When flying a helicopter with a HOTAS, opening the inventory, map, or pause menu resets the in-game analog controls to their neutral positions.

This affects more than the collective:

• Cyclic pitch and roll return to center.

• Collective moves to approximately 50%.

• The helicopter continues reacting to these values while the interface is open.

When the interface is closed, the controls immediately jump back to the current physical HOTAS positions.
Here is a detailed video that clearly demonstrates the issue: https://youtu.be/qIeDdxUcLuI

If the Sticky option is selected for the HOTAS collective in the control settings, the collective no longer resets to 50% when opening the inventory, map, or pause menu. Please see Attachment 2 for a demonstration.

Steps to reproduce

1. Launch Arma Reforger without mods.

2. Start a Game Master session.

3. Place any vanilla helicopter and enter it as pilot.

4. Move the joystick away from center.

5. Set the collective to a position other than 50%.

6. Open the inventory with Tab, the map, or the pause menu Esc.

Actual result

The cockpit animations visibly show the cyclic returning to center and the collective moving to 50%.

The helicopter reacts to these neutral values even though the physical joystick and throttle have not moved.

Expected result

Opening an interface should not change flight-control values.

The game should continue reading the HOTAS axes or preserve the last received values while the interface is open.

Additional information

• Reproduces in Game Master without mods.

• Reproduction rate: 100%.

• Platform: PC.

• Collective device: VKB STECS.

• vJoy disabled.

• Game version: 1.7.0.54

• Joystick: VKB STECS as collective, VKB Gunfighter as cyclic, VKB T-rudder

This makes opening the map or inventory unsafe during flight and can cause a helicopter on the ground to take off by itself.