Damage indicator for vehicles

Valtasar · Post by **Valtasar** » 2008-01-20 13:24

First: I used Search and did't find enything so SORRY if it was already suggested.

Basically simple idea to have some kind of damage indicator for vehicles. And I don't mean light vehicles like car's etc.
Only for planes, chopers, tanks.
It dont have to be vanila style, maybe just some green, yellow, red status. B/c right now it can be complicated to tell how badly demage you have. Untill its to late and you are burning.

Sabre_tooth_tigger · Post by **Sabre_tooth_tigger** » 2008-01-20 14:43

I think its been removed on purpose to put you more on edge. If the vehicle is smoking then your in trouble.

I only find it irritating with the technicals and small vehicles where it just seems to blow up all of a sudden, it has less health so its very easy for it to just combust because you went over a few bumps too fast.

You can see vehicle health when your dead if thats any help

Waaah_Wah · Post by **Waaah_Wah** » 2008-01-20 15:23

If your hit, find an engineer. Thats it

BloodBane611 · Post by **BloodBane611** » 2008-01-20 17:30

Also, the fact that it is very hard to tell when you're being hit is a pain. You can take a LAT and barely notice the impact, but you're smoking.

All the gravity settings in PR are messed up, fixing them would be a huge project as I'm sure you know jonny.

Valtasar · Post by **Valtasar** » 2008-01-20 17:31

Waaah_Wah wrote:If your hit, find an engineer. Thats it

Some times it's difficult to tell if you got hit at all.
For example: did that tank shell hit you or land near youre tank.

Waaah_Wah · Post by **Waaah_Wah** » 2008-01-20 19:57

Valtasar wrote:Some times it's difficult to tell if you got hit at all.
For example: did that tank shell hit you or land near youre tank.

Bail out and check if your smoking then

maverick551 · Post by **maverick551** » 2008-01-20 20:05

I think there should be some kind of indicator for planes and helicopters. There should at least be bitchin' Betty as they call it yelling out at you, Warning, Caution etc and mabey the warning lights in the cockpit could light up, that would be nice but I can imagine difficult. Anyways, a basic warning system for larger vehicals would be a good addition as long as its noting like vbf2.

markonymous · Post by **markonymous** » 2008-01-20 20:41

im pretty sure if youre in a blackhawk and something hits your engine you will hear warning lights going. there could be for example 3 red lights if one lights up you have a damaged engine doesnt tell you how badly one for damaged tailrotor and one for damaged mainrotor. not sure if this is possible though.

or maybe just having them light up one at a time to show how severely youre hit. for example light damage 1 lights up severe damage you hear a warning sound once and the second light lights up. if youre going down all lights start blinking and a continuous warning sound is heard.

maverick551 · Post by **maverick551** » 2008-05-04 06:16

Even if it is simple, it is desperately needed by Helicopter pilots. Having just a generic warning sound initiate really does not help the pilot that much when he is trying to figure out weather not he should ditch or not. Just a indicator on the actual green HUD itself that pops up telling you the extent of the damage would be perfectly sufficient. What ever works (is possible), It does not even need to be complicated, Just a 3 level warning system can save a whole chopper crew;

1. Light Damage, Aircraft Still Flyable, RTB
2. Medium damage, Possible Engine/Systems Failure - Be cautions, land when Chopper reaches level 3
3. Engine Failure/Fire - Land Immediately

There should also be several sounds that should be played for level 2/3.
For level 3 You get some major warning sounds, (Bitchen Betty) For level 2 A a little sound wave plays alerting the pilot of the situation.

Just a 3 level warning helps pilots determine when or if they need to get the aircraft on the ground. Giving them some time to pull back on the stick, reduce the throttle , and auto hover safely to the ground. I really hope that the devs can work something out.

zangoo · Post by **zangoo** » 2008-05-04 14:16

Jonny wrote:Part of the problem is that vehicles magically catch fire, for no reason, and then you die.

I have never seen this happen, I would prefer the vehicle to be disabled until you can get it fixed. Just like in real life with a flat battery, dead spark plug, disconnected cable or other thing that requires specialised knowlege to fix.

well if we made every vehicle have 3 time more health, then when the vehicle went below 66% health it would be disabled. this would also allow people to shoot at a car and it would become disabled instead of just going boom.

snow · Post by **snow** » 2008-05-04 16:12

Do not want.

Post by **Deadfast** » 2008-05-04 16:32

If there is a vehicle that requires damage indicator, then it's the militia technical.

God, I blew up with that thing so many times...

Tannhauser · Post by **Tannhauser** » 2008-05-04 18:13

Jonny wrote:the addition of one line,
ObjectTemplate.gravityModifier 0.666
to each vehicles' .tweak file, the deletion of each gravity modifier from each bullets .tweak file and the addition of said line to the common file which is referenced by all bullet templates.

One time only thing, no need to look at it ever again.

So no, not really that big.

sounds like a joke, otherwise it should have been tested. Any input from Devs?

Post by **Mosquill** » 2008-05-04 19:08

Jonny wrote:the addition of one line,
ObjectTemplate.gravityModifier 0.666
to each vehicles' .tweak file, the deletion of each gravity modifier from each bullets .tweak file and the addition of said line to the common file which is referenced by all bullet templates.

One time only thing, no need to look at it ever again.

So no, not really that big.

Well yeah you can make realistic gravity that way, but imo then someone would have to tweak engine and suspension for every single vehicle. And thats a huge piece of work.

Oldirti · Post by **Oldirti** » 2008-05-04 19:29

[R-CON]Mosquill wrote:Well yeah you can make realistic gravity that way, but imo then someone would have to tweak engine and suspension for every single vehicle. And thats a huge piece of work.

touche

Darkpowder · Post by **Darkpowder** » 2008-05-04 19:59

Damage indicators, are too arcady, hence why we don't have them. They are slightly more understandable for vanilla style off the shelf games, but usually the specific damage caused to the vehicle is apparent. Track disabled, turret disabled etc.

As has been said before, pre-arrange to meet your personal land-rover of QRF engineers at an arranged point or have them come to you if desperate to dominate the area by force and .50's to try that daring in the field repair.

Good rule of thumb, if you take a massive hit, get yourself back to base. Vehicles don't have a lot of external damage graphical indicators, but use your imagination.

maverick551 wrote:Even if it is simple, it is desperately needed by Helicopter pilots. Having just a generic warning sound initiate really does not help the pilot that much when he is trying to figure out weather not he should ditch or not.

In general, when aircraft get properly zeroed by anything serious, they go down, as there is a real lack of any planning for aircraft/attack chopppers. The concentration on mid-altitude cruising/hunting still makes damage indicators pretty redundant.

In the same way as medics talk to their squad its good to hear the VOIP members of the squad inform each other how hurt.damaged they are, copters, tanks, and squadmembers. Enhanced damage indicators aren't worth the huge ammount of time needed to bring them in.

Something along the lines of

"Commander: Squad AIRSUPPORT, engineers advise your cobra is smoking badly, return to base, out."

Can do the job of dozens of hours of programming.