Arma 2 Basic Guide.

Arma 2 is a complex game, and it is not always easy to learn, as the game has a lot of content, and the tutorials might be a bit difficult and or not explain some things you should know. This is not a 100% finnished guide, but it includes the basics that should help you get started, i will edit this with your ideas and suggestions!

Feel free to add me personally, and ask any questions you have, or just leave a comment down bellow.

What is - Arma 2?

ARMA 2 / ARMA II

Is a tactical shooter made by Bohemia Interactive Studio.

This is one of my all time favorite games, due to it's high level of realism, it focuses on infantry combat mainly, but there is also ground vehicles, helicopters, planes, and more.

This is as close to war as you can get, without being in one, when bullets start flying you can feel the heat, sometimes even scares you if it's heavy enough, because you will die from a bullet or two, and there is no auto heal mechanic, which always keeps you on edge, this game is suggested for fans of the previous games - Operation Flashpoint, Arma I, hardcore gamers, or people, who are really willing to learn this really nice game, though the game might seem hard to get into at first, once you actually get the hang of it, you will find out it is a really awsome game, and that is why i made this guide, to help new people get started, learning Arma 2 was not a problem for me, as i started from operation flashpoint, to Arma 1, And Arma 2, but alot of people are now buying Arma 2 / Operation Arrowhead and did not play the previous series, so it might be hard for them to learn it.

Sure, the game has training missions, but even they, are sometimes confusing, so i hope this guide helps.

Getting started.

To start, launch Arma 2, and if everything loads, you should see something like this:


SINGLEPLAYER

The singleplayer is obviously to play by yourself, you can tackle on the campaign, do some scenarios, benchmarks, or do some training.

MULTIPLAYER

Multiplayer is my favorite part of the game, and where i spend all my arma 2 time on, you should not try out the multiplayer untill you learn the basics of the game.

OPTIONS

Speaks for itself, options let you configure your game if you're having some issues / want to change something.

PLAYER PROFILE

Player profile, allows you to edit your name, how your character looks like in game, what race is he, if he has sunglasses, how does he sound and such.

EXIT

Exits your game.

What i strongly suggest you do, is go to SINGLEPLAYER, Then Boot Camp.

The most important thing you should complete is 01: Basic Training.

When you start, you will see the map, just press continue, and once you are in game, you should see this.


Run over to Miles, and then he will tell you to take the weapon from the box *if you dont know where to go, follow the yellow marker, that is your waypoint* the box is to your left.


Then come back to Miles, and he will give you a list of choices you can do, start off with the obstacle course, select obstacale course, and head on over to where the yellow marker is at, and you should see this.


When he tells you to start, quickly run arround the maze, climb through the bridge, walk over the obstacle upfront, and then prone under the wire, once you reach the barrel, quickly stand up, and run back to Miles.

Miles will contact you again, asking what do you want to do, select Firing range, head on over to where the yellow marker is pointing, and you'll find Sykes, he will tell you what to do.


Once you've picked up the weapon, free-fire the gun down the targets downrange, once you are done, you will enter marksmanship training, where you need to hit the target's that pop up once.
Once you have done that, he will tell you to try out the sidearm, freeshooting only, no point's, so just try it out, and that should be complete.

Again, Miles will contact you, choose first aid, and head on over to where the waypoint leads you, and you should see this.


Do as the guy says, carry the injured man to the marked location, and heal him as he tells you to.

Once Miles contacts you, select driving course, get in the humvee, and drive to Shaftoe.


Once you arrive, shaftoe will give you 2 options:
Anti tank Training
MOUT

Do anti tank first, you'll need to destroy 3 targets, do as he say's, should take only a couple of seconds


Once you are done with that, select MOUT, this is where you will go into a quick live combat mission, to practice what you have learned, how you complete the MOUT, is tottaly up to you, your objective is to get in there, and kill all the enemies, how you do it, where you approach from, is tottaly up to you.


Once you have completed the training, you have learned the very basics of the game, i suggest you do some other training missions as well, and also try out these scenarios:

01: Trail by fire.
02: Eye for Eye.
03: Counterattack.

Doing those quick scenarios, will get you used to the game, be warned, they are the easiest scenarios, yet they may be hard at first, even i die qutie a bit, so try to be cautious, and get a feel for how ArmA's combat is like, also, don't do Eye for Eye scenario if you did not completed Team training.

Once you have completed that, it is tottaly up to you how you will play a game.
Will you complete the campaign?
Will you try to use the editor?
Maybe beat all the scenarios?
Try some multiplayer?
Join a realism clan?

The choices are up to you, from this point, it is tottaly up to you, how you will continue playing the game, the guide will keep talking on more stuff that will help you in the field, and more, i strongly suggest you try a few campaign missions as well before entering multiplayer.

Basic Controls.

Arma 2 has quite a few controlls, and most of them are important, here are the ones you should try to remember.

W = Forward.
Double Tapping W = Sprint
Mousewheel up & down = Open / scroll through action menu.
Middle mouse wheel / enter = Open action menu / confirm action menu selection.
Numpad Enter = 3rd Person.
Left mouse button = Shoot / use action menu
Right mouse click = Shoot
Right mouse hold = Zoom in + Hold Breath
A = Left.
S = Backwords
D = Right
Z = Prone
X = Crouch
C = Stand up.
Q & E = Lean left & right.
R = Reload.
O = Watch
F = Switch firing mode's / weapons.
G = Inventory / Gear.
H = Show last tip.
J = Diary.
K = Compass.
L = Flaslight.
V = Vault / hop over obstacles.
B = Binoculors.
N = Nighvision.
M = Map.
ALT = Freelook.
2x CTRL = Lower weapon.

Action menu & Gear menu.

The action menu, is something you will use a lot, for actions such as:
Getting into cars.
Opening Doors.
Opening crates
Looting bodies.
Ordering your team arround.
And alot more, learning to use it is sometimes hard and takes practice, and sometimes it's easy as 1+1 and people learn it under 5 seconds, everyone is different to how fast they master this game.

To open your action menu, move your mousewheel or press you middle mouse wheel or press enter, once you open it, move your middle mouse wheel up and down to select your option, then PRESS the middle mouse wheel, or press enter, to confirm it, here is an example:


I want to get in a car as driver.
I go next to the door, i move my middle mousewheel, i scroll up untill it says - Get in car as driver - And then i confirm it by pressing the middle mousewheel or enter.

Gear Menu.

The gear menu, is really essential, that is where you will put your weaponry in, your pistol, bincoluors, magazines, weapon - whatever you can find / need.

If you press G, you will see something like this:


Now, lets narrow it down a bit, since it may be confusing for some people.

First - Avaible Item's:

Compass 1
M16A4 1
Map 1
Nvg Goggles 1
Radio 1
Watch 1
30Rnd. STANAG 6
M67 Frag Grenade

Now that, shows your inventory contents, what do you have, and how much, for instance -

M16A4 1 = I have 1 M16A4 Assault rifle.
30Rnd. STANAG 6 = I have 6 - 30Rnd. Stanag mags.

And to the RIGHT, you can see the same thing, exept in a nicer layout.

Now, you can probably see the soldier as the background picture.

On very top left and top right are 2 big slots, those, are for you to put Night vision, and binoculors there, so as you can see, i have Nightvision, but i dont have binoculors.

Below that, you can see my weapon, that indicates, what are you carrying as your primary weapon.
Below that, is your secondary weapon *Launchers*, It can be a backpack as well if you have Operation Arrowhead.
And to the right of primary and secondary weapon screen, you can see 12 slot's avaible.
There you can put 12 items that you want, mags, grenades, smoke grenades, you name it, so remember, you can only have max 12 mag's for example, but then you can't carry any grenades, you need to organize your inventory really nicely.

Now, below the secondary weapon slot, is your pistol slot, you can store a pistol there.
Right of the pistol slot, are your pistol mag's / Grenade launcher grenades, you can either store pistol mag's there, or Grenade launcher grenades like M230's, so if you have a weapon with a grenade launcher, the grenade launcher grenades will be stored there.
And at the bottom, is your misc stuff, Radio, GPS, Map, Watch, Compass, that is what you will usually have, but you can sometimes loose them / not start with them.
So that, is how your basic inventory look's like, but let's look at it after we've opened an ammo crate.

To open a weapon crate, you use your action menu, come up to it, move your middle mouse wheel, and press gear.


Pretty straight forward really, to the right, is YOUR inventory that i discussed above, but on the LEFT on avaible item's, is the avaible item's you can take from that place wether it be a crate / body / vehicle whatever, as you can see theres like
10 M4A1
4 M4A1 CCO
3 MP5A5 1
There is 10 M4A1's in the crate.
There is 4 M4A1's in the crate.
There is 3 MP5A5's and you have one.
The left number show's how many item's of that is in the crate, number to the right show's how many numbers of that item you have / do you have it.

Fatigue System.

Fatigue in ArmA is very important, by most people ignore it, or don't even realise it is there, but in most cases it can mean life or death.
Fatigue is like it is in real life, if you are calm, and not out of breath, you can focus, and do your duties, but if you run for a long time and fatigue yourself, you'll be tired, you will have a harder time focusing, stuff might be blurry, your accuracy will decrease, and so on, same goes for ArmA.

You loose Fatigue by running, getting shot at, and getting wounded.

When you're fatigued, not only is everything blurry, but your aim becomes very bad as well, here are 2 pictures to show that.

Not-Fatigued


Fatigued


These examples you saw is me being fatigued from running - That can easily be fixed by standing still, but it's much quicker if you crouch, go prone, or even sit down.

Next way to get fatigued is to be shot at otherwise as others call it "Being Supressed" Most games try to simulate supressivness by blurrying out your vision, or something like that, whilst ArmA tries to do it a bit more realistic, it fatigues you (Simulating you being scared), making you aim very bad, whilst in real life you'd obviously be scared and you'd be moving your weapon a little, this also, can be fixed by standing still, laying prone, crouching, sitting down, also take note supression works against A.I as well, so let them have it :D

Last way to get fatigued, is to get injured, that is when you're obviously in pain, you're having a very hard time aiming, but it can get even worse if you run more, or get shot at, to fix this, you need to be healed, and then again, remain still.

Tools that help you in the field.

The Compass.


Compass, is one of the most crucial parts of navigation, besides the map, but sometimes, it can be even more important then the map itself.

You can use the compass, to find out where are you, where to go, where the enemies are, or to even report them in multiplayer, here's an example:
My leader just said, Enemy, north-east, 200 meter's, so i quickly open up my compass, and look North-east, and i know there is an enemy there.
Navigation with the compass + map will be discussed later on.

The watch.


The watch is pretty self explanitory, you use it to find out what time it is in the field, when it will get dark / morning.
It also helps to co-ordinate assaults in multiplayer or with A.I, for instance, you want someone to attack a city, at a specific time, you have 3 team's, and it is 2:30 right now, but you want everyone to attack when it's 2:35.

The map.


The map, is probably the most important navigation tool, but it serves more than that.
In the map you can:
Check the map for locations, where to go, use it for navigation's.
Read about tasks / what are your objectives.
Read Notes about the mission.
Check what units are doing what.
Set up a plan, and more, we will discuss the map + compass navigation a bit further into the guide.

Binoculors + Night vision goggles.

These are nice to have, but not crucial, unless you're the leader of the squad.
Binoculors are alway's good to have, as it let's you scout areas before you attack, and help you make a plan, if you don't start with any, try to find a dead enemy leader / officer, they usually have them.

Night vision goggles obviously help you see in the dark, and are really handfull in night-time mission's.
On a side note, after you put on your night vision, it will take a few second's before you can see, because your eye's need to adjust, same for taking them off, you'll see pitch black for about 10 second's, your character eye's need to adjust.

Navigation.

I'm sure that if you haven't already, you will, sooner or later, get lost in the field.

This section will help you navigate in the field.

Now, if you're playing on the easiest difficulties, you wont get lost, as you can see where you are on your map like this:


But if you're playing on harder difficulties, you won't see yourself on the map, and that might complicate things.

Now to avoid being lost, make sure you read the briefing of the mission if there is one, look on the map before starting, where will you start, and where will you go, try to find some landmarks that you will keep an eye out so you would know that you're heading the right direction, and if you get lost for instance, if i find on the map that there is a huge mountain, and i get lost, but i can find that mountain, i'l know my aproximete location.

So lets say, i am lost, i found out my general location, and i need to get somewhere.

For this example, i know i am somewhere near the city of Chernagorsk, and near a village called Prigorodki, and there is a shed in Prigorodki that i need to find.

So i open my map, and i find where i will go to (the shed), and i will Double click my compass in the map, to make it bigger, and i will drag the compass on my target like this:


Big yellow arrow. = North
Small brown needle, indicates where i am facing, which mean's i am now facing the north, but the shed is a bit east, so i close my map, open up my compass, and look a bit east.


I close my compass then, i look in the general location, and there it is!


This is a nice navigation trick, if you know your general area, same for going somewhere where you can't see, lets say, i am lost, and i need to reach a village.

I look around for a landmark, and i find it on the map.
I put the compass on the place i want to go, and check where i am facing right now, and where my target is faced at, so i close my map, open my compass, look in my targets direction, and i head off in the general location, as i get closer, i look for more and more landmarks making sure i'm heading the right direction.

To sum it up:

Find your approximet location.
Put your compass on the location you want to go to.
Find out which direction you're facing, and which direction your target is at.
Head off in the direction of your target.

Also, look for landmarks on the map NEAR the target, so you would know you're going the right way.

Multiplayer + Modes.

Like i said, multiplayer is what Arma II is all about, and there is ALOT of stuff to do in there, so lets narrow it down a little.

Coop: Coop focuses on players cooperating with each other VS A.I, the mission editor allows people to make missions that they want, so you will probably never play the same coop mission, which is why its really neat.

Chernarus life: Chernarus life focuses on roleplaying life, there are 2 sides, Cops and Civilians, the Cops job is to keep order, stop illegal acts that civilians are doing, drug deals, speeding, murders, hostage situations e.t.c
The civilian have alot of choices, they can farm food, set up an enterprise, start manufacturing items, mine gold, e.t.c good stuff.
Or they can rob, make drugs, make gangs, become terrorists, do bank heists, it's tottaly up to the civilians to do what they think is best!

Domination: Domination is a really nice coop MODE, yes mode, you start off in a base theres crates, you can get yourself armed, and you will get objectives, take over cities, destroy radio tower's, and you and your fellow team-mates need to accomplish them, if you are looking for some nice relaxing coop this is what you should try.

TvT: Team VS Team is a player vs player mode where teams fight other teams.

Deathmatch: Deathmatch is bassicly every man for themseleves.

Warfare: Warfare is my favorite gamemode, it is like an RTS.
2 Teams, Blufor and OPFOR, go against each other, they start off with an HQ vehicle, and they need to build a base, deploy the HQ, build barracks, light factories e.t.c and with that, you can buy units, cars and alike, then you go capture cities to increese your income - the main task, is destroy the enemy base, will you be a soldier, capture cities and help your team. Will you buy an airplane and provide close air support? Will you get a chopper and start inserting fellow troops? Will you get a tank and provide ground support? There is SO many stuff to do in warfare, and it's definetly my nr.1 favorite mode.

That sums up the main famous modes of arma 2, but there is ALOT more, i will be adding them a bit later.

Voice Communications "VOIP"

Voice communication is really important in ArmA 2, without it it's really hard / impossible to communicate with your teammates, besides typing.

To talk to your teammates you will need a microphone.

To talk to them simply hold CAPS LOCK, but you need to be on the channel you want.

Switch channels with , "Comma Key"

CHANNELS

Global Channel - The global channel is used to speak to everyone, that includes to other factioned players, so all factions will hear you talk or see you writing.

Side Channel - Same as global except only the side you're on will hear you - Example if you're on BLUFOR - OPFOR won't hear you.

Vehicle Channel - The vehicle channel is used to speak to people inside your vehicle, but only the one you are inside.

Command Channel - It's exactly like side channel, but mostly leaders use them to boss arround other teams :D

Group Channel - The group channel is to speak to people inside your group.

Direct Channel - The direct channel is the mostly used one, and with it you can speak with people in the vicinity / the people next to you, that includes friendlies or enemies so if you're playing Team VS Team or PVP and you've teamed up with a friend and are talking in direct chat, the enemy will hear it if close enough, the range of direct chat is about 10-40Meters

Clans / Units

Clans, or otherwise reffered to as "Units" Make up a massive portion of the ArmA community, and i definetly advise all of you to find one, and practice playing with one, when i said i mainly play multiplayer, i mainly play with other units.

Units consist anywhere from 5 to a 100+ players, they organise large scale cooperative events, where the whole group gathers to conduct a very organised event.

There are plenty communities out there, here are the top 2 places to look for them.

ARMAHOLIC: http://www.armaholic.com/list.php?c=news_community
BI FORUMS: http://forums.bistudio.com/forumdisplay.php?90-ARMA-2-amp-OA-SQUADS-AND-FANPAGES

And also on the steam page, there is a recruitment forum posts as well.

Like i mentioned at the start, if you have any questions, don't be afraid to leave a comment, or add me and chat

Happy hunting!

The... End?

If you've finnished reading this guide, you are probably ready, to get into the single player campaign / mutliplayer and begin to learn advanced stuff, but this guide is far from over.
I did the basics yet, but i will keep updating this guide as i go.

If you guy's want me to add something to this guide / make a new one like
How to use the map editor?
How to fly choppers?
E.T.C just leave a comment below and i'l try to get it done!

Like i said, this guide is not 100% finnished, but this is enough to learn the extreme basics of Arma 2, i will put in combat techniques and more a bit later on when i have the time, this is my first guide ever made, so any feedback you guy's can give would be much apriciated ! :)

[Richard]

@Ironclad2000 You probably did not select the units that you wish to give said orders to. Select your whole team with the ~ key, or individual members with F1 to F12, and the options should become available

[Ironclad2000]

In the unit commands pop-up, Unit move, Fire Mode and commands are greyed out.. Anyone able to tell me why or how I can access it,, Not fun when you can't tell your squad to take a particular formation and such..

[Kuollut]

how do I install and play this game?

[CryseTech]

Hah! "Once you have completed the training, you have learned the very basics of the game"
And here i am can't even complete the Training since the last Mission where i have to Clear the Village lit me up 2 times already...
I don't get it, not even playing stupid, i am crouching, using the lean function, shoot semi auto but 1-2 enemys keep getting me killed since i never be able to spot them...
Like i ran twice trough the village, got shot at multiple times but for the love of hell i don't see them until i peeked, everything was clear, crossed a street and felt like the first soldier landing on D-Day

I really wanna love this Game, it feels so Awesome but seems like i am just to incompetent T_T

[EBOCY AMINE 44]

plz tell me guys how i can play multiplayer ?
i saw in official web server browser when i launch steam with it it sawy waiting for host and then throw me to main menu plz help

[Moses of Sploses]

tottaly finnished binoculors ok

[vlados99999]

Very good guide!

[Arkad 407]

rl060895, there is a lot of tutorials on YT. I am sure about they will help You.

[rl060895]

how do i use the editor?

[iSheep]

Thanks for the rundown. It's really useful considering the tutorials aren't very good especially on the controls.