Steel Beasts: Content Wish List

[Grenny]

Ok, thats the G3 with 100m setting as I know it :-)

[Andres87]

18 minutes ago, Apocalypse 31 said:

...and thats exactly why it will never be in SB. 

I think it is possible, same like HMG and LMG teams have accesses to the weapon sights.

Those machine guns sights are also similar, simpler but they haven't recoil animation like OFP.

Edited December 20, 2016 by Andres87

[Apocalypse 31]

Just now, Andres87 said:

I think it is possible, same like HMG and LMG have accesses to the weapon sights.

Those machine guns sights are also similar, simpler but they haven't recoil animation like OFP.

I just think there are many players that don't want the game to extend beyond the turret of a tank - for fear of the game 'turning into call of duty'

[Apocalypse 31]

Another pipe dream. Not sure about the in-game scope on the TRG-42. 

[Andres87]

20 minutes ago, Apocalypse 31 said:

 for fear of the game 'turning into call of duty'

I know that, this is tool, simulator. To Call of duty  is certainly far. There is a lot of animation and attachments to weapons like silencers, flashlights, several types of sights etc.

Here, such things are unnecessary.. Add to a wish list, and maybe one day come true. Then say Bye bye OFP/ Arma CWA/ Arma 2.

Edited December 20, 2016 by Andres87

[Apocalypse 31]

2 hours ago, Andres87 said:

Then say Bye bye OFP/ Arma CWA/ Arma 2

 

I was hoping 4.0 would've introduced first person functionality for infantry. I had my finger on the delete button for ArmA 3.

[Gibsonm]

5 minutes ago, Apocalypse 31 said:

 

I was hoping 4.0 would've introduced first person functionality for infantry. I had my finger on the delete button for ArmA 3.

 

Well its getting closer.

 

I think its a case of small updates done properly over a period of time (no doubt too long for some).

 

I mean in 2.654 you had sprites, very few crew served weapons, no wire, no medics, no "formations", no "follow me" type routine, etc. Now you have all that and more.

 

I suspect it will take some time for more features to be added and then there will need to be decisions made along the lines of where the limited developmental resources go. That is, "we can fix 8 things this build, what gets priority 4 non infantry, 4 infantry?, 7 infantry, 1 non infantry?, etc. and then out of that sub set which has priority - weapons sights, or better defensive options, or ... etc.

 

I don't think it will ever get to the point where you'll be able to choose from say 15 different types of 7.62mm ammo to put in your rifle, but it is getting better.

[Apocalypse 31]

1 hour ago, Gibsonm said:

Now you have all that and more.

We have come far over a long period...but there's still no utility in the rifle infantry. They're paralyzed and unresponsive; they sit and watch the enemy go by or wait long enough to get mowed down, or get into 'firefights' where they can't hit a barn door at 5 meters. Sure, they're good for scenery and they make great coax targets, but that's where it ends. 

 

The HE grenades have been a great addition (why can't we have a hot key!?) but we needed 5 meters, not 3.

[Gibsonm]

1 hour ago, Apocalypse 31 said:

We have come far over a long period...but there's still no utility in the rifle infantry. They're paralyzed and unresponsive; they sit and watch the enemy go by or wait long enough to get mowed down, or get into 'firefights' where they can't hit a barn door at 5 meters. Sure, they're good for scenery and they make great coax targets, but that's where it ends. 

 

The HE grenades have been a great addition (why can't we have a hot key!?) but we needed 5 meters, not 3.

 

Sure but arguably the AT teams are busted too. There are so many things that need to get "fixed":

 

Intimate control of rifle teams (i.e. where your rifle sights come in)

Ability to fire RPG/AT4/PF manually (the end of the Bazooka Polka)

Ability to develop positions (i.e. dig in) over time

Ability to use crew served weapons inside "bunkers"

Utility of the "Bunkers" themselves

Night Fighting Equipment

CBRND posture?

....

 

The key question remains what gives eSim the best bang for their buck in terms of what they should give priority to.

 

Then add to that the calls for better implementation of both fixed and rotary wing air (and air defences) as well as the usual clamour for more or better implemented vehicles, ... and you start to get a feel for the task.

 

I think they acknowledge they have an elephant to eat, the question is where do they start chewing.

[Captain_Colossus]

I think the environment wasn't quite made for the infantry perspective to begin with. I see two difficulties:

 

1) The computer's awareness counts for more than any human, able to sort through dead/live, friendly/hostile units instantly and without error. For example, if a computer can see two heat signatures at 2 km, the computer knows which is a valid target and which isn't without any context whatsoever, a human has to rely on more information to know the difference. Computer crews are like on alert mode always, it's difficult to simulate a situation where the enemy is more relaxed in posture, it's difficult for these reasons to sneak up on computer units or spoof them.

 

2) The computer has the potential to spot infantry much better than I can, often through all kinds of cover, or from perspectives where it appears there is no line of sight to me and what have you. Computer TCs will often spot and designate troops and there's nothing there as far as I can see, or from the other perspective, enemy crews detect my infantry crawling up for mile away even through forest. To see how disadvantaged a human is in the gunfight, use the heavy machine gun or the automatic grenade launchers- the perspective from the human player is often blinded, because it's shown low to the ground and grass and whatnot fills the entire view (my request is that eSim raises the perspective on these types of weapons- they almost cannot be used except in open ground, where you are going to get spotted and killed anyway.)

 

While I would have no problem with simulating gunsights with recoil, and I think it would be fun, I think the engine itself would still make it  frustrating in practice except under select conditions for these reasons. You'd be ready to rock n roll, but you'd probably feel blind in many of these gunfights compared to how well the computer can detect you and shoot first.

Edited December 21, 2016 by Captain_Colossus

[Ssnake]

I was about to write a reply and then came to realize: Everything I have to say about infantry related development in SB Pro I already wrote here at several times, and I think that I've been consistent in my statements in the past three years at least.

 

Steel Beasts is about leadership and crew training — to the extent that that is even possible to support with a computer simulation. Small arms gun sights would only distract from that mission, and it would become much worse over time.

 

If you want to shoehorn a still relatively focused product into something entirely different, bring millions. Until then, feel free to remind me of your personal pet priorities if you want but please accept that we're making our business decisions (and life choices) independent of external pressure.

[Captain_Colossus]

I don't even think anyone has really done it so that it's exciting. Either you get the FPS on rails ego shooters, or you get the more simulation oriented Operation Flashpoint and Armed Assault games, but the two or three episodes I played with those always seemed

off- again, it was the same thing. Enemy units were always inconsistent in behavior, somehow in some circumstances seemingly clairvoyant and tracking the player's thoughts or something, spotting and shooting the player with uncanny awareness, or on the other hand stand around right in plain view and do nothing while being picked off. If were consistent one way or the other it would be one thing- at least if the enemy was just seemingly unnaturally tough all the time, you might spot some pattern of behavior you could adapt to,

but when it's that seemingly random, you can't even do that, I never found most any of these games that psychologically rewarding for that reason, because whether a logical approach succeeded or not seemed arbitrary much of the time. Infantry centric scope is probably very difficult subject matter.

Edited December 21, 2016 by Captain_Colossus

[Japo32]

To not be lost between all these interesting infantry posts:

 

 

 

[Grenny]

47 minutes ago, Japo32 said:

To not be lost between all these interesting infantry posts:

 

 

 

That would be way too much data transfer during the game and huge files. Also there is not much value for the training purpose...

[lavictoireestlavie]

I am Leclerc all the way usually but will we ever see the Leopard 2A3 ? It is the Leopard 2 before the the A4 tungsten/titanium turret armor uprade. Could be great for some Cold War 1985-1986 scenarios:

 

 

[Japo32]

4 hours ago, Grenny said:

That would be way too much data transfer during the game and huge files. Also there is not much value for the training purpose...

That should be leaved to the user to use it or not. I am a user of falcon and believe me the huge data at the end is not so much during a whole battle period or 2 hours or so. Maybe for you is not value for training, but for me is value for cinematics and just spread good battles around youtube... and just enjoy myself watching the battles.

[Grenny]

28 minutes ago, Japo32 said:

That should be leaved to the user to use it or not. I am a user of falcon and believe me the huge data at the end is not so much during a whole battle period or 2 hours or so. Maybe for you is not value for training, but for me is value for cinematics and just spread good battles around youtube... and just enjoy myself watching the battles.

The problem is, the endusers who pay for most of the development, don't give half a f*** about cinematics. As training value is the most important factor for the software, from their p.o.v. this feature would be a waste of the limited programmer resources. Besides, there are secondary softwares like FRAPS that allow you to record the battles and watch them afterwards.

Edited December 21, 2016 by Grenny

[Japo32]

20 minutes ago, Grenny said:

The problem is, the endusers who pay for most of the development, don't give half a f*** about cinematics. As training value is the most important factor for the software, from their p.o.v. this feature would be a waste of the limited programmer resources. Besides, there are secondary softwares like FRAPS that allow you to record the battles and watch them afterwards.

I record my battles with OBS that is much more better than Fraps.. . but that still gives only one camera, the one that you had. 

I understand that the professional that pay for the development don't want that, but we also pay for it and maybe there are more people that would like it... and it would be nice IF the development of it would be easy (maybe it is already as it is recording possitions each franction of time, and could be changed to other reduced franction of time.. and introduce again the particles to see the explosions).

The same principles comes to Bohemia Interactive for example. they have the VBS3 professional, and the ARMA3. And now also to Titan Vanguard and its "entertainment" future version

Maybe a 100$ is nothing compared with (I don't know 3,000-10,000$ per professional station)? but multiply 100$ x 1 200,000-500,000 users (fsx and Prepar3D maybe have a good number around)

[Ssnake]

Well, Bohemia claims to have 250 programmers for VBS development alone, plus another group of developers just for the engine and ArmA. At eSim Games, we have five (1995—2010: One). So the situation isn't quite comparable (but I think we're doing well in the face of sheer numerical disparity).

That said, I have also advocated the option for seamless mission recording. There is no inherent reason not to offer it, I fully agree with that position. However, we also must take into account a constant fight for development priorities, and a priority this feature is not. For every item we work on there are 100 other items on which we can't spend that time.

 

Contractual obligations are our #1 priority.

Code maintenance/bug fixing/increasing the overall development efficiency is #2.

#3 priority is to improve the simulation quality by expanding or deepening the tactical elements.

 

There are more identified "important tasks", but I'm not sure how many of them should be listed as "priority items" before the word loses its meaning.

[Ssnake]

14 hours ago, Japo32 said:

I understand that the professional that pay for the development don't want that, but we also pay for it

 

Yes, you do. Selling the Personal Edition contributes to somewhere between 5% and 10% of the total turnover every year (and more than 95% of the customer support effort). We devote between 10% and 20% of the development time to features that can be considered "PE items", which is a disproportional amount. Rest assured, you are not shorthanded as a customer group!

More than 75% of eSim's annual turnover are reinvested into research and development, another relevant figure, I guess. And more than 85% of all personnel are directly involved with R&D, which is an awesome teeth-to-tail ratio.

[ssidiver]

1 hour ago, Ssnake said:

 

Yes, you do. Selling the Personal Edition contributes to somewhere between 5% and 10% of the total turnover every year (and more than 95% of the customer support effort). We devote between 10% and 20% of the development time to features that can be considered "PE items", which is a disproportional amount. Rest assured, you are not shorthanded as a customer group!

More than 75% of eSim's annual turnover are reinvested into research and development, another relevant figure, I guess. And more than 85% of all personnel are directly involved with R&D, which is an awesome teeth-to-tail ratio.

 

Thank you, for these stats!

Though personally I have not seen anything overly annoying. Patience solves most of my problems.

Version 3 was excellent and four is even better!

 

Thank you (and the team)!

[lavictoireestlavie]

The early Leopard 2 armor package generations (Leopard 2A0-A3 1st Gen., Leopard 2A4 2nd Gen. , Leopard 2A5 3rd Gen.):

 

 

[ChrisWerb]

For the $125, for the time I have spent trying to figure it out, the Instant Action Scenario, played with the M1A2 alone would be worth the money. Given that the scenario is just a glimpse of what's possible with the sim, that easily makes it easily my best value game/sim purchase ever. To know it piggybacks massively off various countries defence budgets/taxes and would have to sell for A LOT more if it was purely for the civilian gamer/sim player market is just the icing on the cake.

 

PS: After endless experimentation, my best so far is still only 71 kills. It's brilliant practice for artillery use and reversionary direct fire modes.

Edited December 23, 2016 by ChrisWerb
clarification

[Rad]

More of models of the dead machines.

[Koen]

2 hours ago, Rad said:

More of models of the dead machines.

 

Grozny ?