More infantry, more infantry.

[Gunfreak]

Yes it's a flight sim. But the lack of infantry variation is a pet peeve of mine.

 

For ww2

Machine gunners for the 3 nations that are in.

Need marines and Japanese for the Pacific (rifle and MG)

Post war.

Generic cold war infantry green clad with AK and MG. Green clad with Western guns(G3, M16, FAL) and MG.

Arab/North African infantry,  beige/brown cammo AK and MG.

Special detailed 

Falklands infantry both side

Vietnam, we need NVA, VC and US(probably the most important on the list.) To get proper Vietnam feel whenever a Vietnam map might come we need correct infantry. 

[WinterH]

I tend to agree. In my opinion we need at least:

- 1 AT soldier per side, better yet multiple according to different eras

- 1 LMG or SAW would be neat, if not obligatory

- HMG emplacements, ATGM soldiers, at least 1 per side

- Many more kinds of MANPADS, especially OLDER ones

 

This would be a start. Right now, we can't have blue infantry squad with any kind of AT rockets for example, unless we include either insurgent or (super old and low poly) VDV soldier with RPG-7.

 

Edit: a dream would have been infantry that can have loadouts like aircraft, thus able to be armed with different weapons on the editor.

Edited September 1, 2022 by WinterH

[sirrah]

Infantry improvements are already in the pipeline

(there was a small news update about it a few weeks ago. You can check it out in the weekly official news thread)

We don't know much details yet about these improvements, but looking at how much time and effort ED puts in adding other ground and air units, I bet it's going to be great  

[Aquorys]

Yeah, does not need to get too crazy, because all those models and logic add complexity and reduce performance, but I think these additional infantry units could make sense:

• Rifleman - we have those already
• Automatic rifleman - Machine gun (M249, PK), more ammo, higher rate of fire
• Grendier - Assault rifle & grenade launcher, short range fragmentation damage
• ATGM - Probably go for 4th gen, Javelins & similar
• Designated marksman - Semi-auto rifle .308 or similar, range ~600-800m, better accuracy than rifleman
• Sniper - Bolt action sniper rifle, range ~1200m, high accuracy, low rate of fire
• Heavy sniper - Same as sniper, somewhat less accuracy, but can take out unarmored an lightly armored vehicles

I think ALERT STATE red vs. green should make a difference. When green, they should all move at a similar pace, when red, they should probably crouch or go prone, be harder to hit and move slower. When red, snipers should be very hard to find by the enemy.

[Silver_Dragon]

By now, ED go to improve the infantry path and animations, but by now, no planned other infantry types.

[sirrah]

18 minutes ago, Silver_Dragon said:

..., but by now, no planned other infantry types.

Not planned, or just not confirmed WIP yet?

 

(Imho, a proper "modern-ish" AT infantry unit is long overdue. I seriously hope it's somewhere on ED's to-do list)

[Silver_Dragon]

12 minutes ago, sirrah said:

Not planned, or just not confirmed WIP yet?

 

(Imho, a proper "modern-ish" AT infantry unit is long overdue. I seriously hope it's somewhere on ED's to-do list)

WIP on update the old infantry 3D models, animations and the parhfinding.

[Gunfreak]

5 hours ago, Aquorys said:

Yeah, does not need to get too crazy, because all those models and logic add complexity and reduce performance, but I think these additional infantry units could make sense:

• Rifleman - we have those already
• Automatic rifleman - Machine gun (M249, PK), more ammo, higher rate of fire
• Grendier - Assault rifle & grenade launcher, short range fragmentation damage
• ATGM - Probably go for 4th gen, Javelins & similar
• Designated marksman - Semi-auto rifle .308 or similar, range ~600-800m, better accuracy than rifleman
• Sniper - Bolt action sniper rifle, range ~1200m, high accuracy, low rate of fire
• Heavy sniper - Same as sniper, somewhat less accuracy, but can take out unarmored an lightly armored vehicles

I think ALERT STATE red vs. green should make a difference. When green, they should all move at a similar pace, when red, they should probably crouch or go prone, be harder to hit and move slower. When red, snipers should be very hard to find by the enemy.

It doesn't affect performance to add infantry types to use. 

[upyr1]

32 minutes ago, Gunfreak said:

It doesn't affect performance to add infantry types to use. 

I could see he AI changes taking up some CPU cycles but it would be worth it

[Gunfreak]

41 minutes ago, upyr1 said:

I could see he AI changes taking up some CPU cycles but it would be worth it

Yes AI stuff takes up CPU power(something DCS doesn't have much to spare) but having different infantry types to choose from doesn't take up any more resources (except game space) 

It's simply adding variations for the sake of immersion. Personally dropping of generic modern US troops in the jungles of Vietnam in my Huey would be a huge immersion killer.

[MAXsenna]

9 minutes ago, Gunfreak said:

Personally dropping of generic modern US troops in the jungles of Vietnam in my Huey would be a huge immersion killer.

I agree. But I'm confident, when the map finally drops, the contemporary assets will too.
Might even be the reason "it takes so long".

[WinterH]

FWIW, I'd have much, MUCH preferred to see more infantry types added with the level of current infantry models rather than giving us more basic riflemen with fancy models and animations. But I hope new infantry will include more than just fancier looking riflemen hopefully.

And by current models I obviously don't mean ancient relics from 90s-2000s like some of the insurgents, VDV, and US GI models. But I'd be happy to see more varied infantry armament at the visual levels of units like Georgian M-4 soldier, that later insurgent model, Russian troops with AK-74Ms etc. And I'd be happy to see them like yesterday

Although to be fair to ED I guess it's understandable, coming up with new models and skeletally animated infantry CA open up more and more easily developed variety in the future.

With that said though, my wish for more infantry comes from a mission building capacity point of view. Which, while does include an element of immersion, I also think having every kind of infantry weapon and uniform for the sake of immersion is a bit much. For example I don't think sniper/DMR/anti-materiel armed riflemen means much in DCS other than cool looks, while AT soldiers do give infantry squads some semblance of capability vs armor to make them a factor in missions. ATGM soldiers would really be great to have too from a mission design point of view. Even better if they can actually move with the weapon system packed, and take some time to deploy it and fire statically then. But I can see that being somewhat problematic with the way ground units move/shoot currently. If though they could be ordered to deploy and stay or pack up and move through Combined Arms as well as Lua scripts, that'd be cool. But I'm already flying off on new tangents so I'll cut it here

[cfrag]

22 hours ago, Gunfreak said:

having different infantry types to choose from doesn't take up any more resources (except game space) 

That rater depends on what you are looking for. If "all" you are looking for is different 'skins' / 'liveries' (i.e. paint jobs) for the existing infantry models, you are absolutely correct, all we'd need is some more memory for the new textures.

If, on the other hand, you want them to to be anything different (other weapons, more refined visuals, natural movement/idle, better gestures etc) you are looking at new models, with new animations and IK/colliders - so the foot connects to the ground, the hands hold and use their weapons properly, and the weapons don't move through their body. I don't know how DCS creates and imports their models from (Cinema, Maya, ZBrush...) but newer models tend to have more complex meshes (higher polygon count) and the animations tend to use more 'bones' - they therefore often produce a heavier CPU/GPU load for collision detection and skeletal animation. For example the newer Georgian M4 and SC carrier boss models look *much* better than the older US and Russian troop models - and I'd wager that they also consume more CPU and GPU.

That being said, as an avid helo driver whose nose barely hovers above the mud I do agree that the older models could use some love and greater variety. 

[upyr1]

I figure more and better infantry for all eras would be part of my ideal overhaul. I'd also improve the template system and add the ability to place units.  For example a fire team might be a 

automatic rifleman

desingated marksmen

grenedier

2 riflemen

a squad might be 3 fire teams

2 rifle squads might be a platoon 

 

[Baco]

yes please, specially with the increasing number of helos.

 

[Stratos]

I agree, we need a machine hunner with a russian MG, and also some south saharan black troops.

[Razorback]

When possible in DCS ?
Not via a Mod or a script but via a normal Menu and with visual effects.
The rope already exists for slinging. We would just have to model the infantry sliding along the rope.
This would clearly provide a huge additional effect for our UH-1 and Mi-8!

FAST-ROPING ALL THE WAY

 

Edited September 10, 2022 by Razorback

[bies]

When it comes to infantry DCS could implement something like 2001 Operation Flashpoint infantry.

Animations and graphics level would still look fantastic and very realistic from more than 50m away and CPU calculations for numerous infantry squads moving and fighting in a realistic way, embarking/disembarking helicopters and aircrafts, would be minimal, calculator level.

Too big level of detail of single infantryman or too complex animations would make it unusable. On the other hand current level of animations is lacking severly. ED can't work on everything at once so we need to be patient. They may also wait for multi threading implementation since calculating them on another core would be the most optimal solution.

Edited September 10, 2022 by bies

[Angelthunder]

It would also be nice to add Engineer,Recon and Signals infantry also like for building,sandbags,FOBs,barbed wire and setting up communications too.

[upyr1]

On 9/14/2022 at 5:30 PM, Angelthunder said:

It would also be nice to add Engineer,Recon and Signals infantry also like for building,sandbags,FOBs,barbed wire and setting up communications too.

I'd also like to see foxholes and trenches.