New radar and icon options

[Krusty]

Next time you see an airliner flying by at 20,000 feet look at it. Can you tell what angle the wings are at? Where are the engines? What color is it? 2 engines? 3 engines? 4? Engines in the tail? High tail, low tail? How far out on the wings are they?


All of these details are clear and evident to anybody with basic vision most times, and they help you ID a plane.


In this game, at a miniscule FRACTION of the distance, you can't ID a plane because it's 2 black pixel dots on a screen.


Pretending "icons off" is realistic is just ignorant.

[Chalenge]

I have TrackIR and the 'FOV' setup on my Pro Throttle micro-stick such that I can center the view and zoom on icons at 20k and ID types. While it is possible I dont think it is practical.

[Krusty]

I also have FOV mapped and use it regularly... Even at max zoom you're not approaching what the human eye sees.

[rabbidrabbit]

I would not advocate turning off friendly icons...  If anything increase the friendly icon range.  Limiting or turning off enemy icons does change the dynamics and might be interesting.  The tail end guy in your flight better be covering the six or you could get wiped out from behind.  Plane camo scheme can make a difference for once.   In this setup you know icon= friendly no icon = bandit and you can easily tell bombers from fighters for a long distance.  Types of fighters can be IDed pretty reasonably within 4kish.

[daddog]

We will never (well, as long as I am in charge) turn of both friendly and enemy icons.

I had considered making enemy icons 1k and extending friendly to 5k, but opted for something a bit different this last frame with enemy off at a very low alt, (300 feet). Other Admin CM's may choose some different settings.

[gyrene81]

I turn the icons off just for a little added "fun"...what are you guys complaining about? Having the ranges shortened isn't that big of a deal.

This is a "game" for enjoyment.  We aren't battle reenactors.

Really? So why the focus on realistic setups with the plane sets and objectives and mission assignments?

[Boxboy]

I turn the icons off just for a little added "fun"...what are you guys complaining about? Having the ranges shortened isn't that big of a deal.


Really? So why the focus on realistic setups with the plane sets and objectives and mission assignments?

Really well tell us what video card you have and what size monitor, and while we're at it how old are ya?  I can tell ya at 66 years old and with a 20" monitor and GTX 260 it's hugh deal to me 

[gyrene81]

GTS 250, upgraded to a 22 inch from an 18 inch monitor and I'm 48 with 20/150 uncorrected vision. Try lowering your resolution and don't forget to hit shift + f1 for max viewing range if you can't make out plane types from 3000 feet.

[Vulcan]

I have TrackIR and the 'FOV' setup on my Pro Throttle micro-stick such that I can center the view and zoom on icons at 20k and ID types. While it is possible I dont think it is practical.

Sorry but I believe your full of something brown and sticky, AH uses different levels of rendering LOD. At those longer ranges the rendered object LOD makes it difficult or impossible to tell what it is.

[Vulcan]

I turn the icons off just for a little added "fun"...what are you guys complaining about? Having the ranges shortened isn't that big of a deal.


Really? So why the focus on realistic setups with the plane sets and objectives and mission assignments?

Icons fill in a gap the game engine cannot currently do, that is to render the world in the fidelity that we get in real life. Vision is a complex beast.

[Motherland]

Sorry but I believe your full of something brown and sticky, AH uses different levels of rendering LOD. At those longer ranges the rendered object LOD makes it difficult or impossible to tell what it is.

In AH LOD is dependent on your FOV. If you mess around with the zoom key you'll notice this. It's an interesting feature.

I can identify aircraft at very long distances too with ample zoom (I don't know about 20k, but outside of FSO icon range easily, and often times outside of MA icon range, depending on the circumstance).

[Vulcan]

In AH LOD is dependent on your FOV. If you mess around with the zoom key you'll notice this. It's an interesting feature.

I can identify aircraft at very long distances too with ample zoom (I don't know about 20k, but outside of FSO icon range easily, and often times outside of MA icon range, depending on the circumstance).

OK alt-S for a screenshot of what you see.

[fudgums]

In AH LOD is dependent on your FOV. If you mess around with the zoom key you'll notice this. It's an interesting feature.

I can identify aircraft at very long distances too with ample zoom (I don't know about 20k, but outside of FSO icon range easily, and often times outside of MA icon range, depending on the circumstance).

done before as well.

[Motherland]

Easiest way to see this is with the destroyer from the CV tower. It's noticeable on airplanes after a while too but it's a bit harder to see unless you're used to shifting through the zoom key.

It's a little (very) jittery because I couldn't keep my head still and didn't want to turn off my TIR and lose the destroyer as it was moving. (actually since my position relative to the destroyer stayed the same I guess I wouldn't have lost it turning off TIR but I'm an idiot)

You can see in the first frame that the guns are suspended in the air , not attached to the deck (easiest to see with the rear gun)
Second frame the 'towers' for the guns appear
Third frame the railings start to show and the small caliber ack guns
Fourth frame everything (I think) is full displayed (full zoom), including the flag on the bow

This was all done from the CV tower of course so I was in an absolutely stable position.

[Krusty]

And yet, in real life, you can see so much more... Individual rungs on ladders, individual wires, individual windows, portholes, hatches, and even weld lines on turrets and what have you:





And comparing the destroyer to an airplane is only a way of illustrating the change in LOD. It doesn't compare to planes at all.

IDing a con even at max zoom is difficult, especially considering the black and silver shadows that most seem to have (LOD bug that's been around since 2.06 or so!) that cloud the textures underneath it, giving only solid shapes with no color to deal with.

Somebody posted a screenshot once in one of the millions of "no icon" threads that all popped up around the same time, and asked them to ID the plane, the range, the orientation of it. It was in a dogfight, within guns range, and I don't think a single person got it right. It was under 800 yards, and was a 109. I tried to search for the thread, but couldn't get the keywords right for the search tool to work. Oh well.