resolved New spotting is great / New spotting is overcooked feedback thread

[Tippis]

11 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

PS to the above. With Spotting Dots On the distant high-aspect fighter aircraft be come easily visible at 21 miles as defined black dots.

Setting aside that you've conveniently not framed them in such a way as to show that the circled contacts are what you're ranging, you should probably try comparing them side by side. You'll notice that the old “no dots” are actually more distinctly drawn, and darker than the supposedly less visible new ones…

[SharpeXB]

Same mission in 2.8 (Edit: somehow the screen grab doesn’t capture how big these appear, they’re gigantic) dropping the resolution to 1920x1080. Do I really need to add the red circle to show the gigantic dots visible at 30 miles? 

Edited November 26, 2023 by SharpeXB

[Tippis]

24 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Do I really need to add the red circle to show the gigantic dots visible at 30 miles?

You need to actually point to some dots that are “gigantic”, yes. A single pixel — the smallest anything can possibly be — does not qualify.

That aside, yes, that's a good illustration why the old system has to go and why the new one is far more promising and more realistic.

And it is possible to make the game realistic in this regard, but remember how some people argued vehemently against any change in the spotting system because it was supposedly fine? Remember how they used the ability to see contacts at these ranges as an argument that actually, the problem with spotting was that people weren't looking closely enough? Fortunately, ED didn't listen to that, so here we are, with a much better system even in the first iteration. And there are quite a few posters in this thread saying that it should be removed completely.

Your position here is getting a bit muddled, though. On the one hand, you have come back to the notion that the new spotting dot system has to go and we should just use the old system. One the other hand, you now come back with these screen shots, demonstrating and arguing that the old system is pretty darn horrible and actually provides the very “huge black dots” that you lambasted the new system for having. So which one is it?

[SharpeXB]

What’s hilarious now in 2.9 OB is that since the Off option isn’t a true off, just reverts to 2.8, the feature is now totally open for hacking and exploiting. 
1080p players can select Off to see giant dots. 
anyone can reduce their res, select Off and see giant dots.

VR players can see giant dots using On  

The only players at a disadvantage are anyone not wanting an ugly game. 

[Pikey]

This is what happens when vocal minorities are listened to.

This was nothing I ever wanted or asked for and its only made VR exceptionally bad by default. Watching dogfights from 20 miles removes the point of a radar, WW2 is now like watching a beehive tipped out, in modern combat people are now fox2 ambushing with radar off even more.

How is this a good idea for the game when it changes the entire nature of multiple groups of players? The only people who benefit are offline players who can do what they like with the sims settings anyway. Multiplayer online group is stuck with enforced settings. This has basically made the change without giving the option first, its classic EDSA kneejerk.

[okopanja]

16 minutes ago, Pikey said:

This is what happens when vocal minorities are listened to.

This was nothing I ever wanted or asked for and its only made VR exceptionally bad by default. Watching dogfights from 20 miles removes the point of a radar, WW2 is now like watching a beehive tipped out, in modern combat people are now fox2 ambushing with radar off even more.

How is this a good idea for the game when it changes the entire nature of multiple groups of players? The only people who benefit are offline players who can do what they like with the sims settings anyway. Multiplayer online group is stuck with enforced settings. This has basically made the change without giving the option first, its classic EDSA kneejerk.

Sadly there will be always 2 groups of people:

1. realism group, interested in reality as much as possible
2. convenience group, interested in easier of game play.

I can imagine which one is more vocal.

However, at minimum: server admin must be able to disable this setting and enforce on all clients.

I do think ED should reconsider which one is the priority: realism or convenience and work toward providing more unified experience and limitations of built-in and external Mk1 Eyeball zoom.

If someone does not still see the aircraft, ED can not do much except to advise: 1. make sure you have quality device 2. calibrate your display device.

For the second, perhaps DCS should include a wizard that could help people configure their monitors, or advise them to use built-in windows wizard.

Edited November 20, 2023 by okopanja

[BIGNEWY]

Folks please keep the feedback constructive here and friendly, if you have already given feedback thanks, we are looking at all the feedback and considering options. It is clear VR dot spotting needs some work, with so many different resolutions and different eye sight considerations it does make it challenging to get a system that suits everyone. 

thanks

[Tippis]

3 minutes ago, okopanja said:

I do thing ED should reconsider which one is the priority: realism or convenience and work toward providing more unified experience and limitations of built-in and external Mk1 Eyeball zoom.

The thing is, the spotting dots serve both those goals, so there's really no contradiction there that needs to be prioritised between.

The point of the dots is not to make the game easier – it's to make it more equitable over a wider range of displays and settings than had to be served a decade ago. Just because it's not there yet as far as VR goes does not mean there's some grand conspiracy to cater to any specific group over another. It just means exactly that: it's not there for VR yet. That's all.

7 minutes ago, okopanja said:

If someone does not still see the aircraft, ED can not do much except to advise: 1. make sure you have quality device 2. calibrate your display device.

The problem here is that, as this thread has begun hinting at, that advise rather works in the opposite direction: a calibrated good-quality device means the spots are working better, meaning they are less visible. A bad display and bad settings make them stand out more. Doubly so if the dots are turned off and you revert to the old system where they were already more visible to being with. A mission-enforce setting would most likely do the exact opposite of what everyone expects when doing that.

The game is kind of funny that way.

That is not to say that a wizard or walk-through on how to calibrate your display (both in software and hardware) wouldn't be a nice think to have, but the pitch for it wouldn't be "you'll see better" but rather "you'll see correctly"… which might not be the desired outcome for the user.

Still, it would probably be a good idea to try to include those factors as well in trying to figure out how to best tune your setup for the new dots. It probably won't be anything that be compared one-to-one since all displays will have very different settings and calibrations are in relation to the environment the monitor is in, but it could still be an interesting point to see if there is a trend where certain display types and environments are particularly affected.

 

Oh, and as for the most vocal group… that would historically be the ones who have claimed against all evidence that DCS' spotting was fine and must under no circumstances be touched. Fortunately, ED didn't listen to them and instead started working on this improved system that offers an avenue towards greater realism.

[Vakarian]

28 minutes ago, Pikey said:

This is what happens when vocal minorities are listened to.

This was nothing I ever wanted or asked for and its only made VR exceptionally bad by default. Watching dogfights from 20 miles removes the point of a radar, WW2 is now like watching a beehive tipped out, in modern combat people are now fox2 ambushing with radar off even more.

How is this a good idea for the game when it changes the entire nature of multiple groups of players? The only people who benefit are offline players who can do what they like with the sims settings anyway. Multiplayer online group is stuck with enforced settings. This has basically made the change without giving the option first, its classic EDSA kneejerk.

Do you see the irony in your statement?
VR users are vocal minority. Multiplayer PvPers are also vocal minority. For the people playing on monitors, on higher resolutions (yes, it's 2023 and people use something else than 1080p monitors these days) it was impossible to see something 2-3 miles away unless you actually knew where stuff was so you could focus there.

Now, is the current system perfect, no, it's not. Is it better than it was previously? Depends who you ask. In VR, mostly people say no (don't have VR anymore so can't personally test and say my opinion). However in 2D I'd say hell yes. I can actually fly visual circuit without having to guess where people are or use zoom for basically 2-3 nmi bubble.

[okopanja]

17 minutes ago, Tippis said:

34 minutes ago, okopanja said:

I do thing ED should reconsider which one is the priority: realism or convenience and work toward providing more unified experience and limitations of built-in and external Mk1 Eyeball zoom.

The thing is, the spotting dots serve both those goals, so there's really no contradiction there that needs to be prioritised between.

The point of the dots is not to make the game easier – it's to make it more equitable over a wider range of displays and settings than had to be served a decade ago. Just because it's not there yet as far as VR goes does not mean there's some grand conspiracy to cater to any specific group over another. It just means exactly that: it's not there for VR yet. That's all.

When there is question of equitability, I would prefer more fairness, but not at the cost of reality.

19 minutes ago, Tippis said:

36 minutes ago, okopanja said:

If someone does not still see the aircraft, ED can not do much except to advise: 1. make sure you have quality device 2. calibrate your display device.

The problem here is that, as this thread has begun hinting at, that advise rather works in the opposite direction: a calibrated good-quality device means the spots are working better, meaning they are less visible. A bad display and bad settings make them stand out more. Doubly so if the dots are turned off and you revert to the old system where they were already more visible to being with. A mission-enforce setting would most likely do the exact opposite of what everyone expects when doing that.

Not really, mission enforce means you get to choose where you play. There are servers that offer more realistic vs those that provide the gamey environment. As the comment on this topic, when I played with 3440x1440 monitor on Enigma's server I very soon discovered that despite the super-accurate GCI and me turning onto the bandit, roughly knowing where he will appear, I simply do not see him before he starts firing the tracer rounds at me. That was the point when I realized that we do not see the same way ( tried playing in 1080 with not much improvement). Some people found the way for the dots to stand out even back before the new changes.

In such gameplay visual range is really critical and decided not to play there for now. However adding dots the way they are added atm makes it rather ridiculous.

As I stated before: this is not just about the dots, there are also other subjects like size of the monitor (resulting dots), distance, zooming features, etc. I do not think realistic system can be built without addressing all of this factors together.

The infamous zoom feature is what effectively made almost all users map their HOTAS as one of the most important options both A-A and A-G. I personally try hard to utilize it only without my own cockpit and not peep outside of physical capabilities of human eye.

So for me choice is very clear: I would pick a realistic system that does not allow the users to utilize different "helps".

 

 

 

 

[buceador]

58 minutes ago, Pikey said:

The only people who benefit are offline players who can do what they like with the sims settings anyway.

How do the offline players benefit as you point out that they can do whatever they like with the sim's settings anyway?
(I also have to point out that the 'offline players' represent the vast majority of 'players' )

[Pikey]

20 minutes ago, Vakarian said:

Do you see the irony in your statement?
VR users are vocal minority. Multiplayer PvPers are also vocal minority. For the people playing on monitors, on higher resolutions (yes, it's 2023 and people use something else than 1080p monitors these days) it was impossible to see something 2-3 miles away unless you actually knew where stuff was so you could focus there.

Now, is the current system perfect, no, it's not. Is it better than it was previously? Depends who you ask. In VR, mostly people say no (don't have VR anymore so can't personally test and say my opinion). However in 2D I'd say hell yes. I can actually fly visual circuit without having to guess where people are or use zoom for basically 2-3 nmi bubble.

The change affects targets viewed in low resolutions more than high resolutions. There's no account for screen resolution in the dot size, so pancake gets nicer dots (they are still dots and you can see them) but VR and 1080 gets big black holes of space stations. Again, its a setting implemented as a default, that enforces the setting before VR users can opt out and before server operators can enforce one way or another. It is absolutely back to front, objectively so. And more objectively, from a technical standpoint it has no effect inside 1.2 miles when you are in and out of that range in the circuit, and especially at the visual contact WVR when the dot flicks between on and off which makes it absolutely awful you can lose sight of a plane the CLOSER it gets. SO it affects you at the worst possible time, when you need to keep visual and has no benefit to anyone in the beyond 5miles range where you either a) can't shoot or B) have a radar - pick your 'either or'. So who does this actually benefit?

Anyone thankful for this is obviously playing this sim in a completely different way that I cannot fathom.

[Wizard1393]

I'm on a Reverb G2 100% and PD 1.0, and I like the new spotting dot system overall, but sure it can be tuned a bit. Here's my take on it:

In my opinion they are drawn too far out. They could definitely start to fade in at a closer distance, perhaps around 15 miles, starting at 100% transparent going to fully visible at around 7 miles. Then they could fade out from 7 miles to perhaps 3 miles where the actual model is about the same size as the spotting dot. 

The dots could also be reduced in size by 25-50 percent.

I especially don't like that there's a sharp "cutoff-point" where the dot disappears at what I estimate to roughly 5 miles and makes me loose tally. I would like the dots to be more gradually drawn, going from transparent at range, to solid mid-range and then back to transparent when in close and dot size ~= model size instead.

Edited November 20, 2023 by Wizard1393

[Tippis]

1 minute ago, okopanja said:

When there is question of equitability, I would prefer more fairness, but not at the cost of reality.

And again, with a bit of tweaking (or lots of it... that remains to be seen), this can provide both.

1 minute ago, okopanja said:

Not really, mission enforce means you get to choose where you play. There are servers that offer more realistic vs those that provide the gamey environment

Yes, really, and for exactly that reason: servers that want to offer a more realistic environment will most likely enforce off a setting that they perceive as a "helper" of some kind, but the effect will be the opposite of that – they end up with an environment that has less realism and is more open to tweaks to further inflate that lack of realism. Meanwhile, the "gamey" servers, operating on the same assumption, will create an environment that is actually more realistic and more equitable. But I suppose fair play is pretty fitting for a gamey environment too.

6 minutes ago, okopanja said:

As I stated before: this is not just about the dots, there are also other subjects like size of the monitor (resulting dots), distance, zooming features, etc. I do not think realistic system can be built without addressing all of this factors together.

Quite true. Dots are perhaps not the most advanced and all-encompassing of solutions to all of that, but they can help with a lot of it. Their main strength lies in the transition from just-beyond-WVR to just-inside-WVR. To some degree they can help with the upper WVR range as well, but that's where dealing with resolutions will cause problems as we are, pretty much by definition, at ranges where the full model could and probably should be used, but the outcome will be very different depending on the setup.

6 minutes ago, Pikey said:

Anyone thankful for this is obviously playing this sim in a completely different way that I cannot fathom.

I don't think anyone is thankful for the oddball fluctuation of visibility that happens at mid-visible ranges. The happiness with the new system stems from the combination of pancake + outer boundary of WVR, which is the game has long had problems of every variety and the new dots offer a welcome (and, for this particular group, functional) solution.

[Pikey]

Here is the disappearance factor issue.

10nm, see dot fine (remmeber, there is compression on the recording and in VR this is magnified.
watch the range count down and then...just disappears in close.

This was never the case before.

 

[Tippis]

21 minutes ago, Pikey said:

Here is the disappearance factor issue.

10nm, see dot fine (remmeber, there is compression on the recording and in VR this is magnified.
watch the range count down and then...just disappears in close.

This was never the case before.

"Not before" as in the last patch, or as in with the 2.8 and earlier dots?

Because contact loss was most definitely an issue before as it transitioned into fully using the 3D model. It may not have been as pronounced as it is now, with the VR contact dot being more apparent, making the transition from that dot to the smaller, less visible model be far more obvious and jarring.

[Pikey]

Before 2.9.
The net effect of making a large dot suddenly disappear is worse than making a tiny dot disappear, especially at a critical moment, one of my personal issues with it.

The other issues are:

• It's a default. Allowing choice should always be the default, not forcing people to have something they didn't ask for whether it's negative or not.
• It's not server-side configurable or enforceable (yet) - So right now, its basically dot neutral labels for everyone, enforced in MP. Great.
• It looks very different, depending on hardware (low res, big dot, high res it's somewhat reasonable, I liked it on my 4K screen, hate it in VR) 
• It's nasty looking in VR. In VR I can't begin to explain but its really nasty seeing fighter-sized planes at 20nm as big black dots, just breaks immersion.

That's the summary of my findings at least. This is divisive because not many seem to understand that this manifests according to your screen settings, so its going to get a bunch of disharmony on the forums and that brings out the subjectivity, when in fact, it's an implementation based on differences to start with. Objectively there are huge issues with the implementation and its no different from the scrapped imposter sprites a few years back.

[okopanja]

7 minutes ago, Pikey said:

Before 2.9.
The net effect of making a large dot suddenly disappear is worse than making a tiny dot disappear, especially at a critical moment, one of my personal issues with it.

The other issues are:

• It's a default. Allowing choice should always be the default, not forcing people to have something they didn't ask for whether it's negative or not.
• It's not server-side configurable or enforceable (yet) - So right now, its basically dot neutral labels for everyone, enforced in MP. Great.
• It looks very different, depending on hardware (low res, big dot, high res it's somewhat reasonable, I liked it on my 4K screen, hate it in VR) 
• It's nasty looking in VR. In VR I can't begin to explain but its really nasty seeing fighter-sized planes at 20nm as big black dots, just breaks immersion.

That's the summary of my findings at least. This is divisive because not many seem to understand that this manifests according to your screen settings, so its going to get a bunch of disharmony on the forums and that brings out the subjectivity, when in fact, it's an implementation based on differences to start with. Objectively there are huge issues with the implementation and its no different from the scrapped imposter sprites a few years back.

I believe you provided a very good summary, and perhaps it would be wise for all of us to stop commenting any further and let ED crunch the problems.

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, Vakarian said:

it was impossible to see something 2-3 miles away unless you actually knew where stuff was so you could focus there.

I think you need to post a screenshot to support this observation. From what I see on a 4K screen (in the examples above) an aircraft at this range is so easy to see it’s impossible to miss. Plus at this distance the dots aren’t even a factor, you’re seeing the 3D model. Let’s not muddy the water with disinformation. Show us a screenshot of an “invisible” plane with a label over it indicating 2-3 miles. 

2 hours ago, okopanja said:

However, at minimum: server admin must be able to disable this setting and enforce on all clients.

Indeed and this needs to be a true Off option, not just reverting to 2.8 which is also broken. 

1 hour ago, okopanja said:

The infamous zoom feature is what effectively made almost all users map their HOTAS as one of the most important options both A-A and A-G. I personally try hard to utilize it only without my own cockpit and not peep outside of physical capabilities of human eye.

It should be obvious to you that the human eye is vastly more capable than a 1440p screen. Hence the reason for having a zoom view. It’s there to replicate roughy what you’d see with 20/20 vision while looking at a low res computer screen. If you need it’s help seeing your cockpit displays why would you think the same issue doesn’t equate to things outside the cockpit?

2 hours ago, BIGNEWY said:

It is clear VR dot spotting needs some work

Just to be clear it’s not just VR that needs work, this feature is highly unrealistic and unsightly on monitors as well. 
 

[BIGNEWY]

4 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Just to be clear it’s not just VR that needs work, this feature is highly unrealistic and unsightly on monitors as well.

Yes, 2d also needs tweaking, but note there are many different opinions here, including yours and it may not be possible to meet everyone's expectations. We will have to wait and see for now. 

[Tippis]

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

It should be obvious to you that the human eye is vastly more capable than a 1440p screen.

Yeah, no, it really isn't, nor should it be “obvious” that this misconception is true. At least not as far as “resolution” goes.

You can dig out a 480p screen from the mid-80s and it will still be able to exceed what the human eye is capable of. It's not a matter of resolution but about pixel density and distance. Get a small enough a screen for any given resolution and place it far enough away (and neither of those two parameters end up being all that extreme), and you get the effect. We've already done the maths before, but let's do it again since the whole PPI thing keeps tripping you up.

We are looking to go beyond the angular resolution of the eye — 1 arcminute or 0.0003 radians (i.e 0.3 mils).

Let's punch in a fairly standard display, let's say 27" @ 2560×1440 in our trusty old PPI calculator. It comes out as 108.8 pixels per inch or 42.8 px/cm, or more usefully 0.2335 mm/pixel.
Since we want that single pixel to occupy less than 0.3 mils, we simply divide the pixel size with the angle to get the radius (distance from the monitor) at which that pixel size equates to the desired angle.
It comes out as 77.8 cm — about arm's length, which is how far away your monitor should be anyway. And if you stack up a bunch of keyboards and joysticks and table mounts and button boxes, in front of it, chances are it will be a bit farther away still.

So no. Even at a pretty standard ergonomic distance from a regular monitor, it may already have beaten your eye in terms of how small details it can display compared to what the eye can perceive. Of course, if we mix colour differences and contrast into all of that, it can get easier still to trick the eye, although colour representation is one area where ye olde RGB spectrum doesn't cover the full gamut of what the eye is capable of (but that's more around the edges — even good old 24bit RGB does still allow for smaller differences in colour than the eye can resolve).

But remember, if you have a larger monitor, that threshold moves further back. A nice big 4k TV becomes outright atrocious. For a reasonably standard 55" @ 3840×2160, the PPI drops to just 80 px/in — 26% lower than the humble 1440p monitor, and it thus needs to be placed that much farther — over a meter away — to make the pixels too small to see.

 

Zoom isn't there to fix the issue of the level of detail a monitor can achieve. It's there to deal with the small coverage of that monitor — it's a field of view slider, after all — in combination with the fact that none of the distances mentioned are fixed. What is very tiny for you, where you need to zoom in, might not be the case for someone else, simply because of the physical position of exactly the same hardware.

You ironically mentioned something about misinformation...?

Edited November 20, 2023 by Tippis

[Buzz313th]

On 11/18/2023 at 1:43 AM, TheFreshPrince said:

Which will simply put you into a huge disadvantage in multiplayer. 

So what..  It makes the game more enjoyable for me as the spotting in VR feels more realistic without being able to instantly acquire aircraft.  As long as I don't lose sight I'm good.

Edited November 20, 2023 by Buzz313th

[Buzz313th]

1 hour ago, BIGNEWY said:

Yes, 2d also needs tweaking, but note there are many different opinions here, including yours and it may not be possible to meet everyone's expectations. We will have to wait and see for now. 

There is no way you will be able to please everyone, everyone is running a slightly different setup and nobody wants to admit they don't have the greatest eyesite. Just give us sliders to adjust the parameters of distant spotting and give server admins the ability to force the same parameters.  

Wash hands and done..  

[SharpeXB]

6 minutes ago, Buzz313th said:

So what..  It makes the game more enjoyable for me as the spotting in VR feels more realistic without being able to instantly acquire aircraft.  As long as I don't lose sight I'm good.

It’s really odd that someone doesn’t mind being at this unwitting disadvantage in a game. I don’t think most players feel this way. Right now MP is a total joke, the spotting is exploitable for any of the players since they can select either version. 
 

4 minutes ago, Buzz313th said:

There is no way you will be able to please everyone,

Of course you can’t. But at some point the devs just need to decide what kind of game they’re making and what audience they want to appeal to and decide accordingly. DCS will never be for everyone, no game is. 

[rfxcasey]

Reshade-me can be used to make dots pop from all the way across the map, both on 2D and 3D displays. In particular, the 'Cartoonify' or 'Cartoonerize' filter. It creates a thicker outline of objects as if bordered in thick ink. When set to the extreme, it can make the game look funky, but there is a happy medium that will make the dots pop without effecting the overall look of the sim too much. You're welcome. If you want proof I'll post screenshots. While this can be used to exploit multiplayer and does not break integrity check, it is also an equalizer for 2D pilots facing those in VR.

Edited November 20, 2023 by rfxcasey