Bomber LGM gunner bug, any fixes?

[Iamthefallen]

I've spent some time playing Laser Guided Missile gunner on the two seat bomber where I keep coming across some issues and I'm hoping someone might've seen a fix or workaround for them:

First issue is that no missiles actually fire. The plane behaves as if it were fired, the counter will drop by one for a second, but nothing actually left the plane.
Cause:Unknown. It's been suggested that it might be an issue where the LGM magazine is reloaded while one LGM is still in the air.
Workaround: Crash the plane and it should work when it respawns.

Second issue is that the vehicle lock becomes extremely weak. The lock is obtained very late and is broken after the slightest turn or obstacle. This means the gunner essentially has to guide the missile in without any lock. This bug seems to creep in slowly and get worse with time. After a while it's completely impossible to get a lock.
Cause:Unknown.
Workaround: Unknown.
Crashing the plane is not a consistent fix. I've tried disconnecting and reconnecting and it doesn't seem to do any difference. I've tried a four corner sweep (a la chopper TV guided missile cam) both in TV mode and outside it in an attempt to recalibrate, but nothing seems to work. I have not yet tried to completely restart BF2 when it happens, that'll be the next test.

Finally the bug causing a LGM to go wild, veer off course and hit a friendly vehicle. This is very inconsistent and I've seen some speculation that because Specops were supposed to be able to paint targets with handheld lasers, the code for that might be in the game even if the tool is not. So it could be possible that your missile tracks a target painted by an enemy bombers laser halfway across the map. But again, this is pure speculation, it could just be that the code for target tracking is stupid.

LGM gunner is a role I'm really enjoying and it's getting frustrating to have to ask the pilot to crash the plane every 5 minutes to fix the various bugs, so any insight, confirmation or suggestions is appreciated.

[jepzilla]

The FLIR is bugged in the same way that the attack helo guns are bugged, and must occasionally be recalibrated. Usually this fixes problems I have with the missiles.

[Iamthefallen]

I haven't seen any difference, do you just do a 4 corner sweep when coming out of TV mode?

[SgtDuke]

I do the sweep in TV mode and it seems to help.

[Phelan Ward]

4 corner sweep seems to work for me.

[StrikeFear]

I've been trying to replicate the bug since 1.03 ... and haven't.
How sure do any of you guys feel that the TVGM is still bugged in that way?

As for the rest of your stuff, fallen - I haven't replicated any of it.
Occasionally, the missiles DO home in on friendlies near the enemy to which you locked... yeah. (Of course, in that situation, the best thing is obviously to fire before you get a lock so you can manually guide to the enemy target.)

That last bit - whew! Wild bit of speculation, that.

Your first bug - could it be just a lag-related graphic glitch? The missile fired and hit SOMETHING, but the missile never rendered on your screen, and perhaps when it impacted, it was out of your view?

[perry]

Originally Posted by Iamthefallen

I've spent some time playing Laser Guided Missile gunner on the two seat bomber where I keep coming across some issues and I'm hoping someone might've seen a fix or workaround for them:

First issue is that no missiles actually fire. The plane behaves as if it were fired, the counter will drop by one for a second, but nothing actually left the plane.
Cause:Unknown. It's been suggested that it might be an issue where the LGM magazine is reloaded while one LGM is still in the air.
Workaround: Crash the plane and it should work when it respawns.

I've run in to this bug, though I haven't gunned all that much since the patch. I think it was Duke I was flying with one time when he landed, I hopped out and right back in.. the missles worked fine for about 2 shots, then went haywire again. He landed again, and I ended up getting run over by the plane.. when I got back in, the missles still wouldn't work. And what made things worse was that I couldn't change camera views -- couldn't even stay in the rear chase cam so I could watch our tail -- I was just dead weight. Really annoying.

[StrikeFear]

Yeesh, perry. Suck.

I just remembered a nasty issue I've had where I get enemy-HUD-brackets on friendlies. Imagine the situation:

"Hm... that's odd. I can't get a lock on those enemy tanks down there. That's ok, I'm a l33t d00d, I'll just guide a missile manually." <fires missile, target neutralized, StrikeFear teamkills... > wait a minute. "WHAT!!??"
A couple times of that before my pilot and I decided to switch. Ugh.

[Steel_Penguin]

The chopper minigun seems to be fixed, no more sweeps, at least so far as i've had the chance to gun. Pass throughs and misfires with the TV-guided are still there though.

[Iamthefallen]

Originally Posted by perry

I've run in to this bug, though I haven't gunned all that much since the patch. I think it was Duke I was flying with one time when he landed, I hopped out and right back in.. the missles worked fine for about 2 shots, then went haywire again. He landed again, and I ended up getting run over by the plane.. when I got back in, the missles still wouldn't work. And what made things worse was that I couldn't change camera views -- couldn't even stay in the rear chase cam so I could watch our tail -- I was just dead weight. Really annoying.

Yeah, the camera view thing is also very annoying. Definitely another bug to add to the list.

[Iamthefallen]

Originally Posted by StrikeFear

I've been trying to replicate the bug since 1.03 ... and haven't.
How sure do any of you guys feel that the TVGM is still bugged in that way?

I'm 100% sure the laser guided missiles on the bomber have issues. The difference between getting good locks and getting none is too big to not notice. I wish I knew what caused it so I could give some kinda guidance on attempting to replicate it. I just played a full game with Miles where I kept doing corner sweeps and didn't have a single issue the whole game.

Originally Posted by StrikeFear

As for the rest of your stuff, fallen - I haven't replicated any of it.
Occasionally, the missiles DO home in on friendlies near the enemy to which you locked... yeah. (Of course, in that situation, the best thing is obviously to fire before you get a lock so you can manually guide to the enemy target.)

That last bit - whew! Wild bit of speculation, that.

You're right, it's way out there. But I really can't think of an explanation for the phenomenon. It's not that it confuses two tanks that are side by side either. On occasion, even after a good lock, it'll just go wild and hit a friendly vehicle way off screen. For instance, I've TKed a vehicle on Daqing as I were targetting hostile armor at gas station. I fired the missile after a good lock and it veered way off and TKed a tank NW of Oil cisterns. Much like AA missiles that traverse half the map for a TK, it seems the LGMs can go wild as well. Something's gotta be causing the bad lock.

Originally Posted by StrikeFear

Your first bug - could it be just a lag-related graphic glitch? The missile fired and hit SOMETHING, but the missile never rendered on your screen, and perhaps when it impacted, it was out of your view?

Negative, I see a count of four LGMs. Hit fire and it goes down to three for a split second and then up to four, much faster than a normal reload. Interesting is to press the button repeatedly and very quickly, you'll see the missile count jump up to 5 on occasion. Go figure

I can keep firing missiles endlessly but none actually leave the plane, it's like the client just reduces the LGM count for a moment before the server corrects it. And it goes away after the plane is crashed.

Often, but not always, it occurs along with the pilot only being able to drop one bomb at a time.

[face84]

LGM hiting friendlies i think has to do most with peps exiting vehicles when they hear locked tone. I know tons of times they showed up on my hud as targets and as i approach yelling "bombs away" i notice blue names around that tank that just popped up on my hud but its too late by then.