Project Reality Forums

Let's think for a moment about our lovely Close Air Support (CAS). Now to start of I completly love the topic of CAS, I love flying in PR, and hopefully one day to become a fighter pilot myself. Now to continue on with my discussion...

Being a Big advocate on CAS, I wanted to take into consideration of the amount of time CAS reloads. Looking at for example, the Apache. The Apache takes somewhere from 1-2 minutes to fully re-arm after expending ALL AMMO.

For me, this number is too small. I love seeing CAS. but There is no way that it takes that long to reload an Entire Apache, Flares and all.

Is there anyway or do people feel this timer is enough. I for one, think we should expand this timer to a longer time. Maybe we'd see CAS as a Much much much more valuable asset to the game then.

In my opinion, it should be shorter.. cause say you call in CAS, and pilot comes in, does his Fire mission and then flies out... but then you need it again, in RL another plane or helicopter would be on its way in a matter of seconds

Why not call this topic "longer reload times for helicopters/jets" since that is the only point your making in this topic?

Charliesierra-RCR wrote:In my opinion, it should be shorter.. cause say you call in CAS, and pilot comes in, does his Fire mission and then flies out... but then you need it again, in RL another plane or helicopter would be on its way in a matter of seconds

Not neccesarily.

I actually support this idea.

If you ask me the best way to make CAS more popular is to get the spotters some spotting scores from a succesfull attack. If somehow possible that is

Gaffertape wrote:Not neccesarily.

I actually support this idea.

i don't - that one apache represents more than one, as there wouldn't just be 1 apache

Herbiie wrote:i don't - that one apache represents more than one, as there wouldn't just be 1 apache

Thats why there are 2 apaches on Kashan...

CAS has problems that have to be fixed. The way to do so is to find the problem, then fix it.

Gaffertape wrote:Thats why there are 2 apaches on Kashan...

yes those 2apaches represent more than 2 apaches...

What would happen IRL if an Apache ran out of ammo one of the reserve apaches on Standby would go out while the other one is refuelled and reloaded. There is no plausible system like this possible in the BF2 engine. Reloading represents the other crew getting into the air.

Plus isn't the rate of reload a map controlled feature?

I know that the helipads in Qinling rearm the craft super fast (takes no more than 10 seconds honestly). And the helipad in Dragon Fly doesn't even exist! Grrr.

rearm speed is based on a formula with the max ammo.


Notice how it takes a long time to get 1 patch if you can only hold 1, But it takes 1/3 of the speed if you have 3?

Also, You'll get pistol ammo slower then assault rifle ammo, since you have 2 magazines for your pistol, but 8 for your assault rifle.


Anyway, back on topic.

I disagree.. adding a longer reload time will just make breaks in the game.

How long does CAS calls take though. Maybe if your lucky and you have some sort of Air Asset near by, 10-15 minutes?

I find that jet CAS calls are the quickest and usually the best effect on target, while attack choppers take too much time ahead of calling for it and if the do miss from a bad lase or something its 5 minutes until they are good to go compared to the jet gaining altitude, turning around and comeing in again.

IMHO, CAS is fine, as said IRL you would have a Heli on standby, but this isnt plausible in PR.

Gameplay > Realism

You fight a whole battle in 3 hours, where as IRL, it could take 3 days.

I think this is one of those thing that will come back and bite you, in real life it can take 10-15 minites for a air craft to be reloaded.

Dev1200 wrote:rearm speed is based on a formula with the max ammo.

Even simpler it goes as follows.

Given player has 0% ammo of a specific weapon Y. Specific weapon has 50 shots.

Given player has 0% ammo of a specific weapon X. Specific weapon has 100 shots.

Given rearm station has a rearm rate of .05/s or 5% a second

Weapon Y will rearm at a rate of 2.5 shots a second.
Weapon X will rearm at a rate of 5 shots a second.
Time to Rearm Completely will be 20 seconds or 1/.05

Its all percentage based.

Now the only variable in this game to rearm rate is the rearm station. Individual rearm stations can have different rates and multiple stations can have a multiplying effect.

The rearm docks at Qinling have a ridiculous rate of armament for all vehicles while Muttrah is more balanced.

An army has only so much apaches and f-16. If one unit has 4 apaches rolling in in fast succession they might be absent elsewhere.

I say decrease the spawn time for downed aviation and increase the reload times to make up for it.

Also the rounds in a tank rearm too fast IMO.

Same goes for every vehicle infact.

i honestly, after careful consideration and reading, believe that the core problem of CAS is it's life expectancy/spawn time.

one of these two must be dealt with, reload times are fine relative to real life versus gameplay,
if i may suggest maybe altering the lock alert system of most helis to better suit there real life counterparts.
OR if no one wants to touch that, significantly reduce spawn time to achieve a short life/effectiveness type of package.

think of these as how it should be compared to RL or regarding spawn time, how quickly replaceable they are on real battlefields.

iv got one more long shot idea, if there could be a way where many more helis are already on the battlefield, but are locked until the rest are destroyed, meaning map starts there are 7 helis, only 2 can be used, when one dies 20 second delay and a heli is unlocked and so on. when all helis are down spawn time will kick in for all at the same time. therefore it will be very bad to lose all of them, but effective. and it will be appropriately balanced.

this should emulate a real battlefield replacement when critical conditions are at maximum.

CAS takes 20 minutes to spawn anyway, so with this you may as well crash it and be flying again before the apache is reloaded to "real" standards.

CAS is useless enough as it is.