DiscordianKnight

Firstly, before attempting this, I would like to solicit info from any of you out there (Rangers, helo pilots, crew chiefs, etc.) who might have any experience with firing one of these beasts. How difficult was it to control? How many rounds in the hopper? And so forth. Some things just aren't available in the officials specs, after all, and are definitely worth including in a decent mod. Postscript- For me the prospect of building and skinning an entirely new model is more exciting than simply reskinning OFP's mounted M2; but then I am a person longer on 3d modeling experience than on actual OFP editing... Comments, suggestions, complaints and info welcomed.

I for one would just drool over it... I loved Kegety's Kiowa Warrior addon for the (quasi) minigun it carried. If there's one thing that makes a good war movie for me, it's heli gunships with GE miniguns! (Blackhawk Down, and We Were Soldiers come to mind as of late) I might be able to kobble together some VRML or .dxf files- my 3d modeling tools are limited to DogaCGAL-3. Is anyone else interested in putting something together?

I recently undertook the arduous task of wiping my system and reinstalling everything (at least, everything windows-based) from scratch. When I finally got around to OFP, I installed, rebooted, patched, rebooted, patched, rebooted and ran OFP to find that the upper quarter of Malden and a few areas on Everon were wiped clean of ground texture and, for the most part, trees and shrubbery as well. A few patches of ground-texture surround buildings and such, but other than this... nothing. Desert! Eccch! I've already tried reinstalling twice; no luck. My pet theory is that there's some file I'm not trashing after my post-uninstall cleanup and delete. I'm running OFP on an Athlon XP 1.4GHz with 196 megs of PC133, with a 30GB HD and an Inno3D Tornado TI 200 Geforce 3 video card with 64 megs of RAM, running Win98SE. Prior to my reinstall, everything OFP-wise was running smoothly. Halp!

You might be surprised at the armor penetration of the plain ol' M60 and M249. A weapons effects demonstration which I saw a video of shows approximately one round out of seven from an M60 piercing the side armor of a Cadillac Gage Ranger APC (an armored car) and one round in ten from an M249 doing the same. However, accoding to my Jane's  Tanks and Combat Vehicles Recognition Guide (Second Edition), the maximum armor of an M113 is approximately six times that of the Ranger. Draw your own conclusions. (I know *I* for one would prefer a LAW.)

I agree one hundred percent on the M249 and arty issue- the SAW is an awesome weapon according to all I know who have fired it, and what modern air-land battle game can possibly be complete without at least, for Bob's sake, mortars? Would the M1064 120mm mortar carrier be too much to ask, given that the M113 chassis is already available in game? Not to mention *real* tube artillery. Perhaps it would be too much trouble to model and execute, although I must point out that the object files must already be there- let us not forget the two artillerypieces stashed away on Everon. (Coordinates He76 for those of you unawares.) I have noticed, however, the the somewhat-ballistic flight path of the RPG, LAW, etc. rounds leaves some hope for MRLS-type weapons, if and when we get an object editor. Can't you just imagine calling in support from a Stalin's Organ type weapon? Mmmm... [Any former grunts or arty troops are welcome to correct the following, I'm all ears, er, eyes.] "Arc Light, Arc Light, this is Badger, request fire support, over!" "Badger, Arc Light, send your fire mission, over!" "Arc Light, TRP charlie, adjust left ten meters, add seven meters, fire for effect, over..." "Badger, fire request received, on the way, out." [thunder of incoming rounds, etc.; Soviet motor-rifle platoon is reduced to pulp.] Really... the game is just ASKING for it. Not this scripted schtuff either.

Deathbysaw is right- Hummers (at least the hummers at every base I've been to) mounting a gun are either turretless, or have a sort of metal "hopper" to afford the gunner a little protection from small arms and fragments. It looks almost like a wheelbarrow with a slot for the M2 (or M60) to poke out of... In either case, the point is that a turret is not nescessary- just the pintle (or what have you) to mount the '60 or M2. A MK19 would be nice, tho.