Author Topic: Tracers are not Visible Enough (Read 835 times)

phookat · « **on:** September 09, 2004, 11:21:42 AM »

I think tracers are currently less visible than they were in reality. This is probably due to limitations in the range of light intensity displayable by a computer monitor. They might match up to gun-cam footage, but such footage is subject to the same intensity limitations and should therefore not be used as the basis for in-game tracer visibility.

Here's how I see it.

Reality:

Tracers bright from nose mounted guns.
Tracers brighter from wing-mounted guns.
Tracers brightest from the perpective of the target.

Game:

Tracers visible from the target.
Tracers dimmer from wing-mounted guns.
Tracers nearly invisible from nose-mounted guns.

To make up for the fact that in-game tracers are not and can never be incandescent like their RL counterparts, I would suggest two things:

1) Make tracers a different color, which is not used anywhere else in-game. Hot-pink would be a good choice.

2) Make the tracers a bit bigger (especially in "diameter")

mechanic · « **Reply #1 on:** September 09, 2004, 12:24:58 PM »

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH AHAHAH!

you just posted saying NO to night time, an obvious realism factor, yet you sit here and complain of the 'realism' of tracers?

mad i tell you.

completely mad.

batfink

phookat · « **Reply #2 on:** September 09, 2004, 01:00:33 PM »

Night, MRE's, real pain and real death....I don't want any of those in game, even though they were a part of war.

Realistic tracers, I do want. Which are not possible on a computer monitor, so I am offering an alternative.

DoKGonZo · « **Reply #3 on:** September 09, 2004, 01:28:45 PM »

Lordy ... if anything I'd want them alpha-blendable so they wouldn't be so intrusive. Fire off the front guns of a Mosi and good luck seeing what you were shooting at.

phookat · « **Reply #4 on:** September 09, 2004, 01:48:50 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by DoKGonZo
Lordy ... if anything I'd want them alpha-blendable so they wouldn't be so intrusive. Fire off the front guns of a Mosi and good luck seeing what you were shooting at.

I think that may be more from the smoke than the tracer. In fact, the smoke is more visible than the tracer, which is also kinda strange.

But, for your problem, you can always disable tracers...

For myself, I can simply not see where the round went most of the time.

mechanic · « **Reply #5 on:** September 09, 2004, 02:21:01 PM »

think how good tracers would look at night time...

DoKGonZo · « **Reply #6 on:** September 09, 2004, 02:54:14 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by phookat
I think that may be more from the smoke than the tracer. In fact, the smoke is more visible than the tracer, which is also kinda strange.

But, for your problem, you can always disable tracers... For myself, I can simply not see where the round went most of the time.

Yeah ... it is the smoke more than the tracer ... I turn 'em off for that reason.

phookat · « **Reply #7 on:** September 09, 2004, 03:32:59 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by mechanic
think how good tracers would look at night time...

Yeah, that's true, the tracers do look good in those screenies you took. This is because we have a nice wide range of intensity, so the tracers are a lot brighter than the background. But in the daytime...other mechanisms needed.

Schutt · « **Reply #8 on:** September 10, 2004, 03:43:20 AM »

Any of the retired fighter pilots can tell how good you see real tracers?

I always thought the game tracers are already bigger and easier to see than real ones.

Flayed1 · « **Reply #9 on:** September 10, 2004, 09:04:43 AM »

I think tracer effects are neat but I started turnin them off a couple weeks ago and my gunnery has hit an all time high for me any way. I think it's because I'm paying more attention to the targets relation to my sight and not where my tracers are going.
In short the effects are nice but they distract you from perfecting your aiming.
Just my humble opinnion.

phookat · « **Reply #10 on:** September 10, 2004, 10:40:28 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Schutt
Any of the retired fighter pilots can tell how good you see real tracers?

Would like to hear from them as well.

Quote

Originally posted by Schutt
I always thought the game tracers are already bigger and easier to see than real ones.

I would be very surprised if this was the case, especially for nose-mounted guns. If this were so, then the main purpose of tracers is lost, and they simply wouldn't have used them.

phookat · « **Reply #11 on:** September 10, 2004, 10:44:21 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Flayed1
I think tracer effects are neat but I started turnin them off a couple weeks ago and my gunnery has hit an all time high for me any way. I think it's because I'm paying more attention to the targets relation to my sight and not where my tracers are going.
In short the effects are nice but they distract you from perfecting your aiming.
Just my humble opinnion.

I semi-agree, but for different reasons. I think the reason for this is what DoK brought up, the smoke obscuring the target. If tracers were bright enough, they should help your aim...but they don't, cause you can't see them. And to make it worse, the smoke hides the target. Again, if tracers worked in reality how they do in the game, I think they probably wouldn't be used at all IRL.

koda76 · « **Reply #12 on:** September 10, 2004, 10:53:36 AM »

I'm still trying not to pee my pant's from the "Hot PinK" suggestion

DoKGonZo · « **Reply #13 on:** September 10, 2004, 12:21:40 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by Flayed1
I think tracer effects are neat but I started turnin them off a couple weeks ago and my gunnery has hit an all time high for me any way. I think it's because I'm paying more attention to the targets relation to my sight and not where my tracers are going.
In short the effects are nice but they distract you from perfecting your aiming.
Just my humble opinnion.

I'd love to be able to use them as I usually fly 3 or 4 (or more) different planes in an evening and the ballistics from Hispanos to Russian 20's to German 20's to US .50 cal's are all pretty different. But the smoke trails are so pervasive and distracting that I don't bother switching tracers on.

Anyway way to just have a smaller or quicker-dispersing or less opaque smoke trail?

JTs · « **Reply #14 on:** September 10, 2004, 01:39:41 PM »

was never a fighter pilot. i fought the river war. when we loaded tracers we put them ever tenth round in the .50 cal and every fifteenth in the 20mm. i found them very distracting. from my point of view the tracer looked like a very bright firefly with a rocket strapped to his a** and always seemed to be going high so if you corrected for the tracer you where missing with everything. in early 1971 the powers that be decided to take the 20mm off the boat. the 50cal was moved amidship and in its place they put the GAU-2A minigun from the cobra gunship. this was a 7.62cal weapon and could fire 6000rpm in high and 2000rpm in low the tracers came every five rounds in this as all ammo came preload. we carried 15,000 rounds so that gave us 3000 tracers very pretty but i still didnt like them. buy the way vc/nva tracers where red. ours where green. at night the main disadvantage of tracers is they gave away the ambush site and increased the pucker factor. in ah i still dont use tracers(lol) turn them off and your gunnery will improve. now if i could just learn to fly a fighter.