AATA Beta 0.9

Felix the Cat · Post by **Felix the Cat** » 17 Apr 2006, 22:09

Warlord Zsinj wrote:IIRC, radar in AATA was only going to be to detect aircraft. If this is the case, then everything is technically "stealth".

The cloaking idea would only work if units would only cloak while motionless, and uncloak as soon as they moved. Anything else would defeat the purpose, and either overpower, or underpower.

I'm guessing that a player would certainly have 100 infantry; but they certainly wouldn't have 100 infantry in a single place, ambushing. If you have 100 infantry, grouped together (in clear ground for even worse realism ) in ambush, and I spot them, I'll click my artillery, and indundate the area with fire in moments. Having that many infantry in an ambush is it's own discouragement. You'd never be able to pull off the ambush effectively anyway.

The only time having masses of infantry cloaked would be helpful would be when they are back at your base, and you want to conceal them from the probing eye of a reconaissance flight (or some artillery observers!), which seems realistic enough to me.

1) Of course radars were originally intended to only see aircraft, and thus everything else is stealthy. What I'm saying is to take out radars, give every unit shorter-range radar, and make only infantry stealthy.

2) Nonsense on the last paragraph. Having masses of infantry cloaked would always be a good idea; if you can hide your infantry by simply ordering them to "hold position" in an open field, it would always be to your advantage to do so unless the infantry were in a fight, or on the march, simply because invisible infantry is better than visible infantry.

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 18 Apr 2006, 09:46

Not exactly; invisible infantry is not necessarily better than visible infantry that can move.

And, what happens if you make it that infantry have to be motionless for a certain amount of time before they cloak?

Say, you have to keep infantry immobile for 30 (or 60, whatever) seconds, before they cloak. If they move, they decloak, and have to wait the time again. The time represents the time it takes for an infantryman to "dig in" and conceal himself. If I had 100 infantry sitting around for 60 seconds idle, firstly, I wouldn't be very efficient, and secondly, I risk being spotted and hit by artillery.

I think it certainly makes infantry quite powerful. But is that a bad thing? Isn't that exactly what we are looking to do?
Sure, it'll be very different to the way TA works, but isn't that also what we need to do? You won't be able to simply throw hoardes of units at each other, because a few panzershreks set to ambush can stop tanks in their tracks. It'll force players to fight more strategically, and in a mode that is more true to WWII (in my opinion).

But again, it relies on those scripting elements being put into spring, as well as a general agreement on it's inclusion. So it doesn't look likely.

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 18 Apr 2006, 15:10

It's a good idea, certainly.

But I doubt it will be implemented engine-wise anytime soon. There are just too many other things to do first.

Nemo · Post by **Nemo** » 18 Apr 2006, 15:25

Well, in the meantime we can just limit LoS of non-optics equipped vehicles by a lot, so a tank advance unsupported by infantry can be easily ambushed.

Speaking of LoS, has anyone played with the new demo (2.0A) enough to determine how much of an effect the AT mine LoS has on gameplay? I had to give them some sight so they could see enough to fire their detonator weapon. On the plus side though, they won't detonate (or decloak) when infantry are walking through them.

Next up on the planned mine improvements: change the german AP to a bouncing betty, affectionally nicknamed 'the debollocker' by the Brits.

Any suggestions on 2.0A, PM me here or post on TAU, or just tell me when I'm on TASclient.

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 20 Apr 2006, 02:47

Sure, I was just putting the idea on the table.

SpikedHelmet · Post by **SpikedHelmet** » 06 May 2006, 05:44

Omfg how did this thread get to page 2?!?!?

Anyway, have completed 6 brand new infantry units... latest is German Sniper:

Here's them all:

They aren't textured, simply .3do's with ta palette colours. However they are fully functional otherwise.

Also I've decided to make things easier and make 10 generic explosion sounds that will cover ALL explosions, be they from weapons, units exploding or what-have-you. They range in "size" from 1-10, 1 being basically a small 20mm explosive shell making a dustball, to 10, which would be basically a 2,000KG bomb tearing through solid earth.

Also, this new sound format crap is annoying. If Spring devs are going to limit what formats of sound we can use they could atleast LET US KNOW WHAT THEY ARE... (22kHz, 16-bit, Stereo)

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 07 May 2006, 14:46

Any 16bit sound will work.

SpikedHelmet · Post by **SpikedHelmet** » 08 May 2006, 00:37

Okay, just spent 3 hours uvmapping this fucking guy.

Excuse the lines, dont know how to make them disappear in UU. It isn't s3o'd yet, just the view from the mapping program.

Nemo · Post by **Nemo** » 08 May 2006, 01:16

Brilliant work. Does this mean that the main bottleneck for getting these guys ingame is now gone?

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 08 May 2006, 04:13

SpikedHelmet · Post by **SpikedHelmet** » 10 May 2006, 05:12

Pretty much. All we need now is a good script to go with it.

OMFG LOOK HOW SEXY THEY ARE.

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 10 May 2006, 16:58

SpikedHelmet wrote:Pretty much. All we need now is a good script to go with it.

OMFG LOOK HOW SEXY THEY ARE.

Yes yes. Exams coming up. After that I'll see if I can't get a solid script done.

tomcat ha · Post by **tomcat ha** » 11 May 2006, 22:16

looking sweet.

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 22 May 2006, 23:24

Animated tread concept

http://aata.tauniverse.com/downloads/video2.mpg

SpikedHelmet · Post by **SpikedHelmet** » 27 May 2006, 06:19

Alright thought I'd do little update...

Infantry now 3SO'd and uvmapped ingame:

Flozi is working on aiming/animation scripts for it. Once we have a base infantry script to work on we can pump out the rest of the infantry, and then on to vehicles! Hoorah!

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 27 May 2006, 08:46

Are you still planning on fixing the shading on those infantry?

smoth · Post by **smoth** » 27 May 2006, 09:22

they look great, Hell I bet without shaddows on(how most of us play) they will look fantastic!

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 27 May 2006, 15:14

smoth wrote:they look great, Hell I bet without shaddows on(how most of us play) they will look fantastic!

They will probably look even better with welded heads, and arms, and legs.

edit:

Here are a few different angles of the standing fire pose I am currently working on.

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 27 May 2006, 17:05

*double post for the bump*

Kneeling pose for snipers:

The bright green parts show where the model needs improving / has misisng faces that are needed in this pose.

Felix the Cat · Post by **Felix the Cat** » 28 May 2006, 01:54

Is it possible for them to look down the sights?

Gun is too low on the sniper's shoulder (well, it's on his chest in the pose :p). Same for standing up. I may be wrong because it's tough to tell locations on a glaring pink-purple model.

Spring RTS Engine

AATA Beta 0.9