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Spotting Distance... again


bell_rj

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And really scale has nothing to do with this issue.

Sure it does. People bring it up one in relation to the other all the time, and it relates to the underlying apparent flaw in the engine. The problems related to scaling; the problems related to penalising more advanced hardware; the problems related to visibility; the sensor effectiveness dependencies; the fundamental balance issues all those create — they all stem from the same root cause. They all have to do with each other, and the whole argumentation against solving one issue because there are other issues with the same root cause just ends up circular and, ultimately, in favour of addressing the whole thing.

 

It's actually kind of shocking to see people argue so adamantly against engine improvements, future-proofing, and game balance. I still harbour some hope that it's because they don't understand that their arguments actually speak to the need to implement such changes as opposed to just maintaining some perceived advantage on their part, but you never know…

 

Look at the screenshots of the tanker above. It’s huge.
…so it wouldn't be scaled. That's the whole point, after all. But that's assuming it is that huge and apaprent for everyone, and the whole point was that it isn't. That's something that needs to be addressed.

 

Besides, if you want objects on your screen bigger the solution is easy. Get a bigger screen and sit closer to it!.
Those are not solutions to the underlying problem, and if you want to talk antiquated dead-end solutions, then that one qualifies an entire pyramid based dynasty to properly convey its status.
Edited by Tippis

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…so it wouldn't be scaled. That's the whole point, after all.

So the tanker wouldn’t get scaled but the fighter next to it would be? See that’s why this whole scaling business makes no sense.

 

Scaling was a method from the CRT era of gaming when monitors were small and low res. Limited in size by sheer weight. Today’s screens are huge and high res. Scaling just isn’t needed and looks really terrible in a world of more realistic graphics. And ED isn’t likely to change what’s certainly a big part of the game engine to accommodate a vanishing issue, since now and in the near future displays will be of such size, resolution and affordability.

Again the whole question of scaling is moot because it can’t be done.


Edited by SharpeXB

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So the tanker wouldn’t get scaled but the fighter next to it would be?

What?! No. That's not how any of this works. What on earth are you even on about?

 

Scaling was a method from the CRT era of gaming when monitors were small and low res. Limited in size by sheer weight. Today’s screens are huge and high res.

…and scaling is therefore more needed than ever because it now has to compensate not only for the unrealistic visibility that those resolutions create, but also for the far broader range of resolutions available and the differences those create in terms of how large units appear on-screen. This is an issue that can only ever increase over time, doubly so as people also expect better simulation and not just some naive and silly speed hack that was invented a decade and a half ago to accommodate (much much) lower performance computers.

 

Again the whole question of scaling is moot because it can’t be done.
Again: that just highlights that there is a fundamental and critical flaw that holds back the capabilities of the simulation — a flaw that needs high-priority attention and fixing.
Edited by Tippis

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What?! No. That's not how any of this works. What on earth are you even on about?

Honestly as many times as this comes up nobody explains what “scaling” is anyways or how exactly it would be applied.

 

Not worth discussing because it can’t be done anyways.

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Honestly as many times as this comes up nobody explains what “scaling” is anyways or how exactly it would be applied.

What it is, what it does, and how it works is spectacularly well known…

 

But what you're essentially saying is that you've spent all this time arguing against something you have no idea what it even is. Nice. :doh:

 

Not worth discussing because it can’t be done anyways.
Fundamentally wrong in every way, per previous explanations. Please read them.

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What it is, what it does, and how it works is spectacularly well known…

You may be assuming too much. Only the players of one other old sim know exactly what this does and how it works.

I do know that Wags says it won’t work in DCS so there’s no point in going on about it.

 

Your choices here (and every other sim) are:

A. Zoom view in

B. Sit closer to your monitor

C. Get a bigger screen

 

Look now you’ve got “scaling” and nobody had the rewrite the whole game. See how that works!

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You may be assuming too much.

No. I chose the wording very carefully.

Read the research. It even has that lovely non-subjective maths in it.

 

I do know that Wags says it won’t work in DCS so there’s no point in going on about it.
Fundamentally wrong in every way, per previous explanations. Please read them.

 

Your choices here (and every other sim) are:
This is also wrong, by the way. I suggest you research the topic if you're going to continue commenting on it.

 

I would also suggest that you start offering some kind of explanation why you are so adamantly opposed to improvements to the simulation and to the game engine in general.

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You may be assuming too much. Only the players of one other old sim know exactly what this does and how it works.

I do know that Wags says it won’t work in DCS so there’s no point in going on about it.

 

Your choices here (and every other sim) are:

A. Zoom view in

B. Sit closer to your monitor

C. Get a bigger screen

 

Look now you’ve got “scaling” and nobody had the rewrite the whole game. See how that works!

 

Excuse me? That other sim is extremely well known in this community. And this is also technically a very old sim, and still has parts left from a long time ago to show it. (not that it's a bad thing, but you make it sound like old = irrelevant)

 

Idk what wags has said, you've told us he has said it, but the explanation seems a little rough around the edges. Our choises with what we have is off topic of this thread, this is a "wishlist" thread.. You might not want this, but it's just as valid of a wishlist item as anything else.

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I would also suggest that you start offering some kind of explanation why you are so adamantly opposed to improvements to the simulation and to the game engine in general.

I’m sure everyone believes their particular suggestion is an “improvement” to the sim. But it’s not beneficial if all it does is spend a lot of time and effort from ED which ends up being wasted. Like the previous Model Enlargement feature. That doesn’t help anyone.

This particular feature is something they have already explained they can’t do so it’s not worth going on about.

 

Excuse me? That other sim is extremely well known in this community.

Maybe sort of well known, it is quite old. I wouldn’t assume everyone on DCS has experience with it.

 

Idk what wags has said, you've told us he has said it, but the explanation seems a little rough around the edges.

Go to 1:30 in this video, from back when “Model Visibility or Enlargement” was introduced.

 


Edited by SharpeXB

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Maybe sort of well known, it is quite old. I wouldn’t assume everyone on DCS has experience with it.

 

 

Go to 1:30 in this video, from back when “Model Visibility or Enlargement” was introduced.

...

 

Then unless he comes back to that later in the video, i did not notice any mentioned problems of this so called "object fusing", neither did i hear that smart scaling is impossible. He only mentions how it would have negative effects with regards to RCS and a reference to proximity fuses having a larger object to fuse on.. There are probably many different ways to do these things, and the current solution may or may not be the best (who knows, not me..). But afaik, smart scaling described in the paper i posted earlier has it's main goal of making the identification and visibility of aircraft in simulators on par (as closely as possible) with the performance of what pilots would be capable of in real life. This with regards to distances ranging from close up (<1nm) to further away (3-5nm (or maybe more)). It goes to say that there are issues regarding unrealisticly large models far out, but that there are several ways for developers to deal with these issues.

 

So, if we take wags by his word in this video (though, i will forgive him if he made some mistakes), the imposters that were tried are used once aircraft get down to the size of one pixel. This was one of the issues i heard a lot of times with regards to this method, you could see imposters really well from insane distances, but suddenly it switches to just a few pixels once you got closer, and you'd loose track of the target you were looking at (by getting closer!).. This is not comparable to how smart scaling is supposed to work, in fact, it might describe the opposite of what it tries to achieve. Where "smart scaling" would apply "magnification" at close and out to resonable distances and leave other solutions/certain implementations to deal with how to make things small enough to be realistically difficult to spot at large distances.

 

Again, i stress that what you've been saying that "ED can't do smart scaling" is not proven in this video, it's only given a reason as to why they have chosen another method instead (which is fair on their part). That being said, it's likely that fundamental mechanics would have to be rewritten. Though suggesting it would require rewriting parts of game mechanics can hardly be used as an argument to say they made it clear it's "impossible".. at least when all we have is a few words on it.


Edited by Farlander
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I’m sure everyone believes their particular suggestion is an “improvement” to the sim. But it’s not beneficial if all it does is spend a lot of time and effort from ED which ends up being wasted. Like the previous Model Enlargement feature. That doesn’t help anyone. This particular feature is something they have already explained they can’t do so it’s not worth going on about.

 

We might have a different opinion on this subject. But If I can choose between having the F/A-18C and F-14B or improved spotting. I would pick the improved spotting and ditch those modules in a heartbeat. That is how important proper spotting is. Does not matter if it is a sim or IRL flight, having good vision is an integral part of it.

 

Several other sims (Im leaving them unnamed) has solved this issue. Either by smart scaling, lighting, effects or a combination of the three. It can be done. If not, yes part of the engine has to be rewritten. But leaving it "as is" will mean the end of DCS: WWII, Korea or early Cold War fighters. Players doesen't want to spend their entire evening struggeling to see eachother. Spotting is essential for those types of modules and gameplay. Period.

 

Model Enlargement was not the best solution, but for me it was at least going in the right direction. You might be happy with the current implementation. But there are an awful lot of users who think it does not work well. Even memes pops up every other week poking fun at how bad the spotting is...

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Again, i stress that what you've been saying that "ED can't do smart scaling" is not proven in this video, it's only given a reason as to why they have chosen another method instead (which is fair on their part). That being said, it's likely that fundamental mechanics would have to be rewritten. Though suggesting it would require rewriting parts of game mechanics can hardly be used as an argument to say they made it clear it's "impossible".. at least when all we have is a few words on it.

Well that’s the explanation why they did not go with smart scaling. As for it being “impossible” ok nothing is impossible only expensive and time consuming. Whether that’s worthwhile or not we can’t decide. He did say “we don’t consider that a smart option” so perhaps not everyone shares such a positive opinion of this feature.

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Well that’s the explanation why they did not go with smart scaling.

…and that explanation implies such a fundamental flaw in the simulation that it needs to be fixed regardless. It really is that simple. What happens afterwards is an interesting discussion, but scaling and normalising becoming an option is one outcome of that completely necessary change.

 

So again, any appeal to Wags claim that smart scaling affects RCS just further reinforces that the game desperately needs fixing. That's not even something that should qualify as a wishlist feature but a must-have-do-or-die bugfix. It doesn't even really matter if it's expensive or time consuming — it's vital, and they might as well just shut down development completely if it isn't addressed because DCS is already obsolete.

 

Put another way, if smart scaling is not an option — especially for the reasons cited — then there is no other option than to make it one. We can then go back to discussing whether that option should be exercised or not.


Edited by Tippis

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…and that explanation implies such a fundamental flaw in the simulation that it needs to be fixed regardless. It really is that simple. What happens afterwards is an interesting discussion, but scaling and normalising becoming an option is one outcome of that completely necessary change.

 

So again, any appeal to Wags claim that smart scaling affects RCS just further reinforces that the game desperately needs fixing. That's not even something that should qualify as a wishlist feature but a must-have-do-or-die bugfix. It doesn't even really matter if it's expensive or time consuming — it's vital, and they might as well just shut down development completely if it isn't addressed because DCS is already obsolete.

DCS doesn’t have a fundamental flaw and need a “do-or-die bugfix” which “doesn't even really matter if it's expensive or time consuming” if it doesn’t directly imitate some other game.

If you can’t live without smart scaling then perhaps DCS just isn’t the game for you. At some point you have to accept that games are just games and they aren’t all identical. Either deal with how they are or move on.

Maybe smart scaling needs to be treated with rules 1.10 & 1.15 :doh:

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Whether that’s worthwhile or not we can’t decide.

 

But we can certinly be a reason for them to consider it worthwile, depending on how many of us would like resources to be spent on it.

 

He did say “we don’t consider that a smart option” so perhaps not everyone shares such a positive opinion of this feature.

 

Something you've definately been an example of for the last 20 pages. This is a wishlist thread, i'm not trying to be a douche here, but you've been stating this method is impossible and is therefor not even something which should be discussed here... several times over the whole thread... And now you agree it's not "impossible" anymore, just because i actually listened to the 30sec you were basing everything on? I've come with what i think is reasonable responses regarding the claims, and given you a link to the actual paper of this method, so you can read up on it.

 

You are allowed of course to mention how there is no problem with the current way DCS works whenever someone chimes in on this thread, but remember that this is a place for players expressing what features they'd like to see, and unless you prove evidence their opinions are invalid, they're pretty much as valid as yours :) I'm sorry, i just don't see how suggesting sitting closer to the screen, buying a bigger monitor etc. could be considered a serious solution to what's being discussed (edit: as an argument against another guys opinion on the use of software solutions. I don't have anything against you thinking that is a valid solution to the problem in general.. :)). Don't take this as a personal attack! It's completely valid to have the opinion that the current state is fine, maybe it is (idk).. But i hope you agree that discussing other solutions like "smart scaling" is fine.


Edited by Farlander
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…and that explanation implies such a fundamental flaw in the simulation that it needs to be fixed regardless. It really is that simple. What happens afterwards is an interesting discussion, but scaling and normalising becoming an option is one outcome of that completely necessary change.

 

So again, any appeal to Wags claim that smart scaling affects RCS just further reinforces that the game desperately needs fixing. That's not even something that should qualify as a wishlist feature but a must-have-do-or-die bugfix. It doesn't even really matter if it's expensive or time consuming — it's vital, and they might as well just shut down development completely if it isn't addressed because DCS is already obsolete.

 

Put another way, if smart scaling is not an option — especially for the reasons cited — then there is no other option than to make it one. We can then go back to discussing whether that option should be exercised or not.

While I agree that it's a unintended bug, it's also a side affect of the very simplified nature of RCS in the game, information that's going to be difficult to come by considering from a military perspective keeping that underwraps really IS do or die.

 

That said, a bug that is ONLY an issue when you're doing wonky shit with the 3d models is faaaaar from ''stop the presses urgent''. I get it, you want kiddie wheels and enlarge-o-vision (it's unlikely to ever come back whether they can do it or not) but exaggerating the quirky nature of the present engine in hyperbolic fashion isn't going to help you get it. It just looks like every other users FIX NOOOW111!!1! pet peeve.

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One of the biggest things missing though @Nineline from DCS currently is acurate 'glint' modelling, read a lot of reports from combat pilots over the years and you'll see that they mention that it's typically a glint off a canopy or airframe, contrails, smoke etc that give something away at the distance, your right you shouldn't always be able to easily spot things but we currently are missing some of the things that do make spotting actually you know able to be done in the sim.

 

Saddly I don't see Raytraced reflection coming any time soon to DCS (not with the current render overhead) however so we aren't likely to get a glint reflection etc.

 

The DOT labels etc are great but ... there is a down side to them as well... they don't occlude through the air-frame.. which means you're getting F35 like SA for objects close to you... Also there really needs to be a seperate set of DOT labels for VR ;)

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I'm sorry, i just don't see how suggesting sitting closer to the screen, buying a bigger monitor etc. could be considered a serious solution to what's being discussed

I know it sounds crazy but trust me it makes what you’re looking at bigger... really it does.

 

i hope you agree that discussing other solutions like "smart scaling" is fine.

Sure just don’t have a meltdown about the game being fundamentally broken and obsolete when you don’t get it. If it was so perfect and great and easy to implement they would have done it after the first eighteen dozen times somebody brought up this topic.


Edited by SharpeXB

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DCS doesn’t have a fundamental flaw

Wags says otherwise.

 

Are you saying that his claim is incorrect?

 

Maybe smart scaling needs to be treated with rules 1.10 & 1.15
Right. Because you don't like the discussion of a feature you, by your own admission, do not understand, means they should make a rule against it. Makes sense. :lol:

 

 

While I agree that it's a unintended bug, it's also a side affect of the very simplified nature of RCS in the game, information that's going to be difficult to come by considering from a military perspective keeping that underwraps really IS do or die.

 

That said, a bug that is ONLY an issue when you're doing wonky shit with the 3d models is faaaaar from ''stop the presses urgent''.

A bug that means I can trivially inject graphics changes (think ReShade) to effectively give me infinite-range, perfect-detection radar (and presumably IRST and EO tracking) is pretty darn urgent. It is an issue at all ranges, and it has nothing to do with doing anything “wonky” to 3D models. Quite the opposite. Solving it would allow for “wonkiness” (read: balancing, normalisation, better simulation) to be applied to those models.

 

Note that I'm not saying they should make RCS more complicated (although that would be fun too). I'm saying it must be decoupled from the rendering pipeline.

 

I get it, you want kiddie
I'm going to stop you right there. You don't get it. You should probably heed NineLine's advice and stop with the condescension, mmmkay?
Edited by Tippis

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...

 

I've played DCS nearly since it's release, i'm not having a meltdown anytime soon. And however crazy that sounds to you, that pixels on a screen appear bigger once you have your eyeball closer to them, it doesn't sound crazy to me.

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Hey SharpeXB, if spotting gets too easy in future you could always sit further away from your monitor or perhaps buy a smaller one?

Funny you should say that because I just did exactly that. Got a bigger monitor and moved it farther away. Less eye strain that way.

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Wags says otherwise.

 

Are you saying that his claim is incorrect?

You’re gettting what he said backwards. He said smart scaling breaks the games. You’re saying the game is broken because you can’t have smart scaling.

 

If smart scaling was so perfect a solution and so scientifically correct, why isn’t it used in every flight sim? Why wouldn’t DCS just rewrite the entire game since it would be so worth it to make everything perfect? Is there some downside to smart scaling?

 

Of course there is. My guess is that it looks completely awful. You’ll see other aircraft all out of scale with each other and ground units out of scale next to building etc. it probably applies an egregious level of expando-vision in order the get the effect it needs. You’ll see planes taxiing with their wheels stuck down in the ground etc. That stuff wasn’t noticeable on a 12” 400x600 CRT but it would look gawd awful on a big 1080p or 4K screen.

 

That’s why ED doesn’t use it I’ll bet. So the required software rewrite isn’t worthwhile.

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You’re gettting what he said backwards. He said smart scaling breaks the games.You’re saying the game is broken because you can’t have smart scaling

No, that is nether what he or what I said. He said that implementing smart scaling would affect RCS calculations. This means there is a fundamental flaw in the game. Period. Why this is the case has already been explained to you. You should take a moment to read up on the matter.

 

Is there some downside to smart scaling?

 

Of course there is.

So what is the downside? If you're going to claim that of course there are downsides, list them please. Not your guesses — actual downsides.

 

You’ll see other aircraft all out of scale with each other and ground units out of scale next to building etc.
No. That's not how smart scaling works. In fact, none of the things you said are even remotely how any of this works. My suggestion is that you read up on it, or even experience it, rather than make these kinds of uninformed guesses. If you're going to argue against something, you should probably try to understand what it is you are arguing against, or it will only come off as incredibly trollish.

 

So the required software rewrite isn’t worthwhile.
You have no basis for this claim. You understand this, right?
Edited by Tippis

❧ ❧ Inside you are two wolves. One cannot land; the other shoots friendlies. You are a Goon. ❧ ❧

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