How weight affects us....

[Lord-Knight Fandragon]

Seriously, this is a question ive been unable to find an answer to. Is there a chart, or some kinda information on how weight affects us in this game? Ive heard it drains stamina, makes our weapons sway more and stuff, but what are the thresholds? I typically run around with like 80-100lbs of gear, being an LMG/MG gunner who sometimes carts along a MAAWS or AT4.....just wondering what it is that the weight is actually doing to my soldier.

[Graf von Scyth]

Uhhh, that is a LOT of stuff.
From the sources I've heard from, a normal soldier carries about 70-80 pounds of sh*t on campaign. That's everything from weapons, to ammo, to food, tents, personal effects, anything.
And when they go into battle, they take with them about 40-50 pounds of stuff. Usually limited to weapons, ammo and a small amount of food.
Carrying 80-100 pounds of stuff on you going into battle is going to EXHAUST your soldier.
LMGs, despite the name are very heavy, so are AT. So really, unless you're installing a mod to remove stamina (Single player only please) you are gonna have to make a choice between them. Take that Minimi or take the AT-4, you shouldn't take the both of them or your poor guy is gonna be in such a state.
I've heard stories from veterans who have suffered disc compression injuries in their spines from carrying huge amounts of stuff. I know that's not modelled in game but... you wanted to know what that would do to a soldier.

[El Berl]

von Scyth raises a lot of good points. I don't advise multi-role loadouts like LMG + AT4 that try to combine two heavyweight roles into one. Stick with the LMG and have another guy, preferably a rifleman, carry the AT4.

Under both the vanilla and ACE stamina models, you're pretty much capped at 100 pounds of gear. With vanilla, you'll be forced to walk, while ACE's calculations strongly accelerate stamina loss with movement if you exceed that 100lb mark.

[mortified_penguin]

As Graf von Scyth stated, there are a lot of factors which contribute to how fatigue is handled that isn't solely due to weight alone (although it is one of the primary factors, it isn't the main contributor).

The simplest way to break it down is as follows:
- All weapons have two stamina-relevant stats called "dexterity" and "inertia".
- The former determines the weapon's bulkiness and how long it takes for you to swing your weapon around. The latter determines how long it takes for your sights to realign after adjusting it in a different direction.
- SMGs and pistols for instance have very high dexterity and low inertia values since they're compact, while an MMG or sniper rifle has low dexterity and high inertia since they're bulky and long-barrelled.
- If you're currently exhausted or you just finished sprinting, your sway will be dramatically increased until your stamina begins to restore itself (~ 5 seconds in vanilla).

Secondly, vanilla Arma 3 uses a generic unit of measurement called "mass" that basically determines how heavy a weapon/item/equipment is. By default, your soldier can carry a maximum load of 1,000 "mass" irrespective of whether your inventory supports more than that.

This is tied to your stamina which appears as a white bar underneath your weapon's HUD. As you may have noticed every time you equip or drop something, you'll see diagonal lines appear or disappear as the white bar shrinks/expands.

The less stamina you have, the less energy you have to sprint. Since you get tired very quickly with so much gear carried, this will affect how long it takes for you to stablise your sights.

Once you run out of stamina, the bar will become red to signify that you are overencumbered and will now suffer heavily from weapon sway until it begins to recover (which can take anywhere from 10-30 seconds depending on your current "mass" load).

This is why unless you're playing a mission which specifically disables the stamina system, it's a good idea to avoid carrying multiple heavy weapons simultanously as they usually have very high "mass", low dexterity and high inertia values.

For example, the favourite loadout used by your KotH l337 dudebro will comprise of a Navid MMG, a Full Ghillie, and a launcher (usually a Titan Compact). The first has a "mass" of 380, the second 80 and the third 120. That's already 580 "mass" worth of your stamina consumed, leaving just 420 "mass" for ammunition, body armour, and a helmet.

Add those into the mix as well and you're already at near maximum load, meaning your soldier will always be tired, won't be able to sprint for very long (if at all), and will take longer to stabilise the weapon's sights.

Note that this is a grossly simplified breakdown but hopefully it'll give you an idea of how the stamina system functions with regards to weight. The main campaign's Prologue, VR tutorials and Field Manual can explain the system a lot more in-depth if you're willing to invest time into looking them up.

[Lord-Knight Fandragon]

My standard LMG kit I do only carry around the gun, first aid kit type stuff, ear plugs, entrenching tool, GPS and other minor things. I am able to pack in like 700-1000 rounds depending on whether 762 or 556. I usually sit around 85-97lbs lol. With the rocket that spikes to almost 120.