Weapon Turorial 101

[Chortles]

By "search" I assume you mean using Windows search? That's a bit more workable for XP, but for some reason Windows 7 isn't very good at finding these entries, even though I indexed the game directory...

The "class system v5 beta" WEAPONINFO_ALT fixed my issue; when renamed to WEAPONINFO, it no longer causes an editor CTD. Should I be extracting the rest of those files (ADDONINFO, AMMOINFO, GRENADEINFO, and MINEINFO) for stability's sake though, considering that I'm running regular non-class BSM?

I vaguely remember seeing the XM-18's model and its ammo in regular/original BSM WEAPONINFO, so I'm actually not sure why you had a WEAPONINFO_ALT, as trying to glance through them didn't make me see any additional weapons, just different values for certain weapons' stats (i.e. Ready time, or Wear/Durability), much less what the "class system v5 beta" WEAPONINFO_ALT changed compared to them, besides correcting the CTD when used.

[safoolfool]

I asked in the other thread, but do you know how the hit probability curve is calculated? I think max range is the 0 point of the graph. I know effective range is not the 50% point, but I don't think it's fixed to any percent either (in my last post I mentioned editing a weapon to have 100 efective range and 150 or 300 max range. The first had 25% chance to hit at 100m, but the second had a slightly better chance). It also seems like the game looks at effective as a percent of max range, so having 100/150 gives better accuracy then using 100/300 (except at the very tail end).
Likewise, range curve seems to effect how much accuracy looks like a step function vs. linear. The thing about this is that it seems to me that it's effect is most pronounced on the "aimed" function, all of the "standard" graphs look pretty much the same (standard never seems to have an inflection point, some aimeds do, some don't).

Also, what seems to effect whether or not the aimed and standard graphs converge? I edited my merc to have 100 shooting, and for most weapons aimed is almost exactly the same as standard. For some weapons, like sniper rifles, the aimed never converges. Even with 100 shooting the aimed is way below the standard graph, and only a scope brings them up.
Is that because there's some switch for certain guns, or does shooting maybe effect how far out you can accurately shoot, limited by a gun's curve (so with 100 shooting I can shoot accurately out to 125m, say. This means for a pistol, which can only shoot out to 50m, I'm perfect. With an SBR thats ok out to 100m, I'm also near perfect. Then with a sniper rifle, which is accurate out to 300m, since I can only do 125m my aimed curve is nowhere near the standard curve).

[Geralt]

What is the meaning of the parameter "balance" on weapons? When I put silencer or laser it gone down.

[R@S]

Originally Posted by Chortles

By "search" I assume you mean using Windows search? That's a bit more workable for XP, but for some reason Windows 7 isn't very good at finding these entries, even though I indexed the game directory...

I use Total Commander for that search function since it's possible to add a plugin that allows browsing inside AZP archives. You can find it here:
Total Commander

Originally Posted by Chortles

The "class system v5 beta" WEAPONINFO_ALT fixed my issue; when renamed to WEAPONINFO, it no longer causes an editor CTD. Should I be extracting the rest of those files (ADDONINFO, AMMOINFO, GRENADEINFO, and MINEINFO) for stability's sake though, considering that I'm running regular non-class BSM?

Yeah, you can add those files without problems, they are from the latest BSM fix and a few other fixes I made along the way.

Originally Posted by Chortles

I vaguely remember seeing the XM-18's model and its ammo in regular/original BSM WEAPONINFO, so I'm actually not sure why you had a WEAPONINFO_ALT, as trying to glance through them didn't make me see any additional weapons, just different values for certain weapons' stats (i.e. Ready time, or Wear/Durability), much less what the "class system v5 beta" WEAPONINFO_ALT changed compared to them, besides correcting the CTD when used.

The biggest changes in the alternative WEAPONINFO is the weapon range, and that changes the game quite a bit.

safoolfool, as I mentioned somewhere else, I usually ignore the graphs and other info in the weapon description window. It only gives some approximate information and doesn't mean much when the bullets start flying. Maybe Quickdagger can help explain the ins- and outs of those settings, I*m too tired to do it right now.

[safoolfool]

Originally Posted by R@S

The biggest changes in the alternative WEAPONINFO is the weapon range, and that changes the game quite a bit.

safoolfool, as I mentioned somewhere else, I usually ignore the graphs and other info in the weapon description window. It only gives some approximate information and doesn't mean much when the bullets start flying. Maybe Quickdagger can help explain the ins- and outs of those settings, I*m too tired to do it right now.

R@S, don't worry about it, you do way too much for this game already

To expand on the alternative weapon info file's range changes, it looks to me that it makes pistols and shotguns shoot a bit further in general. SBRs and ARs shoot way further, but with more linear declines in accuracy. So in the closer ranges they'll be a bit less accurate, but they'll retain accuracy a lot further out (so before where an AR was a guaranteed hit at 50m, and did pretty well at 90, but couldn't do anything at 150 it'll now be pretty good at 50m, fine at 100m, and still do ok out to 250m).

I think the idea is to make ranges more like real life, instead of scaled to fit the maps. In vanilla 7.62 you preserve pistols<smgs<SBRs<ARs, but the ranges are 15m, 50m, 75m, and 100m, when in reality its something more like 30, 80, 150, 300 (or something, those are pulled out of my ass to be demonstrative of what's going on). Since engagement ranges never really get to more than 100m I don't plan to use the alt, since it would wreck the balance, in my eyes. You'd end up with three classes of guns that have the exact same ranges (SMGs, SBRs, and ARs would all be good till 80m, and 99% of fights happen at most at that range; the fact that in AR can still hit at 400m while an SMG can't becomes purely academic, no maps are half that big). If you like more simmy and less arcadey though, it's really cool and I'm glad the option is there.

[Chortles]

Originally Posted by R@S

Yeah, you can add those files without problems, they are from the latest BSM fix and a few other fixes I made along the way.

Thanks, I'm using them now. My Total Commander reply is in the BSM thread.

The biggest changes in the alternative WEAPONINFO is the weapon range, and that changes the game quite a bit.

To add to what safoolfool said, I saw from a glance at "HK416 10Inch w Frontgrip" and "AW Covert" plus a pistol or two, that mainly you've increased the effective and maximum ranges while lowering the range curvature for straighter, longer-distance ("more realistic") shooting in general (unlike safoolfool I didn't notice any decrease in close-quarters accuracy), while increasing both the speed of readying/raising them and the frequency of weapon cleaning/maintenance?

Re: the graphs -- for me it's just that I can't find anything that affects the "aimed fire" aiming mode, and with the Aimpoints they appear on the graph to actually make "snapshot" more effective at the longer ranges than "aimed fire." Haven't gotten into a firefight long-distance enough to test this yet, I'm afraid.

Note for anyone who's tweaking weapons:

If you leave a weapon without eligible attachments in WEAPONINFO but leave its attachment slots intact or even add slots to its entry in ITEMBONES, then the weapon will still have those attachment slots listed as present... just unable to accept anything, as if you were trying to attach a P90 suppressor onto a M1911A1. Also, in ITEMBONES I'm not quite sure what the "FLASH" or "BUCK" slots that some of them have (the latter doesn't seem to be tied to the Masterkey which is treated as a launcher or to the foregrips), but "TL" is "tactical light" (read: weapon-mounted light), and the rest are self-explanatory.

If you'd like to create "modular weapon families" (read: differing barrel length stuff) like the HK416/HK417, the SCAR, the Steyr AUG A1 and A2, or the replacement barrels, check them out in ITEMS.INI to see how.

(As a non-weapon aside, I wonder if there's a way to set limited-usage items to "true infinite," as opposed to simply "implausibly high"...)

[safoolfool]

Originally Posted by Chortles

(unlike safoolfool I didn't notice any decrease in close-quarters accuracy)

Note that I haven't actually used any of these settings in game. I'm just looking at the numbers, and seeing what I think should happen. To add an even further distance from what is actually going on, as R@S said, the graphs don't always match up with what's really going on. So I'm using the numbers to visualize the graph, and then using the graph to approximate the real range. My gibbering is then in the "mountain of salt" category, I guess.

That said, by changing from curves with really steep dropoffs to linear descents, you should get less close in accuracy.

To help go through my thoughts:


The red is whats going on now: short range, steep dropoff/inflection point in the middle. The blue is what I see happening in the alt file, linear descent, more overall range, but this means that for a little while the blue curve is beneath (less accurate than) the red curve. Of course it could always be that the alt file increases range so much (green curve) that it never actually dips below the red curve. Add to that the fact that a lot of the curvatures seem to be ~.7, which ends up looking like limp string: instead of a straight line it actually bows in a bit, meaning they'd be a good bit less accurate close in.


Eidt again:

He also made the following discoveries about the graphs:
The red and the yellow bar is what your gunfighting does
The green is your shooting ability
The blue is your sniper ability
The gray is what the weapon can do

In case it was confusing, I'm using red/green/blue in my graph to represent the "standard" (gray) curve in three different scenarios, not aimed/hip/scoped.

Also, in case you've never done it, try opening up the range graph and messing with plugins. You can see the yellow quick aim line go in and out as you un/replug a collimator, and you can see the red hipshot line go in and out as you unplug a laser.


Edit: take a look at shotguns. The range numbers don't seem to have changed much (slight increase in max range), but the curve goes from 5 for all of them to 20 for all. What's going on there?
I dunno, I'll play with it in game later, right now I'm talking out of my ass.

[R@S]

Originally Posted by Geralt

What is the meaning of the parameter "balance" on weapons? When I put silencer or laser it gone down.

The balance is a parameter that tells how good a weapon is under autofire. I used to think that the lower balance the better grouping with autofire. A high balance makes the weapon faster to prepare/raise. But Quickdagger found that it's actually the other way around, but you have to take his word for it

He also made the following discoveries about the graphs:
The red and the yellow bar is what your gunfighting does
The green is your shooting ability
The blue is your sniper ability
The gray is what the weapon can do

This should mean that the only bar that has to do with the weapon in question is the gray one, all the others are how the player skills affect the handling of a weapon.

Originally Posted by Chortles

Also, in ITEMBONES I'm not quite sure what the "FLASH" or "BUCK" slots that some of them have (the latter doesn't seem to be tied to the Masterkey which is treated as a launcher or to the foregrips), but "TL" is "tactical light" (read: weapon-mounted light), and the rest are self-explanatory.

"FLASH" is the Flash suppressor/Silencer coordinates and "BUCK" is the Butt/Stock.

Originally Posted by Chortles

(As a non-weapon aside, I wonder if there's a way to set limited-usage items to "true infinite," as opposed to simply "implausibly high"...)

You would have to create that function in the code for the item in question. Since the exe this mod is using has opened up the "USE Item" event, you can do that by adding an "on event" function for it and then just set it to be used indefinitely.

[QuickDagger]

Hello there friends,

I hope I can help you out with one thing or two.

Here:


The creators made somethings very well. I´ll explain.

Any weapon has a precision of its own. You cab notice that by its dispersion, you can measure sniper rifles by their MOA dispersion and so on. That´s the grey line.

No shooter can be more precise than his weapon. If you super glue a weapon on the wall and shoot many times the holes will be very close. If you do so bare handing you gun the holes will be more disperse. That´s the green line under the grey line.

Tactical shooters have to aim very fast. I don´t know the term in english but, it might be called something like semi-aiming. Of course less precise than a fully aimed shot. That´s the yellow line.

And cowboys don´t aim at all. Here´s the red line.

Anything you attach to a weapon alters its original engineering project, it affects its balance. That means recoil forces will change rather for better or worse. Also weapons get heavier and then slower to aim. Of course only a bit but, enough to increase weapon dispersion and aiming time.

About ammo. There are heavier and lighter payloads. Heavier ammo can even affect balance.

And, you can never compare damage values of weapons loaded with different ammo. In fact you should choose your prefered ammo first and, only then choose your weapon.

Next time I will tell you about the game errors and creators mistakes.

Keep it up.

[IceShade]

Good stuff! I always thought lower balance meant better grouping. R@S sure preached this, to the point where adding lasers, lights, launchers and everything just to get the balance down was an exploit! Haha. (Or was that AFP?)

Anyway, I've been trying out the SIG-550-1 marksman rifle in BSM. Unfortunately, "they" forgot to config a bipod. I tried to add a bipod by changing a few things:

Added "BIPOD" to the folded/unfolded SIG-550-1 in Itembones, added 1 "AssaultBipod" to both variants in Weaponsinfo.

I also wanted a M203 for the SIG-550 assault rifle (due to lack of a GL 5040), so I did the same stuff for this rifle. Added "LAUNCHER" in Itembones, added 1 "M203" blocks Bipod, and blocks ILauncher for the bipod.

In-game, I can attach the items just fine. Unfortunately, the M203 isn't positioned very well (it's inside the triggerguard, but on a vertical level it's fine) and the Bipod for the SIG-550-1 is .. on the buttstock.

How would I correct this?

---

A second question. In the OP you mention that in itemslevels.ini the last two numbers stand for CGL and the probability in percentage, like "Assault Rifle AKS-74U (5.45mm)"5 50

The thing is, a lot of items have "0 0", yet they still show up in stores.
I'm trying to get "EOTech Holosight 552 (WR)"0 0 to show up in the stores, but I haven't been able to find it. Will changing 0 0 to 2 100 fix that, and it will always show up from lvl 2 onwards?
(I don't like the other EOTech sight. This 552 one is very well done).