Friedchiken

no no. It's a special side like the resistance except it has its own hostility properties. This side is friendly to both sides but when fired upon then the attack. Basically make a side that is neutral but can become hostile in self-defence. This idea doesn't even have to deal with UN units. Hell, this idea would be awsome if it could be applied to POWs. When the enemy decides to ally itself against the POW, the POW may retaliate and try to find a friendly force.

I got an idea! How about the official campaigns and missions have 1 or no saves to communicate the nature of the game as the designers saw it. But when users create missions they should be able to mod in extra saves! Or it could be like it is now and saving would be done through the radio. ^_^;; Well, actually I'm realizing why people dislike savegames so much. The inability to save "just in case" does change your play style and increases your involvement. Sadly, OFP is a niche game as realistic war isn't terribly fun-friendly. How about we keep no saves but leave a savegame style cheat for those who want it. But to leave a bite, there should be annoying penalties for using the savegame, though they would not change gameplay. Rather, using the cheat would wipe out the mission score, leave a conspicious red mark on the score screen. All score numbers would be replaced by *cheat* unless they were replaced by a hi-score that didn't utilize cheats. Basically this wouldn't chop off the hands of people would want more save games but would make a psychological impact on those people who want to get rankings, ect. Or make someone's campaign selection screen look embarassingly red. Not too harsh though or trainers will start popping all over the place. Maybe

somehow I feel that this discussion has too many sides to discuss. whatever you guys want devs...

maybe its an addon problem. I have it too.

ok ok, I'm playing King 6's Swordfish missions and am playing without savegames or check points. Â For me it's starting to be really fun to rely on retry checkpoints and having the games autmatically reserve my progress when I exit. However, some mission makers like TJ and Asmodeus have put extra saves using the radio menu. Â To me that kinda funky. Â Maybe in the official missions only 1 save will be forced and 2 if the mission is really long and has no checkpoints. Â However, in missions like After Montigniac or TJ's compromised, check points should be replaced by extra saves since its hard to determine where checkpoints should be. As for real soldiering, remember that some of us like me are "arm-chair warriors" and want to experience the world of tactics and "adventure" of warfare. Â Real war is hardly convenient and being a soldier is a huge sacrifice. Â Real soldiers probably don't check out books on elite squads at the library (me) and collect warrior memorabilia (a bit too expensive). Let's just say that people like me are huge fans. But if BIS limits the number savegames to 1 in the campaign, I hope there will be a little option in the mission editor for people like to make really long missions with no way to determine the most appropiate point to do a checkpoint.

While timed grenades are already simulated in the ECP mod, I'd like some effort in making realistic grenades that can be bounced off corners as well as different types of nades.

ohhh... confused. oh well, back on topic. I officially shut up.

Normally guns are pretty accurate and soldiers are pretty good shots.  I'm actually not in favor of "gimping" the ai's shooting ability but I think the current ai is too aware of where it's bullets will land.  I think we should examine why  skilled humans in real life miss as opposed to ai bots. 1. Ironsites - while in rl they are pretty accurate esp at 400m, people don't know the pinpoint point the bullet will hit.  This is esp true at varying distances and constant adjustments to the angle you look in sights may be necessary.  Personally I only have shot through 3 (|i|) line sight but I think that this anomaly also applies to the "ghost ring."  I have the suspicion that all the ai know where the pinpoint spot to aim is and do not "estimate" the aim like humans do. To fix this I think the ai should just fire away when their aim goes near a certain point on target like couple of milli-meters.  A tiny cone of aim triggering when the ai shoots may be a way of putting it.  You don't even have to make the weapons inaccurate.  This way they can hit close targets easier than farther targets but not be retarded (think HD weapons now). 2. unsteady arms - kinda like armchair warriors, the computer isn't aware that his avatar's arms should be shaking (a little) and it just lines up the shot and fires away.  Maybe when the ai is shooting, it's aim should move unsteadily, in a ramdom motion.  Then it's misses would be more realistic rather than always shooting bad (HD) and depending on its skill can have some pretty accurate shots in certain situations.  When I shoot a Daisy pellet gun (dinky, i know) it's pretty heavy and my aim moves around a bit. 3. non-omnicient covering fire - this has already been suggested alot in the ai threads. To facilitate different shooting abilities, I think soldier skills should be stat based rather than skill-level based so we can have a variaty of ai skill types, like movement logic, weapons use, and bravery.

Freaking awsome campaign!!!! I only just beat Night Flyer but the missions are so great. Some things that make your campaign better than the rest: - Don't worry about making the storyline accurate to the original campaign. Â This has much better character development and now it would make sense why Gubin would NOT be insane. Â Plus from what I read in history books, we Americans were freaking asses and supplied many terrorists to fight the commies and look at what happened!!! (Afganistan, South america, turkey) Well, maybe my family experience isn't so great, my parents immigrated from Taiwan a few years before the Berlin wall collapsed. - Awsome use of music, though that scary theme when it does the sudden string note frightens me. Â It actually improved gameplay as it was well triggered to reflect the character's instincts. - The missions seem to have insane focus on gameplay. Â There are missions that qualify for the best. Â Night Flyer was the best heli mission. Â The one where you have to close off the enemy before the bmp blow the crap out of everything was the best attack the town mission. Okay, better get back to playing the campaign.

I would like ofp's system to be like VC's. It's basically the same system except the number of saves is determined by the map maker and the difficulty level. Though I would like a much less number of saves. But still, if mission makers want to make their missions hard, they can maqke them hard by allowing little or no saves. I support having the save system to be customizable to the mission maker's intent. Hell, with that, BIS can make a no save "After Montigniac" style mission for the hell of it. I just want mission editor options to determine the number of saves available!

Oh, I know what would involve the UN! Get this: Japanese "ninjas/ashiragu" from a yakuza organization (m-hm) Who attack the Vatican's switzers (swedish mercenary bodyguards) and cause a war on organized crime and private armies!!! (yahoo!!!!) Yeah! I got the idea from reading Hamlet a few hours ago. I'm half kidding about the switzers, but technically I read in PCGamer that the UN has recorded billions of dollars going into private armies (lots of weak ones of course). Â Though maybe the story should not involve the Catholic church... Hm, back to the drawing board. (rant on: and the ninja dudes could have cool toys like customized blackhawks and mp5's and high-tech gadgets and hover tanks lol and new body armor and stolen weapons and salvaged jetfighters and private helicopters with guys shooting out of the doors...) (And they could take over the world because they are some secret cult with technology developed ahead billions of years into the future!!!! MECHA! NINJA MAGIC!! Hooya!!!) Oh, but the United Nations would kick their asses because the ninja leader dude is an impotent old geezer who can't think straight and goes senile. Basically an excuse to shoot 8ft mecha with an heavy finnish rocket launcher.

umm... no. I respect your opinion and it's a great idea but iraq's army sucks. Most of those guys surrendered within 2-3 minutes of fighting. But as for playing as a fictional opfor force, (most enemy forces I heard of in the news really suck at fighting conventionally and terrorism bombings aren't exactly ideal for challenging gameplay. Unless you count the pressure of blowing yourself up or waiting all day and night to blow the i.e.d.) that has a decent chance of fighting conventional wars may be interesting. As for iraq, the first few battles were exciting for marines but the bulk of the actual conflict is just a PR nightmare for the US. Just playing as patrolling guards might be like what you are imagining with the iraqi army.

Well Void, in your standards I really do suck at the game, and I respect your opinion but realize that people want less frustration, ect. I do think that your comment is a little exaggerated. Â It's not like I restart 50 times because I do the same stupid action. Â I like to save whenever there was a long wait or I accomplished something very hard that was very time consuming. Â I'm the type of guy who wasn't too thrilled with After Montigniac and the savegame thing was pretty effective at saving time. Â And there are many times I would savegame a couple of times and not even restart the level once. (even when mortally injured or team being wiped out) I use savegame as an assurance, not an exploit (well, I guess it depends on a player's point of view but that's the point of playing games by yourself). It's just a game. Â Ruining the game for other in MP may reflect some loserness in real life but there are some points in sp missions where the mission design wasn't fair and repetitive. (ie, cqb with flashpoint's weird ai, or crawling for a mile) on the other hand, maybe it was a nice idea the savegame is a cheat because some people pull some extreme stunts to survive (see the best gaming moments thread) on the account that they would have needed to restart a long way back. Anyways, don't be an ass. Â An option for mission makers to define how many saves you can use would give flexibility in mission types, as certain conditions are hard to define for save checkpoints

Excellent! This would be great for those mission makers who like to make machinima and play Flashpoint at the same time. But somehow I think that would be hard to implement with effective camera scripts and such but what do I know.

well, I would definitely want a savegame option for mission makers that allows the grognard making the mission to define how many savegames should be usable on that level. Many custom missions have multiple saves via the radio menu but that's kinda hokey and it wastes valuable room for your megadeath artillery options (boom boom). So I would really like devs to give the option to mission makers on how many saves are acceptable. But as for right now, use the (shift-minus) savegame cheat. It's easy (2 seconds for me) to type and you can just pause the game and type it there. Play like how you want to. It doesn't hurt your SP score and it's really flexible when used with the retry button. Plus when you play some of the user made missions, you (and I) will get your ass handed to you so bad that you will think CWC is easy with Veteran mode and no savegames. (Honestly, you know the default SP missions? I can manage decently (read: die 4-5 times a mission) through all (including Res) of them except for Convoy, which I attribute to slow ai teammies).

well, if the devs can't make the ai perform really advanced cqb tactics, then I'd like a toggle to determine whether the ai should scatter on contact or stay in formation perfectly while moving. Formations may be more effective in real life than in game probably because teamates and keep up with each other even in close places like forest (well, maybe not so much). Having the ai keep up with the player even by sprinting alot would fix alot of problems with formations in OFP

I would really be in favor of a wieght based system that is already being suggested.  While stuff like rocket launchers and machine guns are powerful, there should be incentives not to give them to every man alive. As for holding the big guns, maybe the aim should be more unsteady unless you are supporting your arms on the ground. And machine guns are definitely not the choice for moving quickly in CQB situations as stated in some Army manual I read on militarysim.com  The heaviness and bulk of these weapons should really be considered. For example, playing the Hidden and Dangerous 2 demos, I was actually hesitant with stocking up fully with ammo or massive guns. I think such psychology in a game would really help the tactics if a wieght based system was used in OFP2. Seal Team (1993) used one too, and it's one of the greatest and most realistic tactical retro games.

You could have a multi-tiered command system using the F keys so that you could manage even more guys. On a higher level, you can only order fire teams that you assign in a separate menu. But on lower levels you control the actual guys and can give them more precise orders. Then the bigger the fireteams the less precise the orders are but you can change fireteam makeup on the fly as the top guy or even order individual units though the same assignment menu even though it would be harder as a commander due to the general chain of command. This could even go more than 2 levels of command, so you could control something like a hundred guys whom are assigned to multiple sub-groups and chain of commands. Then you won't be limited by the F keys and have as many guys as you want, if you are willing to wade through the disorganized mess that is.

a tracker unit would be great for those times where you know you didn't clear the entire villiage but you don't want the ai to keep its ass down 90% of the time. They should carefully follow to tracker and duck for cover the second contact is made.

While OFP2 should focus on wide open spaces, maybe future map editors could support the creation of smaller "closed off map" styles that are similar to games like Ghost Recon or SOCOM2. Â This way, map makers to choose to sacrifice huge areas for extremely detailed and varied spaces. Â This could be useful for making detailed MP levels that take places like forests where most real-life missions are restricted to that particular area so making little landmarks and areas in the area would make the scenery more interesting. Don't get me wrong, I don't feel that the devs should at any time work on this type of level due to that wide open nature of their design. Â Do we want helicopters to smash into the skybox? Whoa . But I think this would be a great idea to implement in the map making software after the game is finished, so map makers can make some soldiering focused type of missions where they can go crazy with level design, without having the non-used areas of the map being rendered and tracked. remember how some people complained of lag-gova in multiplayer? Â And how about some guerrilla warfare missions in forests as big as 1/4 of malden. Â We know the map sizes were scaled down in respect to the real life islands. Â How about a "map" simulating a full scale forest like in yellowstone park? Â

I'm sure I'll get wierd looks because of this but it it possible for the ai in "woods exercises" move through the forest kinda like what is shown in Metal Gear Solid 3? (Whoa, that just sounded wrong in an instant!) GameTrailers.com - M-list Scroll down this list an find the E3 MGS3 trailer. Â In the middle, the video shows some guys moving along in the forest, covering all angles. Maybe ai movement should have an ai mode where it follows in formation precisely and quickly so they can keep up with you when you pass through "high density areas." like the forest or urban areas The ai doesnt have to be exactly like the video (plus it's too late and too cosmetic to implement by now, im sure) but I want the ai to keep up in formation. Â The player speed is faster than the ai's for playability right now i guess but I want the ai to keep up in formation even if they have to run faster. Maybe figuring out a way for the ai to move quickly around objects would be enough

yeah, but an extra climb feature (not jumping) does wonders and maybe the action "menu" interface should be streamlined. And maybe an option for mod-makers to create new key-bindings for new features.

oh ok, I wasn't sure if recoil had anything to do with missing the first shot. Again, my dad's small Daisy doesn't have recoil. But I totally agree that the first shot should be pretty inaccurate unless the ai was using a sniper strategy (maybe defined in its ai type?) and took its time to hit a slow person. What I'd like this thread to focus on is what makes a skilled human miss his first shot that hasn't been simulated by the ai? Playing games like vietcong or call of duty it starts to get tricky when I try to hit targets longer 100m. I wonder if this is more realistic or maybe the FDF mod made aiming more realistic.

Maybe the ai style should be more "cowardly" - the first thought that goes into their heads is dart in any direction for anything: the ground, a bush, whatever. a couple of ai's would shoot first but maybe some sort of chaos should break out and even under human command the ai hits the dirt in a second. Much quicker animation (movement) reactions for all avatars should facilitate this. The ai mode would determine whether ai act like this like if they are in "swat" mode, they would shoot first and take cover in a different way.

Thank you Suma for your reply. Â Actually there were times in ofp1 where if I was at a reasonable distance (long) and running like a complete maniac (even more nuts than zig zag) the enemy would miss like 70 rounds. btw, are you talking about ofp1? (no need to answer, I think its yes) I don't want the ai to be inaccurate but I think they need more chances for error, taking time to figure out what is the best way to hit you. Â Like the bracketing idea. For long range combat though, I'd like the rifles and sniper AI to engage at longer distances. Â And the machine guns to be accurate but have freaking recoil that blows off the first shot (and inaccurate ironsites). Â Of course my opinion isn't the most qualified. Â I have trouble hitting a soda can 15m with a dinky pellet gun with a 1.5X scope... ^.^;;