GV Graphic Adjustments to cheat!

[Wes14]

Maybe not allow the graphics to be adjusted "In Flight"?

[hubsonfire]

Originally posted by dedalos
Well, at the list it is not fair.  When I brought my sliders down to improve FPS, I could see where every one was hiding at.  I could not shoot them, but I could see them.  If the had their sliders set to max, they would have no clue were I was and I could sneak up behind them.  I guess it is not cheating until you start moving them up and down in order to find the other guys.  Fix please?

It's entirely fair. Nothing whatsoever stops anyone from running the absolute minimum detail levels.

[VonMessa]

I'd have to agree with Hub on that one.   (did I really just admit that?)

I may have said this before, but.....


With graphics turned down, certain objects are removed from VIEW.
 
THEY  (the trees, buse, etc) ARE STILL THERE!  

You may see something better, but 90% of the time if you shoot, your rounds will hit some "invisible" object that would be visible if the graphics were turned up.

Lowering graphics settings is not some "let's make the foliage dissapear" David Copperfield trick to make killing another GV easier.

Not everyone has a awesome rig.  I say work extra to get the money for upgrades.  That's exactly what I did, but more easily said than done for some.  

That being said, I doubt it will change.  Commerce is commerce and I don't think HTC has any plans of cutting their own throat by alienating, what appears to be, a fair amount of their customer base.   It would equate to them saying "If your computer sucks, you can't play our game."  


Imagine if you went to your usual gas (or Petrol if you prefer) station, and without warning they would no longer sell you fuel for your "crappy" Ford Tempo, or what if they only sold 93 (premium) octane and had no other choices anymore.  You would find another fueling station for sure.

I would bet that HTC isn't in the habit of throwing away money.

[stroker71]

It does take some of the challenge out of the game.  The stalking, the hiding, the hunt, the excitment...doesn't anyone like a challenge?  I think thats the reason the ground cover is in the game.  Maybe HTC thought it was time to upgrade the game whent he put that stuff in and it had in a sence backfired.  While upgrading the game also gave the weak gvers an out to game the game.

[dedalos]

Originally posted by hubsonfire
It's entirely fair. Nothing whatsoever stops anyone from running the absolute minimum detail levels.

Uhhuh, why would you lower your settings if you don't know this was happening? How many people read this board?  I guess it would be too hard to not show the GV if it is hidden?  Anything is better than getting right

[gurinski]

If you go to your local wal-mart you can get a great deal I bought a Dell Inspiron 531 with 22' lcd 2gigs ram 500ghdd for less than $800 put in a evga 8600gt for less than $100 and got a great gaming machine. I could have built my own but Im not that into gaming. You could get an even cheaper machine or just the comp no monitor  and even a cheaper card wich is very simple to install.

[hubsonfire]

Originally posted by dedalos
Uhhuh, why would you lower your settings if you don't know this was happening? How many people read this board?  I guess it would be too hard to not show the GV if it is hidden?  Anything is better than getting right

A better question is why would people, who don't know that others have reduced their settings, be complaining about other people reducing their settings? The answer is that they wouldn't be. Those complaining already know what's happening, and how to deal with it. Nice try though.

As for your idea, it has been discussed numerous times, and the same fundamental flaws were revealed each time. I'll make it short and sweet, because you obviously can't be bothered to read up on it when you can be complaining about HT's code.

Currently, we have a situation in which some people run lower settings, and some simply refuse to do anything but *****, even though they could use the same settings. The two most common solutions, locking detail levels, and tying GV vis range to graphic detail levels both result in a hardcoded advantage for customers with higher end systems.

What this means is that instead of people being blindly stubborn, knowingly putting themselves at a disadvantage, the playing field would not be level for all of HTC's customers, some of whom would now be trying to compete against players who could see them from ranges at which they are invisible to others. Is that clear enough?

[Emu]

Its not about "my system is better than yours" or fighting fire with fire and just sliding everything to the right so you can see the "cheaters" as well as they see you.  The fact is, terrain, trees, houses, etc. is what defines which strategy a GVer will utilize.  Its disappointing to see that strategy can go out the window so easily by modifying the graph sliders.

I also understand this is a flight simulator mainly, and HTC probably wont spend a lot of time fixing this issue, but it is definitely annoying, and it really turns me off from using GVs at all.  During a VH capture attempt, i was up in a hill, hidden behind a forest, yet, all the GVs down below could see me quite well... And I can bet you it wasn't because all of them had outdated rigs which demanded their graphs be set to the minimum settings.  Like I said, disappointing, but it is what it is.  Hopefully, something that might get addressed one day.

[LLogann]

There is a very easy answer to all this but HTC needs to do it.  I dont honestly know if they ever read the forums much.  How many wishlist items are in development?  How long does it take to fix a bug in the code?  

With that said, HTC works very hard for us and the few people there I have had contact with are dedicated to our satisfaction.  It is a delicate balancing act, to fix everything fast they would have to hire more developers and then our subscription would need to rise.

But...

I digress....

Back to the issue,

Code the "lower" graphic detail models to create ugly tress (circa 1990 graphics)  SO instead of disappearing all that is there is a block of green pixels for a tree.  

This would completely remove the need to be talking about Graphics Cheaters.

[derkojote23]

I think its a moot point, I simpathise thoe as a GVr it erks me to no end that we cant hide when we need to but asking every one to play by the same ruels even when thay can when ther is a cheat,, thats not gunna happen. Some one will still be running a Good PC with the slider all the way to fastest and 3 mile range set so thay can WIN WIN WIN. Id say it would be easer to just A) do away with GV icons for aircraft (lets fase it thay can see the little black dot even in s barn or thrue tarain and thats enough, B) make it so if the detail is slid then the distance will go down to. That will help. Never will get a sulution every one will agrey to. but  Gotta keep an trying. thanks HTC for even listening to us

[FrodeMk3]

There's probably no real answer to this. Not everyone can, or has, an up-to-date gaming PC. On the same token, It might be a major problem for HTC to try to code in something that hid the other players' when the Detail slider is dropped to minimum.

It's the same thing as when we used to have night. A whole bunch of people would cry about it being too dark, or wouldn't fly then. The solution then was to move your gamma slider over, until everthing brightened up again. Not everyone knew about this, and there were numerous allegations' of cheating made, about people still blowing stuff up and getting kills' during the dark hours. Eventually, HTC did away with night in the arena's.

[JETBLST]

Hmmm

I understand that certain people have lower end machines.  But I cannot run my Apple IIe on this game.  Where is my excuse for lower graphics?

Cant I just sit here and pull out my $1.99 calculator and hook it up and play?  Come on!  You do not need to invest much to have a machine run with full or close to full graphics.  My puter is 4 years old.  I simply added some ram and I use FSQuick start which turns off ALL background programs and wow have things improved.  

To that end, I think that the graphics lock to range or whatever is the best idea.  If your machine cant handle it well get a new one.  They are so cheap nowadays.  You dont have to go to radio shack and build a new puter.  Upgrade or get new.  HTC has to draw the line some time.  I know.  My buck.99 calculator doesnt work here either.  Dam Im bummed.

Its not a sin to turn down graphics.  I just think that the surrounding 500 yards should still be there so as to block the vision of that player.  If your puter is that big of a piece of crap get a new one.  LOL  Or?  
See my post on new default skins for Panzers and Tigers.

[Oleg]

Too bad, HTC dont want to fix this lame feature.

[Ghastly]

In my experience over almost 10 years and sims by 4 different developers,  HTC is far and away the most responsive game developer to in-game issues. (The Rats on the other hand are far and away the most communicative).  So I really doubt that they are simply "refusing" to address the issue -especially just to torque anyone's sensitives.  Unless you are the one who knows the code,  it's not like you get to decide what's a simple fix and what isn't.

On the other hand, for me personally, it's not that much of an issue.  I've never yet been able to see a tank that I couldn't see before if I play with the slider, and I can't shoot for @#*[ anyway so I die to the better players regardless of where they might or might not have the slider set to, simply because they can always target me long before I can target them.  

I'd kind of prefer that the slider be available at least while FLYING, because while I usually have both all the way up there are times when in busy areas it just gets too stuttery, and I find I need to dial it back down.   That's never happened to me on the ground, but that's not to say that it doesn't happen to others.  I have a "top of the line" computer that's now about a year and half old, so it's about mid-range now.  Other's must settle for a lot less hardware.

[Clifra Jones]

Originally posted by Larry
$1000 will get you a great home built computer that can run max hi res at great FRs. SO no my friend you are the retarded one.

You can do it for 1/2 that. If yu know what you are doing.

What most don't realize is:

1. The human eye connot see frame rates above 60. Anything above that is wasted.

2. For the most part the issues many people experience in this game are not related to CPU/GPU/Network/Internet or HTCs servers. It the configuration of their computer.  If you get rid of all but the most necessary processes running on your PC you will not have problems.

I do simpathize with your situation Larry, Even @ $500.00 if I had to buy a new rig now it would be hard to justify the expense.