Smoke in town

[Fender16]

This is a two part wish.
When you destroy town, the buildings are blown up but there is no smoke or fire. I think it would add a little "ambiance" to have some smoke and or fire in the town when it's destroyed. Perhaps have the radar tower in town burn just like the radar tower at a base would?

Also, when you drop ords, a hangar, dar, what ever, when it's been burning for awhile the smoke disappears but the fire stays. Wouldn't the fire disappear but the smoke would still stay as if what was burning was "smoldering" now? Perhaps make the smoke a greyish color after the fire has burnt out.

Just small ideas that came to mind and really don't think they'd be too much of an issue if they were to be implemented.

[AKP]

Im sure part of the reason why you dont see smoke or fire in town is due to frame rate.  The more animated textures you have on the screen, the harder your system has to work to display them.  But... perhaps if there were like a 10% chance of a building smoking or catching fire it would be nice.  That way, its never the same, and you get some of what you are asking for without overloading anyone's system.

[Soulyss]

Could the lack of smoke in town be a game play decision?  If buildings smoked and burned (which would be a nice visual effect) I would imagine it would become fairly hard to see if the town was 100% down and make the matter of knowing when to bring the troops in difficult.

[RTHolmes]

perhaps if there were like a 10% chance of a building smoking or catching fire it would be nice.  That way, its never the same, and you get some of what you are asking for without overloading anyone's system.

I like this alot, for strat buildings too


As for existing strat/hangar fire/smoke thats always seemed strange to me. Id like to see an initial debris cloud (grey/brown) followed by 5min of Smoke and Fire like we have now, followed by 5min of smaller fire with a thinner plume of smoke, and the last 5mins just scorched earth with rubble and debris. same time for smoke animation (but 2 types), 1/3 less time for fire animation (but 2 types).

[xStrato]

I really like the ideas here as well. Yes, it would be harder to tell if the buildings are down. But if you are working as a team you always have multiple angles on the town.

[Fender16]

Perhaps the only thing in town that would burn would be the radar tower.
Don't think it would cause frame rate issues and wouldn't generate enough smoke to make spotting buildings difficult.

[RTHolmes]

it would be harder to tell if the buildings are down.

if there was smoke in 5-10% of town buildings when its fully down, make capture criteria 90-95% of buildings down, to compensate for the visibility thing?

[EskimoJoe]

How 'bout a weee bit of chimney smoke rising from the buildings to show that they're still up? That way, you look for any smoke to see if a building is still up, instead of a large tower of fire obscuring said building?