MBot

Ok, that's odd. It worked for a friend that tested the mission (and obviously also for me). Did you check the comms menu in the quick command menu or the one in the complex menu (should be this one). Edit: Just tested it again, the mission works fine on my machine. Access the radio menu via the "0"-Key.

Don't the Cobras even still mostly carry TOWs as they are cheaper than Hellfires?

The Wasp LHDs and Tarawa LHAs do not have catapults, nor arresting gear. As Legislator mentiones they are only operating helicopters and Harriers. Edit: Or launching OV-10 Broncos :)

I think rocky and rough terrain without much vegetation, that still is somehow open would serve infantry oriented gameplay best. I am thinking in the lines of the Falklands, wide and rough landscape with lots micro-detail in the terrain that would provide cover for infantry. Perhaps the higher hardware load of such terrain would be offset by the spare vegetation. As I doubt the Falklands would officially appear in any Arma version, a fictional Takistan might work best.

Following issues posted: AI Unable to Defend http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2556 AI Movement not Suppressable http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2557 AI disregards custom placed sandbags as cover http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2558 Please vote as I consider those of high importance for realistic gameplay.

Would be cracking of you could, I have no experience (=no idea) in using the tracker.

fabrizio_T, would you think the the issue of AI being unable to defend/hold waypoint that isn't defensive would fit on the A2 Community Issue Tracker, or is that something we simply have to accept Arma 2 hasn't?

You didn't try the campaign yet, didn't you?

Isn't it somehow sad that after 8 years people still need the original OFP and Resistance campaigns? One would think that Arma 2 would stand on its own feet in that regard. Regarding the saving on veteran. It would already be a lot better if the autosaves would not overwrite the previous ones. A couple of times I had an autosave when a teammate was just mortally wounded or my helicopter was just going down -> Restart mission. Being able to select a previous autosave would already help a lot.

Raven Shield had this implemented very well. You could turn/aim quickly in a sector of perhaps 45°, turning more when prone was slow and had your character readjust is position.

@Master gamawa Well said, completely agree about the campaign and warfare.

Looks phantastic. May I suggest a variant that has a couple of WP smoke rockets strapped under the wing? Would make a great makeshift (A)FAC bird (compareable to the O-1 Bird Dog).

Test setup: USMC player and one Russian AI rifleman are on Utes runway 200m from each other, both behind some sandbags. AI has a single waypoint (can be changed to various options). Global AI skill is 1.0, accuracy 0.5, rifleman skill is on maximum. Mission for download: http://cid-f33d8b1019e6f4ac.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/AI|_Defensive|_Test.utes.zip Observations: Giving the AI a simple move waypoint means he will immediately fire a couple rounds on mission start, then go prone and not rise again. He wont ever attempt to rise to shoot at the player. Player shooting at/over AI (or hold fire) at any point of the test has no apparent influence on AI actions. Giving AI a search and destroy waypoint or changing move waypoint properties to engage at will, results in AI immediately fire a couple rounds on mission start, then initiates flanking maneuver (away from sandbags). Player shooting (or hold fire) at any point of the AI maneuver does not seem to have any influence on AI movements. AI will not go behind sandbags and will execute a same flanking maneuver regardless of any player fire. Thesis: AI is unable to fight from a defensive position. Depending on waypoint setup it will either go prone behind cover or leave cover to engage the enemy. AI has no concept of vertical cover and consciously shooting over such. AI movement and actions are unaffected by suppressive fire. Shooting at AI has no influence on what they do. Suppression does only seem to be modeled as increasing dispersion (untested, heresy). Would be nice if some of the more experienced editor users could have a look at that thesis. Perhaps it is a result of wrong waypoint setup for AI. Also possible custom placed objects are not recognised as cover?

Just tested it and like fabrizio_T already explained, 'this enableattack false' wont stop my lab rat from leaving cover.

Very much agree. Not only this, a more defensive approach should also go into the basic battledrill for offensive actions. Fist achieve fire superiority over the enemy (suppressing and fixing) and only then initiate flanking or an assault. If fire superiority can not be achieved, the attack should not be pressed. Will have a look at 'this enableattack false' this evening.

The AI definitely sees the low stonewall as cover, as it will sometimes move crouched sideway behind the wall until it is behind the tallest portion and remain there (at least for some seconds before moving on). I will repeat the test with the AI further away from the wall but my suspicion is, that it will flank immediately and use the cover of the wall temporarly if it is on its way. Which waypoint is the most agressive, I have the impression that 'move/engage at will', 'search and destroy' and 'guard' are all about the same (very agressive). In case of guard I had the AI with low skill almost immediately flank each time. The impression that the AI with high skill would sometimes be a bit more defensive with a guard waypoint could also have been wrong. Perhaps it just decided to change the flank multiple times, which would explain the excessive latteral movement along the wall. It would eventualy run into to open in an attemt to flank anyway.

Repeated the test with the AI behind a native map object: http://cid-f33d8b1019e6f4ac.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/Public/AI|_Test|_Defense2.Chernarus.zip Test Setup Russian AI rifleman behind stonewall has one waypoint with various properties. Player 100m away behind covered position. Global AI skill 1.0, AI accuracy 1.0, rifleman skill on max. AI waypoint: move AI goes prone immediately behind stone wall and stays so. No attempt to engage player AI waypoint: move, engage at will / search and destroy AI initiates flanking maneuver seconds after mission start. If there is cover on the flank it will try to use it while flanking. AI waypoint: guard AI seems to be a bit more concerned about being defensive. Often it will flank but sometimes it will constantly move along the stonewall from position to position. It does not stay at one fighting position and movement somehow seems undecided. Some observations: -Behavior of AI behind stonewalls is definitely different then behind sandbags which seems to support the idea that custom placed objects are not regarded as cover. -Shooting at AI with a rifle does not seem to have effect on its movements. Shooting at AI with MG could have an effect. Sometimes AI will hold positions longer than usual, go prone behind objects or go prone when sprinting. Still ultimately MG fire will not stop AI from flanking over open ground. In the end it is difficult to achieve consistent results and you are never really sure if it is an action the AI would have done regardless. Currently I can not really say if being suppressed is simulated for AI or not (other than weapon shake). Even if it is though, it would be too weak to have any significant influence on gameplay (should perhaps be tested with lower unit skill). -The guard waypoint seems to be able to hold the AI in place sometimes. Still it cannot stop it from frequently doing suicidal flanking maneuvers. -The AI does a lot of unnecessary and lengthy movements. It will constantly change position and is therefore often exposed. Also it doesn't use "ducked running" which would help to reduce profile when moving behind cover. Because the complexity of even this simple setup it is very difficult to get consistent results and draw definite conclusions. Additional input from other users would be appreciated. When just observing this single AI guy, he does a lot of unexplainable stuff, moving around a lot, going to somehow random places and back again, standing behind this wall and go prone behind the other one. Sometimes it seems he does something smart, but he moves around so much you can never know if it was just by chance. Generally speaking, from the perspective of a gamer, the AI in this scenario does not really leave an intelligent impression. Edit: Setting waypoint to guard and unit skill to 0 results in AI flanking each time. Even massive MG fire does not prevent that.

DCS: Black Shark. Different genre but still a complex beast. Excellent quality release from Eagle Dynamics.

The one tip I can give you for Arma 2 is to depend only on the collective for controlling altitude and not the cyclic. The influence pitch has on your climb-/sinkrate seems to be very undermodeled in Arma 2. In DCS: Black Shark you can easely follow the terrain by using the cyclic only. Trading a little speed for a little alt and vica versa. Flying like that in Arma 2 gets you killed.

This evening I will search for an oppropriate spot on Utes to test it with "native" cover of the map and see if that makes any difference. But frankly I do not expect so as this behaviour matches my playing expieriences. For a military infantry game this is a pretty big deal in my oppinion.

Considering the games unintuitive, 8 years old squad control interface and the AI's lack of self preservation, I remain sceptical about this. Let's not even talk about the missions where you are not the squad leader...

The campaign was a major disappointment for me. Rather short and with very fluctuating mission quality. The fact that about 1/3 of the playtime are warfare mission killed it for me. In general terms the campaign is very ambitious but in the end the game is unable to meet those demands. The open ended approach of some missions is nice in theory but often creates mission ending situations that are outside the players control, forcing a restart. That is not good gameplay. Additionally the openness creates a big potential for bugs, evident as the campaign is still hardly playable one month after release. The decision to give warfare such a prominent place in the campaign is questionable, considering its very amateurish implementation. Dedicated RTS games spend a major effort on effective controls, this is a success/failure aspect of the genre. Arma 2's campaign features 1/3 of RTS gameplay that frankly has controls like an mod solution. The approach with Team Razor that has to survive is understandable from a storytelling perspective but it simply doesn't work in game. For that the AI is by far not advanced enough. Endless times you have to restart a mission because one of your elite Razors gets himself killed and you can not do anything about it. This is not good gameplay at all. It punished the player for things that are outside his control. The campaign has some good moments, especially when it plays out the games inherent atmosphere. But it is overshadowed by a bad implementation, an endless amount of bugs and ambitions that the game simply can not fulfill. I am not talking about story here, I'm not really interested in the personalities of the soldiers (but it will please those that are). I am talking about mission design and gameplay. In that aspect the campaign is not even close to OFP or Resistance. I can understand the desire to go the open-world route which is really attractive those days. But I think it would have been wiser to go where the games real strenghts are, objective-specific infantry and combined arms operations and this "I'm just one soldier in a big war"-type missions. In the end I am rather disappointed because of the wasted potential, but that is just my opinion.

This neat trick is done by simply looking/aiming down at the crouched position. It is a great way to quickly get you head down in cover when firing from a covered position and then pop up again to shoot again. It is a lot quicker and safer than changing to the prone position. If you have TrackIR you can even look around when cower in the down position. This is pretty much the vertical equivalent of leaning around cover. Is there any possibility to incorporate this in the AI? Would greatly increase their ability to efficiently fight from behind cover positions.

You can also do more realistic peeking around corners by controlling your upper body with the mouse and look around with free-view: It is a really awkward maneuver to execute using those workaround solutions, but it shows nicely what kind of nice and realistic movement options would be available with a revised character movement and control model. Of course the "1 foot precision" of the present character control doesn't make such moves very applicable currently anyway.

So, I decided to skip the warfare missions (which feels more like a mod solution rather than well designed and carefully implemented core-gameplay), only to see a rather cheap and cheesy end sequence. If you remove the two warfare missions, which should never have gone into the campaign, and the Manhatten mission, which will forever remain in my memory as a buggy mess, what remains of the campaign? Not terribly much... Quite disappointing and a pity for the great potential.