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No to #2. Volumes of sounds should be consistent across the board for realism sake. Also it could be used to get advantages in game if for instance I turn down engine sounds so I can hear people moving around me or talking around me more easily. If I am standing next to a loud vehicle, my ability to hear other things should be impacted.

I am also getting this problem again. I have updated to latest Nvidia beta drivers. I remember having this issue in A3 originally when playing with 3 monitors due to playing in SLI to achieve that. However, now I am only playing on one montior (other 2 are just displaying windows) but PiP seems to have reverted to the flickering buggy state. Playing on one monitor fixed the problem during the alpha stage and early in the beta before the UAVs came out. Running a single GTX 690 here.

It's more like it was a poor marketing decision by BIS to maintain an inconsistent bundle-pricing structure. The way they structured their packages seemed to indicate that there would not be a physical bundle later on. And usually when someone pays for the largest bundle, they expect to get all the goodies that come with it. As a customer it is a bit annoying when the company isn't transparent with their pricing packages and now someone who is paying less can get a physical map whereas my intention to support BIS is costing me that. Sure maybe BIS will update their map pack in the future but the point still stands that the supporters would have to incur extra cost to get something that non-supporters already have simply because they chose not to support BIS.

http://www.vg247.com/2013/08/14/arma-3-limited-deluxe-edition-detailed-for-september-12-launch-contents-inside/ It was confirmed earlier today that there will be a Limited Deluxe Edition with a physical copy plus some other goodies including a physical map of Altis. A few months ago I was under the impression that there would not be a physical copy and so I grabbed the supporter edition right away. Now that there is a physical copy, is there a way for us early adopters of A3 to get a copy and with the map? We wouldn't need a key for the game since we already have it, but it would be nice to be able to get the box, map and disc + case. Is Bohemia planning some way for us early supporters to get a hold of these physical goods?

*somehow clicking back on the page reposted my old post

The answer you will get a lot on these forums is: A) your computer is CPU bottlenecked B) your computer is GPU bottlenecked The solution we are actually looking for are: A) Devs are working on optimizing engine B) Nvidia is working with BIS to optimize drivers for A3. But very few people on this forum will actually want to come out and say yes BIS and Nvidia need to get together to work out this problem so that users can get a solution. Instead they will revert to the CPU/GPU bottleneck answer that gives the developers a free pass. I'm not saying it is easy to optimize for a game like Arma but I'm tired of seeing people reporting legitimate issues with performance and getting bs answers excusing the developers from responsibility for their product. You can come here and post a spec with some of the best hardware available on the market but someone will always chime in and say "oh, but it doesn't matter that you have a $2000 set of video cards, you are CPU bottlenecked". And even if you respond with the fact that you have a $1000 6 core CPU, they'd rather argue how you need an even more powerful CPU to get any performance increases. I'm as much a fan of BIS and the Arma series as anyone else on this forum but I always get annoyed by these kinds of excuses the community likes to indulge in.

Should this even be a question? Arma should always prioritize realism over balance. If you want balance, make missions featuring asymmetrical warfare.

Perhaps you should read the rest of my post then: "Also sometimes, the air option is simply not available. If the enemy has a high amount of AA capability, then no commander would send in air forces and expect them to execute their objectives properly. Lots of Arma players have this mentality that if an asset is available then they should be able to use it. Most missions are not designed to showcase those assets and you should use proper judgment and intel when deciding to use an asset. Domi/warfare/wasteland doesn't usually ask for any of this and thats why players have this idea that the "game is unbalanced" because suddenly conditions changed and their simple run and gun tactics are failing them now." Arma's mechanics do not need to be adjusted for chaotic public matches. You are playing unrealistic missions like domi/warefare/wasteland and expecting the rest of the game to be tweaked to suit those missions. Arma does not need to be adjusted for those 3 game modes; the developers only need to try to reflect reality as closely as possible and allow mission makers to build the scenarios they want to build. If you only like to play those 3 types of game modes, take it up with those mission makers because you are complaining in the wrong forum. Unless you can find some real life research/proof that flares are being depicted as unrealistically ineffective then you need to learn to adapt to the situation. Either find a coordinated group to play with or improve your flying skills so you don't get killed as much in pub servers.

Uh, you know this is why roles like JTAC exist right? You are supposed to be executing attacks in coordination with ground forces who will spot and identify enemy targets as well as AA for you. CAS doesn't just stay on site in a battle area unless it is highly certain that enemy forces have no significant AA threat. CAS is supposed to provide quick and precise strikes usually with coordination from the ground or other intel source. Once you are given a strike location and target, you take the the most concealed or distant position you need to execute the strike. If possible always execute strike orders from range and wipe out the enemy before they have a chance to engage you. If the enemy happens to be in a well covered location and requires you to get closer, there are a variety of tactics such as peaking over the top of hills to take your shot before descending back into cover, or making a fast attack run that takes you from a covered position into another covered position. I also hope you know also tactical domi is a bad representation of what actual missions might be like. You don't just have one circular AO and random forces all over. Typically there are blue/red zones drawn up that encompass rather large areas and once you exit a blue zone you are considered in danger because there may be unknown threats out there. Red is only the known areas of enemy activity. In the case of domi, once you leave your base (and sometimes even before that) you should consider yourself in danger and apply all tactics possible to minimize it (fly NOE, head to your obj then execute and rtb, don't be on standby unless ordered to, etc). Also sometimes, the air option is simply not available. If the enemy has a high amount of AA capability, then no commander would send in air forces and expect them to execute their objectives properly. Lots of Arma players have this mentality that if an asset is available then they should be able to use it. Most missions are not designed to showcase those assets and you should use proper judgment and intel when deciding to use an asset. Domi/warfare/wasteland doesn't usually ask for any of this and thats why players have this idea that the "game is unbalanced" because suddenly conditions changed and their simple run and gun tactics are failing them now.

Just performed a test tonight. Placed 4 AA soldiers in the city northwest of the middle airfield of Altis. Started with a ghosthawk on the airfield and made several fly overs the city. I was always able to dodge at least 1 AA rocket with the aid of flares. I was once able to dodge 3 rockets, 2 of which were assisted with flares and 1 of which I ran out of flares but performed a diving maneuver to break lock. What worked even better though was when I just flew NOE to the city, which allowed me to fly right over the city and land on the edge of town without any lock to "simulate" a insertion/extraction scenario. So honestly, I can not see the AA issue you are describing. Yes the AA rockets seem more effective than in A2 but in A2, AA was too easy to dodge using flares. My suggestions are listed below: 1. Do not fly within 2km of AA if you don't know what you are doing. 2. If you have to fly near AA, fly NOE whenever possible (I recommend ~13-15m because lower than that and you might catch an accidental powerline). 3. Always approach from cover and land in cover. Unless the AA is placed on top of a hill overwatching the entire AO or in the middle of a flat plain, you should be able to get reasonably close to insert or extract troops. Also dropping off troops 1km out of a hot AO is more appropriate than dropping them off 100m from the AO. 4. Keep speed above 150kph whenever possible. 5. If you do get locked on, dump flares immediately, dive downwards and increase speed as much as possible (which happens anyway if you try to dive). Then do not hang around that area because a second rocket will come and you might be so lucky.

No this is Arma, not any other computer game. Why should the devs intentionally mis-simulate something for a mod to fix? Unless you have proof that right now AA missiles are accurate beyond a realistic value then this is not a valid request. Perhaps as a pilot you should be trying to avoid active AA zones rather than flying through them?

Yes exactly this. Arma is a sandbox game if you add too much story based flavoring then the map becomes unusable for other purposes. Regardless of whether or not a war zone would have this many wrecks, or if mediterranean islands would or how realistic this would be, from a functional standpoint it would be much better to remove most of wrecks and flavoring of that nature and allow modders to add them in. Unless there is some sort of technical issue with placing wrecks (like fire-bug killing everyone), then it would be best to minimize their placement on the default map. A few here and there for unique flavoring would be fine.

Well a digital map isn't really the same thing. And once the game is out I'm sure anyone can find a digital version online. Also from the lack of official BIS response I am assuming they are not gonna do anything for us supporters. So anyone who purchased early is kinda getting screwed here.

I'd like to get an official answer form a BIS representative please. A lot of us here did pay early and pay extra and it would not be a good experience to miss out on goodies like the map just because we tried to support BIS.

Have you confirmed that the FaceTrackNoIR software is properly detecting and smoothly tracking your face? I remember trying the software using a 720P webcam and it just didnt work well enough to use in game. The tracking would fail sometimes or would jitter around too much. Some general tips: 1. Get good lighting on your face. Sometimes just your regular room lighting might not be enough especially at night times. 2. Use the best webcam you can get 3. Try to reduce clutter in the background that might confuse the software. A nice solid color behind you would work the best. 4. Play around with the FaceTrackNoIR software settings before taking it in game. It should track you very well and closely before it will feel good in game.

Thats true about the radio man, but that radio man carries the long range which is still true. Personal radios have short transmission range and are used for squads to communicate within themselves. There still needs to be someone with a long range radio to maintain comms with other elements of the army. I would be fine with a advanced vs simple GPS/nav tool but this should still be left up to the mission designer.

This is a mission editing issue. Soldiers are not always ideally equipped for every situation and need to adapt to overcome them. It is not a "messed up system". It is a simulation, a sandbox environment, and it allows mission creators to do interesting things with their mission. If a group gets split up you should meet up at a rally point specified earlier, or you should use your radios to try to communicate with each other. There is no need for some magical your-squad-leader-is-here system. All of these challenges are ones that real life operations face and there is no reason you can't do the same in Arma. And I can give you a reason for why not all soldiers would have a gps. In non special forces units, squad members are expected to function as a squad and be with their team the whole time. It would incredibly redundant and costly to issue a gps to every single soldier when you don't need to individually navigate. Just like how long range radios are not issued to every single soldier because you have specific roles that handle that function.

He's not saying to get rid of maps. Please re-read his post. Red circle should be a difficulty/server setting. Some people like to have an easier time so the red circle is good for them. For more experienced players, the circle breaks the realism for scenarios. There are potential scenarios where the player can start out lost and needs to navigate to a certain location. The red circle completely denies that possibility. To have a general idea of where you start, that should be up to the mission maker to place good insertion/you are here markers instead of using a red circle that doesn't do a good a job at this and also defeats attempts are more complex scenarios. Marker sync and GPS should be gear related, not side related. If the gear (opfor helmet, blufor goggles, gps etc) is available then the soldier would be able to enable friendly force markers, GPS navigation, global map markers, etc. If the soldier is not using that gear, then they should not by default have the high tech navigation and coordination benefits that the gear is supposed to enable. Although some issues should be left up to the mission maker to decide, most of the OP's points are valid in that he is striving to achieve greater realism than current gameplay mechanics that are more game-like in nature.

I've played through all the showcases now and I'd like to go over their strengths and weaknesses and hope BI takes note of this for any future showcases. ------------------------------------- Infantry Showcase The good: mission concept is solid. The bad: the mission execution plan and AI behavior. The main reason the showcase is a pain is because your friendly AI tends to have subpar accuracy and spotting skills compared to the enemy. Enemy fire rapidly takes out you and your squad. The problem is only made worse by the mission execution plan defined in the briefing. The plan has your squad running through an exposed valley while enemies engage you from superior positions on the hillsides or waiting in the valley to stop you with superior firepower. Instead of sticking with your squad, you are forced to abandon them and counter attack from the hill as well. This kills the immersion of the scenario the devs tried to setup in the first place. Autosaves are very sparse, sometimes causing you to have to start the mission from the beginning because of an AI error or a few misplaced shots. ------------------------------------- SCUBA Showcase. The good: cool scenario and allows for multiple strategies for completing it. The bad: slight bugginess on sabotaging the boat (you can overcome this by sighting in with your weapon and then trying again). Overall pretty decent showcase. Does its job of showing off the SCUBA abilities and presents a decent challenge without having a frustrating amount of enemies. Would have been nice if SCUBA was more of a focus than the on land portions though. ------------------------------------- Vehicles Showcase The good: straightforward scenario without many potential failure points. Good autosave points. The bad: not much to complain about here. For a vehicle showcase, seems like an odd decision to start the player without a vehicle. Could have easily done a similar showcase by having you support a friendly squad using a Hunter. ------------------------------------- Helicopters Showcase The good: fun showcase demonstrating most of the aspects of piloting the helicopter. The bad: not much to say here. Its a pretty good showcase. ------------------------------------- Combined Arms Showcase The good: interesting concept. The bad: the execution is very bad. All the combined arms elements do nothing to impact the mission at all. CAS does a single run that has little to no effect on the enemy (depends on whether you take out their vehicle or the CAS does). APC gets destroyed almost instantly without doing anything. Once again the squad is pushing through a valley instead of taking superior fire positions from the hillsides. Once again, friendly AI seems to get devastated by enemy AI fire. This showcase is supposed to show off the intersection of armor/air/infantry combat and how they work together to accomplish missions. Instead this showcase just demonstrates how incompetent or useless vehicle AI can be. Instead of the friendly APC staying at a distance to engage enemies using superior range and firepower, it drives right up to the enemy and gets blown up right away (I've tried this mission like 10 times and never has the APC survived to do anything). Similarly, the CAS has 0 effect on the enemy. It does make a single pass but besides hitting the enemy vehicle (which you can easily do yourself as an AT soldier), it does nothing to the enemy infantry. Once again the scenario places your friendly squads in tactically disadvantageous positions. The main advantage to an approach from the valley is concealment and stealth, however, the chopper landing quickly gives that away and your squads do not get close to the enemy base before being engaged. This disadvantage could have been used to demonstrate the power of combined arms tactics (yes you engage from a compromised position, but your CAS and APC turn this around!), but as explained above they have 0 impact and turn the combined arms showcase into an infantry showcase at about 3 minutes in. ------------------------------------- Commanding Showcase The good: not a bad idea having a showcase where you learn to manage AI. The bad: your squad AI tends to suck and fail leaving the player feeling dissatisfied or feeling like they need to micromanage every little action the AI takes. The scenario is better thought out with the mission plan suggesting the player take an advantageous position on the southern hillside. However, once the action starts, the friendly AI's inability to react to threats usually messes up any positional benefits. My primary issues with the AI are: 1) they don't spot enemies fast enough - even when I start shooting at them they do not seem to notice, and this in turn causes the enemy to focus their aim on me. 2) they get distracted - I had a plan to have the AI stay on the hillside mostly facing away from the bay to avoid fire from the assault boat. However, early on the AI catch a glance of the speedboat and from then on they seem to turn to face it a lot or take potshots at it. They have failed to spot or engage the enemy several times because they were distracted by the speed boat. I cannot order them to ignore it either. 3) they don't have a good concept of cover or overwatch - if you order them to take cover, the are likely to end up bunched together in a spot with some cover and all facing the same direction (usually the wrong one too). Or they can end up out in the open but prone, or they could end up in a place with a lot of concealment where they can not see the enemy. My best solution to get around this was just to have them stay in line formation and ordered them to hold position. My manual positioning gets some of them into cover and makes sure they all have LOS on the approaching enemy. A lot of these problems stem from large AI issues but that being the case, the devs should probably make an AI worth commanding before making a showcase for it. ------------------------------------- Night Showcase The good: cool concept. The bad: equipment/loadout is totally messed up. It is not very dark for a night. This could have been a really cool mission but instead it leaves the player feeling disgrunted. 1. For a night and stealth mission the player is not given a silenced weapon at all. This doesn't help the fact that nearly all the points of interest have enemy presence that need to be neutralized. 2. It is very bright for night time and it just feels immersion breaking when they enemy appears to be unable to see you despite it being pretty light out, and with a lighthouse shining on you. 3. Flashlight is useless. See 2) and also it has very little range on its illumination which makes it barely light up anything even when it does. ------------------------------------- Supports Showcase The good: good concept, fun mission, well executed. The bad: not much to say here. This was a very good showcase. All the elements of the showcase are successfully demonstrated and the showcase is pretty fun to run through. The has enough assets to never feel like they are facing an impossible challenge and there are enough enemies such that the player has something to do as well. ------------------------------------- You'll notice that most of the showcases that were well done featured: 1. Solo missions - no friendly AI to deal with 2. Sufficient firepower/assets to deal with enemy threats 3. Sufficient enemies so that the player feels challenged 4. Good strategy on the mission makers part (player starts in a tactically strong position; mission plan does not force the player to do stupid things) 5. Good introduction and coverage of showcase themes. For the bad showcases, the opposite points of 1-5 hold true. 1. Dealing with friendly AI is usually more frustrating than fun since they are usually incompetent. 2. The player is heavily outgunned and facing impossible odds 3. Bad mission plans. Player's squads have to do tactically stupid things that get them killed 4. Bad interaction with showcase elements (e.g. combined arms showcase that offers little combined arms support, night showcase that offers no stealth weapons)

Can someone post a video of all the problems they are having? I play on elite difficulty with AI on .85 and I have not gotten any problems with insane AI spotting me from too far away or it being too dark to see anything. In fact my complaint for the AI is that they can't seem to spot you even though its not that dark out. Other than that it would be nice to have a silencer. I am fine without NVGs because on a moonlit night like that you don't really need any. Flashlights are not that useful with the night mission being that bright.

One of the big problems with AI is that the squad based AI behave in a very unrealistic way. There is a lot of dissonance between what the expected behavior of an order should be and what the actual behavior is. It feels like they understand the general principles of squad based tactics but execute them in totally haphazard ways. Thus when you are part of an AI lead squad, you just want to run off without them because they feel cumbersome to be around and get in the way. When you are leading a squad it is even worse because they aren't very "smart" and require a lot of managing to get things done. However, the commands you have to manage them are not very conveniently mapped out and are not sufficient to get the job done. There is a bad mixture of the AI having enough freedom to make decisions to mess things up and not enough freedom to take initiative and get the job done. An example of where the controls are not detailed enough are: you can either tell the AI to hold fire, or open fire. You can't say hold fire on enemy group A but open fire on enemy group B. Sure you could emulate this by first designating targets and then ordering a hold fire immediately after enemy B is taken out, but this is a lot of micromanaging for what should be a relatively simple order to give if the player were explaining to a group of real people. For AI freedom vs following orders strictly scenario: You take a defensive position on a hill top, you order you teammates to stop and to face a certain direction. However, as soon as they see an enemy they will turn to track it instead of facing the direction you ordered them too. Now lets say your squad starts taking fire, AI will not readjust the position to get into cover or readjust to make it easier to engage enemy forces because you gave them a stop command. With real players you would say something like: "Line formation facing N covering bearing 300-060" to let your teammates know you want to have an overall facing of N but to watch outwards to the W and E slightly as well. Players if they spot an enemy would track them but would also maintain their primary focus on N unless otherwise ordered. You would also expect them to automatically move to get clear shots on the enemy or to get into cover when under fire. You just can't simply order and expect AI to do that. Hence you have this bad mixture of pseudo-intelligent AI that kinda follows orders but not really and you don't have detailed enough controls to specify exactly what you want them to do. Ideally we would get "smart" AI that behave more or less like real people but that is something that is very hard to do and would not be reasonable to expect. But to be honest, in lieu of "smart" AI, I'd rather have really "dumb" AI that do exactly as told because then they move and react predictably and I can put them to use knowing their limitations. With the current pseudo-intelligent AI I can't really trust them with anything because sometimes they will be great and sometimes they will ignore some of the most obvious dangers and this switch from awesome to dumb can happen within seconds of each other.

Overall I think the weapons handling with the new stances are pretty good. There are few points that would be be good to have. 1. Sights when side proned (ctrl+q/e when prone). It would be nice to be able to bring up the sights in this stance. In the current state it is not very useful because it is very hard to aim when in this stance. Can anyone with real experience handling rifles chime in on whether it is possible? 2. Rifle in ready to fire position when moving prone. Currently if you go prone and start moving, your soldier starts moving the rifle along with his crawl which prevents you from firing until approximately a half second to a second after you stop moving. It would be nice to be able to have the rifle ready to fire even when moving prone because sometimes you are trying to inch along a ridgeline or something to get a quick shot on a contact. This is even more needed for when you have your sights up. Sometimes you are just trying to move slightly to align a shot but when prone, your soldier completely lowers the weapon to move before bringing it back up again. My proposed change would be implemented this way: "walking" prone speed = rifle always up and ready to fire. This should be a bit slower move speed than the current one to account for having to keep the rifle up. "Tactical walking" prone speed = rifle always up but with more sway than then the default "walking" prone speed. "Run" or "sprint" prone speed = weapon lowered and speed is the same as it currently is. When sights are up, moving will not lower them and the slower you are, the less sway the rifle should experience, the faster you are the more sway.

I agree that it would be a great change if weapon switching didn't freeze the player in place anymore. However, just FYI you can get gold on all the challenges even in the current state.

Yes, I agree the sandbox nature of the Arma missions is what makes it interesting and fun. I tried the combined arms showcase again today and that brought my count up to about 20 or so times on the combined arms showcase. I did manage to see the APC survive once but it was a combination of a lot of lucky factors. My squad was particularly good that time at eliminating enemy infantry early on and some squad members ended up going prone on the road which delayed the APC and allowed it to engage from a further distance with infantry support it in front. I am not sure that was intentional since usually the APC will drive up to the mound just south west of the camp. It is strange though because I feel the AI has a decent understanding of how to use terrain. After securing the camp, the APC actually used some of the hills to get elevation on the enemy targets coming in from the west and also managed to out-maneuver the enemy APC. However, the in the early portion the APC seems to prefer rushing up to the enemy still and ignores the sense it displays later in the mission when it survived. I feel like this is the major issue most players have with this mission. The APC is a HUGE asset when it comes to securing and defending the camp. Without it, the missions becomes incredibly difficult. If only the APC preferred using its range early on, it would make the showcase much easier. Regarding the helicopter in the combined arms showcase, in my experience with the showcase, the CAS heli usually survives. I've only seen it shot down maybe 2-3 times that I've played but usually it does a very short run before leaving. Also it seems to depend on whether the enemy APC is taken out by the infantry at the beginning or not. When the enemy APC is alive, usually the CAS makes a single run to take it out and sometimes a second gun run on some infantry before leaving. If the enemy APC is taken out, the CAS seems to make a gun run before leaving the AO. However, the gun runs are not very effective usually so I have not been able to depend on it very much. Overall though, I'd say most of the showcases were pretty enjoyable and they all pretty much serve their purpose.

What difficulties are you playing with? Maybe my settings are making the game too hard. I play on Elite using 1.00 for friendly AI and 0.85 for enemy AI. However, my AI still are worse shots than the enemy even sometimes when spotting them first (i.e. on command one). On this setting even from a concealed position, if you do not hit the enemy AI within 2-3 shots they will detect and kill you right away. So even when the ambush goes right it is hard to survive because if you or your AI miss you start losing forces. The other issue is the distance at which the game detects you, the player, "spots enemies". Sometimes it is very good and "spots" them as soon as you put your crosshairs on them, allowing you to give orders on the target. For me, when the main force arrives, they are almost charging fully down into the valley before my character "spots" a few guys. Even though I could clearly see them ~20s beforehand they are not always "spotted" and I can't perform orders on them. I find it strange that the AI isn't coded to respond to you shooting at something as well.