Comrades in Arms Discussion Board

I would like to address something that I have seen a lot recently, mainly about composition of enemy forces. I will cite some of my own missions, not because I want to promote them, but to give examples of what I mean. So please bear with me

Recently we played a mission in which we had to move a convoy through enemy held territory, and every enemy we met was either machine gunner, or had an RPG. Same in another mission we played recently.

I've seen this multiple times: as soon as players have heavy vehicles, the enemy has an unnatural number of AT capabilities. Not only is that in no way realistic, it also creates the impression that the whole mission is laid out against the players.

I find this lazy. And unnecessary. With a normal level of AT, it is likely that the players vehicle still gets multiple AT fired at them. If in doubt, add an enemy vehicle of similar make, to counter the player vehicle.

If you check Finder's Keepers, you will notice that the enemy has very little AT capabilities, just a few AT gunners (all enemy groups are standard groups taken from the game). There is another Gorgon in the area, but that is the only armored thread. Still, the mission was hard.

The second topic I want to bring up is the amount of enemies. No sane commander would plan a mission that sends a squad against a battalion. At least not regular armies. In Flycatcher, FIA forces ARE pitted against an overwhelming enemy force. Basically, it's a suicide mission, but it is born out of desperation, not careful military consideration. In Kavala Lost, you are remnants of a scattered CSAT battalion and have to escape the oncoming enemy. And even there, you are not alone, there's allies fighting in the city as well. I made an Arma 2 mission called Beachhead that had you assault Berezino from the sea, where you played an assault squad and APC, but there was a whole platoon sized force attacking the town, including two A-10 and two AH-1Z, two more mechanized infantry squads, plus an initial artillery barrage on the beach defences.

That doesn't mean you can never have few players against large armies. Infiltration missions work like that. But there is a difference between sneaking in and doing something, and assaulting an enemy stronghold. The former can be done with a single squad, the latter requires at least equal numbers on the attackers side. At least!

I know that Arma is a game and there has to be some middle ground. But still, I personally prefer missions to be grounded in reality rather than Hollywood.

I have to agree. We've come to treat armor assets as frail little butterflies because of the 50 million AT soldiers lurking in every mission. Shouldn't having an APC or a tank make you feel like you've got some serious fire power rather than having a small child you need to protect from all that is evil?

I find this very frustrating and it makes playing as vehicle crew not very fun so I rarely do it. Being in an APC should feel like you're somewhat protected, not like you're riding in a bomb waiting to go of.

I have the same feelings when it comes to helicopters in missions. Just because we have a chopper doesn't mean every other enemy has to be AA, or that there has to be 20 Shilkas. This is especially true if we have a littlebird. I mean even a regular rifleman is a deadly threat if you don't fly smart.

I certainly don't want "easy" missions but as Varanon said, having them at lest grounded in reality would go a long way

I fully agree with the above well written posts. I remember recommending here in the Arma 2 days, to mitigate the players' armor with multiple AT launchers, but only with weak warheads. That will ensure a thrilling experience, but keep the life expectancy reasonable (does CUP or RHS have non-tandem warheads that do little damage to armored vehicles?

I might also add that it's ok to have the enemy utilize AA and AT against the players' corresponding air and ground assets, however, it shouldn't be arbitrary in the sense that it's a threat that always exists, you can't really tell when and where it's gonna hit you, and by that it paints the vehicle experience with colors of constant imminent doom. What could be done instead is, have the infantry assault team attack the AT/AA nest, clear it, and allow the vehicles to move more freely. In the meantime, the tank can mow down a convoy of Ifrits, or the Littlebird can strafe a bunch of lightly protected vehicles in a safe distance from said AT or AA nest. A confirmation to the player can be provided in a message from HQ saying that "The AA thread has been removed, you may call in the birds". That will gratify the players for removing the threats to their vehicles while keeping it realistic.

In this opportunity I'd add that a request for mission makers - Give the players something guaranteed to shoot at. You have a tank that is about to face strong armored or AT threat? Give the crew some easy targets to shoot at before bringing it up against the main threat. That will lower the chances of the vehicle team getting frustrated for spending time in a mission without contributing to the effort before being Titaned to hell.

I totally agree with these comments, at first I thought, we have a larger group so I will add more enemy's... however, the fact you play First person only, have realistic revive with only medics revive plus no blips on map to show exactly where you are so have to navigate carefully... these make it harder in its self

I had adjusted my missions PBOs yesterday anyway, so the balance should be better and hopefully more tense!

(02-01-2016, 11:48 AM)Variable link Wrote:I fully agree with the above well written posts. I remember recommending here in the Arma 2 days, to mitigate the players' armor with multiple AT launchers, but only with weak warheads. That will ensure a thrilling experience, but keep the life expectancy reasonable (does CUP or RHS have non-tandem warheads that do little damage to armored vehicles?

I am sure about CUP, and I am quite sure about RHS. They both have the full range of available warheads for the RPG-7. The others, not so much, there aren't many different warheads for the SMAW and MAAWS.

Quote:I might also add that it's ok to have the enemy utilize AA and AT against the players' corresponding air and ground assets, however, it shouldn't be arbitrary in the sense that it's a threat that always exists, you can't really tell when and where it's gonna hit you, and by that it paints the vehicle experience with colors of constant imminent doom. What could be done instead is, have the infantry assault team attack the AT/AA nest, clear it, and allow the vehicles to move more freely. In the meantime, the tank can mow down a convoy of Ifrits, or the Littlebird can strafe a bunch of lightly protected vehicles in a safe distance from said AT or AA nest. A confirmation to the player can be provided in a message from HQ saying that "The AA thread has been removed, you may call in the birds". That will gratify the players for removing the threats to their vehicles while keeping it realistic.

Agreed. One thing that struck me with "Approaching Kavala" is that it is impossible to secure the APC. It will inevitably be destroyed. There is so much AT that it makes it impossible that it survives.

I have been guilty of the same thing, "Plant your fields" has its fair share of AT in it. The static launchers, however, can be taken out by the infantry, and the rest will have a pretty far shot so evasion is possible. It's still a bit on the high side though.

Something else which I notice in a lot of missions, including some of my own, is the complete lack of support. Obviously, a group of Force Recon operating behind enemy lines is pretty much on their own. But assaulting a town with no support is rather unrealistic. You'd always have a mortar or artillery gun or maybe some air support, or maybe a tank on standby. You'd always have an engineering group somewhere that could come in for repairs. A lot of missions (as I said, I include myself here, a lot of my missions make the same mistake) make the players the only actors, which is not realistic at all.

I suppose balance is the main issue to make mission success not too easy but realistically achievable. Try imagining yourself as the high commander or whatever sending your troops to battle, would you send a battalion of this size and level of technology against the enemy forces you placed in the mission in a real life situation and expect success. When determining the balance of ai and player units in the editor, don't think of this as a coop game with virtual men fighting think of the mission as a real life war that can be won.

And would you send them in to risk life and limb to retrieve "some" documents

(02-03-2016, 11:42 AM)treendy link Wrote:And would you send them in to risk life and limb to retrieve "some" documents

I believe I am referring to the "Composition of enemy forces" and only that, not whether the objective makes sense or not. Those two things are not related.

... my comment was related to a point Variable raised in the last coop night, which I found funny, but also true... (something I will check my missions for)


Although... the description of the mission and situation will give a clue of the balance of opposing forces... so the composition of opposing forces and the mission descriptions are both very closely related