MikesPhotos

What new lighting feature?

Spaloo is spot on once again. Even the County, which is big on tankers due to areas such as Palmdale/Lancaster, Malibu and Topanaga Canyons, and other rural areas without good water supplies, doesn't have anything remotely like what you all are suggesting. You can see a full walk around of LACoFD WT70, one of the newest and largest in the Counties fleet, here. Notice the small pump panel and hose connections, and such. Mostly it is just a water shuttle to refill engines, not to fight fires from. This allows rigs to stay in place using their tanks, and the WT goes back and forth, usually in conjunction with another WT or another Engine to form a daisy chain of water replenishment. Mike.

To deploy the jump bag, grab one with your firefighter. Select the FF and click on the building with the jumpers. You'll see him run over to the building, lay down the bag, and it will inflate. Jumpers will land on the bag, and walk off. Use the FF to grab the bag to deflate it and carry it away.

Well these ideas haven't been said no to outright, I, and MikeyPI when he comes back, are personally hoping for a revamped boat system in the not so near future. Same with the Command Unit. It's also on the list, though it may not be used quite how y'all are thinking, but it hasn't been dismissed The only thing that gets dismissed outright is just saying add this. We want to know why you want it and how you want to use it like james did. It helps us flesh out the useage, entry points, and many other factors that go into implementing a new unit. Personally I think this is an intriguing suggestion, especially since LAPD cars come with ballistic armored panels since the Northridge Bank robbery. The whole point is that you SHOULD hide behind the car when being shot at. Not run away and run away from everything explosive. There are various ways of doing this and if hoppah, who is swamped at the moment, doesn't look into it, I might put that on my to-do list. As said before, CSI really doesn't have a place in this game. It's more focused on "first responders" then on investigation, overhaul/salvage, and other parts that involv extended time on scene and effort. Also the LAPD's Scientific Invetigative Divison isn't like the CSI's on tv. They are not officers, and they usually just respond in pretty plain vehicles. They just collect evidence under the direction of the detectives and that's about it. Since we solve all of our cases by arresting the bad guy quickly, there really isn't a place or need for them. Please use the search button for the discussions on tasers.

Whoops I meant to address this part as well, thanks for picking up on it KingNikan. There are currently 4 ambulances in the game. As Hoppah let the cat out of the bag, I'll expound on it a bit more. Currently, they are virtually interchangeable in useage, staffing and such. Just cosmetic differences for the most part. In 1.7, one of the things I've tried to stress, and Hoppah has really been all for it, is to make as many of the Fire units as unique as possible. In regards to the ambulances the staffing will be 1 FF/PM stretcher team in the Red ambulance and 1 FF/EMT stretcher team in the white ambulance. The Yellow LAX ambulance will be ALS staffed for use in the 2 airport missions (via mission patch), and the Vintage ambulance will be ALS staffed for people who just love that style of box. So there will still be 4, and 3 will be the same, just different model and skins, but at least 1 will be different While you are the only one to post here about this, judging by the pms I got as well, that's multiple for leave as is for game play vs 1 so far for 5 on truck/1 on 2 car.

This is a good idea in some regards, and all i'll say for now is that there might be something special along these lines already done for 1.7.

You are correct in that EMT-P stands for Emergency Medical Technician - Paramedic Level, but FF/PM is a very common abbreviation all over the US for Firefighter/Paramedic. Just google "FF/PM paramedic" and you'll see results on the first page from Virginia, Florida, Alaska, Missouri, LAFD's Battalion 14 blog, Chicago, San Francisco, and more. Actually it'd be the EMT-P

The light equipment truck (fictional name from earlier versions of the mod) / Heavy squad is a paramedic resource from the Los Angeles County Fire Department. Because of how spread out Truck co's and Light Forces are in LA County, some areas also include a Heavy Squad which is staffed by 2 Firefighter paramedics as well as necessary tools for extrication and forcible entry. Think of it like a small USAR truck staffed by 2 paramedics. It's primary role in real life is as the LACoFD's primary ALS resource since we contract with 5 different ambulance companies for BLS transport instead of having our own ambulances. You'll find it is a great way to get Medics on scene quickly to areas of the map where there are no stations due to its entry point on the map effectively sticking a 3rd station there. With the addition of the 2nd station, entry points which were introduced in 1.6 will be changed to better spread out resources throughout both maps with ALS resources being the primary factor and extrication duties being secondary. That's nice.

The game clock plays a major part of the freeplay code from scripts to health/life, to the events themselves. Some things are tweaked for play-ability, others are for realism. You've made your suggestion, its been answered.

Please see this post as to why it takes the time it takes. Depends on the status of the patient. BLS runs can be emergency transports that require no ALS intervention but are time critical . The default is lights and sirens because the behavior of the vehicle is to go around traffic and through lights. The great thing about the mod is that hoppah has made it so you can change the default setting of the lights by turning off the automatic lights and sirens. They will still respond with lights and sirens when dispatched via the BC or PD, but will respond to the hospital with lights and sirens off if you wish. Nothing that needs to be changed in game, you already have the controls at hand to make it how you want it. Hoppah had the foresight to include that to compensate for everyones wishes.

This has not been decided fully yet, but here is a question to you and everyone, just for my own personal knowledge... Since there really are no truck ops, would it be annoying to the majority of you to have to disembark the truck, run to the engine, grab the hose and connect to it each fire or would you rather just have 2 on the truck and 4 one the engine since you're going to use those 4 on the engine anyways for 99% of all of the calls, and the 2 on the truck can be used for extrication, master stream, and the few truckie duties that are in game. 2 is just the right amount for the things the truck does, and 4 on the 2-car means less hassle because of the quick deploy. The whole point of the game is understanding that realism has its place, but it is a very delicate balance between real and game. For absolute realism we'd have the game clock be 1 second = 1 second and you'd only get maybe 3 to 10 fire/ems calls after playing it for 24hrs, and maybe 20 police calls. And speaking of the game clock.......... One thing I think many of you fail to realize is that there is a thing called a game clock. 1 second does not equal 1 second. The alarm at FS1 sounds for 15 seconds in real time. 15 seconds equals 5 MINUTES in game time. Here are the run stats for the Los Angeles City Fire Dept from Jan to March 2008 For those who might find this quote confusing, that means that from the time the citizen dialed 911 and the phone was answered, firefighters were on scene within 5 minutes almost every time. That includes driving time, turnout time, and call time. Going by those stats, for 100% of the calls where you are hitting the alarm button, you're late to the call! You want realism, then we should speed up the time it takes to get on the rig, not slow it down. I'm not Hoppah, but I will field this one as well. I've spent the last 4 days going through the 60+ pages in the suggestion thread to cull it, make a list, and see what the future of that thread will be. Honestly, it's a lot like panning for gold. There are some really good ideas, some that will be implemented at some point, maybe not this time, but at some point, but the majority, and it's an overwhelming majority are just thoughtless and without merit. Many of the posts in that thread are made by those who feel a need to comment on every post in every thread possible. I don't know if they are trying to boost their post count, or they just like being very very social. On the flip side, there are some great nuggets and some good conversation that added to the thread. It's really like panning for gold. Mike

Remember that LAPD: Life On the Beat was filmed between 1995 an 1999 before the LAFD switched to the new all red color scheme. LAFD has always had both ALS and BLS ambulances that are denoted not by color but by number. Paramedic RA's will have the station number or a 2 in front of the station number, for example RA 88 (FS88), RA209 (FS9 along with RA9), RA102 (FS102). A BLS RA will have an 8 or a 9 in front of the station number, for example RA 888 (FS88), RA909 (FS 109) and are referred to as "800's" or BLS RA usually. Because of the recent purchases of ambulances, 35 this last budget alone, many of the older white colored rigs either stayed or got handed down to the 800's, though even today you'll find some white box's being used by paramedics when they need a reserve for whatever reason. In the game, for easy visualization of units, we've decided to go with White = BLS, Red = ALS. In the show though, you'd have to have paid attention to the number on the ambulance to have known if it was ALS or BLS. Mike

Once again, I hate to sound like a broken record, but there is no "National Policy" regarding anything in America. Some small rural departments allow it, some larger departments allow it as well. In Los Angeles, some departments allow their Motor officers to take their bikes home, but not any patrol or unmarked vehicles.

Los Angeles World Airports, the company that runs LAX (Los Angeles International), Van Nuys, and Ontario airports.

Brake light will be added. As for rear view window lights, the only vehicles with them will be FBI with its dual flasher, LAWA PD will have them added, slicktop will keep the rear arrow bar, unmarked will probably lose its arrow bar (cue whining ... now) and be modeled after the current LAPD unmarked configuration used by SWAT and other units which just has a dual flasher in the left rear corner of the window. I might have forgotten one or two, but mostly, don't expect too much change in the lights.

Let's put this to rest, this is not the Mike Mod, nor the Who is Mike game. We all don't need to know any more about me then what I've posted before.

Hehe, No, not a chief... thank god. I don't even drive the big red toys. I'm happy being lowest man on the totem pole, all the fun a guy can ask for.

The response matrix is based on numerous factors including type of medical cal (level a through d)l, location of the nearest ALS or BLS unit, and even weight of the patient can be considerations. A sick person might get just a BLS RA, whereas if there is a delay in the nearest RA on scene, the nearest BLS unit, Engine or Light Force will respond with the 800. An ALS call might get just an RA, or it might get an RA and an 800 or an RA and the nearest BLS fire company. As for the jaws, that's been discussed a few times here and on the main thread. They will be removed from the Engine companies and will remain on the Heavy Squads, USAR, and Trucks.

This thread is closed, all msgs besides the original and Stans have been deleted. If hoppah wishes to respond, HE will, otherwise his silence speaks volumes.

Yes, it's the fancy term LAFD uses for its ambulances. Typically referred to on the radio as an RA or just Rescue

The police, ambulance and fire sirens sound as if i was sitting on the corner of the street. Code 3/PSE sirens aren't used by anyone I know out here. Just FedSig/Unitrol by the big players and motorola radio/siren head. I'll tell you two stories that highlight just how spot on they are. 1) I was playing the game on my laptop at the station when i first got it and had the speakers up to loud to drown out freaking golf on the tv. We were having a little down time since the apparatus I was assigned to that day decided to have electrical problems and we were waiting for the reserve to get there. I had just responded a full Task Force to an incident (2 Engines, 1 Truck) and out comes the Captain from behind the station screaming, "WTF?!?!? Who's responding and where? Did we get a call? Did we get our reserve already??" It sounded just like the units were going past the station and god he'd have been beside himself if we missed a structure cause our rig decided to belly ache. 2) This happened not to long ago as well. I have it set up so the ambulances have their sirens turned off my default. My hearing is fine, and I don't need to listen to sirens all day and night while playing the game. I can see the vehicles, it's fine. But I pressed the button for the ambulance to go to the hospital and scrolled away. For some reason the siren came on though. I scrolled over to it and sure enough, the closer I got to it, the louder the siren got! But the siren was turned off! I kept pressing the button more and more and nothing was happening until I looked out the window and there was an LAFD RA outside of my place trying to get through traffic. You can't get any closer then that.

That's the brand new, as in barely a couple of months, BP over at 109s. It's the only one of it's kind in service and I'll have to check the budget, but I don't beleive any others are set to be purchased for a bit. It was purchased to bassically replace the hummer. Because of how little use the vehicles get compared to normal wear and tear, they are rarely replaced or upgraded.

I don't know if adding 5 buttons to the menu that is already cramped is such a good idea. The game already has that feature for the most part anyways, if you keep the doors closed, call for the unit via the chief or PD and you'll see that individual door rises and closes. Wow... Ummm... I know I should just ignore this but ... you just don't have a clue at all do you? Really... You don't. Just for the sake of adding some info here instead of just pointing out how clueless you are, from left to right Bike Medics for use at special events, Chiefs vehicle, gator atv for use by medics at special events, Brush patrol, Hazmat tender that is just a big truck to carry additional gear for the hazmat squads during a large incident, Rehab Air Tenders, USAR, and the newer Command Post. Not a single one is a "Fire Truck", only the brush patrol would be involved in active fire suppression and it's already in the game. If you download and install the mission patch you will be able to use the LAX Crash vehicle and Rescue Ambulance on both airport missions and the LAWA (Los Angeles World Airports) PD will be included in the next missions patch as well. Yes there is, and I'm just going to leave it at that. Like I said earlier, there will be a complete and dynamic change in the use of EMS and Fire units in the game. How it will be implemented and what units will be included and changed, well, enjoy the 1.6, it just came out That is already included in the game, it was the first thing I ever did on this board Include tool tips, I beleive, and then mouse over the dispatch in the window that pops down when you press tab and you'll see: Freeplay will be altered in many ways. 1 thing that must be understood is that freeplay events are hard coded. Things like a building collapse don't already exist so they will probably never exist. Fires, Accidents, and such can and will be modified, but don't expect anything shocking like a child in a sewer pipe or storm the crack house calls. That's for Hoppah to decide and with as much on his plate, I have no idea if its in the works or not. He's mostly concentrating on the LAFD and LAPD right now and I've laid a ton on his shoulders to do and he's responded remarkably. The work he's done is just astounding. Nope, all of the freightliners ended up in the shops and I believe they're torn down/torn apart or just gone. No two are identical, which is one of the fun aspects of being in the fire service. Each one is built to fit into the area where it exists in both style and function. To see photos of the new stations being built and photos of what is being replaced, check out this amazing site that details exactly where the Prop F money is going to and the new stations. The latest is FS43 in Palms, which either opened up last weekend or will this weekend. Feel free to msg pm me or email me via my website. You're welcome

I'm still curious about what you meant by all cars have lights in the back window, I'm not sure what you are referring to, do you mean the 3rd brake light?

None of us are tired of the suggestions, please don't get that impression, good ideas are good ones, but we ask that everyone be part of the big picture and put some thought into it. As for the new unit system, honestly... No... 1.7 will be out when it's out, and everyone will just have to be patient till then If you like it, that's great, if you don't ... well.. honestly... with all of the hard work and hours Hoppah has put into it, i'm not sure whether you like it matters all that much I will say this, 1.7 will not be a small update, nor will it be released any time soon. It'll make freeplay, missions, and all aspects of game play very different, more realistic, and accurate... and that's a good thing.