Ok, I just played around with knowsabout to test for stealth.
Seems like I fire a silence weapon near the guy but don't him them, knowsabout is now at 0.1 . The magic "detection" number for knowsabout is 0.7 . Whenever you shoot and your bullet hits the guy, knowsabout is automatically set to 1.5 (unless it is higher). Knowsabout can range from 0 to 4. At that point, the guy will need to die since alarm system is on 0.7 or else it'll trigger. Even at that point, its a gameble on whether the trigger goes or not since you're at 1.5 and if another AI besides that guy you killed is aware, alarm goes I guess. In that case, you're better off not even thinking about shooting any people. So if you have an alarm system using trigger detected by, probably best to not shoot unless Alarm goes off, so prefer way of beating this mission would be, don't get spotted, and only use silence bullets on light bulbs. After 2 min, knowsabout will reset back to 0 (or if you go out of range from the enemies <which is basically farther than the max viewdistance but that would be crazy>).
So for alarm system type of mission, it should be design around some way to sneak into the objective and not fire a single shot. Another thing about knowsabout I'll probably say (the big WTF/flaws of it) are satchel charges and mines.
There's this one sander mission we played one time, the convoy automatically shot Variable through a bush because it hit Variable's mines and satchels. Because Variable killed the convoy and that it is registered as HIS kills and whoever else who took out the convoy, knowsabout is now 1.5 so the AI automatically knows that Variable is behind the bush or whoever else had satchels and mines that hit the convoy (which is bs). I think that, if you create an explosion that does not count as YOUR kill, then your knowsabout would not raise and I think you might be safe hiding unless bush provides no sense of concealment in Arma, that would be another story. I think a car bomb that you remote denonate would do the trick since it is civilian object that won't register as your kill.
The system I thought up for my Robbing the Tempest mission was actually detect by Aware -> Combat setting. If enemy was in Combat mode long enough, the trigger triggers. Alwarren's right about just use detected by instead of check combat mode. Checking combat mode is actually more punishing than the knowsabout system since AI will switch to Danger if shot near or if someone dies. Silent dropping will also switch danger mode of another nearby AI grouped or not group to Danger. (The mission is still easy to beat anyways, if you're not trigger happy)
I think the combat mode detection would only work if AI are EXTREMELY scattered out that you can drop one while the next one is at least maybe about 50-100 (more so around 100 I think, not sure) meters, for dropping each of them individually for stealth kills. It wouldn't be realistic, but I guess it works if you want to kill people. They have to be isolated.
Overall, if the base is compressed, enemies are near, and there is an alarm system on detection (depends on which method of detection you use), the goal would be, don't shoot anyone (light bulbs are ok). (I guess stealth purist would say the most successful forms of stealth is the one that you don't kill anyone at all).
If it is breaking in the somewhere through the midst of combat, you can shoot people. Best that you try to avoid still to keep knowsabout low, but it won't be as punishing.
NEXT TEST:
Loud vs silence weapons. My knowsabout went to automatically 1.35 after firing a loud weapon about 100 meters from the AI, I'm detected. Silence weapons, I'm not detected. I guess that makes silence weapons in Arma have a purpose to... shoot light bulbs but not people since you're automatically at 1.5 detection if you shoot people.
If enemies shoot at you, knowsabout goes up and up. So I pretty much wouldn't need the detect for gunfire script or anything since knowsabout already went over the magic number for alarm to trigger at that point.
Seems like I fire a silence weapon near the guy but don't him them, knowsabout is now at 0.1 . The magic "detection" number for knowsabout is 0.7 . Whenever you shoot and your bullet hits the guy, knowsabout is automatically set to 1.5 (unless it is higher). Knowsabout can range from 0 to 4. At that point, the guy will need to die since alarm system is on 0.7 or else it'll trigger. Even at that point, its a gameble on whether the trigger goes or not since you're at 1.5 and if another AI besides that guy you killed is aware, alarm goes I guess. In that case, you're better off not even thinking about shooting any people. So if you have an alarm system using trigger detected by, probably best to not shoot unless Alarm goes off, so prefer way of beating this mission would be, don't get spotted, and only use silence bullets on light bulbs. After 2 min, knowsabout will reset back to 0 (or if you go out of range from the enemies <which is basically farther than the max viewdistance but that would be crazy>).
So for alarm system type of mission, it should be design around some way to sneak into the objective and not fire a single shot. Another thing about knowsabout I'll probably say (the big WTF/flaws of it) are satchel charges and mines.
There's this one sander mission we played one time, the convoy automatically shot Variable through a bush because it hit Variable's mines and satchels. Because Variable killed the convoy and that it is registered as HIS kills and whoever else who took out the convoy, knowsabout is now 1.5 so the AI automatically knows that Variable is behind the bush or whoever else had satchels and mines that hit the convoy (which is bs). I think that, if you create an explosion that does not count as YOUR kill, then your knowsabout would not raise and I think you might be safe hiding unless bush provides no sense of concealment in Arma, that would be another story. I think a car bomb that you remote denonate would do the trick since it is civilian object that won't register as your kill.
The system I thought up for my Robbing the Tempest mission was actually detect by Aware -> Combat setting. If enemy was in Combat mode long enough, the trigger triggers. Alwarren's right about just use detected by instead of check combat mode. Checking combat mode is actually more punishing than the knowsabout system since AI will switch to Danger if shot near or if someone dies. Silent dropping will also switch danger mode of another nearby AI grouped or not group to Danger. (The mission is still easy to beat anyways, if you're not trigger happy)
I think the combat mode detection would only work if AI are EXTREMELY scattered out that you can drop one while the next one is at least maybe about 50-100 (more so around 100 I think, not sure) meters, for dropping each of them individually for stealth kills. It wouldn't be realistic, but I guess it works if you want to kill people. They have to be isolated.
Overall, if the base is compressed, enemies are near, and there is an alarm system on detection (depends on which method of detection you use), the goal would be, don't shoot anyone (light bulbs are ok). (I guess stealth purist would say the most successful forms of stealth is the one that you don't kill anyone at all).
If it is breaking in the somewhere through the midst of combat, you can shoot people. Best that you try to avoid still to keep knowsabout low, but it won't be as punishing.
NEXT TEST:
Loud vs silence weapons. My knowsabout went to automatically 1.35 after firing a loud weapon about 100 meters from the AI, I'm detected. Silence weapons, I'm not detected. I guess that makes silence weapons in Arma have a purpose to... shoot light bulbs but not people since you're automatically at 1.5 detection if you shoot people.
If enemies shoot at you, knowsabout goes up and up. So I pretty much wouldn't need the detect for gunfire script or anything since knowsabout already went over the magic number for alarm to trigger at that point.