[VIDEO] Heli Action (beta)

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFW2R5JMWs0

[daithi1]

Really nice video I could get into this...

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a few key points about heli's in FFOW

• There is very little collision damage so you can lightly bump a building and take tiny damage, a bigger bump will take a third of health. So this is newbie friendly, so beginners can flight quickly. Bumping things upsets flight though eg your tail is suddently going off in a direction you did not expect
• In the beta there is no missile lock on for air-to-air, I dont know whether this will be in the release or not. As in the video air-to-air without lock on is just spamming missiles in their general direction. Ground troops with rockets are better than taking out helis than other helis (in the beta)
• You can get repairs by hovering over a capture point, so you dont have to fly all the back to main base for repairs
• There are to be AA vehicles in the release
• Ground troops can really hurt helis.
  • The rocket kit is available to all players and can lock onto a chopper. The guidance from lock on works well and hits with a bang. 2-3 rockets downs a chopper or more often then not they run away to repair. Helis hate rockets lock on, and tend to feel around the map to where they can attack without harrassment from the lock on tone. The heli gets a lock on tone and can deploy flares. Flares seem unlimited and recharge quickly. Repeated flares prevent rockets for about third of the time. You can also descend altitude quickly to break the lock on and avoid rockets, however its difficult to tell if rockets are in the air to dive/flare, as the lock on tone is for targeting and not firing
  • The 2nd tier emp role unlock is emp rocket. I haven't had this one yet (makes mental note to try this one) it appears they dont have lock on capacity, so no warning tone ! Its a question of point and shoot but they fly fast in the air and more often than not hit the heli. Heli falls at a medium pace to the ground, with a little bit of moving capacity, so you can often crash land with a tiny bit of damage. But then you are stuck there for 5 secs till it wears off and vulnerable to all weapons. The emp rocket reloads faster than the emp wears off so they can zap you again. I think they have 4 rockets in supply. Emp rockets are most irritating to heli pilots
• Air vehicles will be in short supply and popular which means queues or even TK on non TG servers
• Seat 2 mini gun is tough to hit anything with, most of the time you spend confused on whats going on with the heli twisting and turning. There is no guided missile for seat 2, maybe in the release? but no news on that
• It is possible for a squad leader to be the seat 2 gunner and parachute out over a contested CP and then have squad spawn in. There may or may not be a rule against this on TG servers
• Heli missiles are lots of left click low explosive, few right click big bang
• It takes several missiles to kill a vehicle, usually a few left clicks and one right click on a bombing run
• With missiles you have to shoot ahead of a vehicle ie where its going to be in 1 sec, this means getting in close on a bombing run
• Helis are on one of the two beta maps, there respawn time was about 2 mins, one heli per side
• There are two fly modes, standard and advanced
  • Standard fly mode has a stabilising feature in flight and most people can fly immediatly
  • Standard fly mode has no auto hover, so you have to keep tapping the upwards thrust
  • Standard fly mode has a downwards thrust to loose altitude quickly, rather than just stopping upwards thrust and drop with gravity. This is not real life heli behaviour at all
  • Standard fly mode is dexterious, and allows lots of maneuvours
  • Advanced flight mode was not available in the beta
  • Advanced flight mode is where your missile bay closes, so you cant use the missiles
  • Advanced flight mode stops missiles locking from troops with rockets, ie stealth mode.
  • Advanced flight mode changes the control and feel to like DC choppers, ie auto stabilising is off, easy to crash, very easy to crash, but with practice its extremely maneouvable, even stunt worthy
  • Advanced flight mode may or may not allow the minigun to be used
  • How long it takes to switch flight modes will be interesting

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interview here Dec 28, 2007

Originally Posted by interview

OPG: For the flyboys out there, could you tell us a little about planes and helicopters and how they will work and what the community should expect from such vehicles?

FFOW: I’ve been working on helicopters in these games since the Apache in Desert Combat and if I’ve learned anything, it’s that you can’t please everyone…so at least please Frank. In all seriousness, I’ve always been surprised at the wide range of opinions we receive about the helicopters and how popular they are. I really feel like we could just be successful making a helicopter game. They’re deadly. They’re fun to fly. They’re probably the vehicle we’ve iterated on most. We feels it’s very important to get them right. Desert Combat was our standard for everything in the air and that’s what we continue to work towards and improve upon.

...

OPG: Could you explain what type of anti aircraft/anti vehicle weapons will handle in game?

FFOW: We have two primary anti-aircraft vehicles in the game, one for each side. The WC’s anti-aircraft is quicker and more nimble when moving around, while the RS side has more health and can withstand a greater onslaught from above. Both are equipped with straight-fire proximity missiles that you can use to lead aircraft without locking on. Since this is more difficult, it’s also more rewarding, delivering more damage to your target. If you’re able to lock-on to a target (which is no easy feat mind you), the missile will track them down but it can be avoided fairly easily. So, it comes down to skill in most instances. If the pilot is well-skilled, chances are you’re not going to be able to lock-on to him/her, fire and forget. You’re going to have to outsmart him/her.

For the infantry, we have EMP missiles, that disable aircraft within a proximity of their detonation, and the anti-vehicle missiles, that can either lock-on or direct-fire. The EMP missiles are very satisfying, as watching the helicopter that’s been tormenting you fall helplessly from the sky to it’s destruction would bring a smile to any gamer’s face.

[Exploding_Silver]

with the western coalition heli you can go into stealth mode in the beta
goto external view and press the scroll mouse button down, you will see the missile bays retrack (takes 1-2 secs). In stealth mode you cant fire missiles and your gunner cant fire, the enemy cant get lock ons with missiles. Flying feels the same.