Load Outs

[Packetloss]

As for load outs? - Each 'person' in a vehicle with this game engine can support two weapons - The pilot will control the .50 and ffars, while copilot will control stingers and artillery targeting -
Another load out will include player guided hellfires - Copilot will have to control those as well.

[Syseng]

If you want to make it realistic and give it something no one else has, give the left seater an M-4 and give him a first person shooter mode out the door.

[Packetloss]

Hehe - I did think about that :)

I've seen MH-6's with troops carrying stingers and SAWs on the side benches ;)

[Syseng]

Ok. Give him an M-16. It would still be cool.

Is it going to be doing over water missions shooting at speed boats? I have it from a Prime Chance pilot that the Stinger is the weapon to use on the speed boats. Nails the motor. Leaves them dead in the water, and sometimes on fire. Then they give up or you use the .50 cal. But you don't want to fire Stinger at too low an altitude or it goes in the water and makes like a bottle rocket in a pond.

[Packetloss]

That it is - I was thinking an Mp5 or car-15 specifically.

[Grunt]

what is the left seater going to be doing? just sittin there, or as mentioned above, is he going to be able to shoot his assigned weapon? Another possible idea might be to have the left seater have the ability to call artillery, which is of course, one of the major 'design' features of the 58D..

[Packetloss]

The game has limitations. Each 'position' in a vehicle can have up to 2 'weapons'. On that note:


Left seater may go a couple ways:
a) 'view' position would be the MMS (sort of like the 105mm on the AC-130) with a 360 degree view. We'd tie this to the current artillery call system - like binoculars - And possibly give it a large factor zoom - this would be 'primary fire' - His alternate fire would be two stingers. (if anything) - It would seem 'weird' to have one kiowa carrying stingers, .50 and ffars, wouldnt it? correct me if im wrong, kiowas can essentially only tote one weapon per side.

b) Left seater gets artillery only.

c) Left seater carries only his rifle. (There is a bf patch coming that will support a soldier firing his weapon from a vewhicle position - As you will notice with MH-6, etc, this isnt a working feature now)

We have been toying with the idea of player guided hellfires - left seater would 'fly' those - and control the MMS. Problem with player guided weapons on flying platforms - We havent been able to make them lag-free yet - So they arent really a viable option.

The pilot load-outs are still sort of in the air - I like the idea of .50 and ffars the best.

Opinions?

[dirtyharry71]

I like guns and rockets most of the time for a Cav mission. If there is armor or heavies, then need hellfire in the team somewhere.

The hellfire is a fire and forget. Can you have the programing check that all requirements have been met (left seater did all the switches right, right laser code, ect..) and then have it fired. would that help the lag?

Also, games like ghost recon and others, it is up to the user to define the systems per mission. Would it be possible to have the "pilot" chose the weapons according to each mission?

Haven't played the game yet. Going to see if I can find it today.

[Grunt]

yep your correct PL - 1 weapon system per side. how bout this:

Right seater - .50 cal and rockets.

Left seater: I'd say arty and personal weapon as a first choice for the left seater, but as you said, not do-able yet. Arty for sure. Tied into the MMS sounds incredible. Kick ass. Wondering however if stingers are even do-able..ie 'locking-on' to a target - as you said the 'steerable' munitions aren't happening.

Bad Ass

[mr242]

I think that we should keep the left seater limited to operation of the MMS and calls-for-fire only. IRL the left seater has no control of the weapons firing.

Unfortunately, the average DC gamer is all about the score and observers for artillery get zero points, all the kills go to the guy firing the arty.

So if the patch is implemented to allow firing of personal weapons from moving vehicles, this would encourage more players to fly left seat in Kiowa Warriors. The drawback (or advantage) to this is, the player has use of all weapons that he chose when selecting his kit at spawn. So, we end up with left side cockpit firing of M-16/203s, SMAWs, Stingers, M249s and even aerial deployment of Mines. Could be interesting.

[Syseng]

aerial deployment of mines?

[Packetloss]

EA is pretty tight-lipped about everything - Contrary to popular belief, we dont have any insider information. We just reverse-engineer EA's code and figure it out ;)

The rumour is, there will be kit restriction capabilities to these seats. Ie. we can allow rifles, but disallow mines. Not sure.

As for air-dropped mines? We looked at this with the Mi-8 ;)

Also - We need to think about actual gameplay - Notice the Ah-6 has 2 seats, but you never see 2 people in it? Remmeber when the blackhawk could spot arty from the left side? People NEVER used it, because they couldnt shoot weapons from that seat.

Giving a stinger or something besides artillery to that left seater, will make it so people actually get in that seat, Resulting in more artillery calls.

Basically, this is the big debate - While we like to stick to realism, realism doesnt make for good gameplay.

[Packetloss]

Originally posted by Syseng
aerial deployment of mines?

Engineers in this game carry Anti-Tank mines as one of their weapons. If you had an engineer in the left seat who could 'fire' his weapon (mines) you'd end up with minefields being laid by littlebirds :)

[Syseng]

OK. My vote would be give the right seat guns and rockets and stinger and give the left Hellfire and an M-16. Left would also do Arty.

[Desloc]

The KW is crewed by two pilots, (yes I know "single pilot whos....") working as a TEAM. Have the guy in the right opperate the .50 and FFAR the left gets arty and HF but both get the kill. So if the right seat shoots something then both players get credit same goes with the other seat.
Just my 2 cents
Mike

[Syseng]

Desloc

That is how the aircraft works, absolutely. We are talking about a game that is going to be played by ONE person sitting at a PC. So you have to split it up. I can chose to fly right seat if I want to do rockets or the gun or Stinger. Or I can chose to fly left seat and blow the crap out of things with Hellfire or go first person shooter out the door with an M-16. I think that would be great.

[Desloc]

Syseng,
Understand that it is a PC game. What I was gathering was that unless a player is able to get kill credits, improving there stature on the super highway they would be reluctant to sit shot gun in a 58D while someone else gets to wiggle the stick and recieves all the glory. My only suggestion was to have the kill credit sharred by both "crewmembers".
IE you are in the left seat and shoot something with a rocket = one dead. I am in the right seat conducting an arty or M-4 engagement = one kill. Our stats would reflect:
Syseng>killed jones with FFAR and Dog with arty
Desloc>killed jones with FFAR and Dog with arty

Increasing both our scores by two. Even though we only killed one person individually.

Mike

[Packetloss]

Definately would be nice to have team points. But - Wishful thinking. If EA releases an SDK or something where we can actually modify the game engine, it gets possible. As it is now, we do the best we can with the limitations we have and thats it.

[Kiowa Spirit]

Originally posted by Syseng
OK. My vote would be give the right seat guns and rockets and stinger and give the left Hellfire and an M-16. Left would also do Arty.

Are you proposing that they give the OH-58D four weapons-systems at one time?

[Kiowa Spirit]

Also, I'd say that the best arrangement of the controls, would be to have the Right-Seat control all weapons-sytems, while the Left-Seat Observes and aquires targets for the "gunner".

and one possible use for the MMS would be like when you use the binoculars to spot targets for artillery. You click on a target or area to designate it, then the artillery right-clicks and the "scout-view" appears. The OH-58D could do the same thing for its "gunner" and the other various artillery in the field, using the MMS.

this is only a possible outcome of course.

[Syseng]

I was pointing out which weapons each seat could use, not that they could use them all at once. It's a game. ONE person sitting at a PC, possibly in their underwear (hopefully at home), will be playing it. If I am sitting in the left seat flying the sight, who is going to be shooting?

[MilitaryBuff]

The pilot would manage the weapons.

[Kiowa Spirit]

Syseng:

The person in the right-seat would control the weapons.

[Syseng]

If I am sitting at my PC and flying the game as left seat, there isn't a person in the right seat.

[mr242]

The problem with the left seater firing the Hellfires, is that he is still at the whim of the pilot, since the current Hellfires are fixed forward in the game...aim helicopter and shoot.

[Syseng]

It's a game. If I'm the only one playing and I'm flying left seat, then I'm flying the aircraft too.

One of the Apache games lets you switch views and essentially change seats in flight. I'm not sure which one. That might be an approach to take. You have one screen where you fly the sight and lock the target, then you toggle to another screen where you are flying and you take the shot. The computer flys while you are on the sight. You could also have an M-4 screen where you jump into the left seat and shoot out the door, while the computer flys.

[mr242]

Originally posted by Syseng
If I'm the only one playing and I'm flying left seat, then I'm flying the aircraft too.

Syseng, the problem is, with BF1942 Desert Combat mod, the only seat that can fly the aircraft is the right seat. In the Blackhawk and Little Birds, the left seater is a sandbag.

You can switch seats at will, but should you be flying in the right seat and want to switch to the left, the aircraft will immediately stop flying and crash. In fact, the moment you exit the pilot's seat, the engine will stop.

Perhaps an AI that can continue to maintain the aircraft in flight, on heading altitude and speed, would be cool, I doubt we will ever see that in DC.

[Syseng]

Bummer. I haven't played this particular game yet. I'm currently fighting a seemingly endless stream of Orcs before the Black Gates of Mordor.

Other games I've flown, the AI takes over when you jump to the other seat. Things like Longbow 2 or Gunship or Comanche 3 (which I liked a lot better that Comanche 4, but Comanche 3 won't work on my new Windows XP machine).

That sucks. I guess then you will have to fly the right seat all the time and use all the weapons from there. Like the original Gunship (5 1/4 floppy disks on a PC XT) . The only time you could have a left seat would be if you were doing it multiplayer over the internet. I don't like doing that, I prefer to play the game myself.:mad: