I remember the Desert Combat mod for BF1942 was one of the first FPS with helicopters, and I also remember how every n00b would jump in, full throttle, and immediately kill themselves. While it had a steeper learning curve, once mastered, was very precise controls.
All later Battlefield games that had helis, they dumbed-down the controls to make it easier, and they just weren't as fun or precise.

I think I have played this Battlefield map.

I remember when DICE bought out Trauma studios, who created the Battlefield 1942: Desert Combat mod. Possibly the best (read most fun) version of Battlefield ever, and the gameplay to which Modern Warfare and all the subsequent Battlefields owe their existence.

It's been all downhill from then...

Change the last line of that piece to, "Project EXACTO is designed to line the pockets of wealthy defense contractors. Nobody really cares whether it provides a tactical advantage on the battlefield."

Really? What's the per-shot price on these things? Couldn't that money be spent on better training and higher wages for troops so you attract a better quality of personnel in the first place? If the US military spent half what they do on these boondoggle science-fiction experiments on their troops they'd be far more combat capable.

I took her video to be more skeptical of his historical claims, his assertions that he rediscovered them, and that modern techniques isn't valid, than if the trick shots work or not. She goes to show many of his techniques are still in use in some cultures.

Like others said, even from a fairly small knowledge window, it looked like trick shots. Back in the day you would have had to film on expensive film making hundreds of shots to get one that worked, it would have been more complicated to do this. Now with video, it is easier than ever to record it as many times as you need to get the shot that worked.

Would his technique work while hunting or on the battlefield is the main question. Take an arrow through the armor joints in the knee or whatever from his technique won't kill, but probably will hurt enough to take you out of the battle, which would be the point. Would it put a deer down though? Doesn't seem there's enough draw strength to really kill the deer or large game, rather it would torture the animal for an overly long period of time before it might finally die. My understanding of modern archery is to put the game down as quick as possible to minimize suffering.

We need to see him doing his things live. Don't let the myth busters do it, have him do it, in situations that would represent a battlefield. Have armored mannequins moving, some still, have him use his techniques, see how many of his shots would have taken that soldier out of the battle. Unfortunately, you can't safely test having him under fire at the same time since that puts a level of stress on top of everything. Have a deer mannequin and see if his technique would be effective at the sort of range you need to be at to avoid startling the deer, again at a stand still and in motion (generally you are going to wait for it to be still enough to fire anyhow in that case since it is rarely a matter of life and death to kill the deer or other game).

That all said she keeps saying archery is about what works, and it does seem to work for the situation he's in. The question is as I noted above would it work in hunting or the battlefield and even if not, would it work on regular archery targets live without many repeated filming attempts. Would it work at an Olympic style event better than modern techniques? If it could do better, or even near as good, as modern ones at competitions, then, even if it fails at hunting and battlefield situations, it could still be valid.

As an aside, the videos I saw of him weren't trying to sell anything specific beyond him perhaps. I haven't bothered to Google him up to see if he's selling stuff, or just demonstrating things for now. If he's not selling people on teaching in person or via video or whatever, then all the more reason to suspect he's just showing off trick shots the same way basketball trick shot videos do. In which case the historical research could have been lazy just because it was more in jest than anything meant to be taken serious. He could have been pulling a poe in that regards.

I completely agree with her about Lars on many points. He often (very often actually) makes his technique seem "the best in the world" when compared to ANY other technique (as there are A LOT of shooting techniques; some that need different bows, materials, and setups).

Kind of like being able to shoot through plate-mail... Lars would NEVER be able to pull that off (of course no one, with a shortbow and the wrong arrow--or tip--will be doing it either; the crossbow is as close as you can get to being small and puncturing plate) as it requires a huge amount of pull force to puncture plate (even heavy English oaken wood shields). The type of bow is a big issue, because that is where you get your draw strength. But, what type of tip you have on your arrow will determine whether or not it even goes into or just bounces off the armor...

However, for the most part, archers didn't try to puncture plate armor--because to be honest about it: it was HARD, it required a VERY heavy bow and expensive tips (of course the bows were also expensive, because they would not be made out of normal material--it might be a specially imported type of wood that could hold up to extreme forces; the string may also be made of something a bit different than normal). So, you didn't have very many people walking around with the innate ability to puncture plate. BUT, what most archers trained a VERY long time to accomplish was extreme accuracy, for one reason alone: armor.

Instead of trying to puncture plate or even chain, archers instead aimed for gaps or areas were there was no coverage (basically anywhere you bend or connect the armor to another piece or tie/connect itself together; so places like under the armpit or along the side of the body were the armor is pulled together and tied shut). Then they may not have to go through anything at all, or they will only have light leather or heavy cloth armor in the way--either way they will penetrate, and they will slowly kill their target by slowing them down and immobilizing them, then moving in for the finishing blow OR if they hit the right place they can just let blood loss finish them off...

But, this requires extreme accuracy, especially in battle AND especially so if you are firing from a horse (if you were lucky you were able to ride behind someone and concentrate solely on firing your shots, then you could add a bit of speed as well). This is the one place that Lars has horribly mislead people--OR he has made a really great breakthrough. But, if Lars never bothers to really demonstrate this stuff, we have no idea how great an archer he really is.

His entire video is one gigantic edit. Every shot and "trick" has been setup with the camera in the right place. The biggest problem is we don't know if it took Lars 1000 attempts to accomplish some of these feats (he makes it sound in some areas that it happens VERY fast, however...but due to the editing, or how he edited it, we actually have no idea if his claims are true) or if he did it in ten...or right off the bat...

That is why I said we needed to wait for Lars to actually talk to us about this whole thing, and to clear various areas up (records and competition). Because he has set a very high bar for himself, and from his own video he seems to be amazing--but, I like many know that if you edit enough and try something over and over again, you can make yourself look like an expert *whatever* whenever you wish to do it...

I agree heavily with her about his historic claims (and also mocking him on his "super clumsy" shots and setups to make fun of "modern" archers); she also points out, correctly, how wrong he is on some of those claims. Like everyone shooting from the left side; which somehow Lars, in ALL his studying completely and utterly missed. Which tells me one thing: she knows more about archery history than Lars actually does.

But, is Lars actually a great archer? Would Lars be a good archer in a battle, or more specifically his "technique"? Lastly, is he really an unique archer more than worth praising? We won't know until Lars does what I mentioned above; he must meet these criticisms head on.

If we allow Lars time to learn how to ride a horse; or it might be a bit more fair to just allow him to ride behind someone controlling the horse, which was a common practice even in battle (then make sure Lars knows how to also fire properly from a horse, since it requires controlling a horse--if you're alone--and staying on the horse using your thigh muscles...which is actually a pretty hard thing to do...and requires expert horsemanship; asking Lars to accomplish this is laughable, as this type of thing would have been a lifetime achievement in the past AND any archer that could fire fast, accurate, and ride a horse by himself...would have been a horrific force on the battlefield; then give him a sword/melee skill--make sure they have a lot of upper body strength--and a very well made, thick steel buckler and he'd be godlike; and then enough armor to protect from arrows...BUT this means you have to be very strong...otherwise you will never be able to accomplish ANY of the feats with the bow mentioned above; BTW, I'm mentioning a superhero right here, there "may" have been a few people like this in history, but they would've been very few and far apart...and more than likely used sparingly).

Mounted archers are extremely powerful against all units that are mounted yet slower than them and of course those on foot and without a long range means of attacking them (at least shorter than the mounted archer's range), this I will always agree with. We already know that mounted archery units could create absolute havoc in the past, see: Alexander The Great. However, eventually people figured out how to deal with this type of threat as well... But, horse mounted archers do have their "nemeses", namely foot archers--since they can take some time (if an arrow comes their way, they block it--it is much harder for a horse archer to carry around a big shield or at least just have on sitting nearby--or you can aim for their horse, which is why above I said that "superhero" like warrior would need a melee skill, because eventually they WILL be on the ground).

So, again, we have to wait and see if Lars bothers to respond to this video and to ALL of the others that have also been made (he did make a lot of people angry; as he did make some stuff up and possibly "overshoot" the mark on other claims and possibly even his own abilities...). I won't hold my breath though.

I think we can all come to a fairly logical conclusion on this. If Lars NEVER responds to anything, then we will have to assume that a lot of his "super-speed" with "accuracy" was due to one thing alone: editing.

Phew, I think that covers everything...it certainly was long enough!!!!

This is too cool. When are these expected to be available to consumer?

Hopefully be ready by the time Battlefield 6 comes out.

Surprised he didn't mention "auto-shotguns" as part of alternative designs. Being able to fire 8 successive rounds was mighty useful in close-quarters of some Battlefield 2 multiplayer maps. (after appropriate gun upgrades of course).

The trends in policing throughout the country are ominous, thanks to the drug war, the Dept of Homeland Security, and the spillover from America's many foreign wars. The whole world is a U.S. battlefield, and the people of the world, including Americans, are the enemy.

Greek military must be terrifying on the battlefield has been added as a related post - related requested by Norsuelefantti on that post.

"We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, is possible to carry this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield"

-- George Orwell.

Battlefield 4 (BF4) - Singing Shark has been added as a related post - related requested by oritteropo on that post.

Battlefield 4 (BF4) - Singing Shark has been added as a related post - related requested by oritteropo on that post.