FROM: Project Lead
TO: Arma 3 Users
INFO: Update 1.44 Released, End Game Livestream, Texture Templates
PRECEDENCE: Flash
SITUATION
Update 1.44 has rolled off the presses and onto main branch. We thank you for your help with Release Candidate testing. Please allow a little time for all your favorite servers to update. It can take some time for the data to propagate through the entire Steam ecosystem world-wide. Until then, you may not be able to connect to all servers. If you are not seeing the game update itself, try restarting the Steam Client.
There isn't a lot to report on otherwise. We are still specifying our development road map for the rest of the year, and beyond. The various departments are planning their major tasks and assigning priorities. They are performing feasibility studies, doing analyses and building prototypes for the Expansion. It will be a while before we can share the results with you. When we do, we'll be more confident we can actually deliver what we have planned.
INTELLIGENCE
It's high time for another developer livestream! Designer Nelson Duarte and Creative Director Jay Crowe are to be some of the special guests appearing to discuss End Game multiplayer. A prearranged roster of developers and community members will duke it out in a 'best of 3' battle. Join us on our official Twitch channel on Thursday May 7 at 18:30 UTC (20:30 Prague time). We'll try to also motivate a few team members to take your questions in the live chat. Please be nice to them! In all likelihood, a YouTube recording of the stream will be shared afterwards for those who cannot attend.
In a previous report we shared documentation on presenting your mod well in-game. Tools Commissar Julien Vida has followed up with a sample mod on Steam Workshop. After subscribing and downloading the mod, you can visit the mod's local folder for references and to be inspired for your own creations.
"Godly Creations" is the third achievement we're placing in the spotlights. It requires you to assume the role of Zeus and place a total of 200 objects. Zeus is free DLC that we introduced with update 1.16 back on April 10 2014. Its multiplayer framework lets one or more game masters curate the online experience for other players. Scenarios can be created from scratch and modified on-the-fly. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination, but with great power comes great responsibility. Being a good Zeus is not easy. It can, however, provide some of the most rewarding multiplayer experiences out there. You can get a first impression of Zeus via its introduction in PLAY > SHOWCASES.
You have since elevated the global unlock percentage to 3.0%. Remember that you don't need to place all objects in a single session; the counter is stored on Steam's persistent servers. You are also not limited to official scenarios, so you can use any custom Zeus-enabled scenario as well. The real challenge of course, is not just to spam simple objects, but to build meaningful compositions for your stories. A bit of a shortcut is to place preset compositions via the CREATE tree on the right (Groups > Empty).
OPERATIONS
We've decided to do a multi-phased roll-out for the improved BattlEye anti-cheat software. What does that mean? Update 1.44 has prepared the infrastructure. The Launcher has been trained to provide the easiest interface to enable, disable, update and start the BE Service (but it remains possible to use separately for advanced use cases). We'll not immediately enable the more effective protection. In order not to upset the live game too much, we'll do that a little later, after the infrastructure has been proven to be reliable. Please use this forums thread to post related feedback.
LOGISTICS
Beneath the watchful eyes of Art Lead David Zapletal, our artists have created a set of very useful PSD texture templates for the Marksmen DLC assets (weapons for now, vests soon). Find them in the Samples_F\MarksmenDLC_Textures folder of Arma 3 Tools. Become familiar with the rest of the tools changes in the latest TECHREP. Have fun creating re-skins for your mods!
One type of Dedicated Server crash is somehow able to evade capture by our programmers. The trouble is that it does not produce usable crash reports (they are empty or otherwise corrupted). We have been unable to reproduce the crash, and have not discovered a reproduction method or common factor between those servers affected. We feel it was probably introduced in update 1.42, and it may only occur for large player counts and after long server up-time. Special tests are being organized by Online Services Consultant David Foltýn. If you have any useful information, please share the specifics in this Feedback Tracker ticket.