MCAR-driven portable SAM - how to?

[SoldierEPilot]

Hi, MCAR project team and other experienced scriptwriters!

if (there are some MCAR-based portable SAM addons 4 OFP)  then {
please give me a link or two
} else {
what MCAR_engine scripts and stringtable variables I will need
 to create 'em by myself?
} ;

[h-]

What do you mean by portable?

[SoldierEPilot]

"Portable" means man-carried,
 secondaryWeapon  like "9K32Launcher"

[h-]

Well, since the weapon already fires a 'missile' why need MCAR?

Anyway, as MCAR relies on gamelogics placed on correct positions on a vehicle weapon, which is not possible to do with a infantry weapon model, I have my doubts if any of the code could be used as is.
I'm not 100% sure on this but as far as I can remember basically all of the MCAR functions and such rely on the data from those game logics, apart from maybe some stuff directly related to some of the guidance 'maths'.. 

sa8gecko did make a MCAR based TOW guidance script set for ArmA (1) many many many years ago but that code is most likely in byte-unexistence since forever, could be that it didn't use any of the gamelogic stuff as it was no longer needed in ArmA due to it natively supporting missile weapons on car class vehicles..

[SoldierEPilot]

Thanks 4 the information, I'll think about it...

[h-]

This is already being discussed internally at what is basically the MCAR team so you may get more answers soon(ish).

EDIT:
Well, that soonish turned out to be nowish
Apparently also remembereda bit wrong about the gamelogics, they're needed to find the target which is then the base of the MCAR code.

Anyhoo, from the guidance code coder:

- there are four guidance codes available, most sophisticated and deadly should be 'PROPNAVG'
- missile maxspeed is given by: maxspeed = (exhaust gas speed) * ln (initial mass/ final mass), where ln stands for natural logarithm.
This in vacuum, in MCAR there's a simulated air resistance (I believe it decreased with altitude, but I'm not sure)
The missile exhaust gas velocity is set by the MEXH parameter (look at the SA-8 or SA-9 stringtable.csv files), the initial mass is given by MMAS, final mass is calculated by subtracting MBNT (missile's engine burn time) multiplied by MKGS (amount of fuel burnt in a second, it could also be a formula, like in the SA-8 addon, to simulate a booster phase) to MMAS. So for example in the SA-9 addon
MEXH=1700 (m/s)
MMAS=32 (Kg)
MBNT=4.8 (s)
MKGS=2.2 (Kg/s)
So maxspeed= 1700*ln(32/(32-4.8*2.2)) = 680 m/s, this without taking into cosideration air resistance.
FT is the missile lifetime, after which it gets destroyed.

Of course not knowing what exactly SoldierEPilot has in mind doesn't help.

MCAR routines need a target, otherwise they won't work.
Having this in mind, getAmmo.sqs should be executed by the fired EH: it creates the missile at the right (hopefully) place, finds the target and then executes guidMis.sqs which directs the missile to the target. Some of the code in those scripts was written for multiplayer even.

Anyway, if you want help in the realm of the possible (since too many years have passed), you should
be more specific about what you need MCAR for exactly.

Just remember that you want to operate in an environment MCAR was never designed to work at so there is no guarantees you can what you want with just vanilla MCAR stuff.

[SoldierEPilot]

OK, what I have in mind:

1) soldier, player at least, makes an "combat mode" action
on his SAM (vehicleAction needed in AA soldier config.cpp);

2) target monitoring script starts to seek for air targets;

3) when SAM is pointed on air target for some time - sound
beeps and it means what target is locked;

4) MCAR scripts usage 2 make realistic guidance - PROPNAVG
for modern launchers and dog-search for old "RedEye"/ "BlowPipe".

/////////////////////////////////////////////

The main pain in the a..rm:
how 2 find target on which the launcher is pointed on?

Fwatch 1.15 commands can easily solve the problem 4 PLAYER:
":mem getplayeraim" can be used 2 find gun direction and
":mem getplayeranim" can check out if the player plays some of AT animations.

The desigion 4 AI will be harder.
There is no problem to use "animChanged" EH + stringtable database of
~100 animations 2 check what weapon
was selected by particular soldier, but we also need an angle.

Plan A: check all vertical plane from AA man in several km in front and
the script will take no care where the launcher is pointed vertically.
Neither accurate nor effective way(

Plan B: a tricky one. Make a launcher with 2 muzzles: LaserDesignator+AA tube.
Use some invisible target moving up and down in front of the man to intercept the laser dot - now we have
the man-->target direction .

I will ask a few questions when the non-MCAR part of the task will be finished.