Group activate with fire at point.

[dooom]

:smartass:can't seem to get an activated infantry group to fire at point. Is this a known bug or am I messing something up?

 

Here is the situation.

 

small US inf group runs into trigger zone at wpt 1, activates insurgent infantry squad up the hill with a smoke marker.

 

The insurgents have good line of sight, range and a "fire at point" waypoint task.. nothing happens.

I try the triggered action "fire at point" with a Group AI on trigger and nothing happens.

 

I'm stuck here... any ideas? I want the insurgent group to fire but not at my US squad. i.e. simulate danger close without killing my guys (yet they are still mortal to allow for blue on blue from the straffing run)

 

Please advise, with .miz if possible. Thanks all!

[VFA41_Lion]

I dunno.. can you yourself provide the .miz?

[dooom]

here you go....

 

i tried with both waypoint action and trigered action - nothing.

 

note if you remove the fire at pont,,, they will fire upon my guys.

testbed.miz

[nomdeplume]

Are they set as ROE -> HOLD FIRE by any chance? I think they'll 'fire at point' if you set them to RETURN FIRE, but HOLD FIRE really does what it says on the box...

[dooom]

nope - just checked the testbed mission... no ROE parameters set. i just tried setting ROE - > weapons free as priority then the fire at point but nothing.

[VFA41_Lion]

Your fire at point zone was set to zero feet.

 

Unfortunately for me, even with it set to 300 feet, they still refused to fire.

 

Then I thought it might be the truck in that group, so I replaced it with a soldier, but they still didn't fire.

 

 

Yeah, i dunno yet.

[dooom]

agreed... i still don't know why they won't work. I tried changing the point diameter to no effect as well in addition to changing the makeup of insurgent group.

 

nothing.

[VFA41_Lion]

Maybe infantry cant fire at point?

[Grimes]

They can. Infantry are just incredibly temperamental to work with. Hence the only infantry I ever use are manpads. All other forms of infantry are pretty much useless.

Infantry_Fireatpoint.miz

[Joyride]

Not sure if this will work, but you could create a single invincible unit in the blue forces and order the insurgents to fire away on that unit. One thing though, they will run out of ammo fairly quickly so if you want the A-10 players to see a big firefight, have to keep spawning/activating units over time to keep the tracers going.

[nomdeplume]

The target point is just too far away. I set it to ~ 200 metres from the group and they started firing immediately. I think infantry can engage up to about 300 metres when you are using fire at point. RPGs have a longer range but don't seem so keen to take advantage of it.

One thing though, they will run out of ammo fairly quickly so if you want the A-10 players to see a big firefight, have to keep spawning/activating units over time to keep the tracers going.

I set up a repeating trigger to enable the AI 'fire at point' task, and then set a flag that stops that task after about 15 seconds. It usually takes them a few seconds to start shooting, so that gives a few seconds of tracers and then you can pause for 20-30 seconds before repeating. That allows a small group to keep putting out fire for a long period to enable the player to spot the tracers.

[Evil.Bonsai]

The target point is just too far away. I set it to ~ 200 metres from the group and they started firing immediately. I think infantry can engage up to about 300 metres when you are using fire at point. RPGs have a longer range but don't seem so keen to take advantage of it.

 

I set up a repeating trigger to enable the AI 'fire at point' task, and then set a flag that stops that task after about 15 seconds. It usually takes them a few seconds to start shooting, so that gives a few seconds of tracers and then you can pause for 20-30 seconds before repeating. That allows a small group to keep putting out fire for a long period to enable the player to spot the tracers.

 

Any chance you can post a .miz with just this?

[dooom]

agreed - I'd love to see the .miz of that nomdeplume...

 

I haven't really seen some good examples of start stop conditioning either... although this sounds like a trigger argument.

 

I'd love to see the track nonetheless.

 

 

... as to the target distance, they seem to have no problem engaging without the fire at point and simply utilizing the basic engagement AI when they spot an enemy in line of sight.

[dooom]

i tested moving them closer as suggested nomdeplume but they fire at the enemy - not at the "fire at point".... unfortunately, it doesnt take long for my troopers to die. if i have told them to hold fire.

 

fire at point still does not appear to work if triggered

[Speed]

i tested moving them closer as suggested nomdeplume but they fire at the enemy - not at the "fire at point".... unfortunately, it doesnt take long for my troopers to die. if i have told them to hold fire.

 

fire at point still does not appear to work if triggered

 

Fire at point works fine if triggered, at least for indirect fire systems. Use triggered actions instead of waypoint actions. Waypoint actions suck :D

 

See this post:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1289894&postcount=9

Edited September 29, 2011 by Speed

[dooom]

thanks speed - i look at your .miz... nice trigger with the Radio add - i'll have to play with that.

 

I tried the AI triggered action as well. please see if you can offer assistance on the .miz i posted.

 

I just tried this:

 

troops enter zone -> group activate insurgents.-> AI task on (Insurgents fire at point)

insurgents AI triggered action = fire at point.

 

nothing.

 

:helpsmilie:

 

maybe infantry is bugged ot the actual "fire at point is broken when enemy is also in Line of sight?

[Speed]

maybe infantry is bugged ot the actual "fire at point is broken when enemy is also in Line of sight?

 

May not be limited to just infantry. Make the units they are currently getting "distracted" by invisible. Invisibility just means invisible to AI, players will still see them.

[Insanatrix]

Infantry don't fire at a point for some reason, I've tried it before.

[dooom]

May not be limited to just infantry. Make the units they are currently getting "distracted" by invisible. Invisibility just means invisible to AI, players will still see them.

 

 

oooh... this i did not know... invisible blue is visible to blue coalition eh?

 

very interesting - will try after i shower and report back.

[dooom]

May not be limited to just infantry. Make the units they are currently getting "distracted" by invisible. Invisibility just means invisible to AI, players will still see them.

 

 

OK I can now report the following:

 

Group Activated AI WILL NOT fire at point as per AI Task.

 

However, if the group in question is NOT activated by a "group activate" trigger, then all works as expected.

 

Here is how I did it.

Two groups: US troops set to invisible, Insurgents already spawned, with AI action of Fire at point.

 

US units in Zone - > AI Task (Insurgents, fire at point)

 

The following is bugged as far as I can tell:

US units in zone -> Group activate (Insurgents)

-> AI Task (Insurgents, fire at point)

 

 

** IMPORTANT ** only one group will trigger at a time - if you set more than one to have their AI task triggered then only the first will fire.

 

getting frustrating.

Edited September 29, 2011 by dooom

[VFA41_Lion]

Nice work!

[dooom]

it is definately not workign consistent - sometimes more than one fires - other times only the first fires -

 

i have pulled out a bit of hair on this.

[Druid_]

i have pulled out a bit of hair on this.

Know that feeling well, if all else fails ......

[nomdeplume]

Works consistent for me, but I have found you need to make their ROE 'weapons free' - even with 'return fire' they won't execute a fire at point.

 

So your best bet is to make the friendlies invisible (so they won't be automatically engaged) and have them set to hold fire or return fire (so they won't open up). You can always make them visible again with a trigger later if you want them to get mowed down if the player takes too long to respond.

 

Attached is your test mission with the 'fire at' point moved closer to the insurgent position (so they can actually fire at it), and a repeating trigger to have them fire in relatively short bursts. It never disables (so they'll keep firing at that point in bursts until they run out of ammo), but you could stop it at any time by disabling flags 50, 51 and 55. The timing kind of sucks but you can play around with it.

 

I think for it to work well in this particular situation you'd need a few different 'fire at' points to better follow the progress of the friendlies. It might also be nice to split the insurgents into multiple groups and have them firing at different positions so the aim point isn't so obvious.

 

Also the triggers I've put it indicate when they've activated - you'll see it takes a few seconds from the AI 'fire at point' task being activated until they actually start firing at that point. They cease fire as soon as soon as the stop flag is set, though. Just something to factor in when you're playing with the timings.

 

I've randomised the start time to be from 5-25 seconds from when the start flag (#50) is set - to make the bursts a little less predictable.

testbed.miz

[dooom]

thanks plume.... i jut got back froma trip and will look at this tonight... +1