Is it possible.........in 1.2

[rekoal]

to get, say a squad of infantry to mow down, that would be so FUN!:D

 

rekoal

[Witchking]

yeah...we want tiny ppl in game with small ak-47's to kill. :p

[britgliderpilot]

yeah...we want tiny ppl in game with small ak-47's to kill. :p

 

Can you say . . . . framerate killers? :p

 

 

It'd be nice, but it's a not-right-now thing.

 

Helicopters aren't really designed to kill ground troops. Not really a necessary feature just yet.

[Force_Feedback]

if those tiny peaple have rpgs, manpads aks and semtex belts, then I'm in. (not in the army lol, the chopper)

[britgliderpilot]

if those tiny peaple have rpgs, manpads aks and semtex belts, then I'm in. (not in the army lol, the chopper)

 

Aha!

 

I think an ED rep mentioned at some point the potential introduction of the DSHK . . . . some kind of Russian heavy machinegun.

 

Light in the scheme of surface to air weaponry, but closer to infantry and certainly representative of a real threat to a chopper.

 

 

I still think that animated 3D troops are going to utterly destroy any system you care to mention. We don't have enough power to run Lomac NOW . . . . start introducing large numbers of 3D troops? No chance.

[Doug97]

Can you say . . . . framerate killers? :p

 

Rubbish, M1 Tank Platoon 2 had infantry, and that was released in 1998.

 

Newer games have shown that you can render large numbers of detailed troops and still have smooth gamepaly (see Rome: Total War).

[britgliderpilot]

Rubbish, M1 Tank Platoon 2 had infantry, and that was released in 1998.

 

Newer games have shown that you can render large numbers of detailed troops and still have smooth gamepaly (see Rome: Total War).

 

I just Googled M1 Tank Platoon 2, and I was not hugely impressed by the graphics that I saw ;)

 

 

New games have rendered large numbers of detailed troops, OK, fine.

 

Have they done it on top of the performance hog that is Lomac?

If you want a true estimate of how well it'll work, try running Lomac in a window over a running R:TW . . . . . . so you are actually running 3D animated figures at the same time as that 52,000 polygon Su25T model, those radar calculations, those physics calculations, that water, those volumetric clouds, that bump-mapping, those textures, those other hundreds of units, and the thousand and one other things that these newer games never had to deal with . . . . .

 

There's a bit more to that picture than you're painting ;)

[Doug97]

I just Googled M1 Tank Platoon 2, and I was not hugely impressed by the graphics that I saw ;)

 

 

New games have rendered large numbers of detailed troops, OK, fine.

 

Have they done it on top of the performance hog that is Lomac?

If you want a true estimate of how well it'll work, try running Lomac in a window over a running R:TW . . . . . . so you are actually running 3D animated figures at the same time as that 52,000 polygon Su25T model, those radar calculations, those physics calculations, that water, those volumetric clouds, that bump-mapping, those textures, those other hundreds of units, and the thousand and one other things that these newer games never had to deal with . . . . .

 

There's a bit more to that picture than you're painting ;)

 

M1 Tank Platoon 2 was released in 1998, and you're complaining that its graphics are not impressive?

 

There may be more to it than I typed in my last post, but the picture YOU'RE painting is still garbage. You cannot believe that running LOMAC at the same time as R:TW will give an accurate indication of framerate.

 

You would be forcing the CPU to run TWO sets of AI, TWO SEPARATE graphical engines, in fact, two of everything - you seem to think that there is nothing to R:TW other than its rendering of troops, when in fact it is a very deep game with a lot of other things having to be calculated at the same time.

 

Adding some graphical representations of humans to LOMAC is so totally different from what you are describing I'm spluttering in disbelief.

[4cExpert]

t

 

Ability to join more than 2 coalitions ;)

[KILSEK]

Hi all.

 

It would be great to have a camera icon that, when you were in the map view, would show your position. That way when you were in the F11 view and were traveling around, you could switch to the map view and see where you are at.

 

-KILSEK

[ARM505]

A stupidly simple polygon model of the troops would be better than no troops at all...I'd even suggest a simple sprite, ala Steel Beasts if it weren't for the fact that we could fly over head them. We really do need troops, IMHO.

[Weta43]

Things for 1.2 that I've (as have others) asked for before ...

 

A civilian coalition/status for units with the possibility to set their survival as a goal (also useful for creating missions where not everything that shows up from a distance in a town is "enemy". At present you can only have ground units - including cars & busses from the same coalition in town or they try to destroy each other. A neutral team would let you put cars/trucks/busses/transports etc in a map as clutter round targets & have both sides move past without destroying them as soon as they see them))

 

Fluctuating windspeed over time - making landing / low slow flight more challenging. Doesn't need to be localised or truly random - could be scripted universal fluctuations.

 

Simple placeable non individualy animated units of infantry might be good for a start. Maybe some sort of fixed perimiter of sandbags/block wall/ruined buildings low walls & a set of characters that rotates inside that like an armoured units turret. - the MG that's planned, maybe activating (& skinning) the RPG character or a couple of kneeling people with a TOW launcher

 

Extending the GAI task to ground units & letting units assigned GAI resume GAI when they return to base, rather than disappearing once they've tackled their first target.

[britgliderpilot]

M1 Tank Platoon 2 was released in 1998, and you're complaining that its graphics are not impressive?

 

There may be more to it than I typed in my last post, but the picture YOU'RE painting is still garbage. You cannot believe that running LOMAC at the same time as R:TW will give an accurate indication of framerate.

 

You would be forcing the CPU to run TWO sets of AI, TWO SEPARATE graphical engines, in fact, two of everything - you seem to think that there is nothing to R:TW other than its rendering of troops, when in fact it is a very deep game with a lot of other things having to be calculated at the same time.

 

Adding some graphical representations of humans to LOMAC is so totally different from what you are describing I'm spluttering in disbelief.

 

That's right - I'm complaining that it's graphics aren't impressive. You can put in sprites for ground troops and you won't have much of a system hog . . . . but it'll spoil the point of having good graphics in the rest of the game.

 

 

 

I'm well aware that R:TW has to work out the AI, the movement, and the battles as well as the graphics - my point was that you have to expect Lomac to do the same things!

There is zero point in adding troops if all they are going to do is stand there.

Troops do not fight aircraft - troops fight troops. If you're going to add them, you're going to end up with an R:TW scene within Lomac . . . . . is there any reason Lomac doesn't have to consider the things R:TW does?

 

Investigate what kind of framerate hit you get over a big tank battle.

Now imagine what's happening with hundreds of little 3D animated figures, all thinking and moving, all with their own damage, all firing little bullets . . . . . the number of units adds up to truly obscene levels.

 

We KNOW Lomac has problems with large numbers of units. You're suggesting adding more isn't going to be any trouble at all?

[Yellonet]

Can you say . . . . framerate killers? :p

 

 

It'd be nice, but it's a not-right-now thing.

 

Helicopters aren't really designed to kill ground troops. Not really a necessary feature just yet.

But it would be good for making better ground battles, and they really don't need many polys or any advanced AI.

[Doug97]

A stupidly simple polygon model of the troops would be better than no troops at all...I'd even suggest a simple sprite, ala Steel Beasts if it weren't for the fact that we could fly over head them. We really do need troops, IMHO.

 

Exactly, even just bitmapped sprites a la M1 Tank Platoon 2 would do - they'd look just fine until you got REALLY close (and you could have them at higher resolution than in that 1998 game).

 

And contrary to what has been posted elsewhere, troops DO fire at helicopters - just ask the crew of the Apache that was brought down by small arms fire in the last Gulf war!

 

Even if small calibre rifles aren't likely to do much damage to an armoured chopper, you might still get a lucky hit. And that's without medium machine guns, anti-materiel rifles and RPGs (obviously these things are only going to be a threat at close range, but that's the point - IRL I'd imagine chopper pilots are wary of getting too close to live enemy troops, so the game would have to have a similar motivating factor).

 

Plus there might be intelligent solutions to the problem of having lots of AI entities milling around - that's why I gave the example of Rome: Total War. There a lot of the AI is dealt with at the unit level - with each individaul SEEMING to have its own animations, actions etc, but in actual fact much of that is simply scripting, and is triggered by what the overall unit is doing. Therefore, each group of soldiers would act as an AI entity, without them all performing the exact same actions like robots.

[Witchking]

 

 

 

If you notice there are troops with guns. especially terrorists with aks who can damage you. This is AN ARCADE SIM named "apache air assualt" & "apache longbow assault".

 

but it is real fun .

[Force_Feedback]

Jeesh, just play OPF

 

Argh, can't wait for Armed Assault