The Fighting TTLGers present: Arma 3 (a TTLG Coop Saturdays spin-off)

[Tony_Tarantula]

So I've got this on my wishlist, and I'll drop it the next time it shows up on sale.

I'm kinda out of practice (Was in a staff job, then business school, now finance) but I can show some of the basic tactical movement techniques and squad battle drills used in real life. Disclaimer is that unless they've improved the AI vs. Arma 1 most things work better PvP than PvE. But that said at least in Arma 1 and Operation Flashpoint were good enough simulations that real military squad tactics work well.

[Thirith]

I appreciate the offer, but since we're playing two hours every 2-3 weeks, I'm not sure how feasible it is to do drills and the like. It's not what I want out of the sessions, at least. Yes, it's fun to improve at cooperating, but at the moment I think it's more realistic to do so while doing missions rather than using the time to train.

What's been working well is that one of the people playing has a lot of Arma experience, and when he takes the lead it makes a huge difference. Other than that, though, I'd rather point people in the direction of dslyecxi's video guides and hope that they check them out and take them to heart.

[henke]

Indeed. You're welcome to join, Tony, as long as you can chill out and not take the whole thing too seriously.

[Tony_Tarantula]

Not my intention, I simply don't have the time or energy to spare for that. For reference, a "Battle Drill" is a technical term that just refers to a doctrinal response for specific situation. A lot of them are literally as simple as Fire team 1 moves into cover to suppress an enemy element, Team 2 moves around to flank, and then they charge through while Team 1 shifts their fire to the side to avoid friendly fire and catch any "squirters" that react by moving away from the charge. It's not as relevant for PvE because the AI doesn't react to those tactics realistically. PvP however, not only do players react realistically to that but a lot of them are familiar with real world squad tactics and will use them against you.

I was thinking more I could just take 5-10 minutes and explain some basic, real world techniques that soldiers use to move under fire.

[Neb]

Gotta practice your serpentine if you wanna be pro.

[Thirith]

As the year is into its fourth quarter, the days are getting shorter and they're already trying to get us to buy Christmassy stuff at the shops, I wanted to ask the TTLG Arma gang if they'd be okay with adding another mod - or, more accurately, a suite of mods called the Arma 3 Community Upgrade Project (CUP). It adds the units and, more importantly, the maps of all the games going back to Operation Flashpoint to Arma 3. It's a fairly hefty mod pack, somewhere between 15GB and 20GB, but it very much adds to the kind of terrains we've got at our disposal: Eastern European woodlands and towns, Central Asian valleys, Middle Eastern cities.

My suggestion would be that we finish 2017 with Altis, Stratis and Malden 2035 and add the likes of Chernarus, Takistan, Sahrani and Everon for our sessions in 2018. They can easily be downloaded and added via the Steam workshop.

Would that be okay for everyone?

[Jeshibu]

Yeah! No need to wait for 2018 either IMO, unless there's some hidden depths of Altis we haven't plumbed yet.

[Thirith]

Hey, welcome back! How were things in the Land of the Rising Sun/Tentacle Porn?

Re: when to add CUP: I'll have to check out the missions I already have for the CUP maps, and I may have to edit them. I might have some ready for December, (Christmas on Chernarus!) but it'll be tricky to get anything ready for the next 1-2 sessions.

[scumble]

I'll just be glad to join a session. Is it possible to get a bit of experience solo just to figure out the game?

[Malf]

I never played solo Scumble, just jumped right in, although when we started with ARMA 2, I did have quite a bit of experience with the original DayZ mod which helped. And we're all still asking each-other which button does what now

[henke]

Scumble, there's a boot camp thingy at the start, good idea to run through that. Don't worry about asking questions once in sessions tho, this game has more key commands than anyone can keep in mind. There's key commands for everything from standing on tippy-toes to modulating your voice(whispering/talking normally/shouting).

[Thirith]

I second what Malf and henke said. The tutorial is definitely worth doing, but don't worry about being new to the game.

The only thing that's essential to do beforehand is download the mods and Teamspeak 3, install the latter and make sure that the radio mod TFAR is correctly installed. All the info on this is listed in the first post of the thread.

Looking forward to having you join the session, scumble!

[Thirith]

And that's it for tonight. After a horrifically meatgrindery beginning, we settled into a mission of Escape Altis. Some of the high and low points points: quadbike recon and Malf managing to run over Sulphur in the middle of the road; a gruelling firefight in a small town against a fire team plus MRAP; Malf sinking through the floor of a house and still getting rescued by Sulphur (no hard feelings, right?); finding two cars whose front tires were gone, driving them to a repair truck at a snail's pace and getting them up and running again; and finally liberating a small camp by taking out the MRAP's driver and gunner.

Next session: Saturday 11 November at the usual time. Hoping to be revived repeatedly by you there!

[Thirith]

Last night's Arma session was cancelled at short notice, as we were only three people. There will be one last session this year, on Saturday 23 December. Hoping that some of you can join!

If you do, please note that we're adding the CUP set of mods, which brings all of the maps, units, vehicles and weaponry of the earlier games in the series (including Operation Flashpoint) to Arma 3. You can find all of the required mods here: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfile.../?id=877349651

[Thirith]

I’m currently on holiday in Chile, sporting both a sunburn and a cold and battling wobbly hotel WiFi, but if I’m not mistaken Arma 3 is currently sold at a nice discount, which also extends to the extensions. For anyone who’s been wanting to check out the TTLG sessions.

The Apex extension and its great Tanoa environment would be a fun addition to the coop sessions, but I don’t want to split the group between those who have Apex and those who don’t. If most of the gang has it at some point, I can start planning in missions on Tanoa.

[Jeshibu]

I'm getting Apex now. Is any of the other DLC worth it?

[Thirith]

The heli one has nice stuff; the rest I mostly bought to support Bohemia and the game. They’re all at least okay, but I’m not sure I’d generally call them great value for money. Though the marksman one would give you access to some neat sniper rifles, I think.

[Tony_Tarantula]

well...I did say I would buy it if it wen't on a good steam sale, and I'm a man of my word. 7% Dl-ed now.

[scumble]

Still on the fence about getting it - do you suggest the Apex edition?

[Thirith]

I would, since the Tanoa map is great and very different from all other Arma maps going back to Operation Flashpoint. At the same time, if any of the players don’t have it, we'll just play different missions. I’m not making Apex a requirement unless everyone has it.

[Thirith]

Will anyone be around for a session of Arma on Sat 23/12? If so, please let me know so I can pick some missions accordingly. Here are the details:

The next Arma 3 coop session:

Date: Sat, 23 December 2017
Time: 4-6pm UK time

As always, I'll be online a bit before 4pm to set up the server and check who's on Steam. I'll try to launch the server with a lobby mission 15 minutes before the session starts, and I'll post the IP and password on the Steam group, under the Events tab.

If not, we'll be continuing the Arma coop sessions in 2018 - with the newly added CUP mod, which means we'll be getting shot to pieces not just in the Mediterranean but also in Chernarus, Takistan, Sahrani, Everon, Malden etc.!

[Malf]

I'll be back in Gloucestershire to spend Christmas with family, so won't be able to make that.

[Thirith]

Looking forward to going to battle with you in the new year, then. Lord Penney's already done some new missions, and I'm looking forward to trying the city escape mission again - practically the same number of enemies, but they're less aggressive. The idea is that the players can't just walk out of the city (the perimeter has to be secured to some extent) but that they aren't shot to bits within a minute.

[PigLick]

I will be around on the 23rd, and am on holidays now (yay). Doesnt look like anyone else will be though.

[Jeshibu]

I'll be there!