EU1, my first impressions ramble

[radek]

Ahoy

 

After playing a couple of days and nights and nights, I decided to share my thoughts on EU1 gameplay I'm pretty new to arma multiplayer, so this just my feedback.

I have played many nice missions on AW, and have met remarkable soldiers, leaders, or just role-playing folks. I enjoy AW, as it has this casual feel, is open to everyone (the server is full for most of prime time!)

Any criticism here, is just my rational opinion on the gameplay and how I see it. Even if nothing would change (now I'm really looking forward to the upcoming IA3 release), AW is where i spend my arma-time.

 

The IA mission system

It's a wonderful baseline set of features (what else to say in it's birthplace, right?). What I miss is the "annex - and defend/hold" phase, which I understand is in the system, but is switched off at least on EU1. As all of this is probably going to mix/change a lot this weekend in IA3, up to the more general topics next...

 

Command/Comms

I really miss TFAR - or generally TS usage. I hate the ingame VON, which can't be split from the sound effects, into a headset. You cannot opt-out of channels, you cannot opt-in. That led to muting the side chat...

Either way, it seems everyone just became allergic to the VON usage, even for useful info. But the text chat is so lame. it's too small, too short, too distracting, cluttered and inefficient. Relaying important information about coordination, enemy positions or imminent threats is very cumbersome.

Also the discrete separation of map layers is annoying - see the chaos in LZ designation/in-vehicle picking, random marking deletion/spam or just missing info because you switched to the wrong layer by mistake comma dot comma dot dot dot damn...

 

Classes, weapons, difficulty

The AI is dumb. (although it might have improved a bit in the N>O update?). Yes, it's lethal at close range, but it's recce and reaction to engagement are a joke and long range ops are non-existent. It might be a feature, it might be a bug. But it has profound effects on the BLUFOR ops. Especially some classes.

A MBT can wipe out all enemy armor in 2 minutes just by camping on a hill, at comfortable 1500-2000m away (haven't really seen enemy armor retaliating at more than ~1.2km).

A sniper can have a picnic 1200m away for a whole day and shoot infantry with all the ammo he can carry (enemy snipers are pretty clueless even at marksman ranges of 800m). even marksmen/spotters with the large caliber guns can wreck havoc from 1000m, limited only by the Kahlia scope zoom.

The issue becomes ridiculous using the 7.62's, when you can slowly chip away squads and garrisons, delivering the needed 2-3 hits at long range. Enemy squads just keep standing there after being hit, or they run for a bit, treat themselves and resume patrolling as if it never happened.

When a reasonable player/team uses these assets, it's way too op and there is a lack of challenge to them. The effect is a little downplayed by rambo-mode tank drivers and snipers getting wasted...

I see it can be related to balance and general accessibility of the gameplay, but these roles have it more difficult to get into the battle before it's over, than surviving/winning it.

And more on "thermal imaging" later...

 

Population, co-op and Tactical skillset

Most of the time my impression of the mission flow is like this - never ending stream of helis hurling respawning random infantry into the AO. You are afraid to board one, because you don't know where it will go, or if it's a geronimo flight (my longest shot-down streak is like 7 flights). once successfully landed, people get out and the sprinting starts, to the action. If you stop or slow down you risk the route will be swept clean or you will be alone because everyone else just got wiped out. Increasing the enemy AA to press more squads into vehicle transport, or recon and LZ securing, seems unfeasible because of the quick respawning and revival of the "nas mnogo" tactics.

People don't seem to really use the "technological" edge over OPFOR - a lot of times a quick scan of the AO with the range/laser will "light up" a lot of enemy troops on the map, somehow unseen by previous waves of invaders. The IR channel is also op in this regard, especially at night.

 

Anyway, see you in battle

[Colsta]

From the quick read I gave your post, all the problems I saw you pointing out are pretty much solved in EU#3, our modded server, AKA Enhanced.

 

If that intrigues you, here's a few links of interest:

Rules

 

Mods

And the general sub-forum

https://forums.ahoyworld.net/forum/86-enhanced-server-information-and-discussion/

 

 

Hope to see you there.

[PiranhA]

Hello Radek

 

After reading your post i think you might give eu3 a try as Colsta said. Its the modded server were tfar is used.

 

On eu 1 and 2 are no special mods needed, its is, as you know and this keeps for most of the time the gameplay as you mentioned in your first part. By keeping it open and, for example, no mandatory TS connection everybody can have a easy go whenever and however they want (within the line of the rules). So far about the comms and mods.

 

About the weapons, classes, difficulty and population: Its a open game with a versatile variety of people and playing styles, preferences and gaming history. The "long distance problem" is something i dont have much against couse i like to sneak up close from where they get a bit more lethal. This game in combination with invade and annex idea can be played on many, many diffrent ways. Choosing for the easy option in arma is a insult to yourself i think, its not a game about picnic-ing. I experience the game best with trying diffrent styles, roles and approach of situations.

 

I accept the rush people make in the game, the posibility is highest on peak times,  but agree its annoying. Maybe a idea to go by land vehicle, you can load them up aswell with all sorts of handyness, but be aware its still a open server so someone can steal it and geronimo it into the AO.

 

In my opinion you made a good post with some constructive critisism, quite a read tho.

 

Cya in battle.

[GamerbugUK]

As PiranhA said, with it being open to all and mod-lite you will encounter many issues with the playerbase and how missions unfold.

 

I find the engage at 1000m+ thing to be a bit annoying as well as often by the time you get to the fight, and if you dont have a good long range scope, you are just sitting this one out. I like to get into the thick of a town and fight toe to toe, but that often is a limitation of Altis and its large open hilly areas.

 

I'm also not a fan of a vehicle showing up at a mission and blowing everything away, but often the AO's are so far away this becomes less of a thing. However occasionally that vehicle showing up late can be the saving grace to a squad with no AT left.

 

However I love the open nature of the EU1 & 2 servers and thus prefer them due to time constraints, and not having to overload on mods like TFAR can be a blessing for short sorties onto the battlefield. The only thing worth changing is the maps, but those take a lot of setting up when not vanilla, and chances are they won't ever implementthese on I&A beyond EU3.

[Liru the Lcpl.]

ohh ohh @radek I love these! Ok let me throw in my hat here!

 

Overall: You have to remember that EU 1 and 2 are more on the casual side in terms of public servers, so it's just a potpourri of people playing tactical and EXTREMELY casual gameplay. If you want something better, I would *highly recommend* you take Colsta's advice and look into EU 3. It has mods that fix AI stupidity (thanks to ASR_AI3), communications (with TFAR), command structure (thanks to the high level of discipline in that server group), and honestly all of the other gripes you seem to have listed. Just a thought

 
1. I and A mission system. I miss the defenses too, and believe that I and A 3 will change up things quite a lot. We also have a lot of new Spartans coming up in the ranks for more customized AOs.

 

2. Like I said, it's a casual open server. The spam in side chat is just one of those vanilla things... I've found groups of people that prefer VON chat though in EU 1 and 2 (mostly 2 actually) and usually roll with them. It's all about finding your squad mates and being social

3. That's the intelligence of the vanilla AI you're talking about right there. Some scripts can fix small things, but i'll admit vanilla have a difficult time reacting to engagements around the 1 kilometer mark. Hence why i'll the people highest on the leaderboards are snipers or lone wolves in tanks... or me with a truck filled with various amounts of titan launchers and missiles... (I only do it on EU 1 and 2 compared to everywhere else because  they are casual servers, and at that point it's just me having a bit of fun messing around competing with them tank wolves for kills)

 

4. Ahh yes, the EU 1 charge... again, a side effect of a casual server. Not really much can be done about that one...

Again, I would really recommend EU 3! :3

over n out!
-Liru

[Vlk]

Welcome to eu 3 enchanted. Hop in ts and ask a moderator/admin/eu3 veteran to get help with mods if needed

Sent from my iPhone using a phone app that is really irritating because it constantly advertises itself.

[radek]

thanks for the feedback guys. yes I'm aware of EU3. I got it running some time ago, but the server seems empty most of the time, among other things. i'll check it out more closely after the IA3 hype settles

[Colsta]

Two things regarding that:

- EU#3 shouldn't be greatly affected by the I&A3 release, as it doesn't even run I&A, and I'd say a good amount of players there don't usually play EU#1/2, if at all.

- It's empty depending on times and days. It's been seeing a stable player count of ~15 players at night (in Europe) during the week, and ~20 on weekends.

 

As a side note, if you're interested, show up to the EU#3 meeting tomorrow, which we'll follow with a gamenight, where we'll play a different gamemode than the usual Gauntlet that runs on Enhanced.

 

 

[radek]

@Colsta i was referring to myself waiting to see and play IA3

but thanks for the info about the meeting, I'll try to make it and listen in

[TheScar]

now stop grabbling this fellow,he´s not interested greatly in EU3!

 

This guy is EU1 material - and i m saying this in the best positive way in case there s any doubt in my judgement ...

Welcome Radek,get a glass of good ol buddy Whisky and dont look at those guys by the bike garage anymore

 

 

 

 

[Cebi]

Ahoy Radek

 

I will try to give you some tips that might enhance your experience on EU1 and EU2 :).

 

Command/Coms:

Teamspeak channels for EU1/2 are used by a majority of people which are sometimes more talkative than my mother-in-law . Jokes aside, only a few players from EU1/2 go to TS but you can very often get help from them because they tend to be more cooperative as you can motivate them by yelling. With ARMA in-game chat  you can make your life easier if you modify you HUD layout in settings. You can make the chatbox bigger and thus you will see more messages displayed. You can also scroll by using page up/down when you have activated chat by  "_" to type.

 

Classes, weapons, difficulty:

Ever tried to engage a player in PvP beyond 1500m with 30mm cannon HE rounds...they will seem to be just as dumb as AI, but in reality, they are clueless and hopeless. They will try to disperse but on the Altis there are few places to hide. If you fiddle with AI (spot targets for them) you can get them to engage as far as server set object draw distance (actually further but let's not complicate things more). If that is set lower, AI will look dumb to you because it can't spot you over its object draw distance. But AI spotting distance is lowered further by its skill settings, if the player is prone, if it is dark, if you have sillencer...etc.. This is something I experimented on some time ago so don't sue me if this info is outdated.

 

The way I see AI difficulty is this: You can choose to outsmart the game or you can choose to play the game.

Most of the ppl will lay down on the hill and kill AI at a range. It is a perfectly reasonable thing to do when you have powerful optic sights, but they are robbing themselves from thrills of fighting the AI at a distance when they can see you,target you and engage.

 

When I am using assets I am trying to not waste them (it is forbidden). If I know that Anti-Air will not engage me at certain distance i would be fool to enter its engagement envelope. So for example there was a time i flew with BlackFish armed. The pilot used pylon turn with a small radius (less than 2km) and orbited in high speed (>400kph) and thus accuracy from onboard guns was piss poor and we took a lot of hits. When he left i got the pilot slot. I asked the gunner what was his object draw distance. It was 6km. So I opted to hover in air 1000m AGL 4 km out of AO. The accuracy of the guns must have been much better because he managed to wipeout the AO from enemy armor presence in very short time period. We did this twice then I felt we are making the game for other too easy so I left to fly transports. This is the example of Outsmarting the game. 

 

Playing Infantry is for me the other way around. I take a rifle and dive straight in, to dance between bullets. I don't like playing AT because it would tempt me to outsmart the game and not play it.

 

Population, co-op and tactical skillset

If you don't know the pilot, you can judge his skill by looking how he is landing at pads. If he has problems and overcompensates a lot, then take next one or take a hunter or offroad.

Optionally you can do side missions. Sometimes I can only see one or two ppl at those. There you seldom need to worry that somebody will steal your kills before you get to the action.

If people would use "technological edge" over opfor, you would have even less action. Mortar gunner cooperating with UAV operator can sometimes kill most of the enemy infantry before players even can move from old AO to the AO.

 

The difficulty was somewhat harder before with AI jets spawning. These days we only get strafing runs, but before it was full on AI CAS and AA. It took some skill but it was hard for new players. Imagine you are new to I@A and arma and you decided to take a slammer to AO to help and probably TK some in TI mode. These days you are golden until you arrive at AO there is only wild side mission spawn that can endanger you. But in the past you could have been taken out anytime by ATGM that you would never see coming. If this happens near base you will probably take next vehicle, but after 10 driving to Syrta...you will rage quit and probably never return

 

Sorry for such essay. See you in battle fellow countryman.

[Aegis_RVIR]

Pubs are pubs, but EU#1 is still not safe for rampaging tanks. Yes they are less common now but it only takes a good crew of 3 using vehicle chat to talk to wipe out multiple AO's before needing to restock on ammo again.

 

Still, the underwater side ops are pretty organised. They will be your best shot at order at EU#1