I agree that a more realistic arty system would be good. A proper call for fire would really crank up that realism knob that everybody is so sensitive about. Even if we agree in missions with arty to not use Global marks on the map and attempt to actually use map coordinates between the forward observer and the battery, one round to spot, adjust laterally and for depth and then fire-fire for effect. What would be nice would be a variable load out for the guns. Smoke to spot initial round impacts or conceal movement, flares for night time missions, HE rounds, WP rounds, DPICM, laser guided rounds, etc.

Sounds good. Either way, I look forward to it. Interestingly, I found this yesterday at Armaholic.

http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=16248

No mention of it on the BIS forums, and yes, it's another M4 addon, but really well done. The ACOG optics are 3D and not just an image overlay. Has all the regular bells and whistles (PEQ, GL, Forward Grip, light), but most importantly, the SD ammo actually works! Plus it inherits whatever sound mod you have. While I love RobertHammer's work, his M4 sounds and SD ballistics are crap.

Anyway, I thought I'd mention it not as another addon addition, but as a couple of data points for working SD ballistics and a neat reticule system.



Theoretically, the SecOps module lets you do this. You can call for a particular fire mission (including lasing for rounds) and then the game generates the arty or mortar attack. What I haven't figured out how to do is keep the mission active so you can spot rounds then fire for effect. So far I can only get one thing to happen (spot, smoke, HE, etc) before you need to reset the module and call for the fire again. There's still pages to read about the SecOps on the BIS thread that I haven't had time to go through, though.

Although I don't have much time invested into the server these days and am a little late to the party on this topic, I feel it's worth weighing in as someone who's spent a few dozen hours researching and implementing mods for use on the server.

Mods obviously fill in a lot of gaps for units, terrain, and features that were missed out of the game. It didn't take us too long in ArmA2 to hit the wall with the USMC/Russian/insurgent units we had and the heavily forested terrain of Chernarus before we went looking for something else. At the same time, to say that distributing and implementing new mods and updates for old ones is a frustrating process is a huge understatement. It'd be nice to maybe have something like Six Updater to easily manage the updates, but otherwise we've grown to expect slowdowns for the first few weeks as players can't find the time to download new mods, can't figure out how to install them, or somehow botch their install. When you switch to a newly released map and lose two or three players out of a group of twelve, that's a relatively big impact. This has happened and will happen again; it's the reality of adding new stuff to an already-complicated game.

So, thinking strategically, I guess the question should be: what kind of game do we really want here? Do we want to keep things accessible and open to a broad group? Perhaps not necessarily; we've tried that approach for a long time by keeping mods to a minimum, providing detailed setup instructions, and conducting very thorough testing (taking several weeks before rolling out a single island), and don't have much to show for it. Or do we want a smaller, intimate group with more focus on fun with new gizmos and gadgets? That seems to be the direction Military Monday is headed, which is understandable if that's what the players want.

My two cents - going back to the ArmA1 days, we went a very long time without using any 'real' mods of any sort. Because the focus was on hardcore tactics, we played to beat missions the best and most efficient ways that we could. We used the same ol' M16 varients for months and months, and very few people got tired of them to the point of going vocal with them. As the tone of the gameplay has become more amiable, we're paying less attention to hardcore tactics and more on the kind of toys that we have at our disposal. Not how I would prefer things, but again, if it's what the players want, it's the direction we should take.

That said, two suggested guidelines for choosing mods with which to move forward:

1. Test, test, test, and test some more. Test with existing missions, test with new missions. As you've already seen, some mods might work well for some, but totally break for others. Put a couple of hours into each one, and make sure they are not going to cause surprises down the road.

2. When deciding what mods to add, the 'test' should be - is adding this mod worth the inconvenience it will cause for players? We still have a few people on slow connections, so downloading a gigabyte or two for next week is not so easy for them. Likewise, not everyone is totally comfortable with fishing around in the ArmA directories and shortcuts to update or add new mods.

My thoughts are that mods aimed at introducing new units or vehicles don't necessarily add enough to the game to make them worth the trouble for players, especially when we've only tapped into a fraction of what's available in the game. I've only ever seen one or two missions made with the stock Czech units, for example. Likewise with some fun toys like player-crewed mortars or artillery.

Good points fatty, i was actually throwing out an idea of when the mods are available to download, to only use the new content after, or near the end of, the regular playing sessions (or if you know for certain everyone on the server has them) for a couple of weeks to a month, to give everyone time to download it and install it. As to installing, i belive taos aim is haveing a 1 shot folder, so if need be you could just put its addon folder into on of the current maps folder and you wouldnt have to activate anything.




have to admit, i do kinda miss some of the more tactical stuff we did in the arma1 days, things have relaxed a fair amount, but i guess thats to be expected when the same group of people turn up each week, so long as the team work and tatics stay in place i dont mind banter etc during the missions. So long as it doesnt override the SL or TLs.



Good point, from my view i've got a little bored of the same stuff after all these years, if you look at the mods listed to be added its more about expanding the current stuff rather than replaceing them, or changeing them a little (like woodland camo for the US stuff, no more green russians in the desert etc)



one of the reasons i dont use the czech stuff is the amount of comments you get about the weapons they use, you always seem to end up with a squad full of AKs or FALS that have been picked up instead of the G36s. The thing i dont like about the mortors and arty is that its a bit of a pita to set up if you want them as AI, and can get very boreing when you playing them, open computer, click, fire .. instant direct hit. Also there isnt always the player count to spare to have a couple of people on mortors

First, I'm going to delay proposing any release version for at least a week, so I can continue testing. I had planned to do a lot of testing over the weekend, but I ended up traveling and couldn't do any at all. With my other responsibilities this week, I can't put in an appropriate amount of time for test work. To give you an idea of my testing, not only do I test the mods in action on brand new and old missions, but I also de-PBO them and check the config file to ensure that they don't interact with other units/maps in any way.

@fatty: your input is very valuable to me. I want to comment on a few things.

I'm not sure how it was in the early days, since I wasn't here. I would be interested to hear exactly how tactics have changed since then. When I joined, we were playing really the same way we are now, so I simply don't know. Anyone who knows this stuff, tell me. I will try and make it happen again, at least every now and then, as a squad leader.

For me, ArmA is a really terrible simulator of small things. Because the game is so huge, the details are simply not there. Use of cover, weapons, weapon resting, interaction with doors, buildings, and glass -- stuff like that is extremely primitive at best. In a scenario where one would likely blind fire, for example, it is simply not an option. In a case where you would breach a door: impossible, unless by breach you mean 'use satchel to level house.' If the grass is too high, I can't raise my head up and look without coming up from prone to crouch. You can't even shoot out glass. All of the things that would make it a 'tactical' shooter to me are absent -- the kind of things found in the good Rainbow 6 games, for example. It sucks in that role. I wouldn't play it, I don't think.

That's why I've focused on adding stuff that expands what ArmA is good at. More support units for the infantry core. More options for the infantry to get CAS and armor/mechanized support. Updated infantry models and camo patterns so that suspension of disbelief is not interrupted in certain environments. Tools for faster (much faster TBH, since I don't have to build detailed bases much now) mission making. There are literally no changes to the gameplay being rolled out, and none of the mods will retroactively change anything whatsoever. I've even dropped my updated ballistics. I will include it in an optional client-side mod later, and it will only affect the player's bullets (that this is possible opens up a huge number of possibilities, too...). This is my goal, because I am strictly opposed to breaking stuff that already works.

Install process for players should be: download one file, unzip it into your ArmA 2 folder. Run ArmA, open the expansions menu, and click Enable on @SimHQUnits, @SimHQMaps, @CBA. Since BIS fixed the Expansions menu in 1.6, there's little reason to use a launcher or a command line unless you are a dev. I expect the download to be under 2GB and we will follow Meatshield's suggested approach, to avoid losing players early due to issues. I will also prep a mission that you can log onto the server and select which will let you quickly see if you're good to play.

@Beans: The R3F scripted arty allows all of that. It's really cool. I will experiment with it further.

@Gator: I've checked that addon out, and I really like the 3D ACOGs, but it adds an insane amount of config clutter, including tons of stuff for weapons that are not in the mod and are just bugged out placeholders. Most likely there will be no weapons in the update, with the possible exception of the RH M4/M16 pack, which I will adjust to not override built-in sounds (have to check the license terms).

The only difference i can see (or remember!) is that people are just more relaxed now and chat a bit more. Brennus still has a load of vids from MMs gone by http://www.youtube.com/user/Brennus you can find older ones from the arma1 days if you dig deep enough

@Gator: Another update. Nevermind about the config stuff. That was my misinterpretation. I fixed the RH M4/M16 with a separate addon that I wrote which removes the sounds and uses whatever the game would usually use. I will most likely include these weapons. Because I dig the ACOG thing so much, I might later release a small addon that will do a client-side graphics replacement for all the existing ACOGged M4s with those.

Suh-weet. I tried playing with RH's configs on the M4 addons and their sound and couldn't get it to recompile. I'm sure it was operator error, but if you could share a config that makes that happen, that would be awesome. I started a thread over at BIS about this but it kind of degenerated into a permission/use argument, which didn't help. I was mostly asking for my own personal education, but you know how that goes.

If you'd like a (Single Player...just can't get the time to get online with you guys now that I'm in PDT) tester for the sound config, let me know. Adding the 3D ACOGs is great too, but I completely understand if it causes issues and not wanting to go there. It was just a neat discovery I made this weekend.

As for Fatty's comments, as usual, he knows of what he speaks. It's good to find the balance between toys and tactics.

Please link me to the thread. Those addons do not include any licensing information, so I have been hesitant to include them.

Yep, anytime there is doubt about licensing or distribution for addons I'd go the distance to personally contact the author. More than once I was denied permission to host an addon for our players. That's the author's decision of course, and I'm fine with that, even though for how we have traditionally managed our addons it does rule out those we couldn't host.

Tao, after there is a final addon candidate list you've got approval on from SimHQ management, if you'd like me to make those contacts and collect permissions, just mail me.

Some good points fatty. I would disagree that we've not much to show for how the addons have been managed over the last few years. My objectives with the slower addon approach was not really aimed at easy accessibility for new players. Plenty of new players load up with a considerable addon load for play elsewhere. My thinking was of our regulars, many of whom are still with the group. A straight forward, low maintenance setup that guys with kids and schedules didn't have to waste much time keeping track of. They could go away for a week or a couple of months and still be able to jump back in right where they left off.

A core of quality "regulars" who seemed to appreciate that addon management approach, and who still find enjoyment there weekly, was for me a satisfying result.