Mi-8 Gunner Controls

[Art-J]

I recall it was clearly stated by one of the devs recently in one of the threads of this section, that only the side gun would be operated by the player.

 

At least for now (not that this tiny PKT peeking through absurdly small rear opening would be useful for anything anyway).

[Esac_mirmidon]

Agree but the AI isnt firing also from the rear. So maybe is only cosmetic for now.

[M460]

Both AI gunners work fine for me!

 

Noticed you cannot open the rear Bay door and the side door when gunners are equipped.

 

Is there going to be an animation added in the future for this?

[Esac_mirmidon]

Uhmm, strange, i need to do more testing.

[fjacobsen]

You must set ROE for the gunners in order to make them fire.

Lctr+5 For the rear gunner and Lctr+LWin+4 for the front gunner (This can only be set when the gun is mammed by AI - check Kneeboard for setting).

[Esac_mirmidon]

Thanks. Thats my error.

[Dugong]

Couple of questions on the new gunner functionality,

 

1.How does one get the gunner status (Ralt Rshift K) bar up? for me it only works when i'm occupying the side gunner and disappears when i switch to positions 1 2 or 3.

 

2.Is there now an option for the copilot to take control as per the Huey, to make it possible to player control the side gun without crashing?

 

3. Is there a key command to look down the sights of the kord?

Thx

Edited December 2, 2016 by Dugong

[Buzzles]

Couple of questions on the new gunner functionality,

 

1.How does one get the gunner status (Ralt Rshift K) bar up? for me it only works when i'm occupying the side gunner and disappears when i switch to positions 1 2 or 3.

 

Bring up the kneeboard :)

[firmek]

Gents, I'm just about to try it out but by RTFM - reading the flight manual (or reading the new fantastic manual :) ):

The machine guns are controlled by the AI-gunners, the player can set the ROE behavior for them. Besides that, the 12.7-mm KORD machine gun can be controlled by the player...

 

Key commands for playing as a gunner (page 373)

[4] - Take the door gunner’s place

[1] - Take the pilot’s place

[Rshift + K] - Aktivate kneeboard

[K] - Aktivate kneeboard (shown only while the key is kept pressed)

[Lwin + H] - Activate/ deactivate gunner’s status panels while playing as a door gunner

[LCtrl + Lwin + 4] - Sets ROE of the door gunner

[LCtrl + 5] - Sets ROE of the tail gunner

[Lalt + T] - Switches simultaneous use of TrackIR and mouse modes

[F9] - Disables/enables TrackIR from its own software

 

It looks like that at the moment the door gunner is controllable while the tail one is purely AI. IMO, no issue with that, super great that the door gunner is controllable.

[stalhuth]

same problem here, rear gunner don't shoot

[hannibal]

do you think belsimtek will add multicrew slots like the gazelle or L39 albatros in the future?

i dont want to lose hope for multiplayer multicrew..

[fjacobsen]

same problem here, rear gunner don't shoot

 

Again...

 

Set ROE for the AI gunner(s) via the Kneeboard.

[lmp]

Both gunners shoot just fine. By that I mean they expend ammunition... I've yet to witness them actually hit something

[Zimmerdylan]

Both gunners shoot just fine. By that I mean they expend ammunition... I've yet to witness them actually hit something

 

 

 

In that respect they're pretty useless. The Huey gunners are the same way. Couldn't hit the side of a barn from the inside.

[SFC Tako]

Here's a very long vid where I try things out. Skip ahead to 17:15 for the gunner controls. You can read my feedback in the vid-description.

 

[Hook47]

In that respect they're pretty useless. The Huey gunners are the same way. Couldn't hit the side of a barn from the inside.

 

Being a former CH-47 Gunner/Crew Chief, there is realism in that to be honest. Aerial Gunnery is very tricky, that being said I think the M134 at least and possibly all the AI gunners could probably use an effectiveness boost :) One issue is the M134 or M60 don't always drop infantry like they would in the real world, speaking as general as something as complicated ballistics permit anyway. One thing can be said for certain- the chances of surviving a hit from a 12.7mm or a M134A 7.62x51 (since the likelihood only of being hit once by that weapon system is... near zero) is extremely unlikely at best!

Edited December 3, 2016 by Hook47

[Hook47]

After more time with this- I have to be honest and say I'm a little unsatisfied with this being considering the out of beta release- The inability to control the rear PKM is disappointing, I would like to see that added soon.

 

Also there is a really frustrating stuck sound bug that happens very very frequently

[PilotMi8]

After more time with this- I have to be honest and say I'm a little unsatisfied with this being considering the out of beta release- The inability to control the rear PKM is disappointing, I would like to see that added soon._

We have not planned it (required costs are, but little use: how we think - player want to try just one time)

_Also there is a really frustrating stuck sound bug that happens very very frequently

It will be very useful to get from you track with bug!

[zaelu]

We have not planned it (required costs are, but little use: how we think - player want to try just one time)

 

 

At this point yes, but if the entire back cabin is modeled to be able to take troops... maybe later will have use/immersion.

[zerO_crash]

Splendid addition, makes Mi-8 even more magnificent :thumbup: :pilotfly:

[firmek]

We have not planned it (required costs are, but little use: how we think - player want to try just one time)

 

It will be very useful to get from you track with bug!

I think it's a good decision. The visibility for the rear gunner must be like looking through a straw. Most of the people would just try it one, twice and then come back to the main thing which is flying the chopper.

Just trying to be fair here, it's the same with the door gunners - they are controlled by AI for good reasons. Personally I have the same opinion about the multi-crew - It's hard to imagine that a core game-play would be someone spending his whole flight as a gunner (Maybe some day if we'll get the B-17).

 

IMO, just to summarize. To improve:

- AI gunners efficiency - as someone wrote they're just expanding ammo. Even if pilot takes all the care to fly slow and steady. At the moment this one is the biggest issue.

- AI gunners burst length - even on high setting it's too short. Maybe consider making short, medium, long. It would be great to have a setting for those fast and close flybys when the gunner should just more or less hold the trigger.

- Aiming control - there is a big delay between mouse movement and reaction of the gun. In result at the moment aiming is just a nightmare. Please make the gun control and mouse input 1:1.

 

To fix:

- sound bug: gun firing sound is looped and is being played after AI gunner has stopped shooting. Once AI starts shooting again the sound gets back to normal.

- external view for sling loading - outside front cabin section is missing, cockpit is visible.

 

Not a priority, nice to have:

- rear gunner

- multi crew

 

Overall, great work on the Mi-8 - it's just a fantastic module. Kudos for the manual.

Since it was an release and the module is pretty much feature complete just do the bug fixing and move forward with developing another great aircraft ;)

Edited December 4, 2016 by firmek

[eurofor]

(...)

 

- Aiming control - there is a big delay between mouse movement and reaction of the gun. In result at the moment aiming is just a nightmare. Please make the gun control and mouse input 1:1.

 

(...)

 

 

Are you controlling it with the view aimed down the sights? I find that it's much easier to have the view separated from the aiming, that way you can manually align the sights using TrackIR for targets up close and aim/lead by the tracers for targets further out.

[firmek]

Are you controlling it with the view aimed down the sights? I find that it's much easier to have the view separated from the aiming, that way you can manually align the sights using TrackIR for targets up close and aim/lead by the tracers for targets further out.

I can be missing something but is there a way to aim down the sights - something like RMB in FPS (sorry for trivial compression)? What I'm doing is pausing the TIR when aiming as also zooming in with the mouse wheel. Still when the mouse/gun is moved the camera gets off center of the sights. It gets aligned back after a while after mouse movement is stopped. In result the feeling of the gun controls is rather "rubbery" or lagy. My suggestion would be to remove or minimize this effect.

[Art-J]

Pausing TiR is also what I've been testing recently as well. My feelings on this implementation are mixed - apart from aforementioned input delay in "aiming-down-the-sights" mode, I'm not quite happy with the fact that sight notch and bead align well only when aiming level, or only a few degrees up and down. Anything higher or lower causes either:

 

a) bead to be higher than notch - not a big problem, you can still adjust fire by tracers, or;

 

b) notch to be higher than bead - that IS a big problem, because You literally can't see where the gun is pointing at all, and it happens in the most usual situation - firing at targets located 20-30 degrees below. That makes using KORD efficiently possible only when the target is roughly on the same level as fuselage floor, and it doesn't happen often.

 

I can understand the delay as an attempt to simulate handling of big and heavy weapon, I also understand that gunners physically cannot aim down the sights in full vertical movement range, but I would like to see the auto-alignment to work a bit better in 0 down to -30 degrees range.

[eurofor]

I agree that it's difficult to use the aimed down view, both because of the lag in lining up the sights and because the narrow partially blocked view doesn't let you lead the target effectively, and also there doesn't seem to be any quick button to get that view.

 

My suggestion is to physically move your head with the TIR to manually line up the sights or simply aim by the tracers when the target is at a too awkward angle. Like this: