PacUK

Small bit of news, just finished that last fix so we'll be moving into testing this week. Fingers crossed nothing major crops up and we should be on schedule to release next weekend. I did manage to find a very small bit of time to squeeze in one cheeky new unit, its not 100% but I thought it would be fun to include it, you can spot them hitching a ride in the shots below:

Fingers crossed this new system might just tempt them back, those people familiar with different tanks armour configurations are definitely going to have one up on everyone used to hitting any part of the tank and whittling it down to a firey ball of metal. We've got most of the issues we can fix in a timely fashion out of the way now and should be finalising things this weekend ready for some mp tests. Then any final fixes and we hope to get it out to you guys soon as possible. While the patch will be lacking in much new content, the gameplay enhancements really improve the existing content so much I think its worth the rush to get it out to you all instead of delaying while we slog away working on distant LOD models for tanks and infantry we don't quite have ready yet. Also with Gnat's plane overhauls and new planes from Yac about to steamroll into our main production line we'll likely push that content into a post 2.7 version rather than intermittent ones before hand. Then we can look to add the new heavy tanks and AA weapons that we just don't have the time for right now with our tiny team in 2.71 or so :) This will also allow us to ensure the planes balance with the new tank damage systems and the weapons can have the desired effects rather than squeezing in a third patch to balance the two together.

Heh yeah there shouldn't be too much confusion about that anymore :D We've always been a bit torn by using damage textures or not as sometimes it just looks a bit too extreme (or not extreme enough). While at some point I would love to have proper wreck models they are pretty tough to produce especially for the vast array of vehicles we have. However these new effects give a great bit of visual feedback to the gameplay and should make the situation a lot more readable from a players perspective. Also the new penetration data means where and when you engage tanks is going to require a lot more thought and planning if you hope to survive the encounter, including real world tactic use such as using regular shermans to distract heavy armour while firefly's go in for the kill and other fun bits that should prove for some interesting situations.

Making some great progress on 2.64, chomped through most of the issues we'd planned to cover, though a couple have had to slip to a later version as we are very under-manned right now team wise. But it looks like we should be able to release in the next couple of weeks hopefully before the end of January unless we find any major issues in the upcoming MP tests. I'd really like to do a promo vid of the new damage system if possible, it probably won't end up being too cinematic though and more showing off the various explosion and fire effects. Really though nothing quite gets the feel of it across until you land a round smack on the front of a tiger, then see it still coming through the smoke without a dent (and nothing better than being in the Tiger instead!). Either way though this video may have to wait until post release as it does take time out from actually working on the patch :( On the faces, I won't have time to address it for 2.64 but possibly in a later patch, I think we need to re-fix the setup for them anyway as we had some ethnic faces slipping in where there shouldn't be and there's nothing like some good old fashion racism to keep the mod historically accurate.... On a note about the camo face paint, I found it pretty amusing when browsing some colourised photos to see some AB troopers with literal Native American (could this paragraph get anymore confusing in its political correctness?) war face paint. Red white and blue stripes in a night time drop could be fun too!

Indeed lets get back on topic, TANKS AND EXPLOSIONS!!! As you can see in the shots, tanks can become damaged and disabled in very distinct ways producing a nice varied battlefield atmosphere, with smoke building and pouring from hatches, growing to fires, with the risk of ammo explosions for even more fireworks. Time to read up on your armour and learn those weak spots soldiers!

As Sickboy suggested, its worth giving your feedback through their tracking system, I know what its like trying to track issues suggestions and bugs across forum threads and its just next to impossible. So visit http://play.withsix.com/support and direct your feedback there. As a mod maker PwS really is a huge benefit, it simplifies releases no end and is continually improving with each release. We waste countless hours just supporting releases with people who have trouble with installations and they are 99% always due to failed manual installations and ignoring instructions which we had to spend more time writing. With PwS people can just click and play and we don't have to spend hours or days uploading content to various mirrors, as with the 11 hour upload that I had to do three times over for 2.0's release, which then had to be promptly hotfixed twice on release day. You can see with your own confusion about which version(s) to download how much easier it is just to click and install/update button rather than hunting down all the parts you need, for example the correct version of CBA, just becomes much tougher when you have to go through hosting sites.

That link is for Armaholics 2.62 package, they kindly incorporated 2.6, 2.61, and 2.62 into a single download. You will however have to get the 2.63 patch as well if you decide to install manually and want to play online.

You've not followed installation correctly, also the version number is 2.##. To run correctly you MUST install 2.6, 2.61, 2.62, 2.63 IN ORDER, patches do not include the previous patches. If unsure use Play withSix as that will download the whole current v2.63. Classname Q already answered. The first aid system SHOULD work, if you are planning on making your campaign SP its probably the safest bet. If you want it to be MP, use ours its a lot more realistic and interesting to use with things like hit reaction animations.

Without knowing when its happening or what units you're using when you experience it or missions you're loading there's not much we can suggest. Are you using Play withSix?

Think Gunter covered everything there :D You're free to try running any mods you like with I44, but generally they won't be compatible and we can't provide any kind of support to those that do run it and encounter problems.

There were no plans to, its not something I think I've ever seen, but depending on the scope used and mounting it may be possible to add it at some point in the future, but don't hold your breath for it ;) I know I'm on the same team but wow Gnat and Yac your work continues to excite the hell out of me :D Really looking forward to producing some epic air battle missions (and a few bombing runs too!) that I've had to hold back on with releases so far it'll be great to get back in the air properly!

Not quite, all that was done was that weapons and items were given weight values for a system we were developing for a co-op campaign. There's no display in the standard interface or affects on limitations with it (though missions scripts can make use of it should they choose too). I'm almost entirely sure its possible, but it does require a lot of coding that there simply isn't the time for right now I'm sorry to say, possibly in the future.

Perhaps a little smaller scale than what we have aimed for but not far wrong (we did drop our old D Day tag though some websites still give that as a subtitle for us). Of course if we could produce every faction and unit available it would be great for players but practically as a free mod impossible to achieve to the high level of quality that we require. As with the qoutes Gunter pasted. We would be more likely to expand the European Theater on the Western Front before considering covering the Russian side of the war. There is plenty to do which is what often surprised me about the more general requests for future work are "How about the russians?" when we still haven't been able to finish a singular unit like the Flak Vierling in about 2 years due to under-staffing :D Currently planning to keep 2.64 relatively small content wise, focusing on tank fixes, but they'll be a few surprises in there too if we get time, theres an FG42 model update from Macolik and Yac that I'd really like to get in if possible but that may have to wait a bit (as with a few other planned weapon updates). So its looking more likely additional tanks will have to wait for a few later patches, but it should give you time to learn the penetration tables and such (and really start hankering for an M10 when your shells bounce off the sloping armor of a Panther!). Hope to have a video previewing some of the new effects soon but only if it won't delay the release as I'd rather get this game-changing (for the better I hope) update out as soon as possible.

That's okay, I don't mind drooling over those new toys again :P~

I understand Titi's point completely and do agree to some extent its better to have people playing than not at all because a small group can't get together to run D-Day. However seeing it as often the only map/mission combo running it does deter me from making any effort on future maps or missions when I know it eventually comes back to Chernarus and Domination every release. While I would love to have the time to develop a map on that sort of scale, its just not something I could afford to do myself (though if anyone would like to donate food and expenses for a month or three... ;) ). Still it would be great to see those servers that are active run a couple more organised public events with admins so you can deal with griefers and enjoy the custom content we do put a lot of work into on the odd weekend, I don't believe many/any of the team members have actually had much chance to play the mod itself online as the only servers available are domination so makes it quite hard to get a sense of your work being fully enjoyed. But again at least people are still playing even if its not many. Yup the F2 was removed finally, there's always been a lot of back and forth with it as it is essentially a G model reworked from a D that was slightly modified again to become the F2 just to keep the varied models available. However the D and F2 were starting to look very ropey and Macolik had some time to convert Vex_Man's gorgeous G model back into a D. Leaving a very old and quite redundant F2 ghetto model, which we decided to remove from the editor list (though it is still available through class names, do not expect it to behave properly if used). I think the sense that taking towns as being important is what puts people off say having a Domination style run on Omaha, taking the 3 towns would be very short work. However I don't see why the town type objectives couldn't be placed inland in fortified positions to make up for the lack of towns. These are gametypes we've discussed developing in the past but due to the lack of interest in our produced maps and missions in favour of Chernarus means its a bit of a shit-cycle. Chernarus' scale offers a lot of options, particualarly planes which have always been something we've delayed focusing on with most of our larger missions while we wait for Gnat's overhaul. We will be looking to promoting and few public events in the coming weeks, especially some battelgrounds pvp, I'd highly encourage anyone especially those who don't like pvp in ArmA2 to give it a go as it does play very differently to most mission types I've played in the vanilla game with a much faster pace more akin to Battlefield 1942 with a more realistic spin and push on tactics and teamwork. Keep an eye out for announcements soon! We will also look to run some Co-ops as well, its been a while since I charged up the beach with 31 other players!

I still think Liberation: would have made a much better prefix, then Iron Front and D-Day as the subtitles. Choosing 44 was always a little close for comfort but hell it was an interesting year :D

Not at all they just picked a very similar name for reasons that still baffle me. Firstly, its 8 maps now I believe with Merderet_v2 as well (the layout of chef do pont and a few other places is very different, extra railway bridge etc). But yeah I agree, seeing Chernarus Domination is still thoroughly disheartening to see on the only active servers. The airports can't really be the only reason to play these as well, the planes are unbalanced as hell and working on 3 different damage models so the air combat isn't the best. Having spent a good 2 months building hedgerows by hand one bush at a time on Omaha v_2 it is a real shame not to see more being done with our maps. It should be very possible and dare I say it fun to play an infantry/ground vehicle only variation of domination on any of our maps, and yes while they are not Chernarus sized, they would still provide a good few hours of gameplay. But then I'm still waiting to see a single server running any of the missions included in 2.63 and have yet to see one. Which as one is pretty much a domination style mission on Neaville, is pretty puzzling.

The rockets don't have the velocity to travel 300 meters without using an arcing flight path the only thing that would be happening at this point is removal of the other range options but as I wasn't the person who set them up, I don't know why they were done like that, hence my hesistation to remove them. The ranges on all these weapons are very realistic as is and with practice they are not hard to aim. You need to remember these aren't modern anti-tank launchers they were last ditch defences used only when tanks were right on top of infantry that did not have armor support, very rarely used in any kind of offensive situation. The panzerfaust especially is a different beast as it should be held underarm and fired almost like a rifle grenade at an angle anyway (the animation is not possible with the way A2 handles rocket launchers). Really the best thing I can suggest here is just practice practice practice!

Well the panzerfaust 60 especially, kind of gives it away in the name, the 60 stands for meters as in the maximum range. While the others allow ranging, the weapon still only has an effective range as in real life of around 100-200 meters, but with an arc you can hit much greater distances. Really there shouldn't be quite so many range options on those, but without accurate information on what if any adjustments could be made I prefer to leave things along than fiddle with them when I don't fully understand the implications ingame.

I don't believe Macolik snuck anything in to fix it with 2.63 and I don't know how it works so didn't take a look myself. Not being entirely sure when or why it stopped working makes it a touch harder to fix but if we get any leads I'll try and get it in 2.64.

Oh just a note, any issues on planes are most likely known about and/or redundant, but as we're holding back all plane updates for 2.7 we won't be addressing them before that so feel free to report them just don't expect anything for them until the complete overhaul!

Other than bug fixes the main thing will be Animosity's new tank damage system, rather than progressively taking damage as before, we now have a more accurate penetration system, so its very possible to sit bouncing shells off the front sloping armor of a panther all day long and not make a dent. There's also various visual effects with smoke and fires from hatches, ammo explosions that make for some great views after a battle. If possible we'll try and squeeze a new tank or two in but right now we're leaning towards releasing the update sooner and roll those out in later updates. It can be hard to strike a balance between new content and fixing issues, as we're a bit lacking in team members to actually produce new content it gives us an opportunity to fix a few things we've had to set by the way-side that are pretty simple to fix given some time. The next big update due after this is 2.7 still with no real plans between now and then we'll probably just keep polishing the bits we can and slip the occasional new troop set or vehicle in as they get finished. Saying that I am about to pester Waxbutter and the other Pacific team members to pinch a couple of weapons for the Brits ;) boatname animate ["Ramp", 1]; // Ramp down boatname animate ["Ramp", 0]; // Ramp up You might need to have the boat stopped to do it, the best thing I can suggest is checking the script used on Landing or D-Day, I've never had much luck with waypoint based scripting and prefer area triggers myself. Hope everyone has had a great 2012, thanks for all your support and that you continue to enjoy I44 into 2013!

Ah interesting stuff Strikor, I'll see if I can get it fixed with McNools for 2.64, which I'm currently trying to prioritise bug fixes for with a limited team size so if there's any big ones you guys want fixed point them out and we'll try and get them done for the next patch. If possible I'd like to keep it a relatively short period before the next release mainly because I've been playing with Animosity's new Armor enhancements and its fucking awesome! They really do make a huge difference to the gameplay and tactics required depending on the gear and hardware you have available.

Merderet will most likely be best suited for what you want and you could add the burnt out trees yourself as mission objects using one of the less descorated areas on the edges of the map (v1 probably more suitable that v2) but as that hill was never designed in any of our maps you won't find an area like that. I would suggest trying various things like normal A2:CO, beta, then tweaking specific graphics settings. I havent yet been able to recreate it myself with ATI or Nvidia cards so not sure what the cause would be (or why I44 would be the causing factor).

As mentioned the other maps other than Omaha do feature a number of hill positions that can be used. Omaha is a bit different in that the area we have modelled was pretty flat which is part of what made the terrain a lot harder than anticipating - advancing through hedged countryside without being able to get a good overview of the landscape ahead but there are still a few high points inland that can be used as high ground to some extent. The Hills on Neaville are probably your best bet for a mix of terrain. Yac had the model as WIP a while back but it was then lost in a HD crash, I don't recall if he ever recovered it or if a copy has made its way to Gnat but we don't currently have the model handy. If Yac does get time to finish it or at least pass it off to Gnat I would imagine we'd include it in 2.7 or later making use of the Aircraft enhancements rather than having to code it twice. Thats because it basically is. ArmA2 doesn't really feature wheeled static weapons that can move like these and OA added the effect of vehicles shaking the view. If you're aware of any variables to disable the effect I'd be happy to patch it in next release :)