Observer Addon

[Unnamed]

Hi,

My first attempt at an addon, well almost an addon

I've setup some infantry units to act as observers for East,West and Resistance. Including Black Ops day/night and Spetz Natz.

They will scan the horizon with binoculars almost indefinitely. They will stop, if the player tells them to or they are killed or threatened.

You can order them to start and stop via their action menu or scripts, with a choice of stance (Standing,Combat,Crouching and Prone).

The observers have the same eyesight quality as snipers, this with binoculars roughly doubles their detection range.

At best, the observer should spot units moving in the open, at a range of around 1000m. Add a sniper to the observers group and he will open fire from around 900m, on the desert island.

See the readme in the attached zip file, for more info and example missions.

Any suggestions, advice e.t.c is always welcome.

Cheers

[Bruce Banner]

Any chance of a Nam soldier?

[Unnamed]

Yeah, it's in the pipeline.

I'm fixing some bugs and giving the AI the option to describe and prioritise targets.

He is ultimately destined to be a Forward Observer for my Mortar scripts, so a SEB Nam version is a definite

[Bruce Banner]

My thinking also. Good work fella.

[Zayfod]

Wow--very VERY nice!

This addon contains some very advanced scripting and has potential to be applied to many other opflash applications (which havent been done yet or even seriously attempted).

Take a look inside at what hes done, I for one can see quite a few opening doors here.

 This is indeed a neat find--Ill be watching this thread closely.

Fantastic work mate, dont stop now. :thumbsup:

Zay

[cliff]

This is the kind of addon needed to increase gameplay and realism, not another M4  

I like the trend with scripts and addons making your average OFP-AInutcase a bit more realistic. Try Keycats grouplink script, the SP/MP pack and this all together for a different OFP experience.

Great work, keep it up.

[sanam]

Downloading Now.

I've always been fascinated by the way the snipers pop up & run for the ennemy (instead of firing from where they are) when you tell them to engage a target. I hope this solves the problem.

"See" you.

Peacepunk

[Unnamed]

Thanks all for the replies,

I always had this guy in mind for my Mortar scripts, the sniper was just a convenient way of demonstrating his increased line of site.

From experience with testing the observer, the sniper will move to engage targets only if he cant get a line of site on them, and then never to far away.

If you can think of any logic that will make the snipers role more effective, let me know and I will try and add it to the addon.

Cheers

[sanam]

So I checked, as officer, as officer commanding the two guys, as Sniper, and so on.

GREAT JOB please right now do a sniper-suit observer you'll be nice include it to the pack thank you otherwise I gonna Steal Your Work.

Nope, I won't, cause it's good & far more advanced than I'm.
The mess with "action/hit the dirt" commands, or "stop" is that they're unique, you can hardly have a guy firing from where you choose, as ordering to fire means killing the engagement stance, so stopping & ordering to fire is still a special script to be invented.

I though the Observer threatened a bit to fast, also: OK on "Desert", but when the view is obscured, you definitely need a guy to watch over your shoulder. The way not to get the guy killed too fast must reside in his own "threat factor" to the ennemy, a .cpp value I think, but for my point of view he is high, a very desirable , dangerous target.

Well, Bravo again, I'll keep watching this topic

PeacePunk.

[Unnamed]

otherwise I gonna Steal Your Work.

If you have the observer loaded in your mission already, you could add something like this to a snipers init field via the editor. Just make sure he has some binoculars.

Code: [Select]

[_This,60,1000,3,False] Call FO_RegisterObserver
This includes SEB Nam units, if you dont want to wait until I finish the next version.

If you dont want to have the Observer on the map at all, then add something like this (or call via a script) to the units init field:

Code: [Select]

FO_RegisterObserver=loadfile "\Observer\RegisterObserver.sqf" ; [This,60,1000,3,False] Call FO_RegisterObserver ; [This,True,FO_CROUCH] Call FO_SetActiveStatus
Good idea about the Sniper version of the observer, I've been testing on that desert island for so long, forgot what a bush looks like. I'll add the sniper to the next release.

The mess with "action/hit the dirt" commands, or "stop" is that they're unique, you can hardly have a guy firing from where you choose, as ordering to fire means killing the engagement stance, so stopping & ordering to fire is still a special script to be invented.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean. I could probably get a sniper to stop and go prone, from a single action menu command. Using the same principle I use for the binocular animations?

I though the Observer threatened a bit to fast

Yeah this is a problem, that's the next thing I'm looking to improve. In the mean time I added a function to allow you to change the threat level depending on the terrain your using in the mission.

The way not to get the guy killed too fast must reside in his own "threat factor" to the ennemy, a .cpp value I think

Just stopping him opening fire when anything passes within 300 meters would help, as the enemy AI is rubbish at spotting stationary units who don't give there position away. At the moment he will happily take on a tank platoon, if there is infantry attached to it

Cheers

[sanam]

Thanks for the lines of codes, so I can... steal them with your approval !

I understand "Desert Distraction Factor". A bush is actually a small green thing that's ...  

& I meaned: If you say "engage this guy" after "stop here", the "stop" is forgotten, you can't combine them. Boring when you carefully place your units around a target, in no firing mode, then you order to attack & some will open fire very fast while others will expose themselves out in the open... and get shot. This points us to the infamous "Hide" feature as well, as I dunno if the AI will engage from the hiding place, well this hidin'retreat is usually in the middle of the road anyway...

Offtopic a bit, but I guess I got to combine all this (in my head) in order to build a workin' sniper team.

( I'm on a 1000m shot mission, by the way. Very functionnal... as long as I take the shot myself. )

Bravo again, thanks for the detailed answers & keep us informed.

Peacepunk

[Unnamed]

Thanks for the lines of codes, so I can... steal them with your approval !

If you can use them for a sniper, go ahead. The only reason I got this far with it, was through trawling the forums here

[walker]

Hi

It would be nice if your observer could call CoC UA assets if available

Kind Regards Walker
For The Chain of Command

[Unnamed]

Of course, this goes without saying. I'm at the point of writing the final chunk to link the Observers chosen target with the firing unit, so it's timing could not be better

Regards

[walker]

Hi Unnamed

You might also like to consider a threat assesment script within your system to choose the most apropriate asset to use.


x = a squad of enemy or armour.
enemy => x then use artillery.
enemy =< x means use an infantry squad or inform other alied squads of target existense (we have some work in this area at the CoC)

We have some AI improvements at the CoC in the making you may like to speak to BN880, Spinor and Dinger about them and perhaps enact Denoirs Neural net as part of your decision making structure

Email or PM BN880 first we can perhaps work with you on this.

Kind Regards Walker