Mando Missile ArmA (ACCEPTED)

[USM-CPT.Dyson]

Yeah missile is hard to control. Can't believe BIS engine deletes missiles. Its weird because I swore I could shoot a hellfire 5 km.

[Luke]

BTW mando;

Is the USEC_C130, Rocket's aircraft?

Luke

[Kremator]

Mandoble,

Absolutely brilliant work.  I must disagree with oktane's click drag system for targetting - I like what you have at the moment.

On the BIS forums I have put on some videos of your system in action.

Once again THANK YOU!  Keep scripting because without people like you the game wouldn't be 1/100 of what is it now.

[TAO] Kremator

[Mandoble]

Oktane, thanks for that report 
- Camera movement: the ide is to be able to simulate a small analog stick or hat to move it, so it implies to guide the camera, not to drag the camera to the desired position. Hence the actual system, the edges simulates the limits of these analog sticks/hats.

- Sharing of Player and AI meta-variable system: This is actually this way to avoid any excess of pubvar traffic during the game, mostly at the very starting point where all the vehicles with players share their counters for every mounted system. But I agree with you, this system may generate inconsistencies for vehicles used by AI and then by players and then by AI again. Probably this has a simple fix, as AI launchers scripts should be run only server side, where, in fact, all the info about ammo counts for player vehicles is concentrated.

- Rearm Script: Quite linked with the previous point. Actually the AI reams by its own if close enough to an ammo truck.

- LOS Check: I added a better check in 2.35 for the camera, it will be intregrated into AI probably in the next beta. But in some cases that "firing against a hill" effect is caused by the guidance mode of the missile (intercept or direct), if intercept is set to true, just after firing missile it will adjust its trajectory for a collision course instead of a direct pursuit, and this may cause the missile to hit a nearby obstacle that was not an obstable for LOS or direct pursue trajectory. For these last cases, the best solution is to adjust the firing for a high vertical angle (60 degrees, for example).

- Min Alt Tweak: I see your point, I will consider it while a direct solution would be to set the air min alt to engage as low as 5m (I doubt a player can keep flying over terrain without going higher than that). Other option would be to make that min alt a function of distance, so, at max range the configured min alt is considered, and for closer ranges just something like (min alt default * (current target range \ max launcher range)), might be you want to try this in your current modification.

- Key Handlers: Already considered, will be included after the beta.


Luke, that C130 is the one linked by Colligpic on page 22 of this thread

Thanks kremator and nice videos. I noticed I forgot to remove the lateral black bars there, if you want them removed, open mando_missile.h and remove all references to MMA_LEFTBAR and MMA_RIGHTBAR.

[Kremator]

Thanks Mandoble.  I will remove that now.  I thought it was due to my having a widescreen monitor.

Keep these betas coming - its a brilliant way for us fanboi's to give feedback!

Any idea about why the light gun was inaccurate but the heavy was accurate?  I also have noticed some movement errors during movement of the camera - only very slight 'bumpiness'.

What's the next beta going to look at ?   Can't wait

[TAO] Kremator

PS I'll keep putting videos on when I get the chance.

[Mandoble]

All the guns should have same accuracy as long as they have same dispersion levels. Anyway, consider that mando gun lite as quite beta. For example, it computes interception point for moving targets only if horizontal distance to target is greater than vertical distance, else it fires directly against target position (which might fail if target is moving fast). Interception position calculation is not perfect either, so in some cases you will find manual firing as better option. Also for the examples the horizontal and vertical dispersions are quite low [0.6,0.6] degrees respectively, you may try increasing these for both guns.

[Kremator]

I have found that at a steep bank in the C130 there are severe accuracy problems (also in a steep climb).  I don't mind the guns missing a little but not WAY off

[TAO] Kremator

PS still testing

[ricnunes]

Today I tried this script for the first time, using the AH-1 Demo mission and first of all I want to say that this script is looking awesome! BIS should have implemented a similar system in ArmA (and I hope that they implement a similar one in ArmA2) but this is an another subject.

Since this is a beta I understand that it has some bugs and I will post the ones that I've found so far and note that all the following bugs are only concerning to the script operations within the AH-1:
1- The cannon ammo available/expended while playing with the Gun camera (both Air-to-Air and Air-to-Ground) doesn't match with the ammo when using the cannon outside the gun camera (BIS "pilot's helmet mode"). This means that if I expend all the ammo while playing in the gun camera mode but never fire a round in outside the gun camera, I will still have 750 rounds of ammo (full) while playing outside the gun camera mode.
2- IMO, you should reconsider the manual mode for Hellfire. They don't work like that in real life! In real life you don't have a camera on the tip of the Hellfire missile (the Hellfire isn't a Walleye Bomb or a SLAM missile for example). In real life while in "manual mode" the Hellfire is guided by simply moving and aiming the FLIR camera crosshair (or in the script the same camera used in the "semi-auto mode") into the place where you want the missile to go or hit. This means that in the script the only diference between the semi-auto mode and manual mode is that while in manual the missile follows the camera's crosshair and while in semi-auto it follows the locked target.
Also I think that the Hellfire manual mode should work very similar to the Air-to-Ground Gun mode, where you can lock any place on the ground. This would be very usefull if you want for example to hit a group of soldiers or a buiding with an Hellfire.

[Mandoble]

Kremator. I would say the gun problem is now fixed, perhaps now it is too much accurate. Expect it for next beta.

Ricnunes
The scrited guns attached to these cameras have no relation with any BIS gun present in the vehicle. The main reasons for that are:
- There is no way to control the number of rounds left in BIS guns.
- There is no way to rotate a BIS turret at will from a script.
- You may want to add scripted guns to planes, vehicles or ships without any BIS gun (case of the C130)
So mando gun lite is not a replacement of BIS guns, I added one scripted gun with two modes to the AH1Z just as an usage example.

About the hellfire, manual guidance is allowed there also for beta testing purposes only. If you want to disable it you only need to edit its control script (mando_missiles\tv\tv_typesmando_tv_hellfire.sqs) or create your own one as a modified copy of the existing one, and then set there manto_tv_no_manauto = true. Note that the scripts present at mando_missiles\tv\tv_types are just few examples, the idea is that mission authors create their own ones using the existing ones as templates.

[Luke]

Thanx for the clarification.

As always, in view of realism, request a few things concerning the AC130.

The most famous variants are the AC130U and the lesser known AC130E.

I suggest using the U variant because it has ammo types usable to ArmA, but replace the 25mm gun with the vulcan's 20mm.

So try attaching:

1x M61 Vulcan Cannon Using B_20mm_AA @ 3k rounds/min, 50 round salvo
1x Bofors 40mm L/60 gun using G_40mm_He @ 120 round/min, 5 round burst
1x M102 Howitzer using Sh_105_HE @ ~8 round/min, 1 round shot

for realism.

Luke

[Kremator]

Luke you must have read my mind.  I have now set up my AC130U with exactly this loadout !

It's an amazing killing machine !  I'm just trying to wrangle re-supplying it now and working it into Evolution (I almost feel sorry for the enemy !)

[TAO] Kremator

[USM-CPT.Dyson]

I'm prett sure they are still in use today (TV guided missiles). Keep in mind they go by a different name (electro-something). Ill do some more non wiki research but I'm sure they are still there.

[Luke]

Mando;

Could you make the hellfire so that in place of the auto/manual control button
you would have an LOAL/LOBL button to control whether it does the pop-up/ or a straight launch?

Luke

[Mandoble]

The simulated Hellfire already does that depending on the range to the target automatically (hi or direct aproaches).
BTW, AFAIK LOAL and LOBL have no relation with hi/direct trajectories but with when the target is locked on (Lock On After Launch and Lock On Before Launch). Here what you have here is LOBL with hi or direct trajectories depending on range to already locked on target or position, you may simulate LOAL firing against a laser target which is not already locked on a vehicle. Anyway there is not a standard laser warning in ArmA for vehicles, so LOAL would have little or no value at all.

[Luke]

I mean:

rather than an automatic determination as you have,
I would suggest a selector switch on the camera.

By the way, as for being too precise, an AC130 can put lead within meters of a target,
as seen here and explained here.

Plus will it have a cool countermeasure package like it really has?

Luke

EDIT: also wouldn't you need a far viewdistance to use this at realistic distances (setviewdistance 8000)?