DCS combined arms - possible ?

[basset]

S!

 

Would it be possible for DCS to incorporate a ground element into the DCS world?? With the addition of BlackShark, Lock On and the new A-10 into one continuous world, the possibilities seem to be endless.

 

Has this been talked about at all - is it possible??

 

Having 1 server with a large area to fight in would make for some intense battles, especially with DCS's attention to detail - it could attract a gamer more interested in a strategic type of play than the frag'em up type.

 

Ultimately we are playing to win and kill/down aircraft - but the insta-action is not what I think anyone playing a study sim is looking for.

 

Thoughts ??

Edited January 4, 2010 by basset

[GGTharos]

It has been talked about.

 

Some ideas were tossed around, but currently the conclusion is: ED is in the flight simming business, and currently all efforts are devoted to that end.

 

It may happen, but don't hold your breath.

[dooom]

isnt ED involved with TBS - the battle simulator? As far as i recall isnt this combined arms as far as modeling on ground assets (save for infantry).... for military?

[Grimes]

Oh im sure plenty is possible, its just a question if something will get created or not. Right now we are simply limited to what Eagle Dynamics makes as for unique and additive game content. In LockOn you have projects that simply replace current aircraft. They generally can't and won't be used in online gaming. If modders are allowed to actually add content and not replace it, I'm sure modders will create unique content to provide for enough of a combined arms that isn't limited to the aircraft.

 

I'm sure you might see some combined arms exercises for what we got, but most likely they will be scheduled events and not consist of the everyday battle you will see unfold in an online game. There is just too many factors present that essentially prohibit teams from coming up with a battle plan and executing on said plan. It just doesn't happen.

[GGTharos]

... and I'm sure the military paid huge amounts of money for integration and functionality specific to their needs. At the same time, they probably expect it to not be given away to the public for $50 a pop.

 

I'm glad they allow ED to put the knowledge they gain about aircraft into the DCS modules, as well as other features instead.

 

isnt ED involved with TBS - the battle simulator? As far as i recall isnt this combined arms as far as modeling on ground assets (save for infantry).... for military?

[basset]

Grimes I agree with you 100%, there is always a lone wolf group of players in a MMOG, that will never work with a squad.

There was a time in another MMOG my squad plays that large squads used to be able to do combined arms OP's with other squads and we used to have quite a good time. The frag element was always there, and they were incorporated into a attack or defense knowing how they play and it worked out and I believe a unique/memorable time was had by the majority of players.

The game has changed and there is now a small group of players who control of where people can fight and it has taken away the freedom for large squads to operate and most have departed the game entirely, along with a large group of players, the frag em up type of play was not what a lot of them were looking for.

I'm not sure how big the market is for a MMOG marketed to a crowd that appreciates actual strategy in a 1st person combined arms environment and would like to see a MMOG with modern weapons, hopefully it is large enough for a game developer to make a attempt at it.

I see great things for DCS in the future, I can't wait and I am glad to be part of it.

[Grimes]

With realistic sort of games I tend to think its much easier to get several small groups (2-8) people each together and cooperate on a strategic level than one or two massive groups of 20+.

 

The phenomenon of lonewolfs and griefers is present in pretty much any game. Some games mitigate their effect pretty massivily, but overall Lockon/BS in general promotes such strategies because the baseline of teamwork among the majority of players in a server isn't high enough. As a result its almost better to fly alone and not use purposefully created techniques and strategies to combat them. The situation is always different when you find a group to play with who can either lock their server or kick the idiots out.

 

Just curious, which MMO are you referring to?

[basset]

GGTharos,

 

TY for the reply.

[Hardcore]

Want more realism?) Go to the army))

[SUBS17]

If modders are allowed to actually add content and not replace it, I'm sure modders will create unique content to provide for enough of a combined arms that isn't limited to the aircraft.

 

 

Thats definately a possibility if the SDK is released and if they add a ground/sea vehicle option I wouldn't be surprised. Look at Arma and how many addons and mods that have been created for that. What they could do is model the vehicles and have a exit/enter function to allow the pilot to walk up to the next vehicle. With such a mod I think even FPS is possible although it would be limited to DCS graphics.

Some possiblitys:

M1A1

Humvee

T80

T72

Shilka

Tungiska

Carrier

Destroyer

submarine(if under water mod is possible in the SDK)

[Distiler]

Would we cool to, given homogeneous map, units, etc. to connect different games even from different developers through, I don't know, something like a LUA "connector".

[Legolasindar]

I hope ED not include playable ground in DCS. DCS is in essentially Air simulation, include ground player activity need important changes can downgrade quality of Air simulation.

 

The technical reason for my is than the quality of the ground (landscape) and ground objetcs is very good for air simulator, but is very very poor for ground simulator. Actually if you walk with infantry for the map, you can look poor textures, poor buildings, poor landscape ambientation. For improve this need up the quality of textures, the quality of the objects, add more and more complex scenary. This is good for ground section, but for Air section is unnecessary charge.

 

My point is, add playable ground units in the DCS, reduce quality of Air units, reduce FPS, reduce resources, and im not need this, im happy with exclusive Air simulation, if i want to play combined simulation, i go to play with ArmA, but i prefer DCS be only exclusive Air Simulation.

 

Sorry for my bad english.

[Nate--IRL--]

If something like this was added to DCS, I'd be interested.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYGF9njTegs&feature=player_embedded

 

Nate

[isoul]

The addition of a one virtual battlefield(or several instances of one) like in MMOs or adding playable ground/sea vehicles/vessels would be nice as a thought BUT there are several problems and drawbacks of such designed... A few coming in my mind :

 

1) Several people join the battle means several skill levels on the same game. Thats not good for everyone and especially those who want to face a challenge as close to reality.

2) Such multi-player battlefield needs many people to participate and taking completely different roles(fighter/bomber pilots, tank crews, SAM/AAA crews) which won't appeal to everyone(fighter role is much more apealling than AAA crew/driver).

3) Many people playing at the same time together means there is a desperate need of command%communications. That is very difficult to have in a simulation!

4) Having to simulate several completely different vehicles adds more difficulties. Ka-50 is single seat, Apache is two-seat, a tank needs at least 3 people to operate it... I won't mention a sea vessel. Who gonna operate vehicles with more than 2 seats? And if we have them, how many multi-seat vehicles would you like on the map? What kind of server and network infrastructure can support this?

5) Computing power constrains and would limit the possible participant of such a game or would force developer not to include so much realism and detail in the simulation (like ArmA).

 

ED developed DCS to be a decent simulator, a flight simulator, and in my opinion they achieved it(thx ED btw)! Try to be master of many things and you 'll master none. I like how DCS is right now, its one of the few specials in its kind. What described at OP is more like another BattleField,Armed Assault etc etc with the market having already too many!

 

Having more players playing together online and having multi-platform interoperability (DCS+LO for example) is achievable though!

Edited January 4, 2010 by isoul

[SUBS17]

The addition of a one virtual battlefield(or several instances of one) like in MMOs or adding playable ground/sea vehicles/vessels would be nice as a thought BUT there are several problems and drawbacks of such designed... A few coming in my mind :

 

1) Several people join the battle means several skill levels on the same game. Thats not good for everyone and especially those who want to face a challenge as close to reality.

2) Such multi-player battlefield needs many people to participate and taking completely different roles(fighter/bomber pilots, tank crews, SAM/AAA crews) which won't appeal to everyone(fighter role is much more apealling than AAA crew/driver).

3) Many people playing at the same time together means there is a desperate need of command%communications. That is very difficult to have in a simulation!

4) Having to simulate several completely different vehicles adds more difficulties. Ka-50 is single seat, Apache is two-seat, a tank needs at least 3 people to operate it... I won't mention a sea vessel. Who gonna operate vehicles with more than 2 seats? And if we have them, how many multi-seat vehicles would you like on the map? What kind of server and network infrastructure can support this?

 

From my own experience none of the above is necessary to make this work you can have AI cover most of it for example Arma the AI is good enough to drive/shoot and command. If the battlefield was a dynamic campaign and all the pieces follow a set sequence and have their own ROE it would work and has worked in both F4AF and Arma.

[isoul]

From my own experience none of the above is necessary to make this work you can have AI cover most of it for example Arma the AI is good enough to drive/shoot and command. If the battlefield was a dynamic campaign and all the pieces follow a set sequence and have their own ROE it would work and has worked in both F4AF and Arma.

 

First of all, as far as I know, in Falcon4.0 AF the level of detail of simulated ground/air assets aren't that high as in DCS:BS. DCS focus on one aircraft at a time to achieve this. ArmA isn't even a simulation close to DCS standards.

 

Wouldn't all the stuff I mentioned above make ED lose focus on its current goals or spend too much resources on it? Can all these be possible with the level of detail ED does things?

 

I just wanted to say that I like the way DCS is evolving. Focus on making a great simulation and such changes may come when time comes. (Falcon4.0-1998, F4AF-2005 thats seven years later and its still evolving to present day)

[Speed_2]

Well, what I think would be nice would be the ability to control ground units more in a RTS style. All we want is an enemy that controls battles and thinks realistically. A human doesn't need to be behind the eyes of every ground unit, you just need one or a couple guys that are controlling them for fairly realisitic play.

 

Basically, you just keep DCS a flight sim, but add RTS-like control of ground units. Think about all the cool things you could do with that!

[SUBS17]

First of all, as far as I know, in Falcon4.0 AF the level of detail of simulated ground/air assets aren't that high as in DCS:BS. DCS focus on one aircraft at a time to achieve this. ArmA isn't even a simulation close to DCS standards.

 

Wouldn't all the stuff I mentioned above make ED lose focus on its current goals or spend too much resources on it? Can all these be possible with the level of detail ED does things?

 

I just wanted to say that I like the way DCS is evolving. Focus on making a great simulation and such changes may come when time comes. (Falcon4.0-1998, F4AF-2005 thats seven years later and its still evolving to present day)

 

Arma is a simulation especially with the ACEmod in fact if DCS had FPS Arma with ACEmod would be the minimum standard for the FPS in DCS. TAC 50 with Kestrel no other FPS has that combo.

[joey45]

.... ArmA isn't even a simulation close to DCS standards....

 

You're right...

 

ArmA - Land Combat Sim with aircrafts that can not only be flowen with a joystick but keyboatd and mouse..

 

DCS - Study Flightsim.

[SUBS17]

The flight sim element wasn't what I was refering too it was the FPS side of it but there are things you can do in Arma you cannot do in most other sims such as ground lasing and buddy lasing. I think Lockon level avionics and FM would suit Arma quite well DCS level although ideal is not necessary in order to add that best level of realism without having to lose other aspects of the sim. BTW the helicopter FM for Arma is the best ever made for an FPS just a pity the jets couldn't be a bit better.

[Weta43]

ArmA - Land Combat Sim with aircrafts that can not only be flowen with a joystick but keyboatd and mouse..

 

While I agree with your sentiment about the level of fidelity Arma does jets with, this is not in itself proof one way or the other - There's a few people that have posted here flying the Ka-50 with a keyboard :-)

 

Personaly I think untill it has a more complete "stable" of aircraft, ED should concentrate on the air warfare side of things, but their own sub-contracting work for the US Govt shows that the concept has "legs" even with today's technology.

It's significant though that the US Govt is getting (through a supervising technology integrating lead contractor) specialists in each field (FPS, SIM, RTS) to develop the various elements, not one company to do the whole battlefield.

I think the best way forward for this would be for someone - perhaps ED, perhaps a stand alone company, to develop a standard (both comms & things like minimum standards for ballistics / AI FM's / radar modelling) that allows one platform (Infantry sim/air sim/naval sim/overall strategy) to communicate with another in real time.

 

That way the infantry sim can model things at the correct level (think ARMAII & beyond) on the ground - with a max view range appropriate to that SIM.

The air sim sees a world at the appropriate level of detail and view range.

Common shared details are passed between (terrain, buildings & unit positions (including rounds & missiles etc), radar & laser detection, not grass & broken windows or the fact that your Ka-50 is "running on accumulators")

[element1108]

Technically you can fly it with a keyboard, but being combat effective is another thing ;).

[GhostDog]

Common shared details are passed between (terrain, buildings & unit positions (including rounds & missiles etc), radar & laser detection, not grass & broken windows or the fact that your Ka-50 is "running on accumulators")

 

Personally, I think that's the only possible way the concept could work. It simply can't be done (faithfully) with a single sim engine, not with today's technology anyway. But even then, the amount of terrain data that would need to be processed in order to accurately track the position of infantry units, (units that can move behind rocks and trees, move in and out of buildings, etc.) would be overwhelming.

[Prophet]

I made a post regarding this a long time ago. All you need is common data that is passed between clients. After that you just need different clients.

 

If there was enough cooperation you could even work with one of the companies already doing FPS to make the FPS client.

 

As far as tracking infantry units the data is not that hard, no different than now. X,Y,Z.

[Weta43]

It's already being done (first steps) - For those that haven't already, look up the work ED is doing for the US government (DARPA?)

or see:

http://www.totimm.com/RealWorld-simulation-environments.php