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Apocal

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Posts posted by Apocal

  3. Posted

    there was an excellent arty add on for ofp, can't remember the name

    Wargames League (WGL), some members later went on to ACE when focused shifted to ArmA.

    I think such a system is a lot of fun but most won't want to devote the time to learning it. That is where the add on community can come in, which is I believe the true strength of the entire game engine.

    I thought it was pretty cool, because it added a more mental aspect to the game. Unfortunately, I have my doubts the community would accept a "nerf" to the accessibility of artillery now that they've sampled the (excellent in it's own right) ARTY Mod GUI.

  5. Posted · Edited by Apocal

    how about actually hearing incoming mortars and artillery?

    Can't say I've been hit with anything indirect in-game (not for lack of trying!) but according to the config files, there is supposed to be a sound when you are within twice the lethal radius of the shell.

        // M119 / 105mm Artillery Shells
   class ARTY_Sh_105_HE: ARTY_Sh_Base
   {
       hit = 250;
       indirectHit = 110;
       indirectHitRange = 25;
       typicalSpeed = 800;
       explosive = 0.800000;
       cost = 300;
       timeToLive = 120;
       model = "\ca\Weapons\shell";
       airFriction = airFriction_105mm;
       CraterEffects = "ArtyShellCrater";
       ExplosionEffects = "ARTY_ShellExplosionMedium";
       ARTY_NetShell = "ARTY_Sh_105_NET";
[b]whistleDist = 50;// 2x indirect hit range[/b]

    So at least the scripting is already in place.

  9. Posted

    Now we are comparing the Marines and ArmA2 "Ultimate Military Simulator" to construction workers so video gamers can do whatever they want in a game that is supposed to portray the Marine Corps?

    Once again, not disagreeing with you overall point, but there is another non-fictional force depicted in ArmA2, noted for uneven quality, a lack of professional NCOs (and adult supervision in general) and more than occassional gear that does not do the job it's supposed to.

    @ Apocal

    Very true. The other end of it all need to be modelled too, like the mentioned burning, or the effects of overpressure, spalling inside of the vehicle, and the blinding flame of the molten metal jet of a shaped charge penetrating, as well as increased fatigue from riding on top in uncomfortable positions compared to inside seats.

    Hmm, you got things exactly right, but missed my point. People who ride on top of APCs rather than under armor do so (generally) because it's preferable to be exposed to small arms and shrapnel (and probably still killed or wounded by a mine strike), in exchange for not being trapped in a burning vehicle. They can mitigate the risk of ambush riding outside by keeping alert, with weapons ready. They can do nothing against mines from the inside.

    It's probably an irrational decision, as more are killed by small arms than would be by mine/RPG strikes on their vic, but I can very strongly emphathise with it.

    The more that can be and is modeled though, the better. Although I guess fixing the crap-ton of other unfinished features (like the Javelins, use of especially heavy sniper rifles, proper sights for M203 and GP-25, vehicle damage system, fire control computer in the AFVs and tanks, etc) is higher on the priority list, getting to stuff like this would be very, very nice for a more immersive battlefield.

    Yes. Like I said, it'd be a cool feature for all of four screenshots, an intro and two respawns. After that people would stop doing it, because dead is dead in ArmA, whether you bleed to death or burn to death.

  10. Posted · Edited by Apocal

    snip

    Relax, I was just giving you shit because like the fourth image on google image search "marines riding tank" pops that pic up. Better me than one of our, shall we say, less well-traveled posters who'd honestly try to argue the point.

    NORG (Natural Order of Realistic Gameplay) clearly states that let people do whatever people can do in real life. If it is dangerous and stupid to do in real life it should be so in the game as well. Let people ride vehicles if they want to, and let them take the consequences for it.

    While I certainly see your point, I disagree that this is something that could be adequately covered by NORG. People rode (and still ride) on top of vehicles such as BTRs and BMPs because having a four or five times greater probability of being shot or otherwise perforated is preferable to being burned alive. Unless the game adopts some bizarre form of in-game punishment for a particularly horrible death, players will not be presented with a realistic tradeoff of decisions. Instead it will be one of the endless "cool features" that modders spend weeks perfecting, but players take only seconds rejecting.

    And creating an armored vehicle with only desant passenger positions (to simulate real life employment) would just piss everyone off after the second time they got scrapped off the vic by small arms or shrapnel.

  11. Posted

    First thing to do is this:

    1. Enable only one of the Casualty Cap components.

    2. Set it to fire only on 100% casualties.

    3. Run the the mission in F2 Debug Mode.

    4. Monitor the sidechat to see what values it gives for the variables "_grps" "_started" and "_remaining".

    What you should see is a list of your named groups (_grps) (assuming they are not empty), then an initial count for units in those groups (_started) and then a count for currently alive units in those groups (_remaining). This should help narrow down the issue.

    I don't actually see those variables (perhaps chat won't scroll enough?), but I do see a listing of all my named groups (f_var_groups_BLU), another listing of all the OPFOR groups in the mission (f_var_groups_OPF) and yet another listing for both together (f_var_groups). A final listing is called '_grpstemp = [ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY,ANY]'

  12. Posted

    Apocal, I'm afraid it's very unclear what issue you are running into.

    My bad.

    Both versions of the casualty cap fire shortly after mission start. For the regular version, this ends the mission immediately. When I commented out the regular version and left advanced, it fired the custom code immediately. Custom groupIDs were used. They were set to different percentages.

    I suspect very strongly it's because they conflicted with respawns.

  13. Posted

    I think most of us have seen pictures from Afghanistan with Soviet soldiers riding on top of their BTR-70 APCs, since they expected to live longer if they sat on top and could jump off and scuttle to cover, than if they sat inside and got hit by an RPG.

    That and the BTR has questionable mine protection and likes bursting into flames almost as much as my matches do.

  14. Posted

    Vandrel pwned

    Now that novelty has worn off a bit, that pic does very little to refute Vanderal's overall point; it was taken during that awkward phase when the actual fighting was clearly over, yet the safety mentality still hadn't set back in, a unique convergence of factors which allowed them to do stupid shit like ride a tank for no apparent fucking reason.

  15. Posted · Edited by Apocal
    new rpt

    EDIT: I tried to put this in a respawn mission. That was my mistake. I'm leaving it here so others can learn.

    Having problems with the casualty cap and casualty cap advanced. Tried running both, the advanced version would abort your primary objective, fail your secondary and give a new task to extract, the other would kick in with more casualties and end the mission right then and there.

    But for some reason it keeps firing right as it's initialized or shortly thereafter. ArmA.rpt gives me this:

    Error in expression <.sqf";

    f_var_debugMode = 0;

    if ((Param1 == 99) || (Param2 == 99)) then

    {

    >

    Error position: <Param1 == 99) || (Param2 == 99)) then

    {

    >

    Error Undefined variable in expression: param1

    File C:\Users\Sony AR750EB\Documents\ArmA 2 Other Profiles\=7Cav=BSM%2eMayes\missions\OPERATION2.Chernarus\init.sqf, line 11

    Error in expression <t.sqf";

    };

    if (((_started - _remaining) / _started) >= (_pc / 100)) then

    {

    myE>

    Error position: </ _started) >= (_pc / 100)) then

    {

    myE>

    Error Zero divisor

    File C:\Users\Sony AR750EB\Documents\ArmA 2 Other Profiles\=7Cav=BSM%2eMayes\missions\OPERATION2.Chernarus\f\server\f_endOnCasualtiesCap.sqf, line 105

    Protocol bin\config.bin/RadioProtocolRU/: Missing word AwayGrid

    Creating debriefing

    Along with a debug mode error that seems to popup regardless of what I'm running or not running in the framework. I made sure to put down the Function module, although I have my own custom groups, which I've put in the applicable init.sqf section.

    Anyone else run into this problem?

  16. Posted · Edited by Apocal

    Hi guys

    I just wondered how normal it is to be putting in dozens maybe hundreds of hours over months on a single mission.. am I nuts?? haha

    Not nuts, just more detail-obsessed. That isn't necessarily a bad quality though.

    I have a feeling Im not the only one who does this though.

    How long have you been working on your current mission? Or do you have a few on the go at once etc.

    My current (clan internal) mission, about eight hours, split between background research for an insurgent organization and an idea of their tactics, techniques and procedures (Lester Grau's work regarding Chechnya is excellent in that regard BTW), laying out a plausible defense, finally playtesting and tweaking various aspects. I'm currently taking pics to throw into the briefing.

    Admittedly though, they've been "low-tech" to support 50+ players with minimal lag. And the release of F2 helped quite a bit. All told it'll probably be 12 manhours total from start to finish. Having started as a clan mission designer was helpful in that objective triggers can be screwed up or non-functional without destroying anyone's fun, that I can dictate a particular AO with reasonable expectation that players will follow it, that the key elements of the mission won't be driven off a cliff or flown into a mountain, etc.

    For a public release mission, I'll need two or three times that. I've publically released about sixteen missions total, mostly for OFP, but about five for ArmA. Overriding time sinks were play-balancing and preventing people from being asshats. Play-balancing was difficult because back in OFP and ArmA days I wound up having to maintain a "clean" final version and a test version where I'd scripted in waypoints for the friendly groups that approximated likely player courses of action. Then I had to do unlikely player courses of action. Any changes necessary to mission I'd put to the "clean" version and (if they were relatively major) start the process back over again. For minor play-balancing tweaks (such as swapping out regular RPGs for tandem-warhead), I'd let it slide without testing, although twice that's come back to bite me in the ass. Obviously, I've become a HUGE fan of the High Command module since the release of ArmA2.

    Player's being asshats I've not found a systematic way of solving, but I never gave up trying. And never will. Generally though, I find out that about two-thirds of the public missions I'm working on just aren't fun, balanced or asshat resistant and I scrap them.

  18. Posted

    That is the most rediculous thing I have seen someone comment here. How are you able to tell the "color" of a person by their voice aside from obvious slangs and language useage of certain geographical locations?

    Clearly you have not heard 1SG Miles' voice in-game. I could accept the tone and inflection of certain words being misrepresentative of his race, but my god, he's stated to be in his damned late 30s yet he sounds like he's 15.

  19. Posted

    It was frustrating for me the first few times it happened. But like I said, I can count on one hand how many times I actually passed out and still have a finger left over to pick my nose. You had to pretty much ignore the warning signs and it wasn't like they were subtle.

    If it was the type of thing that just happened out of the blue, I agree with you. But in this case, nah, unrealistic behavior should be punished harshly, so any rational cost/benefit analysis sends you right back to realistic gameplay.

  20. Posted

    but it is impossible using motars right now (vanilla) to hit near a target or adjust fire. I don't want uber complicated but i would like functional.

    not sure that angle/elevation setting numerically entries would be that complicated.

    point and click i can do through arti module right now but then the AI fires.

    Open up editor. Place rifleman (player). Place empty mortar. Go to "Modules". Place "Artillery Module". Hit "Preview". Get in mortar as gunner. Select "Target Artillery" from the action menu.

    Bask in the luxury of indirect fire.

  21. Posted · Edited by Apocal

    Yeah, one AT round and launcher. And my primary weapon with clips (note it's an M16 and not a SAW). Look at the video. I'm not carrying a AA weapon, a machine gun, and three backpacks.

    It's an MG36 you are carrying. I see that much. I also see an AT4, but since you didn't show your gear menu, I can't tell the most important part; how much weight total.

    Did you ever play AMRA with ACE? The stamina system was beyond retarded.

    It was a good tradeoff between the technical issues of not being able to adjust player speed, but needing some way of penalizing them for carrying heavy weapons. The passing out thing was harsh, but it needed to be to force players to respect the limitations. I think I blacked out all of two or three times total in the seven months I played the ACE mod. My guy is exhausted? Stop moving, wait 15-45 seconds, start moving again. People that felt the need to move fast had plenty of forewarning.

    No, I do not expect to be able to carry 300lbs of gear and sprint endlessly. But the default ArmA stamina system was far better than the one imposed by ACE.

    Sprinting endlessly was more or less what default ArmA stamina was...

    Problem was that you couldnt even walk with a decent amount of extra stuff on your back without passing out so in the end you needed a vehicle for your extra gear anyway which made the whole backpack feature pointless. :p
    I assure you that I can hump 60lbs of gear across my lawn without "blacking out" after ten paces or "falling to the ground" after 30 paces.

    ACE stamina = fail

    24kg - 52lbs. And that's a damned sight bigger than any lawn I've walked across. As a bonus feature, skip ahead to 2:10 for the 51kg sprint. Also, unlike yours, you can see (in HQ anyway) just what my weight is according to the gear menu. What exactly were you carrying that you only make 10 paces before exhaustion and 30 before collapse? Let's be honest now. On top of all this, ACE had a "base" 15-20kg (can't recall off the top of my head) on top of what you had in terms of selectable gear; to simulate flak, kevlar, camelbak, boots, utes, etc that didn't show up in the gear menu.

    So my 24kg was actually more like 40kg... yet I can still move with a purpose over hundreds of meters before becoming exhausted. And even with a combat load of 65kg (51+15, rounded down AKA still over 140lbs) I'm able to jog for a not-insignificant distance.

    The only way that ACE's stamina system failed was in allowing me to regularly pack that much (I took some crazy loadout, like a M240 with 1100 rounds of ammunition, CLU with 2 Javelins and laser designator when playing Domination) and I never felt particularly punished by it.

    A stamina system I used in another game by plugging numbers into 2 mods other people made for modifying speed based on gear bulk:

    Which was apparently not possible to do in ArmA1. Speed remained uniform regardless of fatigue, only sight wavering increased. So they did the next best thing.

    EDIT: And upon watching your video again, it's not even from a cold start! WTF man, biased much?

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