A few simple requests

[DoKGonZo]

- During program start-up, how about a little dialog that shows the textures being loaded (same one as when they're being calculated when you change resolution). Unless you look at your disk access light, you'd think the game is hung if you launch it with texture preload on.

- An option to have the mouse cursor hide itself if the mouse isn't moved for 10 seconds, and then reveal itself again when the mouse is moved.

- Make tracers a per-plane setting. For Jabo and manning ground guns, tracers are handy. For air-to-air not always so as they give away your presence. Kind of a pain having to go back and switch the master setting in between missions if you do more than fly just one profile.

- How about an "Alert" command on fields from the clipboard map. Hitting this would send an "Alert Field #" to the team channel and put up a little sonar blip effect on the map at that field for like 15 seconds so you could easily find the field in question. Why do this? Well try flying the current map and when someone says "Alert 14" you spend half a minute trying to find "14" amongst all that neon green text.

- In the hanger when selecting the base fuel load, how about showing how many minutes of flight at full power the currently selected percentage gets you? One thing that seems to bite new players often is running out of fuel because they expect normal fuel usage rates.

- Convert barracks from soft targets to hardened bunkers as the troops would most like have slit-trenches to dive into in case of air attack. At least this makes the lawn dart dweebs carry a 1000 pounder if they want to pork troops.

[jetb123]

I like those ideas, There very good ones

[Overlag]

like all of them but.....

Originally posted by DoKGonZo

- Convert barracks from soft targets to hardened bunkers as the troops would most like have slit-trenches to dive into in case of air attack. At least this makes the lawn dart dweebs carry a 1000 pounder if they want to pork troops.

yeah sure, why dont we remove ALL strat so NO ONE needs to defend?

most of the whiners about things being porked say they *WATCHED* 3 bases being porked by a porker...WHY DID THEY WATCH?

[Shane]

Originally posted by Overlag
most of the whiners about things being porked say they *WATCHED* 3 bases being porked by a porker...WHY DID THEY WATCH?

performance anxiety?  

I like #1, 2 and 5, altho' the issue related to #1 was just clarified - it does sorta seem like it's hanging, but now that i understand what's happening . #2 is a minor annoyance, no big.

#3 and 4... well that's aprt of overall "SA." what's next? auto-launching flights based on some "arena" need? People should be expected to look and think for themselves.

#6 - not sure what current hardness is, but overlag's point about defending relates to that look and think thing i mentioned.

[JB73]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
- How about an "Alert" command on fields from the clipboard map. Hitting this would send an "Alert Field #" to the team channel and put up a little sonar blip effect on the map at that field for like 15 seconds so you could easily find the field in question. Why do this? Well try flying the current map and when someone says "Alert 14" you spend half a minute trying to find "14" amongst all that neon green text.

i love this idea.

have it a dot command, and it makes the "alert" (base under attack) sound go off, show a system message in blue or something other than the normal colors, and the base gets bigger on the map, just like when someone keys up on vox.

[Shane]

and have ch2  clogged with multiple alerts of this and that every 3 seconds?

no thanks.

[DoKGonZo]

Originally posted by Shane
and have ch2  clogged with multiple alerts of this and that every 3 seconds?

no thanks.

You could limit how frequently an alert for a base can be sent. I rarely see people send alerts more than 2 or 3 times per hour. This is basically an adaption of the "flare" metaphor used in multi-player Age of Empires - which works very well indeed.

As to some of the other responses ...

Barracks hardness is because it's just so easy for folks to shoot down barracks along a front and more or less freeze that area of the front. Requires no skill at all, and they don't even need to burden themselves with carrying a bomb. At least make them work for it. I wasn't saying barracks can't be killed ... never even implied it.

The load-up dialog is just User Interface 101 stuff.

The per-plane tracer setting has nothing to do with SA or with the need to think. It's moving a setting which is more task-based closer towards that kind of functionality instead of being a system-wide setting. Again, basic UI stuff. If you have an email program, and have 4 accounts - half POP3, half IMAP - would you want to have to flip the POP3/IMAP switch every time you go to check mail on an account? Tracers really is an ordinance setting, afterall.

[Overlag]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo


Barracks hardness is because it's just so easy for folks to shoot down barracks along a front and more or less freeze that area of the front. Requires no skill at all, and they don't even need to burden themselves with carrying a bomb. At least make them work for it. I wasn't saying barracks can't be killed ... never even implied it.
.

takes no skill? wtf?

the reason it takes "no skill" as you call it is because HARDLY NO ONE defends in this game.

I myself have killed 7 rook front line bases (3 small, 3medium 1 large) by just ONE mossie loadout. You know how many people upped or turned around to shoot me down? 1...a nik who went for a HO and died. 1 defender for 7 bases....

does that mean strat needs to be taken out? simply because no one defends it? wasnt removing the fuel porking good enough for you?

[DoKGonZo]

Originally posted by Overlag
...

does that mean strat needs to be taken out? simply because no one defends it? wasnt removing the fuel porking good enough for you?

Your valium prescription run out?

[Overlag]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
Your valium prescription run out?

pointless reasoning with you it seems

[DoKGonZo]

You're the one making it personal and making false claims on what I say ... show me where I said anyting CLOSE to "take strat out." Picking a fight with me is not in your best interest.


Lemme ask you this ... you look at the map and see a field or CV  blinking with only 1 red dot closing on it. You go to the tower of that field ... look outside ... and see a P51 boring in from 65,000 feet to the base or fleet. What is the point of taking off to defend against this? He'll either auger or extend for 12 miles. What's to defend?

You're right that most people don't defend squat ... but half the reason is that the way things work now make it a pointless waste of time to scramble for most raids.

And in your case with the Mosi ... lets look at the ODDS of success here. You see this Mosi blow up your barracks in one pass and head off to the next base. You can launch something fast to catch him ... like a La-7 maybe. And maybe after 20 or so minutes you'll catch him. At which point it's HO Time ... your 3 20mm's vs. his 4 much better 20mm's. Odds of success ain't really great - and the Mosi WILL try to HO you cuz that's all he has going for him. So ... again ... why bother? You'll waste half an hour and likely die on the first HO pass. Or you can launch from the base it looks like hes heading to - and maybe get HO'd there - or maybe get stuck in an even longer useless chase. Again ... why bother?

Forget the obvious reasons of defending bases from attack - from a game standpoint, if you have 2 hours to play, why waste a quarter of it "defending" in this way?



All I suggested was make it at least take a damn bomb to take out barracks. How you stretched this into doing away with strat completely goes beyond reason.

[Overlag]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo

tell me how a little wooden hut needs a bomb to kill it?

[DoKGonZo]

Originally posted by Overlag
tell me how a little wooden hut needs a bomb to kill it?

You're just wasting my time.

[Overlag]

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
You're just wasting my time.

[DoKGonZo]

If you want to discuss why people don't defend stuff, and some solutions, then lets do that.

But if you just want to sit there and snipe and accomplish nothing then bother someone else.