Steam Community :: Guide :: How To: Use/Install TFAR

Store Page

Arma 3

All Discussions Screenshots Artwork Broadcasts Videos Workshop News Guides Reviews

Arma 3 > Guides > FatChris's Guides

Not enough ratings

How To: Use/Install TFAR

By FatChris

Welcome to: Idiot Teaches Idiots: How to use Task Force Arrowhead Radio.

My name is Chris, and along this journey I’ll teach you how to use the ArmA 3 mod known as TFAR.

Follow along with the video in the next section.

The rest is a transcript of the video, so if you would like to, please follow along:

Please keep in mind that this video was made with the group “PhanTactical” in mind, so if there is any information omitted or functions not used as intended, it was most likely on purpose.

What You’ll Need:
TeamSpeak 3: https://www.teamspeak.com/downloads.html
ArmA 3
Task_force_radio (Steam Workshop): https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=620019431&searchtext=task_force_radio
TeamSpeak TFAR Plugin: http://radio.task-force.ru/en/

What Is?

So, what is TFAR, you may ask yourself. TFAR is a mod within ArmA 3 that allows users to communicate through TeamSpeak 3 and talk in a realistic environment.

This gives the player and his cohorts the ability to have realistic conversations.

You can stand really close to each other and have an intimate conversation.

Or you can stand far away from each other and yell indiscernible things!

All sound communicated is just like how it is in real life; the closer or farther you are, the easier or harder it is to hear you.

This mod also allows the ability to use radios and communicate over long distances. Neat!

How To Install

Go to the Steam Workshop for ArmA 3. Subscribe to task_force_radio in the Steam Workshop (the link is in the description http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=620019431) , then within that page, there is an additional download required for TeamSpeak. This link goes directly to the official TFAR website. To install the TeamSpeak Plugin, double click on what you downloaded. An interface will pop up. Be sure that your plugins installation path routes to your TeamSpeak 3 client, then continue. This will be all you have to do.

Once you’ve install the plugin, open up your TeamSpeak. At the top, click on “settings” then “plugins”. Tick the box next to “Task Force Arma 3 Radio”. That will turn on the plugin via TeamSpeak.

Be sure to load the mod via the ArmA 3 launcher before you start playing with it. Open the launcher, to go mods, and tick the box to fully load the mod.

Now whenever you fully get into game, your TFAR should be activated!

Basic Functionality

So, TFAR allows you to communicate with your teammates in a realistic environment. But, how do you do that?

Let’s start with the basics. You’re able to change the volume of your voice. You can do so by pressing CTRL + TAB. This will cycle through three volumes of voice: whispering, normal, and yelling. So, switch it up depending on your tactical situation.

As I said before, this mod allows you to communicate through radios. For the purpose of this video, we’re only going to be using two types of radios: the AN/PRC-152 and the RT-1523G.

Every faction has their own variation of radios, but they all have more-or-less the same functionality.

Let’s start with the 152. This radio is meant for medium to short range transmission. So, let’s configure the radio so we can communicate with others. To open and edit the radio, press CTRL + P. A 2D image of the 152 will appear. For PhanTactical, we traditionally don’t change the channel on the left hand side, but we do change the frequency. If we want to change the frequency to freq. 31, then we would highlight the frequency with the mouse cursor and manually type in 31.

To save our changes, we go to the bottom right-hand side of the radio and press “set frequency”. Hit ESC to exit out of the 2D image. To begin talking with others, hold down the CAPS LOCK key and release when you are done speaking. There should be a gray box that appears on the bottom right hand corner that shows that you are transmitting in green along with what frequency you are transmitting on. When you are done transmitting, it will say “transmitted” in orange.

The long-range radio (or, the backpack radio) is essentially the same. It can transmit over larger distances, but the functionality is similar. To open the long range, press ALT + P. You can change and set your frequency just like the 152; highlight, type, and press set frequency. Hit ESC, then to transmit, hold down CTRL + CAPS LOCK.

Advanced Functionality

TFAR allows you to customize how to use your radio, which is really cool in case you need to use more than one radio at once.

If you want to hear one radio only through one ear, you can do so by pressing CTRL and the left/up/right arrow keys to change your shortwave radio mode. To change your long range radio mode, press ALT and the left/up/right arrow keys. For example, I find this helpful to keep my fireteam radio in my left ear and my platoon radio in my right ear.

If you find that the radios are too loud, you can adjust the volume of your radio by going into the 2D interface with CTRL + P and adjusting the knobs at the top by left clicking or right clicking.

You can also set your radio to be speakers in case you are the only one with a radio and need to convey information faster. Open up the 2D interface and hover over “Speakers” to enable and disable this feature. It can be found, for example, at the bottom row of the 152.

If, for whatever reason, you need to change any hotkeys, you can do so by pressing ESC and going to the main menu. Go to Settings → Controls → Configure Addons → then use the drop down menu to go to TFAR.

Conclusion

For the most part, that’s how to use the essential functions of Task Force Arrowhead Radio. In the description also lies a link to their main website highlighting other functions of this mod, but as long as you can do what I listed above, you should be able to properly navigate through the battlefield.

Thanks for reading.