helicopter stuff

[Pastry]

Sorry, do you mean you are physically stuck in Auto Hover or you want to land without it? If the latter then:

 

A bleed flare is the best way to reduce speed and not gain too much altitude. Dslyexci has a good video on it, check out his art of flight series, specifically the one about stages of landing.

 

Basically though, try to incorporate holding down collective with a little bit of nose up pitch (use them together), this will slow the helicopter down and the opposite effects of down collective and pitching up will keep your helicopter nice and level (if balanced correctly). 

If you need to descend and slow at the same time, just lower the amount you pitch up (bear in mind it won't slow you down as quickly though).

A lot of the pilots on the public servers fly right to the LZ and pitch up/engage Auto Hover to slow down leaving themselves vulnerable to being shot down high over an AO. This obviously makes people angry (rightly so IMO).

You should perform the bleed flare far enough out so that you can slow yourself down and set yourself up for a nice, smooth landing without gaining too much altitude. After some practice you can even use the rudder to kill off excess speed on the final stage of landing and touch down at an angle like a badass!

 

Try to keep away from Auto Hover as much as possible for landing (especially when coming in at speed).

 

I would add that TrackIR is a fantastic peripheral for any would be pilot in ArmA.

[Someone]

How do you make your descent before landing?

There are 2 ways to get lower with a helicopter. One of them is simply trading some height for speed (dive), but the issue then is that you're going to be moving very fast. The second option is to lower your collective. If you are in a situation where you need to lose height quickly for any particular reason, combine both. Lower your collective and lean your helicopter downwards as much as you possibly dare. If you gain too much speed, turn your helicopter sideways rather than pointing it straight up, as this will allow you to bleed of speed by changing direction, rather than regain speed.

This isn't really something you need to learn from the beginning, it's a slightly more advanced method, but it works really well.

For a smooth and decent landing, i rather recommend you plan your decent early. begin to slow down far from the lz, by lowering your collective and pointing your nose slightly upwards. Make sure not to point your nose to high, or you will gain height. You're basically "balancing" your helicopter to not gain height. Once you've slowed down enough and feel that you're in a scenario wehere you can land, continue to approact the lz. A good pilot always plans his LZ before he lands, he knows where to slow down, where to approach from and where to land. In the beginning you may need to think more about it, and take it slow, but eventually it will all come naturally.

Keep your hands away from auto hover, as this will do nothing but slow down your learning progression. Auto hover is only for very precise manouvers and even then it's something I'd rather avoid.

And as stated above, TrackIR is an amazing peripheral for flying, but it isn't really nessecary. It's kind of expensive and if you're only planning on using it for Arma, you may want to concider if it's justified. Joysticks doesn't work well with Arma, I wouldn't get one for flying in that specific game. Rudderpedals are nice to have, but isn't really something you're gaining anything from unless your antitorque is slightly damaged. I mainly use my keyboard for rudder, unless my antitorque is damaged.

[fir_nev]

Sorry, do you mean you are physically stuck in Auto Hover or you want to land without it? If the latter then:

 

A bleed flare is the best way to reduce speed and not gain too much altitude. Dslyexci has a good video on it, check out his art of flight series, specifically the one about stages of landing.

 

Basically though, try to incorporate holding down collective with a little bit of nose up pitch (use them together), this will slow the helicopter down and the opposite effects of down collective and pitching up will keep your helicopter nice and level (if balanced correctly). 

If you need to descend and slow at the same time, just lower the amount you pitch up (bear in mind it won't slow you down as quickly though).

A lot of the pilots on the public servers fly right to the LZ and pitch up/engage Auto Hover to slow down leaving themselves vulnerable to being shot down high over an AO. This obviously makes people angry (rightly so IMO).

You should perform the bleed flare far enough out so that you can slow yourself down and set yourself up for a nice, smooth landing without gaining too much altitude. After some practice you can even use the rudder to kill off excess speed on the final stage of landing and touch down at an angle like a badass!

 

Try to keep away from Auto Hover as much as possible for landing (especially when coming in at speed).

 

I would add that TrackIR is a fantastic peripheral for any would be pilot in ArmA.

 

Thanks for the reply, Pastry. Yes, I want to try landing a chopper without the use of Autohover.

 

There are 2 ways to get lower with a helicopter. One of them is simply trading some height for speed (dive), but the issue then is that you're going to be moving very fast. The second option is to lower your collective. If you are in a situation where you need to lose height quickly for any particular reason, combine both. Lower your collective and lean your helicopter downwards as much as you possibly dare. If you gain too much speed, turn your helicopter sideways rather than pointing it straight up, as this will allow you to bleed of speed by changing direction, rather than regain speed.

This isn't really something you need to learn from the beginning, it's a slightly more advanced method, but it works really well.

For a smooth and decent landing, i rather recommend you plan your decent early. begin to slow down far from the lz, by lowering your collective and pointing your nose slightly upwards. Make sure not to point your nose to high, or you will gain height. You're basically "balancing" your helicopter to not gain height. Once you've slowed down enough and feel that you're in a scenario wehere you can land, continue to approact the lz. A good pilot always plans his LZ before he lands, he knows where to slow down, where to approach from and where to land. In the beginning you may need to think more about it, and take it slow, but eventually it will all come naturally.

Keep your hands away from auto hover, as this will do nothing but slow down your learning progression. Auto hover is only for very precise manouvers and even then it's something I'd rather avoid.

And as stated above, TrackIR is an amazing peripheral for flying, but it isn't really nessecary. It's kind of expensive and if you're only planning on using it for Arma, you may want to concider if it's justified. Joysticks doesn't work well with Arma, I wouldn't get one for flying in that specific game. Rudderpedals are nice to have, but isn't really something you're gaining anything from unless your antitorque is slightly damaged. I mainly use my keyboard for rudder, unless my antitorque is damaged.

 

Thanks, Someone. I will continue to practise on a bigger LZ clearing to tighter spaces over time.

[Mage]

Make sure your speed is less than 200 when a couple of kilometers away in case you need to do tree dodging.

[MessedUpSmiley]

Keep in mind there's some really nice premade scenario's on the workshop if you want to improve at helicopter related stuff.

 

I've also find a really nice YouTube playlist you might want to dig trough:

[MessedUpSmiley]

I never predesignate an LZ if there is no use like a plan to be continued from it.

See what type of people you get in the chopper and decide where you land on the fly (get it? :-¶)

[Jason.]

I agree with Smiley, I will usually decide my own LZ due to the constantly changing situation at an AO, what may have been a good LZ 5 mins ago (or even when you left base), may no longer be viable by the time you get there.

There are MANY factors to consider when deciding on an LZ, and it's something that newer players often struggle with.

 

I had a situation a few days ago where I was in the first heli to a new AO, the LZ given to the pilot was pretty close to the AO and only had a small treeline as cover.

If the pilot flown low behind the cover of the trees and landed at the LZ it probably would have went fine.

But instead he flies in at high speed, way past the LZ and at least 100m altitude, I could see this coming so I already had my parachute ready, the others weren't so lucky...

 

After all that the pilot then blames the LZ for what went wrong, don't be that guy.

Sometimes LZs are quite flexible, but often they depend on a critical piece of cover to protect them from enemy fire. Usually this would be a hilltop but can also be trees, buildings, or a coastline.

[Someone]

I never predesignate an LZ if there is no use like a plan to be continued from it.

See what type of people you get in the chopper and decide where you land on the fly (get it? :-¶)

I always predesignate several LZs. It is alot more safe to mark off areas which should be safe before you accually approach the area. I mark presesignated LZs in black, and LZ:s which I know are safe or at least have been safe earlier are marked with the color, usually Blue or Green.

Even if the LZ isn't checked by UAV prior to landing, even if you have zero intel, you can usually give the approach an attempt. If you've checked an LZ and approach route in beforehand, you can swiftly break off (eventuallt flare/dodge) and then go for another LZ. If you've done your markings correctly, you can simply return behind some hard cover, something which blocks both visuals and fire and after that swiftly fall back to your secondary or third LZ option.

I'd rather do the thinking before I accually aproach the area, so that I can focus 100% on flying while being at a potentially hot LZ.

Some people tend to remove markers and say "do not mark LZs unless you know where the enemis are", and they usually fuck things up by doing so. A good pilot always have a backup LZ, and people removing the markers force the pilots to re-locate their secondary LZs if their first LZ approach fails. This takes time from the pilots, and you don't want the pilot to spend too much time in the map while being close to a hot AO, especially not while taking fire.

This doesn't mean that I can't change my mind and go for a completly different LZ if i find one, it just mean that you've got a plan in case all else fail.

[fir_nev]

Thanks for the help, guys! I managed to ferry >10 troops on hummingbird this afternoon (+8 GMT) after shadowing another pilot, xraydragon, to observe and practise the landing approach taught by U guys.

 

I will stick with the small chopper first before trying out the bigger ones because I am still afraid of base's helipad for the troops' pickup.

[razgriz33]

Perhaps and LZ marker should be thought of an approximate marker and not a pinpoint landing spot. At the end of the decision making it's the pilot in command that determines where is safe and effective to land. I'm skeptical of landing exactly where infantry plop on the map but with enough due care and attention 80% of the time you can put them within 500m of their desired spot

[PiranhA]

Giving an option for multiple LZ's can come in handy aswell, i mark them as follow:

 

Alpha

Hotel

Oscar

Yankee

[Anton2000]

Here is a short video (2mins) of what happens when

You take a stand for the pilots and get into an argument with another player.

Happend yesterday.

 

https://youtu.be/rKg95PEMrYk

 

What can I say...

[Jason.]

Anton if you haven't already I would suggest that you fill out a player report form ( http://www.ahoyworld.co.uk/pr ), and include that video which should be good enough evidence to get the player banned.

[Cebi]

Hi

I have a qustion. How do you resuply troops?

 

The way i do it is: equip chest rig and carryall backpack -> hop in helicopter -> land near VAS -> eguip desired ammo from VAS and then drop it in heli inventory while sitting inside heli...repeat till full.

 

This is somewhat clumsy and can take up to 5 minutes to fill inventory, altough it saves time for folks who dont need to fly back to base to rearm when flying to next AO. Is there some ammobox which you can sling and drop?

[P057code]

Hi

I have a qustion. How do you resuply troops?

 

The way i do it is: equip chest rig and carryall backpack -> hop in helicopter -> land near VAS -> eguip desired ammo from VAS and then drop it in heli inventory while sitting inside heli...repeat till full.

 

This is somewhat clumsy and can take up to 5 minutes to fill inventory, altough it saves time for folks who dont need to fly back to base to rearm when flying to next AO. Is there some ammobox which you can sling and drop?

 

I believe (given that I'm useless at flying) that you can drop an ammobox from the Ghosthawk, and that you can request a crate from the VAS at the Hangars if you want to do that.

[Cebi]

@P057code: Aha! Thank you, will try that next time.

[Someone]

Thanks for the help, guys! I managed to ferry >10 troops on hummingbird this afternoon (+8 GMT) after shadowing another pilot, xraydragon, to observe and practise the landing approach taught by U guys.

 

I will stick with the small chopper first before trying out the bigger ones because I am still afraid of base's helipad for the troops' pickup.

The hummingbird is the easiest helicopter to maneuver, but also one which is the more difficult to properly implement. The strength of the hummingbird is its high maneuverability, low weight and small size. You can fly it really aggressively, using it's small size and maneuverability to push deeper into AO:s than any other helicopter, simply because you're such a small target, capable of flying low which gives you really short exposure times to enemy troops. You're incredibly fragile, but as long as you're behind hard cover none of that matter.

It is the easiest helicopter to fly - but one of the more difficult helicopters to fully utilize.

I do recommend flying it, but I wouldn't say that it's something you should stick with for too long. Fly it, get comfortable with flying and landing, then try and change it for a ghosthawk or a mohawk. Learn to fly the heavier helicopters, how to properly plan and approach LZs. Once you're feeling that you know how to handle those bigger helicopters, once you can approach LZs and land close, without taking fire - change back to the hummingbird.

All of a sudden you'll feel the power of the hummingbird. You can do things with it, which the heavier helicopters simply cannot, and you will begin flying it to its full potential.

 

[fir_nev]

The hummingbird is the easiest helicopter to maneuver, but also one which is the more difficult to properly implement. The strength of the hummingbird is its high maneuverability, low weight and small size. You can fly it really aggressively, using it's small size and maneuverability to push deeper into AO:s than any other helicopter, simply because you're such a small target, capable of flying low which gives you really short exposure times to enemy troops. You're incredibly fragile, but as long as you're behind hard cover none of that matter.

It is the easiest helicopter to fly - but one of the more difficult helicopters to fully utilize.

I do recommend flying it, but I wouldn't say that it's something you should stick with for too long. Fly it, get comfortable with flying and landing, then try and change it for a ghosthawk or a mohawk. Learn to fly the heavier helicopters, how to properly plan and approach LZs. Once you're feeling that you know how to handle those bigger helicopters, once you can approach LZs and land close, without taking fire - change back to the hummingbird.

All of a sudden you'll feel the power of the hummingbird. You can do things with it, which the heavier helicopters simply cannot, and you will begin flying it to its full potential.

 

Thanks for the guide. I am now practising on Editor by becoming Zeus.

 

That's why I have been in-game but not online lately.