Progress Report 24/5

G'day everyone ,

It's been a while, but it's time to do a write up of what I've been working on. So Let's get it started.

Pre-releases, Major NIArms update and Miscellany

So a fortnight back there were some technical issues that if not fixed would have set this back a few months, but it didn't so- The XM8s and Johnson M1941 LMG are basically ready for prime-time. And of course - Patrons get it first here. These are not the final release build- these aren’t signed, and I want to give the configs just a pass over before they go out  -  but they are effectively complete, and absolutely good to mess with in game.

You can check them out here [download link] 

And if you want to show ‘em off to people outside of Arma, I have the release Sketchfab presentations up already. [XM8 Sketchfab] [M1941 LMG Sketchfab] 

Of course, with last year being apparently a no-release year, and a slowly growing list of small persistent complaints I want to fix (plus rolling out the grip support), Recently I’ve been throwing myself at fixing that. As alluded to, one of the primary things I’m doing is adding support for Foregrips, Core NIArms now has a few to work with in that regard - both Pic rail versions of the Magpul AFG and a KAC VFG. I have plans to also do an M-LOK grip, so that Seal Team 6 HK416 etc won’t be left out of it’s completing piece.

There’s also been a continuation to unify all the item masses. I’ve set up some macros that allow me to be SUPER granular about how much things weigh.

So, for example -

Here’s an aluminum STANAG magazine-

__SMALLMASS(9.3, 30, 112); 30 rounds of M855A1, each weighing 9.3 grams, inside a 112 gram magazine

Compare that to a Steel AK 7.62 mag -

__SMALLMASS(16.3, 30, 326); 30 rounds of M39 FMJ, each weighing 16.3g, held in a 326g mag

The corrections don’t just stop at magazines and ammo, I’m refactoring things like accessory weights as well,

Pilad VOMZ3,5C 

__SMALLMASS(220, 1, 73.70876); Scope itself is 220g, Cumulative weight of mounting rings is ~73g.

And so on. At some point I’d also like to make a bulk or volume modifier to this so it “sort of” falls closer to what I think Arma’s stock “mass” values are (which otherwise seem to have only a loose correlation with either in reality).. But for now though, this is fine.

Speaking of the VOMZ though, I’ve been making the move to port all the 2D optics in NIArms to CBA’S scripted optics system, which has given me the opportunity to ,amongst things, refine the reticles, sure up scale and correct stadiametric proportion… and as demonstrated here, it makes a marked difference.

It's actually impressive how much of an improvement for usability switching to scripted optics is for the AUGA1, so this is likely to be how they'll work next update. 

I suppose I should also mention in here, somewhere before we start talking about the guns themselves again- one of the reasons that work over 2020 and also 2019 was kind of slowed was I was brought on to do animation work for a CDLC for Arma3. That CDLC, SOG:Prairie Fire is now out and, frankly, it's got some of my best Arma animation work in it. You can pick it up on steam, and there’s a trailer, but it seems to have gone over quite well, so… y’know, pleased with that. Go check it out. 

Anyway, onto the guns.

Going forward- where’s the XM29 and SCARs?

So, let’s start this off with where things will be headed. The idea is to do another symmetric release with the next two weapons- the XM29 OICW and the SCAR pack. While it would have made more thematic sense to put the XM8s and XM29 in the same release, I wasn’t, and am still not, sure how I’m going to tackle the programmable fuses aspect of the Launcher module, and worries like that keep me up at night. The XM29 basically only needs texture and config work, while the SCARs need to still be baked and textured (And I think I still need to do some animation work on them in addition, but that’s not confirmed). BUT, I’ve touched neither projects since last mention, so consider that a ”this point forward” working bullet point. Definitely the next month or two will show the rewards.

FAL Improvements

So, start of the year, I was commissioned to put some work in making a C2A1 variant of the FAL, and because this wasn’t a thing that needed necessarily to build the whole gun from scratch, I took it upon myself to actually take stock of the FAL base I was putting it onto and realised several things :

1. The model is from 2006 and has a 2006 level of detail
2. The textures are from the same period and painfully so
3. The model is woefully out of proportion

So, on top of the C2 parts as above, I’ve committed myself to a bit of a light redux project to bring things closer to in-line with what I’d be okay with for 2020. Not just for the sake of the C2s, but the FALs overall. I could not let myself let those go out in a state I don’t like. What this boils down to in terms of actual work and end goals is 100% certain retexturing (along with some UV work to match), No bakes (no time), using as much of the geometry we already have as possible. And, for the most part I’m doing pretty well on this, there’s actually precious little I’ve had to recreate to get what I want out of it so far, and most of it really concerns a spot I’d Really want to improve for a C2 anyway- The Breach face and Bolt guides. Anyway, I’m a good way through all the bits needed to make all the SLRs and the C1 and C2. When I get to the end of those, I’m going to make a careful evaluation of what I need from there for Metric FALs.

Some small parts that are interchangeable on metric models - SLR vs C1/C2 selectors, Enfield vs Lithgow vs CAI

Gen 1 Vortex UH-1

So this actually came out of a co-op mission where we had CUP Red Dots and UH-1s and a bunch of us just got fed up with them, myself included. So I spent a half-day putting together a new UH-1. This’ll be rolled into the SCAR Release, and at least this way the Heavies have an optic that agrees with them. Obviously, still a little work to go into this, but it's already a solid chunk of the way to being done.

So that basically covers what's been going on the past little while. Going ahead, not that the CDLC is complete and launched , you can expect that there's going to be a lot more progress to show next update, as I'm not stretching myself thin across projects. 

If you'd like to see the images in the report in higher res - [imgur Album] 

Until then- Thank you all for putting up with me.