Gimpster

Is anyone else alittle let down by the fact that few of the buildings in ArmA can be entered? I know I am. I was hoping that the New Island and Modern Sharani would feature less of the block like buildings we have now and more that can be entered. The Pics I have seen lead me to believe that this is not when we will be getting. Instead it looks like its more of the same old blocks that are dressed to look like a building but lack any form of tactical significants. Very sad in dead for an Infantry Combat Simulator.

The other day I started thinkin and the thought crossed my mind as to whether scripting a realistic Armor/Material Penetration system would be possible within the current confines of the existing engine and scripting suite? Â So I am going to pose the question and challenge. The first question that need to be asked is; Can it be done? (What needed data is already in the engine and what is missing?) If so how can it be implimented? (Scripted only or Requiring new Models and Scripts) How might such a project be structured from a logical point of view? I imagine to do it right we would need the following data types: Definable Armor/Material Density Values Definable Material Thickness Values Definable Material Durability Values Projectile Impact and HE Blast Energy Values I do not think the current models allow for many custom defignable damage locations so we would be limited to the damage locations hard coded in the engine. Does anyone think that the other bits coudl be added as a scripted system to units/models and be allowed to overide the existing damage system? Â Does anyone want to explore the posibility? Â I know that I lack the knowlage to script somthing like this or anything but I can picture in my head how the calculations and information might flow from a logical point of view.

My experance from flying learning to fly RC heli's was that its accaualy not that diffacult of a skill to learn but the learning curve is very steep. I do find it more diffacult now to fly a sim with a poor flight model then I do one with a more realistic model. Just like I find it more diffacult to drive a racing game then I do a hard core racing sim. I am one of the people that accualy think a more complete and accurate vehicle physics model and control setup will make it easier to to use them, increase their useability and performance envelopes and add to the experance much more then it may take away if it takes away anything.

You know some form bullet penetration is already modeled in ArmA. It was one of the new improvments to the core engine and a selling point in their adds. I was just in the editor and an m16 will not shoot through a stone or cement wall but will shoot through wood walls. Maybe what is already there can be expanded on? I did notice that the effectiveness of my bullets was reduces when passing through the wood wall as well. So the wall was asorbing some of the bullets energy (Perhaps speed). Maybe just like the issues with the balistics having incorrest figures this is also a feature that is there but not currently implimented to its full potential? Its at least somthing to look at.

SUBS17 brings up a good point that I ahe been wondering about for a long time. The technology has existed for a long time not to use a gyro to sense movment and then use that data to calculate the correct inputs to arrest unwanted movemnt. Why is that still not a mainstream feature of heli's with reguard to main rotor torque compensasion via the tail rotor?

After some more testing the collective in ArmA does appear to be perspotional when assigned to an axis, though it still feels nothing like my RC heli or my simulator. The way you describe the throttle/collective mixing sounds exactly like what my computerised radio does for my RC heli. I can setup the mixing curves and then use a single input to control both functions. I am still suprised that the technology avalable for my RC heli is more advanced that what seems to be deployed in a real heli. They still lack gyro stabalization for rudder and cylic control.

If you were not refering to me then I am sorry I took it that way Hunin. So what you are saying about heli throttle/collective input is that in a modern heli once the pilot spools up the engine and the rotor assemply reatches its correct effective that heli's avonics take over throttle control and adjust the engine's power to maintain rotor head RPM and overcome the drag from changing blade pitch? If that is the case then I was not aware they had become that complex yet, interesting. I have simulation software on my PC right now that does accuractly simulate heli physics. Realflight 2 & 3.5 as well as FS1, Pheonix and several others simulation packages offer very complex simulation of flight physics. They are RC Flight simulation software and designed to be a training tool for RC pilots. Engine RPM and blade pitch is modeled just fine in Realflight. So is variable wind, turbalance, gound effect, thermals and just about any other thing that can effect flight, so it is very possible for accurate simulation of heli physics to work on a modern PC. I have flown the planes & heli's in ArmA using the keyboard/mouse, my realflight controler and my Saitek X45 Hotas. The throttle on the the heli's is the same as on any other vehicle, by which I mean additive and subtractive. On ground vehicles it may be perportional but I have not checked. On my two controlers that aircraft throttle seem to work the same on Heli and Plane. One button for increaseing thrust and one for decreasing, when assigned to an axis it acts the same as when assigned to a button, not as a direct perportional input like the cylic and rudder. -100% to -10% is decrease, -10% to +10% is no change and +10 to +100% is increase. This is exactly how it works when assigned to a button. It should be a perportional control like the cylic and rudder. Where input axis position directly corasponds to a % of output. In the case of a heli the curve should look like thisbased on how my RC heli works when in a normal (Non-3D Flight Configuration): Control Input ---------- Responce Output -100% Stick ---------- -3 Pitch or -30% Thrust 0% Stick (Centered) ---- 0 Pitch or 0% Thrust +100% Stick ---------- +10 Pitch or +100% Thrust The negitive pitch is needed to allow for autorotation in the case of an engine failure in addition to a one way bearing in the transmission assembly to allow the head assembly to freely rotate if the engine RPM drops. Moving the blade pitch in to the negitive allows it to maintain head speed as it falls through the air. When you approach the ground the pitch is moved back positive and you trade head assembly RPM for lift to make a safe landing but without the engine driving the blades the drag from increased pitch rappidly slows the blades and your avalable lift.

I never claimed to be a "real Heli pilot", I am how ever a novice RC heli pilot and have a fair understanding of the mechanics and how they opperate. Â I would also argue that while the heli flight model in all of the BF series games was more diffacult it was at least as far from realistic as the one employed in ArmA. And you are wrong about throttle/collective bit. They are very much seperate inputs on the same flight control stick. On a full scale heli just like on my RC one the throttle controls the head speed and the collective control blade pitch. While both play a part and throttle is by no means static at all times it is not directly connected to pitch control. In an RC those inputs are mixed by the computer as I only have a single axis to use for both controls. If anyone cares to know, modern heli's have 3 basic flight controls opperating 5 functions: Throttle/Collective Stick Cyclic Stick Rudder Peddles The Trottle/Collective stick has two axis's of motion, the throttle (Engine Speed) is a twist grip on the stick and AFAIK most heli's are designed to opperate as a fixed throttle setting during normal opperation situations. Â This setting is some times refered to as Military Power in or the save imposed limit on engine outbut. Â Above that is what refered to as Emergency power for when you need a little more out of the aircraft just as high altitude and high stress manuvering. Â The second control on this stick is a verticle motion, much like the parking brake in the center console on some cars. Â Pulling this up increases the overall blade pitch of the rotor head and thus affecting the general lift produced by the rotor blades. Â This allows control of verticle climb and fall along the axis of the main shaft. Â This stick is generaly mounted to the left of the pilot. The Cylic stick controls both Pitch (Forward and Back Movement) and Roll (Left and Right Movement) input. Â Moving the cylic stick induces a pitch varience in the rotor head which alters the lift the rotor blades produce. Â Pushing the stick forward causes the rotors to decrease in pitch at the front of their arc and increase in pitch as the back which causes the heli to rotate forward thus inducing forward movement of the heli. Â Moving the cylic in the other directions has a similar effect. The rudder peddles affect the blade pitch of the tail rotor in helis that have a tail rotor or in the case of coaxial heli's like the KA-50 induce a speed varience between the rotor heads to induce rotation about the main shaft axis. Â In a tail rotor heli the tail rotor is used to both facilitate pilot induced yaw and allow for the equalization of the rotational torque produced by the main rotor assembly. Â The Chinook is a special case as the rotors are offset. Â I am not positive but I believe in it's case the rudder peddles induce opposing pitch variances in the fore and aft rotor assemblies casuing them to slip in opposite directions which facilitates yaw control. Lift is generated by the rotor blades spinning through the air much the same way an airplane wing generates lift moving through the air. Â As such during directional flight helis will fly somewhat like an airplane, the Blackhawk even enploye's large tail stabilizers with functioning rudder and elevator surfaces to maximize this effect. Â The reason the rudder function looses its ability to effect yaw control as speeds climb is based on their design. Â They have a tail often with vertical and horizontal stabilizers which cause the heli to act like a weather vein. Â This forces the heli to point in to the wind which in directional flight is the direction of motion. Â The higher the speed of the wind is (vehicle speed) the greater the lift generated by the tail rotor needs to be to overcome the weather vein effect. Â Â Coaxial heli's like the KA-50 suffer less in this reguard as their tail surfaces are generaly smaller and the speed diferential of the rotor assemblies is more capable of countering this then a tail rotor setup. The lift generation of a rotor assembly is a factor of head speed, pitch range, rotor disc size and number of blades. Â Higher head speed, dics size, pitch range and number of blades results in the ability to generate more lift. Â Reduce any of these and the lift generation drops perportionaly. Â There is a point though which additional pitch range becomes ineffective and the added drag reduces the head speed thus offsetting the gained lift from increased pitch. Lift is also generated by the rotor assembly moving through the air in directional flight or in wind. Â Entering direction flight will induce translational lift as will hovering in wind. Â The net effect is that less pitch is needed to maintail lift. Â So pushing forward on the cylic to pitch the heli forward will cause the heli to slip forward and loose altitude but when you pull the cylic back and bring the heli back level you will start gaining altitude without ever having to alter the collective. Hovering near the ground also has the benifit of allowing the downwash of the heli act as a cushion of air in addition to the lift from the rotor head which is known as being in ground effect. Â The one disadventage to this is the air is more unstable when hovering in ground effect and the heli will want to squirm more. There are two deadly side effects of the physics heli's use to fly which I do not think are modeled in ArmA. Â Blade stall and decending through your own downwash. If you increase your speed in directional flight there can come a time when it is possable to stall the retreating blade and cause it to lose lift on one side of the heli. Â When this happens the heli will roll in the direction of the stalled blade. Â This is a bad thing, imagine loosing one of your wings on an airplane for just long enough to lose control and start to tumble towards the ground. If you decend too quickly you may find yourself moving downword faster then the downwash of air. Â You are still producing lift but in falling air so you fall with it, so in essence you loose lift perportionate to the speed at which the air is falling. Â Its like stalling an aircraft. Does any of this really matter though? Â Well some does as parts of this are modeled. Â In ArmA the Cylic input has a similar effect as in a real heli by causing pitch and roll change. Â Translational lift is modeled as well but I do not know how accurately. Â The collective control is modeled like a generic gain/lose lift control and always returns to netural unlike the cylic on a real heli. Â Weather veining is modeled but it feels like it only works at high speeds. Â The rudder control which was the reason for this thread in the first place is not modeled as a perportional thrust control as it is in reality but the effectiveness is based on a max effect speed identicle for each heli and not unique by model as it should be. Now if there are any further questions I will be happy to answer them or if I do not know will look up the answer for you if I can find it. Sorry for the long post.

Another common misconception is that a more complex flight model would be more diffacult to fly. The reality is that it might take a little longer to get the hang of but in the end its just like every other thing you learn to do in your life and once you grasp the concepts it becomes just as natural as anything else you do. I once thought that heli's were harder to fly then planes. While its true that they are more complex haveing spent much of my sim time on heli's rather then planes I now find heli's much more natural to fly then I do planes. Now I really need to dive in to ArmA and try and understand how the flight physics opperate and see if or how they can be altered to bring us closer to how they really opperate, but I am a programing inept no dought and will likely not discover much if anything.

Gisen, sure they could and then you could use a simple curve to model their thrust % vs input as its not a flat curve. Just like much of the other bits of the current physics engine where static values are used in place of dynamicly generated ones and you can still get a passable end result. The only draw back is that it becomes more predictable then it is in reality where there are many things in play that affect the final numbers. Balistics is another hood example of this, where the flight path of a bullet is determined via, gravity, air dencity, humidity, wind, drag and muzzle velocity. If static values are used for everything then the bullets flight path is very predictable and long range shots become very easy. If some of the values are dynamic and changing from moment to moment that the long range shots become more and more diffacult and it takes more skill and practice to learn how the different dynamic elements affect the ballistic path. I would hate to see heli's become so diffacult that only the most practiced and dedicated players are able to fly them, but on the other hand I would like to see them opperate in a more realistic way.

I must admit that this is one of the things I dislike about ArmA. Its a Combined Armed Battle Simulation, yet most of the core functionaly is focused on the infantry level. My question is this. If ArmA is at its core a very modifiable engine whould it not then be possible for a smart coder to extend the core functionality of the engine to allow for the added bits needed to bring vehicle physics up to a point where they are closer to a simulation then the arcadish physics that aew what we have now? Even if it has to be done with custom scripting I think it is possible to build a heli that conforms closer to reality. Personaly I would love the ability to have a realistic collective/throttle axis function instead of the increase/decrease button functionality we have now,(Yes I know it can be assigned to an axis but even then it is still -5% to -100% = Decrease +5% to +100% = Increase and -5% to +5% = No Change). As far as tail authority goes as other have said its a complex thing which involves tail length, tail rotor size/pitch range, heli profie area and main rotor/tail rotor RPM ratios. Basicly the longer the tail lever length is the less power is needed to turn the heli about its axis, but a longer tail also has farther to move and will have a larger profile both of which reduce its effectiness. The higher the RPM and larger the pitch range are the more thrust the tail can generate. As such a heli like the Blackhawk which has a long tail with a large vertival and horizontal stabilizer will have very little tail authority once in forward flight or in high winds. It will want to weather vain and will fly more like an airplane once moving. On the other hand the MH-6 Littlebird with is not so long tail but very small profile will have much less tendancy to weather vain and will have a much more authoritive tail. The higher head speed of both its main rotor and tail rotor also allow it to generare a greater force then the Blackhawk's rotors. At this point I do not think the physics engine has all the componants needed to model this correctly, but I think it could be modeled in more detail then it is now though. Some basic things that could be improved now are: Throttle / Collective Improvement Seperate throttle and collective fuctions and give then the ability to be Perportional with setting hold feature. In a heli the throttle is spooled up to Mil power and generaly left there during flight under most flying condition and the collective is used for altitude adjustment. I personaly would always have the setting hold enabled on the throttle but woudl have it disabled for the collective if assigned to a control axis and enabled if assigned to a key set. One step beter would be the ability to setup throttle/Pitch mixing curves but that might be a little too much. Having a true collective also allows for the ability to Auto-Rotate and safely land a heli with an engine failure, somthing that is not always possible in the current implimentation. Tail Rotor The tail rotor cut-off speeds need to be looked at and set to speeds that are more realistic for the individual heli's as every heli is unique and this individuality. One step better woudl be to accaualy model tail rotor thrust and resistance.

Helicopters are not Fixed Wing Aircraft, so why are they sharing the same base physics and control interface mechanics? This has been one of the main issues I have with the combined arms Sims/Games we have seen of late. OFP, BF2 and now ArmA all make the mistake of basing their helicopter implementation off their implementation of fixed wing aircraft and the two are just not that similar to make it work well. There are a few places where the two basic physics models overlap but it’s not enough to have the two tied together since in the areas where the two do overlap the physics dynamic at work are different despite having a similar effect on flight. I can fully understand the need to allow for some relaxation of the hard physics to allow for greater accessibility for the masses that may not have the hardware or skill to effetely use these parts of the package if they were made to be highly accurate and doing so would not also handicap those with the required hardware and skill. By choosing to base the physics off a very inaccurate model the end result is that it’s just difficult for everyone. It goes beyond that though, a wheeled vehicle also works in a different basic way then a tracked vehicle, a boat or amphibious vehicles works differently then a wheeled or tracked vehicle. ArmA is a based on a tool used to assist in the training military and peace keeping forces across the globe and has implemented many realistic traits to try and accurately simulate things such as ballistics, yet vehicles are implemented in a way that is far from realistic in an environment where their used is almost mandatory given the size of the virtual space we have been given to use. I really had higher hopes for ArmA and am a bit disappointed. I hope that for Game 2 they really take a closer look at the vehicles and try to implement their different incarnations in a way to make each feel closer to what they are and to make each feel unique. Sure it adds complexity, sure is increases the overhead and power needed of the CPU, and makes the control configuration a bit large and intimidating, but the payoff is worth the added difficulties. ArmA is a great improvement over OFP, but it’s still not what we hoped it would be. I would love to see ArmA patched in the future or modified in an expansion to shift more towards realism but I can wait until Game 2 if that is what it takes and enjoy ArmA for what it is, even if it is not what we hoped it would be.

Well I just learned somthing about the throttle I had hoped I was wrong about. It works the same for Fixed Wing, Heli, Trucks, Tanks and Boats. From center to top is acceleration and form center to botom is deceleration/reverse. So in a plane or heli, you do not start increasing the accual trottle until 50% forward on the throttle input. Its not 0%-100% like it should be, its only 50%-100% for positive throttle input. Add it to the list of reasons why each type of vehicle needs its own control interface. Shared controls just do not work with such differing types of vehicles. On a bright note the Harrier can be landed on the tarmak runway and will stop short of roling off the end if you land at 250kph or below. Much faster and you may not make the final taxiway. The Camel is easy to put down almost anywhere.

Yep that is a weird bug, and the only real bug I think that is in there. Rudder/tailrotor should never induce Roll only Yaw, at higher speeds it should alow the deflection of the tail even if it cannot alter the direction of flight. Ever land a fixed wing aricraft in a strong cross wind?

I still think is primarily a control issue and percision issue. Cyclic looks to be limited to 5 degree steps and that will not allow for the fine adjustments needed to aim and hover well. The tail rotor also has a few issues but aside from them the underlying physics seem good. The control inputs just do not seem to be translated to the physics engine in small enough steps or the engine is not accepting small enough steps from the contol systems.

Beta testers are not infalilbe. It probaly never occured to them to try and drive a boat on land. Its rather funny though, truth be told. I spent countless hours flying in OFP, I spent countless hours flying in EEAH, and I have spent a good amout of time flying in ArmA. Deep down the flight model is closer to sim then arcade, the problems are subtle, and seem more about the intreface between contoler and physics engine then problems in the engine itself. This should be easy to fix. You really need a percision contoler that has very smooth axis pickups to make flying not so irritating. You have to setup attacks and manuvers well in advance of the event and you have to plan your egress. Flying from the seat of your pants is much more diffacult but a calculated approach is very rewarding and will only be more so when the interface issues are resolved.

Gax that is not exactly true. As speed increases you will loose the ability to use the tail rotor to turn the helis. The rate at which the tail rotor looses effectivness is a complex equasion but helis like the littlebird which are slower lighter will retain more functionality of the tail rotor then a faster larger heli will like the blackhawk. Even fixed wing aircraft loose the effectivness of their rudder at high speed. At speed a heli is not unlike a fixed wing aircraft. Right now the effectivness just drops off too quickly and at a uniform rate for all helis.

(Clap, clap, clap) Exactly, input is depayed and then notchy followed by rapid movment. Result is unstable and twitchy contol. If you are very careful and slow with your inputs it feels nice but its hard to work around the inteface issues.

Not a spoiler. I have found that some times if you dump you weapon and pickup a different on this happens to me as well. Try using the weapon you start with for the whole mission if you are not currently doing so when these little hangups happen.

ArmA - $50 VBS1 - $500+ Is there even a compairison?

Sentralia, If the modding comunity have anything to do with it, it will tend to move more towards simulation then arcade, or at the very least will be pushed as far as possible in both directions. Personaly I am more for the Simulation camp, but I will admit to using 3rd person in some cases. Â Mainly when comanding or opperating a vehicle. Â Without the ability to easily look about me I just can not keep track of all the terain when flying a heli or effectly select targets for my gunner. But the other things I can live without. Â If I am denighed 3rd person on a server I will choose to be a grunt or gunner, nothing more as I lack the hardware solution to effectly fill the roll.

BlackAlpha, You are funny. I am not sure any of the issues in the helo flight model are bugs or design flaws that are working as intended. There are however more then just two issues. Yes the current physics are useable, yes all areas of the physics seems to have some oddities. Helicopters unfortunatly need more percision to be really effective then they currently have. Pitch and Roll both seem to have a 10% deadzone before input is reconised and then the input and corasponding effect on the helicopter is very notchy. Pitch and Roll seem to be limited to 5 degree incriments. This makes stable hovering much more diffacult then it needs to be. It also takes more pitch and roll to effect directional flight and speed change then it should. This coupled with the high rate of speed gain from that movment makes things very diffacult. Why does the tail rotor induce roll over 100kph? Why does the engine change RPM when I fly even if I don't move the throttle/collective? Hell the engine/rotor RPM should remain constant at 80% until i hit th elast 20% of the range of my throttle/collective control as lift is primarily from adjusting rotor head pitch not speed. The base physics may be dam good but the way the control systems are implimented is masking them. Until the correct control systems are in place we will not know how good or flawed the true physics are.

I would not call that good helicopter flying but its passable, about the same level at my ability as well though I can not do that from the cockpit with my control setup given I do not have a hat switch or headtracking solution. Did you look close enough at that video to notice the lack of percise cyclic angles? Probaly not. If you look closely you will notice that the helo only pitches and roll in 5 -10 degree incrments. How does that make good control easy? On the landing he nearly put the helo on its side to correct for some small latteral movment and ended up landing several meters to the right of his target helipad. The point is that vehicle physics have been poorly implimented in general which is odd considering they are a large part of this package.

The only controler I have that is more percise then the engine is my realflight controler. Â Using it though means I can only fly, not shoot as there just are not enough controls on it. Â With this contorler I can feel the level of persion ArmA is reading and its not as high as my contoler can provide. There are more then just two problems. Â Those of you not seeing them are just not looking hard enough or don't have a contoler percise enough to notice them. Problems: 1) The deadzones on the contoler are not configurable, nore are they uniform across all the different inputs. Â (Solution: Give us the ability to configure, strength, range, deadzone for each axis.) 2) The contols have a delayed reaction to input. Â (Solution: find and kill the interface lag issue.) 3) Engine RPM/Collective are a conbined control and they seem to be relitive not not directly controled. Â (Solution: Most helocopters do not alter rotor head speed except in emergencies, only the pitch is altered to effect movment and altitude change while the engine remains at a constant speed called military power which is about 80%-90% of avalable full rpm called Emergency power. Â Settings for this control need to be more user configurable to allow better mixing based on a single axis input.) 4) EngineRPM/Collective changes are slow to effect the flight of the helo. Â (Solution: The rate or directness of change needs to Be increased and based on lift to weight/mass ratios) 5) We are unable to effectly aquire and engage targets at the optimal ranges of the modeled weapon systems. Â (Solution: We need better modeled avionics system.) 6) Turning helos and the contols to do so are not effective or correct. Â The tail rotor effect is incorrect, and uniform across all models and is somehow able to induce roll above 120kph. (Solution: The tail rotor needs to be more effective falling off at higher speed. Â Its also needs to be design specific, a lighter helo like the Littlebird will have better tailrotor contol at higher speeds then a Blackhawk. Â But the Blackhawls vertical and horizontal stabilizers will allow for a stronger weathervane effect and aircraft like tail control surface handeling at medium to high speed.) The main point I am trying to make is that helicopers and fixed wing aircraft are not the same, they should not share a common physics base, they should not share a common control configuration set and each helo is unique based on its design. Â A Littlebird is you basic helo, it has 5 basic controls, Cyclic(Pitch/Roll), Tail Rotor Pitch(Yaw), Throttle(Engine RPM/Rotor head speed for both main and tail) and Collective(Main rotor head pitch). Â The Blackhawk has 7 basic controls some of which are mixed, it adds Rudder(Yaw) and Elevator(Pitch), both of which are mixed and linked to the existing input channals. In ArmA the basic design is not modeled correctly and thus it will never act correctly without inducing incorrect physics to cover the design limitations of using a modified fixed wing physics and control package.

No worries xnodunitx, we just were not thinking on the same page is all. Some day a combined arms milsim will be built that is a true simulation of all included included systems. Until then this is as close as we can get untill the mod comunity starts to crank out improvments.