[NO LONGER PASSES IC] Improved Contact Dot Spotting (Updated v1.1)

[JohnnyST]

11 hours ago, DayGlow said:

what multiplier did you use?

I removed the "* 2" at the end of this line, that is, I halved it. The dot is an acceptable size, but still a little jittery in VR.

[Amarok_73]

Why the dot at some (close) distance is not blending into the plane's silouette, but just dissapears causing rather unpleasant transition effect?

[JCTherik]

G2 User here. I had to tweak the mod for bigger dots, since G2 natively renders in 3k resolution but the actual displays are only 2k.

If I drop the resolution in openXR by 30% to in DCS without this mod and disable antialiasing, I see EVERYTHING tens of miles away, but the game looks real crap.

If I keep full 3k resolution and antialiasing on the same headset, I lose targets 2 miles away, the few moving pixels just blend in a sea of flickering and blurry aliasing trees.

 

With this mod without tweaking it, I see almost no improvement, I still see basically nothing. With a minor tweak to the mod to bump the size of the dot by 30%, I can see well.

 

This is going to be a real can of worms, because VR resolutions usually get rescaled multiple times by nvidia, openXR, VR settings and DCS, and in the end the resolution being rendered has nothing to do with the actual hardware resolution, due to fresnel lenses issues and various sweet spots, color separations and distortions.

Edited April 28, 2023 by JCTherik

[Why485]

8 hours ago, Amarok_73 said:

Why the dot at some (close) distance is not blending into the plane's silouette, but just dissapears causing rather unpleasant transition effect?

That's simply how dots work. At some point the dot has to disappear, and unfortunately since they are pixel perfect they can be of an inconvenient size relative to the model under them before they disappear. If the shader had more information, you might be able to do some math to make the dot fade based on FOV, distance, etc. but that's simply not available.

In either case, this is an inherent drawback of a dot based system. I don't think dots in general handle this transition very well, and are best suited for low resolutions and distant targets. A good smart scaling style system on the other hand, works best at high resolutions and shorter distances. They complement each other well.

Unfortunately, ED thinks such systems are heresy and will never, ever implement anything like them because DCS' spotting is already perfect because you have a zoom slider axis and an 8k 80" monitor. What do you mean you don't have one? The only way to improve DCS is to improve your hardware. Not going to upgrade? What are you, poor? Use labels and a magnifying glass then, I don't know what you're complaining about. Lowering resolution makes it easier to see targets? No it doesn't. You're clearly mistaken.

Edited April 28, 2023 by Why485

[zildac]

33 minutes ago, Why485 said:

That's simply how dots work. At some point the dot has to disappear, and unfortunately since they are pixel perfect they can be of an inconvenient size relative to the model under them before they disappear. If the shader had more information, you might be able to do some math to make the dot fade based on FOV, distance, etc. but that's simply not available.

In either case, this is an inherent drawback of a dot based system. I don't think dots in general handle this transition very well, and are best suited for low resolutions and distant targets. A good smart scaling style system on the other hand, works best at high resolutions and shorter distances. They complement each other well.

Unfortunately, ED thinks such systems are heresy and will never, ever implement anything like them because DCS' spotting is already perfect because you have a zoom slider axis and an 8k 80" monitor. What do you mean you don't have one? The only way to improve DCS is to improve your hardware. Not going to upgrade? What are you, poor? Use labels and a magnifying glass then, I don't know what you're complaining about. Lowering resolution makes it easier to see targets? No it doesn't. You're clearly mistaken.

 

[PeevishMonkey]

46 минут назад, Why485 сказал:

Unfortunately...

Perfect!  

Edited April 28, 2023 by PeevishMonkey

[Extranajero]

4 hours ago, Why485 said:

The only way to improve DCS is to improve your hardware

 

I agree with everything you wrote, apart from that one sentence. The higher you go in resolution ( which costs more, obviously ) the worse the spotting gets.
If you have a potato monitor, or a crappy VR headset running at Minecraft levels of resolution it's absolutely fine.
Even with a huge 4K monitor the spotting is currently lousy.

The real reason certain people are so dead set against improving spotting is that they run DCS at low resolution to gain an advantage in MP. This is an open secret.
They don't want to lose that advantage - but they can't say that outright here so the 'realism' argument gets deployed instead.

If ED defeat this mod using IC, without first implementing their own version then they are crazy. There's a huge amount of goodwill to be lost if they do that.

[Why485]

5 hours ago, Extranajero said:

The real reason certain people are so dead set against improving spotting is that they run DCS at low resolution to gain an advantage in MP.

The tiny handful of people I have seen that defend the current state of spotting (and it is demonstrably a tiny handful) have always had expensive high resolution monitors and their reasons for never wanting to improve spotting tend to be completely delusional and in direct contradiction with any facts, convention, or data. I have never seen that opinion come from somebody with average or below average hardware. It makes no sense either, because they would also benefit from a good spotting system.

I think the ultimate irony of ED's official stance of "spotting is perfect, your monitor is the problem" is that spotting gets better at lower resolutions due to the dot system. They seem to completely deny the dots exist and how they work, and live in a reality where they never implemented them. Maybe ED should just remove the dots altogether and put us back to square one so at least their arguments can have some basis in truth.

Edited April 29, 2023 by Why485

[Extranajero]

8 minutes ago, Why485 said:

The tiny handful of people I have seen that defend the current state of spotting (and it is demonstrably a tiny handful) have always had expensive high resolution monitors and their reasons for never wanting to improve spotting tend to be completely delusional and in direct contradiction with any facts, convention, or data.

 

A tiny handful, but they make an enormous amount of noise.

They may have large monitors, but I guarantee they aren't running 4K or 2K resolution.
I bought one of the largest monitors I could find when I upgraded a few years ago in the hope that the size of the display would offset spotting issues.
It didn't. Large and expensive 4K monitors are probably better than smaller 4K ones, but the spotting is still dire.

I had a crazy situation with the friend I flew with where we'd swap spotting tasks - his VR headset rendered distant aircraft like housebricks while I was blind - yet once we were approaching gun range I had to tell him which aircraft were friendly and which weren't because they all looked like Lego to him.

Of course, the people who run the servers could just implement neutral dot labels, but that's not 'realistic' is it ? I had one of them tell me that labels were a cheat, which is fairly insane considering that it's built into the software and available for anyone to use by pressing a key combination.
I refuse to run DCS at anything other than 4K though, I'd rather just not participate in MP if the spotting isn't going to improve. I mean I'm hardly here for the realism anyway, not when I can drop a 250kg bomb 5 yards away from a truck and not damage it

[Harlikwin]

26 minutes ago, Extranajero said:

Of course, the people who run the servers could just implement neutral dot labels, but that's not 'realistic' is it ? I had one of them tell me that labels were a cheat, which is fairly insane considering that it's built into the software and available for anyone to use by pressing a key combination.
I refuse to run DCS at anything other than 4K though, I'd rather just not participate in MP if the spotting isn't going to improve. I mean I'm hardly here for the realism anyway, not when I can drop a 250kg bomb 5 yards away from a truck and not damage it

The problems with the neutral dot labels is that you can see them through clouds, and through the floor of your plane, and there is no difference between air and ground units. Honestly if ED fixed all that then I'm sure more servers would use them, even add in some tweaks for server owners to set size of lables and compensate that size for different resolutions as this mod does.

[Why485]

12 minutes ago, Harlikwin said:

and there is no difference between air and ground units

even add in some tweaks for server owners to set size of lables and compensate that size for different resolutions as this mod does.

On this specific subject, there actually are, but not by default. You can set up a custom Labels.lua, which is server enforced by the mission as well, to put labels only on air targets, or change how they appear for different types of targets. For example, the Flashpoint Levant server runs their own version of the dot labels which excludes ground units from appearing.

[Harlikwin]

30 minutes ago, Why485 said:

On this specific subject, there actually are, but not by default. You can set up a custom Labels.lua, which is server enforced by the mission as well, to put labels only on air targets, or change how they appear for different types of targets. For example, the Flashpoint Levant server runs their own version of the dot labels which excludes ground units from appearing.

Yeah but they still show thru planes and clouds right? That was the issue on ECW when they tested it. I mean it was hilarious. 

Also they don't scale with monitor res either IIRC

Edited April 28, 2023 by Harlikwin

[Why485]

27 minutes ago, Harlikwin said:

Yeah but they still show thru planes and clouds right?

Also they don't scale with monitor res either IIRC

Yes, both of these are still true. I was addressing just the part where you can specify the labels by target type.

[Minhal]

Just gave it a try. Running at 1080p, the dot fading does a nice change. Thanks for bringing attention to this and working on this mod.

Hope ED can implement to the core features and further refine it (missile issue and the like).

[Decibel dB]

EUREKA. Thank you, for bringing me back to DCS

[kastrati]

Thanks to the creator of the mod.

It's shocking that the problem of spotting has been ignored for years, even though it keeps popping up as a problem here on the forum, on Reddit, YouTube, etc.

It can't be that you must play the game at a low resolution and then upscale it. Give us the ability to enjoy high res on WW2 and Coldwar scenarios… for what we have Normandy2 now in high details, when we are bound to low Res. because of spotting?!? 

In WW2 and Coldwar, the ability to see the pixels is the basic requirement to be able to play at all. This problem should be very high on ED's list of priorities...! It is not "good as it is"!

This is my first post here in the forum, but I've been flying DCS for years and live with all the bugs... I just let ED do her thing and I'm very patient. ED should act urgently here.

[Feverdog]

Please ED adopt/adapt this, it levels the playing field much more and I can barely enjoy actual combat in DCS at 4k even on a 55" screen up close due to the issue, but the screen also displays 1080p poorly due to not being native resolution making that "cheating" option even worse

[Crashdown]

I've been given this a go in various scenarios and the improvement is definitely felt while using headtracking on a 1080p monitor: I've always struggled with tracking an opponent visually even in supposedly ideal conditions, but with this modification I can actually keep track and reacquire reliably like I can in other sims. It's far from a perfect solution but it's still much better than how it has been for years.

On 4/28/2023 at 4:07 PM, Why485 said:

Unfortunately, ED thinks such systems are heresy and will never, ever implement anything like them because DCS' spotting is already perfect because you have a zoom slider axis and an 8k 80" monitor. What do you mean you don't have one? The only way to improve DCS is to improve your hardware. Not going to upgrade? What are you, poor? Use labels and a magnifying glass then, I don't know what you're complaining about. Lowering resolution makes it easier to see targets? No it doesn't. You're clearly mistaken.

I've been around a long time and I understand your frustration.

[YoYo]

How it looks in VR? 

On the one hand, it seems an interesting thing, on the other hand, if it makes the dot visible from a very long distance and excludes the element of surprise, its not a good idea. Perhaps it should be so that from a distance as it is now it's ok, and only from a few kilometers and close the dot should be increased. I only fly in VR, so the effect may also be different than in 2D. I didnt try it yet. Do you advice it for VR users?

Edited May 1, 2023 by YoYo

[CapnCoke]

1 hour ago, YoYo said:

How it looks in VR? 

On the one hand, it seems an interesting thing, on the other hand, if it makes the dot visible from a very long distance and excludes the element of surprise, its not a good idea. Perhaps it should be so that from a distance as it is now it's ok, and only from a few kilometers and close the dot should be increased. I only fly in VR, so the effect may also be different than in 2D. I didnt try it yet. Do you advice it for VR users?

 

It's a hit and miss for VR users. It really depends on your situation, your hardware and your VR settings. Some VR users don't have issues with visibility and using the mod can make it worse and breaks immersion by making dots pretty big. Regarding your concern about element of surprise, it reduces visible dots to around 14 miles (but opaque) instead of the default 40 miles. If you seem to have trouble spotting incoming contacts around 3-5 miles then you can give it a try. If it doesn't look right, you can modify the mod as some users did.

Edited May 1, 2023 by CapnCoke

[Feverdog]

as the result seem to be mixed for VR due to the different models and techniques (not tried), would make sense to perhaps not incorporate for VR play but seems a necessity for pancake mode to be fair for all.

 

A few downvotes seem to be based on VR testing, or not understanding how it works/the earlier build etc, so think the VR side would need seperate investigation, so I daresay the actual result of poll is higher than 95 if discount a few for user error or VR application

[YoYo]

@Why485

I checked it in version 1.1 in VR, vanilla, ok, it's completely unsuitable for VR users . I see a big dot in the distance, a pixelated square. At least on this level as vanilla, it's unsuitable for VR. The square is too big (I'll add that I fly in 3156 x 3088 pxt in VR so with pretty good settings).

At least for now, I'm deleting it. Maybe it's worth adding that this is a mod for 2D only. However, it would be nice if someone modified it for VR. However, it must have different settings here what I saw.

The first two screenshots are image zooms. It may seem small here, but the dots in VR are way too big.

Original picture:

Edited May 1, 2023 by YoYo

[Why485]

2 hours ago, YoYo said:

@Why485

I checked it in version 1.1 in VR, vanilla, ok, it's completely unsuitable for VR users . I see a big dot in the distance, a pixelated square. At least on this level as vanilla, it's unsuitable for VR. The square is too big (I'll add that I fly in 3156 x 3088 pxt in VR so with pretty good settings).

At least for now, I'm deleting it. Maybe it's worth adding that this is a mod for 2D only. However, it would be nice if someone modified it for VR. However, it must have different settings here what I saw.

The first two screenshots are image zooms. It may seem small here, but the dots in VR are way too big.

There is so much variation in what causes the perceptual size of a pixel in VR that I'm not sure how you can compensate for something like that given that you only have screen resolution and field of view to work with. When you can't guarantee the end resolution (as you can in a console game or old DOS game), I think it's difficult to make dots "fair" across resolutions because you just don't have a lot of granularity to work with. You can't have a 1.5 pixel width dot. It's got to be 1x1, 2x2, 3x3, etc.

I think there are some interesting tricks that could be used to more closely emulate the forbidden technique, but they are beyond what I can do. Like, for example, maybe you render your mythical off-grid 1.5 pixel dot but force it to be rendered with some kind of forced super sampling or multisampling so that it doesn't flicker the way it normally would.

Edited May 1, 2023 by Why485

[RedeyeStorm]

For information purposes. I am using an Valve Index using 2988 x 3320 and the dot is too big with the mod but it is better then Vanilla where I don't spot anything. Granted my eyesight is pretty bad. What I see looks like a standing brick.

[YoYo]

2 hours ago, RedeyeStorm said:

What I see looks like a standing brick.

Yes, that's what it is, it would be nice if it was smaller for VR users.

Btw. I have MSAA=2.