BVR Fire

[Bufl4x]

It's fine and very easy to counter. Just kill the spotter.

[snooggums]

It's fine and very easy to counter. Just kill the spotter.

Sure, on Kashan. On Muttrah or any map with terrain or enterable buildings finding the spotter is quite difficult.

[Narco]

Sure, on Kashan. On Muttrah or any map with terrain or enterable buildings finding the spotter is quite difficult.

Not really. Protips for finding the spotter on Muttrah.
- If the fighting is around North City or Docks he'll be in the A2-4 mountains or on the hotel (if he's stupid)

- Anywhere south of North City, check the A7 mountains.

[snooggums]

Not really. Protips for finding the spotter on Muttrah.
- If the fighting is around North City or Docks he'll be in the A2-4 mountains or on the hotel (if he's stupid)

- Anywhere south of North City, check the A7 mountains.

Well yeah, predictable spotters will be there on Muttrah but smart players will also spot from other city buildings, from the Castle if not defended, from the docks, across the street if opportunity arises and many other places that don't have to have a complete overhead view of the map.

Since spotting is pretty much instant it only takes a second or two of exposure to mark a location for BVR. Once they start firing a smart spotter will be hidden from the target location...

And Draakon beat me to the second part, squad 1 spots something and marks it with a squad marker after death. Commander passes the mark to the chipper squad who just shoots the squad marker, no laz needed and no real time spotting necessary. Or commander just marks a hot location from the UAV.

[Rudd]

my perfect world

1) no attack markers
2) choppers get slightly raised HP
3) choppers get more detailed materials, critical areas being teh engines, rotors, tail and cockpit, all other areas doing significantly less damage.
4) choppers get slightly changed physics, a medium ground between CA and PR, this would makes choppers easier to fly with more capabilities in terms of manouvring (and more realism, I got a pilot to try out the CA physics and he said they were more realistic, however they are slower which isn't the best thing for PR - hence middle ground)
5) point and click hellfires alla the house of pain 2 mod.

this would mean yes, choppers have to come in to harms way more, but also they get a higher survival rate, are more capable of firing while moving; while not being invincible.

re APCs etc doing BVR, no attack markers would mean that they would require correction by a spotter therefore giving the recipients alot more chance to figure out what is happening and either kill the spotter or get to cover. This is a good thing for gameplay as the victims will still be suppressed, while not frustrated by this use of a game limitation, this is an effective tactic but it should be paid for with extra teamwork due to its gameyness.

[Celestial1]

Other, according to poll options.
I think BVR tactics should be extended and expounded upon.

Because view distance is an entirely static thing, everyone is dealing with the same numbers regardless of role or area. The problem with this is you're now giving the view distance that works for infantry players great to pilots which makes it feel like they're confined to a shoebox.

AA and air vehicles are very large-scale things... and I think trying to cut off engagements to the same view distances that may work great for infantry and vehicles brings air combat to a screeching, disappointing halt.

As has been tested in CA, the large view distances greatly improve jet-fighting by allowing opponents to truly track and avoid enemy aircraft. I believe that facilitating this large scale air combat in any way possible would greatly improve air combat and truly allow tactics which both reflect reality and are reasonably safe to execute if done correctly by the aircrews.



I, not having any true knowledge of game development, cannot suggest anything truly beneficial. I have 2 vague ideas of how things could be facilitated, but it's like trying to convince Einstein I understand nuclear physics; I probably would sound like a bumbling idiot who has no idea what is really going on.

These 2 ideas, for sake of argument, are relatively simple. The first, being an approach to serve the minimal "acceptable" function would be to simple increase the view distance of lock-on markers. This would allow for jets to fight even beyond the minimal 600m view distance, creating more of a maneuverable area. Anti-air vehicles could also benefit this in that they could have an even larger lock-on range than the aircraft themselves, making Anti-Air a very heavy threat to consider and also allowing for a bit more strategy in avoiding the AA (the missile would have a larger amount of time to reach some targets, making it easier to deploy countermeasures in defense; the flares would have time to linger and hold the missile's lock while the jet moves away).

The other is to create multiple ways to facilitate higher viewdistances, either for everyone or just the jet pilots. Anything ranging from a super-low-quality LODs (like, flat cubes with a single color texture) from extremely long ranges, to some way of increasing view distances for the pilots, perhaps by some sort of coding magic that increased the view distance whenever the player was at 1000m or above, maybe.





I am probably bringing no articulate solutions here, but the point is that if there is any way to further the use of BVR, I believe it should be done.

[Sniperdog]

@ Celestial

Your first idea is impossible, you cant have an weapon lock onto a GPO outside the map's View Distance.

The second option would require an unreasonable amount of work. You would have redo the LOD's on a ton of objects, many of which we don't have the source files for.

The only real option I see is for the mapper to have some level of restraint in how many objects they put in Aircraft maps, and increasing the map's VD. Increasing the VD is the only way to make quite a few of the things you see in CA (namely radar) possible.

[Alex6714]

@ Celestial

Your first idea is impossible, you cant have an weapon lock onto a GPO outside the map's View Distance.

Have you confirmed this? Im pretty sure AA on kashan reaches out to 1200m with only a 1000m view distance and you can see the box even after the jet has left view distance to lock on to. There is a hud setting to change the visible distance of the box, can´t confirm either that this works out of view distance but I can´t see why not.

[Celestial1]

@ Celestial

Your first idea is impossible, you cant have an weapon lock onto a GPO outside the map's View Distance.

The second option would require an unreasonable amount of work. You would have redo the LOD's on a ton of objects, many of which we don't have the source files for.

The only real option I see is for the mapper to have some level of restraint in how many objects they put in Aircraft maps, and increasing the map's VD. Increasing the VD is the only way to make quite a few of the things you see in CA (namely radar) possible.

I figured as much, like I said it's like trying to speak nuclear physics with Einstein; I got nothin.
However, like Alex said, it seems that AA seems to extend around 200m past the viewdistance on Kashan and the like. Perhaps it is just an illusion, though, with it just being within the view distance but still far enough that it is hidden by the fade from the fog?

[Sniperdog]

Have you confirmed this? Im pretty sure AA on kashan reaches out to 1200m with only a 1000m view distance and you can see the box even after the jet has left view distance to lock on to. There is a hud setting to change the visible distance of the box, can´t confirm either that this works out of view distance but I can´t see why not.

I suppose that's conceivable but I would guess it's because of lag. or because the values aren't all exactly in sync with each other.

[badmojo420]

Like Celestial said, it might be that the fog starts at 1000m while the view distance is 1200? Making it so you can't see the helicopter from the fog, but the game still sees it and targets it.

[Alex6714]

Kashan.

GameLogic.MaximumLevelViewDistance 1000

Renderer.fogStartEndAndBase 700.00/980.00/1.00/0.50

SA19

ObjectTemplate.seek.maxDistLock 1500

Starsteak

ObjectTemplate.seek.maxDistLock 1300

Amraam

ObjectTemplate.seek.maxDistLock 1200

Im pretty sure all these can be locked and fired at over 1000 at their proper ranges, if I remember correctly. Someone should test when they get the chance, looking at the range numbers. Kashan is map with highest view distance iirc too?

[Spinkyone]

I suppose that's conceivable but I would guess it's because of lag. or because the values aren't all exactly in sync with each other.

I believe the issue there is that the view distance isn't circular in either horizontal or vertical planes so it's a compromise to ensure the weapon is in range while the aircraft is still in sight as the weapon range works on the straight line distance between the two as far as I know.

BVR fire use to be hilarious in using RPG's as impromptu mortars although sadly that tactic required one hell of a lot of teamwork and was lost in .75-ish. ??:

EDIT: If you are wanting a better explanation of the first part...

You're fitting a sphere inside a box and if it's identically sized the corners would be a safe haven for helicopters who would still have a target in visual range of it's weapons and the AA wouldn't be able to do a thing about this. The solution is to increase the range to reach out to these corners but has the effect of pushing this beyond the view distance. It's a compromise to minimise the deadzone where aircraft can't be engaged so AA missile distance has to be greater than view distance.

[Bringerof_D]

BVR is awesome, only problem is the lack of effects, i think i've only seen it actually show up once where the effects actually showed up, and it was scary as hell. Thank fully our area had some good cover from the APC fire but we couldnt find the spotter. the first 2 shells flew over our heads and we all hit the deck. the rounds started getting closer so we all booked it into the trees. lost a few guys along the way. most exciting part was each time we thought we were safe the APC corrected fire and was right on us again.

[Haji with a Handgun]

I've been on the delivering end of BVR, its a lot of fun and very rewarding. Its the equivalent of using a vehicle like a sniper rifle. When you're on the receiving end though, it sucks pretty hard. 0 time to react, no indication of why everyone is dying...the effects srsly need fixing.

[CareBear]

i was directing BVR fire lastnight on TG on silent eagle for the havok, and it was wellll beyond visual range, yet i could see all of the effects?

so i think its more than just if its out of view distance you cant see the effects

[l|Bubba|l]

i was directing BVR fire lastnight on TG on silent eagle for the havok, and it was wellll beyond visual range, yet i could see all of the effects?

so i think its more than just if its out of view distance you cant see the effects

If you are between the helicopter and the target it's possible that you can see the impact because you are still in the effect draw range of the helicopter. The people on the receiving end are probably outside that range and don't see any effects. If you do 1 step outside that range you can't see anything at all, even the tracers or impacts that are next to you inside the effect draw range.

[CareBear]

the enemy was between me and the chopper, and the chopper was beyond 2k, so that is well beyond the range of rendereing

[Celestial1]

Kashan.

GameLogic.MaximumLevelViewDistance 1000
[...]
Im pretty sure all these can be locked and fired at over 1000 at their proper ranges, if I remember correctly. Someone should test when they get the chance, looking at the range numbers. Kashan is map with highest view distance iirc too?

Good find.

I believe the issue there is that the view distance isn't circular in either horizontal or vertical planes so it's a compromise to ensure the weapon is in range while the aircraft is still in sight as the weapon range works on the straight line distance between the two as far as I know.

Correct. Increasing it to 1200m is causing it to show targets outside the cone, which allows AAVs to catch targets more easily since the lock-box may show up in a larger area on their screen.

Increasing this value (for jet weapons) to, say, 2500m (1000m viewdistance default) will allow for a sort of "radar" where the pilot can see and track aircraft signatures up to 2500m away, well beyond the view distance but still within whatever reasonable range.

One problem with this would be that only the chasing aircraft would receive this benefit, unless the boxes show when you change cockpit views, which I don't believe occurs. If it is possible to show these boxes at all times when in the jet, it would allow for both pilots to receive the benefit of these quasi-opponent-indicators.

Ground AAV can be set differently to Pilot AA, according to those settings, so you could set something huge for Jets, like 3000m, and put ground AA at something smaller, say 1500m, so that the jets can see each other easily and this doesn't cause an impact on ground-to-air missiles becoming overpowered.