New player feedback and suggestions

Post by **Ninja2dan** » 2007-10-30 00:54

I'd like to start out by saying this is a great mod. I was just about to uninstall BF2 but happened to come across this mod, which is the only version I play now. I have been running this mod for about 3 days now, and would like to give some feedback as well as a few suggestions.

As a former member of the US Army, I have had a bit of real life experience with military tactics, weapons, vehicles, etc. Although it's impossible to make any simulation exactly like the real thing, some have come close. OFP/VBS/ArmA is one example, but that program does have drawbacks. PR almost seems like they took some of the good features of ArmA and combined them with the good features of BF2. If I want the utmost realism available, I'll play ArmA. If I'm wanting realism at more of a "dumbed down" and casual level, this is the game to play.

The thing I hated most about playing BF2 was the lack of teamwork. The only time I really saw people squad up were those looking to pad stats or those in a clan. PR fixes that problem for the most part, although there are at times the lone wolf still around. I like the larger battles that involve tactics and planning. Maps that require skill and not just luck. Huge battles with various assets to manage and counter, and the excitement of not knowing where that enemy grunt is hiding. And those are now possible with this mod. That alone gives this mod a huge thumbs up.

I also really enjoy the added realism for vehicles, especially armor and APC's. A driver should drive, not shoot. Although the AA (Linebacker, etc) still have the driver acting as gunner, maybe that will be fixed in future versions. Aircraft are also done quite well, although I have not had a whole lot of practice with them yet. I rarely see people trying to solo with armor or APC's now.

There are many other good aspects of the game, most have been mentioned by others countless times. I would also like to list some of the bugs or issues that I have found as well. Some are just opinions of what I view as bad features or problematic issues.

First off, vehicles tend to become bouncy or jumpy. For some reason, most likely unstable models, they will sink into the grind at times. This happens most often when someone enters or exits the vehicle, such as a spawn-in. Other times it's just random, such as one side of a tank's tracks goes about a foot into the ground texture and starts to bounce.

Another vehicle problem is the sensitivity of the driver's view. The BRDM for example will span your view all over the place, likely to make you sick. Yet you can hop out and into a pickup truck and the sensitivity of the driver's view is just fine. Also the slew controls on some vehicle views is out of sinc, or lagged. The BRDM again comes into mind, I can nudge the mouse in gunner view and it doesn't rotate for another few fracctions of a second or more. This means you are always trying to correct for overlead. I'm not talking about zoomed-in views, I mean normal view (1X).

In armor, the sound for laoding a Sabot is the same for loading a HEAT round, always states "Sabot Up!". It should say "HEAT Up!" when a HE round is loaded. And is there any way to add the term "Last Sabot" when the last round is loaded in? Such as "Sabot Up! Last Sabot!" The rest of the sounds aren't too bad. I know this isn't a tank sim, but it's worth a shot.

You have a sniper and DM kit, but no spotter? I have seen a few other topics mentioning it, but none of them that I saw really stated much of a reply on what is being done about it. A spotter should be equipped with an M4/M203 combo, smoke and HE grenades, bino, and TLD or similar range finder. If you don't understand why the spotter should carry a GL, read up on US Army Scout/Sniper doctrines and you'll understand why it's important.

AA target acquisition range and Aircraft target acquisition range needs to be looked into. Way too many times have I seen a helo target and kill an opposing AA unit, simply because the helo could see/target/lock/fire/kill the AA before the AA even saw the helo or was able to get a target indicator. Both should have equal ranges, or else what is the point of the AA? That or someone in the helo was using an exploit for view distance, but I highly doubt that.

Remove the stupid target boxes located in some black smoke clouds. I know black smoke means hot smoke, but not enough to light up an AA's sensor. If a small helo like the littlebird doesn't present a high enough heat signature for AA's, then a smoke cloud sure as hell shouldn't. I always see helos and aircraft using this fact as an exploit on the desert map.

I'll list more suggestions as I find them, for now though that's enough to see if there is any response. I had posted on another forum about the lag issues and poor performance that so many others also complain about. I have been able to reduce some of the system lag, but I understand that my only real solution will be to upgrade above my 1GB RAM. That being noted, I'll have to make due with what I have.

I wish this mod much look in the future, I really do enjoy it. I also look forward to the next update, and hope to see some of the above listed issues addressed at some point. Thanks for the fun.

Sgt_Canadian_Floss · Post by **Sgt_Canadian_Floss** » 2007-10-30 02:15

I really agree on the fact that the vehicules are jumpy, just driving a insurgent SUV gets me nuts. The spotter idea is good, but i dont think it could be incorporated n the game as a kit, the snipers could just ask for any soldiers with binocs to help em out. As for the rest, i dont have enought expertise to complain about it.

Post by **77SiCaRiO77** » 2007-10-30 02:25

Remove the stupid target boxes located in some black smoke clouds. I know black smoke means hot smoke, but not enough to light up an AA's sensor. If a small helo like the littlebird doesn't present a high enough heat signature for AA's, then a smoke cloud sure as hell shouldn't. I always see helos and aircraft using this fact as an exploit on the desert map.

I completaly agree about this

Post by **Jaymz** » 2007-10-30 08:06

Driver/Gunner system for AA : Done for 0.7

Black smoke lockon: That's a bug, was not intended.

Vehicle physics: We keep trying to improve this but it's another BF2 thing that's tricky to work with.

Post by **Ninja2dan** » 2007-10-30 08:37

Engineer wrote:For realism purposes then add the possibility to have a lock-on in rocks and cliffs that are in direct sunlight.

And what comes to sniper/spotter suggestion, I'm afraid spotter kit would be in very limited, or in very wrong use. I cant really see the point of a separate spotter in PR.
It has been suggested many times before too, but I havent seen any positive comments about it.

Last release concentrated on jets, not on AA. Thus the AA-missiles, or anything related to AA doesnt work as it should.

I don't know how many people have operated a thermal imager or have fired a thermal-tracking weapon, so I'll give a fast summary of it. When you have multiple heat signatures present, the lock will occur on the hottest signature. Rocks sitting in the sun, humans, and even small vehicle engines will not usually present enough heat signature to give tone, but you'd be surprised how much heat a plane/helo/armor/apc puts out. This is the reason you learn in real life to fire at the rear of everything. Not only is that the least-armored spot, but it's usually where the heat is coming from (excluding helos where it's usually at the base of the rotor hub). But from the comment, it looks like that bug will be fixed.

In regards to the spotter, this is a realism mod. Snipers are not meant to be out on their own, and they are not meant to be part of a normal squad. The role of the sniper/spotter it to locate and call out targets, and if needed, support troops by covering their advance or scouting ahead of them. The purpose of the spotter is not only to assist the sniper in spotting targets, but also to provide close-proximity support fire. Hence the M203, which can be used to lob smoke or HE at the advancing enemy so they can make a hasty withdrawl if needed. A sniper team should never be spotted, and should move often enough between hides that they never come into close combat, but in this game it does happen. More of a reason to allow a spotter kit for creating 2-man sniper teams and use them as their real life counterparts are intended.

I look forward to seeing the outcome of the next patch/update, and wish the dev team the best of luck in overcoming some of the obstacles that the game engine presents in fine-tuning some features such as vehicle stability and mesh/texture blend-throughs. Once you know the game code well enough, you'd be surprised how many things can be done that were once thought impossible. I saw this first-hand with modding for OFP.

Post by **fuzzhead** » 2007-10-30 09:57

spotter is simple, get a rifleman or a grenadier to go with you... done. the only thing he is missing is special optics but it is fine i think.

nice suggestions anyways..

Doc_Frank · Post by **Doc_Frank** » 2007-10-30 10:17

[R-DEV]fuzzhead wrote:spotter is simple, get a rifleman or a grenadier to go with you... done. the only thing he is missing is special optics but it is fine i think.

nice suggestions anyways..

It's just awkward for me that while the sniper has a neat camo-dress, the spotter next to him is an ordinary grunt.

zardez · Post by **zardez** » 2007-10-30 12:14

i think the only way you could make sniper squad work (sniper and spotter) is if he could communicate with the squad leaders the same way the commander can. although i am fairly sure that is impossible because bf2 voip sucks?

MikeDude · Post by **MikeDude** » 2007-10-30 12:46

zardez wrote:i think the only way you could make sniper squad work (sniper and spotter) is if he could communicate with the squad leaders the same way the commander can. although i am fairly sure that is impossible because bf2 voip sucks?

why does it sucks

Doc_Frank · Post by **Doc_Frank** » 2007-10-30 13:33

The inter-squad VoIP is among the already suggested ideas I fear. That's obviously the role of the commander, who syncronizes the squads' work.

Ceterum censeo Carthaginem delendam esse. / We need spotter kits with soldiers dressed in camo-outfit.

Warmagi · Post by **Warmagi** » 2007-10-30 13:50

I think thats very good suggestions, all of them. Furthermore i think that DEF's should make a special suggestion/feedback thread just for military/ex-military ppl that play PR. They should post their ideas and feedback there - it would somehow more profesional and more useful to close in to the real thing.

Sadist_Cain · Post by **Sadist_Cain** » 2007-12-03 11:01

Dam straight they should do that

Safekeeper · Post by **Safekeeper** » 2007-12-03 13:08

Furthermore i think that DEF's should make a special suggestion/feedback thread just for military/ex-military ppl that play PR.

Good idea. And/or there could be some sort of way to identify military/ex-military people (maybe a title to identify them could replace the 'rank' titles like Private, etc.)? Just so long as there's a way to verify they actually are Armed Forces personnel, lest we may get messages like 'TEH F-16 NEDS 2 GO SLOW3R AND HAEV MORE MISIELS I KNOW THES B/C I FLAW FOR TEH VEITCONG IN NM AND SHOT DOWN 5 F-16S!!!!1!!11 WTF LOL'.

ir0n_ma1den · Post by **ir0n_ma1den** » 2007-12-04 02:53

I just had an idea that might make the sniper/spotter combo possible!
Ok, heres my idea...

The commander is a pretty important asset right? I mean, he can order artillery, support, etc. I think that if you are commander and you die, you are kicked from being commander and cannot be commander for that game. So a sniper/spotter would be important because they could finally have a valuable target instead of regular soldiers that respawn. This would finally give reason for a sniper to go out on his own. This would change the game quite a bit.

agentscar · Post by **agentscar** » 2007-12-04 03:18

Give MEC "Hind",as the MI-28 Havoc is like Russia's Apache,and will never be for sale to others anytime soon.

Also,change some of the sounds of the coaxil Tank 7.62...AND! don't make it so quite inside tanks,only jets,Apache,Cobra,and Havoc are actually that quite.

Teek · Post by **Teek** » 2007-12-04 03:26

ir0n_ma1den wrote:I just had an idea that might make the sniper/spotter combo possible!
Ok, heres my idea...

The commander is a pretty important asset right? I mean, he can order artillery, support, etc. I think that if you are commander and you die, you are kicked from being commander and cannot be commander for that game. So a sniper/spotter would be important because they could finally have a valuable target instead of regular soldiers that respawn. This would finally give reason for a sniper to go out on his own. This would change the game quite a bit.

oh shit, better not fall out to door of my CO truch and die! or Hope that IU wont be TKed from a random tard, or baseraped.

ir0n_ma1den · Post by **ir0n_ma1den** » 2007-12-04 04:24

oh shit, better not fall out to door of my CO truch and die! or Hope that IU wont be TKed from a random tard, or baseraped.

Lol, just think of the possiblities....

But seriously, think of what this would add to the game... You'd have to be much more strategic and cautious when building bunkers and stuff. You could have a squad of guards that protects you and builds things.

Razick · Post by **Razick** » 2007-12-04 10:36

agentscar wrote:Give MEC "Hind",as the MI-28 Havoc is like Russia's Apache,and will never be for sale to others anytime soon.

Also,change some of the sounds of the coaxil Tank 7.62...AND! don't make it so quite inside tanks,only jets,Apache,Cobra,and Havoc are actually that quite.

AgentScar the tanks are that quiet. My brother is currently serving in the Marine Corps as a Tank Commander and he tells me all you can hear is the radios and the buzzing of the turbine engine. If they were to take a hit alarms would be going off like crazy. And to IronMaiden who is suggesting the commander dies once rules, I dont wanna be mean but that is a really bad idea and having a squad protect a commander is just taking away resources from an already depleted 32 man team. To stay on topic you dont really need a spotter because you body silhouettes against terrain so target acquisition is pretty easy and you dont really need someone to help calculate a shot because there is absolutely nothing that will effect the trajectory of the bullet except distance alone. Most snipers are noobs anyway so who cares about protecting them. Most dont even scout out enemy postions so there really is no reason to even care bout them. The effective sniper is kinda rare in PR public servers.