a repeating trigger checking if I enter the vehicle and fadeMusic appropriately. FadeMusic does work, but when I exit the vehicle -- fading music down quickly -- it also restarts the track? Is this a bug, or some "by design" stuff I'm not able to comprehend?

Weapons M4GL and M4A1GL appears to be the same weapon. Not sure if this happened with 1.09 or earlier, I just happened to notice it now. M4A1 version is supposed to support full automatic mode? But now it is semi and burst only, which is the same as the regular M4GL. Visually, they look the same as well. If I were to ask for "new stuff" wrt default weaponry, it would be new and fixed M4 versions. Currently all M4GL versions have ACOGs even if it doesn't say so. M4_ACOG (new, ACOG but no GL) M4_GL (it's there now, but has the ACOG) M4_GL_ACOG (there now, but not under this name) M4_AIM_GL M4_ACOG_SD M4_SPR_SD Similar variations to the AK74 would also be appreciated, but I don't know friendly this weapon is to attachments.

I would say tweak the Stryker, so that transportMaxMagazines is set to 100 (same as M113) and transportMaxWeapons is set to 20. These entries are missing for the Stryker, making it inherit the values from the Car class, which is 50/10 I believe. Currently, you can't carry much in the Stryker, making it quite useless from a mission designers point of view. Replacing inventory fills up the ground instead of the Stryker because of its very low carrying capabilities. I do not know what would be realistic values, but I think a Stryker would be able to carry some Javelin rockets as well as some extra ammunition for the units.

Could of findings. 1. When mounted in a BMP2, lights from other vehicles causes glooming/flaring to the guy inside. 2. Slightly more worrying; in the first campagn mission, you are ordered back into some RACS 113 vehicles. After entering these you are kicked back out. Mission ended fine though. The same thing happened also in a later mission. Some has mentioned a "bug" concerning sounds in vehicles. Without addons this seems to work very well. Except maybe not fully thought through regarding the amount of objects that can obstruct sound -- 5t open truck being an example When I have FDF sounds enabled, it seems to me the effect is additive. I think FDF is the ones who need to patch this in the next version, IF the next official ArmA patch has this effect still in it.