Fog of War in Spring must always be shown on the game screen - Page 2

Fog of War in Spring must always be shown on the game screen

Various things about Spring that do not fit in any of the other forums listed below, including forum rules.

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10053r
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Joined: 28 Feb 2005, 19:19

Post by 10053r »

Actaully, I think the best way to deal with it is the way OTA did. Make LOS color, and non-LOS black and white.

I think we should be aiming to improve Spring to the point that LOS is unneccesary though. Or rather, we should make it so that maps get big enough such that there is a horizon, and a real (L)ine (O)f (S)ight. Then it could really be that if there is a straight line between your unit and the enemy one, you see it. We'd need to up unit speeds, weapon ranges, and map size to compensate.

Seriously though, in the short term. Black and white vs color is the best way to do it. If you want to overlay radar and sonar, you could switch to a CMYK color palatte. You get full color when you have everything. You have K (black, so things are black and white) when you have nothing (no LOS, no radar / sonar, no jamming). You add cyan to the terrain when you have radar, and magenta when you have radar jamming. Sonar is yellow, and sonar jamming isn't shown, or is magenta also.
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Min3mat
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Post by Min3mat »

my god that would be ugly. if you want info press 'l' if you want prettiness press 'l' again...my god is it that hard? why do you want some crappy ugly (on all the time) hybrid? :s
Warlord Zsinj
Imperial Winter Developer
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Post by Warlord Zsinj »

Buggi, I'm sorry if this thread annoyed you. If you like, I'll put a link to that thread in my original post.

A number of things stopped me from rezzing that post:

1) I honestly thought that the major LOS discussion thread was lost when the forums had the earlier trouble.
2) I come from a forum (TAUniverse) where rezzing old discussions is a big no-no. If an answer was stated in that thread, then creating another thread is equally bad, when some searching would have done fine. But no answer or conclusion was arrived at in that thread, as it was only speculation regarding what might happen when spring comes out, as opposed to actual current information.
3) I also felt that the content of this thread was sufficiently different, in that it refers to urgent changes from a hotkey to constant gameplay, as opposed to a brainstorm as to what the best method of fog of war would be.

To reiterate that third point, what I really wanted from this thread was not quite a discussion of the best method to display fog of war, although it was rather inevitable. I wanted the SY's to realise that the functions activated by the L key (namely LOS, not radar, although a non-intrusive constant radar range would be nice) were not optional things that can be had on and off every now and then; they are functions that always have to be on for gameplay reasons. It was only then that I mentioned that if they were to be always on, then they would need some sort of visual improvement.

Again, apologies if you feel I have usurped your thread.
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Min3mat
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Post by Min3mat »

grrr look at TA and look at spring. the spring way of showing radar and LoS is FAR superior!!!
Warlord Zsinj
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Post by Warlord Zsinj »

No, min3mat, it isn't. As I stated in my original thread (here I go repeating myself again), LOS is something you need to constantly see, for gameplay reasons, and for visual reasons (its strange to see things popping onto your screen). Therefore, what is shown in the L key (the LOS anyway) needs to always be shown on screen. However, the method used to show the L key is not designed for constant viewing, and is both difficult to see with, as well as somewhat ugly.
Doomweaver
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Joined: 30 Oct 2004, 14:14

Post by Doomweaver »

I just skipped reading most of the posts so this might have been mentioned, but Volumetric Fog will not be implemented in any Real Time Rendering Engines any time soon. So that is not a solution.
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AF
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Post by AF »

Buggi has yet to post in this thread warlord, you should really have named alantai instead, but the original thread had a poll in it, and would have been preferable.
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GrOuNd_ZeRo
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Joined: 30 Apr 2005, 01:10

Post by GrOuNd_ZeRo »

Why can't we have Generals style fog of war and TA style LOS?

Also radar targetting should be implanted, I kinda hate the blip targetting, but wouldn't be as bad if there was a better LOS system
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Gabba
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Joined: 08 Sep 2004, 22:59

Post by Gabba »

Having some real fog or something else to represent fog of war would be nice, but I find the way it works now interesting - it's realistic in a sense, in a real war the general doesn't have colored lines on the map telling him where his unit's LOS ends. That just adds to the fog of war effect and the uncertainty of where the enemy is. It makes for a more sneaky game.

So let's add visible fog of war if people really want it and it doesn't make the map look ugly. But it should be a gameplay option.

Also, I think that multiplying the sight range of all units by a large amount would go a long way in making the way it works now feel more right. It would feel more like "real" line of sight, where your view is limited by obstacles and weather, not by an arbitrary distance.
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AF
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Post by AF »

Volumetric fog would look ncie but it would also slow the majority fo players down into a lag nightmare.
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GrOuNd_ZeRo
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Post by GrOuNd_ZeRo »

what about a texture overlay? something that adds a shader or something to the terrain when it's outside LOS.

texture overlays and macrotextures would be a nice addition, a nice way to add shadows of clouds too IMO.
Warlord Zsinj
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Post by Warlord Zsinj »

Er, sorry, Buggi, Alantai (wow, I'm doing well, aren't I?). Your avatar threw me, because it was similar to Buggi's old one. Apologies.
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Zoombie
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Post by Zoombie »

Well I wish that there a Sonar/Radar button, and no LOS button, so the ugly radar wouldn├óÔé¼Ôäót show up, but the cool looking dimmed out terrain will be there all the time. We just need to make the lighted up area's not look like they stand out as a sore thumb.
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Caydr
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Post by Caydr »

What's the problem with doing it the TA way, which has proven itself for 8 years now? Have LoS on the main map, with jamming, sonar, etc shown on the mini map with circles?

Side note: is there a hotkey to maximize/minimize the minimap? That would be very handy.
Gnomre
Imperial Winter Developer
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Post by Gnomre »

Click the... top right little white square overlaid on the minimap. It's either that one or the bottom left one. I think they give tooltips when you mouse over them anyway.
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Caydr
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Post by Caydr »

Yes, but I mean a keyboard shortcut like M or something.
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Min3mat
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Post by Min3mat »

just drag it using corners! no hotkey i know of
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