Project Reality Forums

So Guys where is it ??

I give you two examples:

British Army is all I can relate to here , so I am sure the US Mil guys will have input.


BATUS - British Army Training Unit Suffield ..... the place where the Brits go to do the most "realistic" training they can. Here they use "TESEX" Kit , test exercise kit ........ basically "laser quest" on a huge scale.

All scenarios etc etc are as realistic as possible, Infantry/Armour/Air/Artillery the whole nine yards - on a Bde v Bde Battle on the "prairie" in Canada.

One problem with it ........... no one "really" dies ?? Its called "tes bravery" , ie - everyone knows if they are killed they will be out untill the end of the battle - and just sit there "bleeping and flashing" until the end, therefore they do things they would not probably do in a real life combat situation - How can you assess that ??

Iraq/Ireland Training ...... we do "tin city" - a mock up of the towns, and carrying out FIBUA etc ......... same thing, you see guys doing things that I know for a fact they did not do in "reality" in Iraq ?

In game is the same IMO .......... call it "BF Bravery" ............ in reality lets be honest in Karkland you would stop at every junction ....... use pairs fire and manouvre - do real time crossing drills etc etc ?

Not just run around eveywhere - sprinting to get there quick for your "points" as something is happening at a flag ???

AAS has resolved some of this - but not all ............. another idea:

How about a mini - mod after the main mod that is "pure" realism, ie you die - you are out of that round, and you lose 10 points from your global score - harsh I know but so is "death" ?? (Maybe good for some clan battles)


Does that provide good gameplay ......... maybe ...... maybe not.

How many times have you played vanilla bf2 and seen people running at 7-8 enemy with a pistol or something totally inferior - knowing they will spawn again anyway?

Or going it alone with no back up - trying to take flags to get the points ?

In a combat enviroment you will be blind/dirty/deaf/disorientated/unsure of your surroundings/wet/cold/hot - but still be able to work through all this .......... How though ??

By taking some time out ...... and "brewing" up ...... the good old british way - a cup of tea solves everything you know (idea here - get some peak stoves ingame)

Anyway seriously though

where is the fine line here - what are your views guys?

Agreed 100%. But to me, the answer is simple, the line is drawn at gameplay.

You have it exactly right in 'BF Bravery' but the thing is that this is how it is supposed to be. Games are here to have fun, not to fear for your life as you would in war!

I see, respect and agree with the suggestions to make players 'fear dying/being injured'. This will add to teamwork and the overall feel of the game. But (as I said in another post) constant attempts to batter this into the faces of players (excessive visual disorientation) will be harmful to gameplay.

It would be interesting to see a battlefield game with the one life and you're done concept (though I think PR's plate is full enough!) and see how short the rounds are and how (probably) dissatisfying the results would be.

The one life thing doesn't work either, the same thing goes on in games like Ghost Recon.

I don't think there is anyway to get someone to play a game like it's for real, in the back of their mind they always know it's just a game and they can afford to take chances.

Sig215 wrote:The one life thing doesn't work either, the same thing goes on in games like Ghost Recon.

I dissagree. It works in Counter-Strike, nuff said.

The problem of carrying it over to BF2 is map size and the vehicles. Could this work on Karkand? Possibly. Could it work on Zatar? No way. It would be a disaster in terms of gameplay. All advances would halt by the first or second flag: Everyone would be dead.

I suppose one can say that the line is drawn at gameplay... But approaching realism, that is not BF2 conquest gameplay. This is the real enemy here that ruins any one-life games or tactical movement.

I would personally approach the tactical movement part from another angle though. Its not a matter of being afraid to die from a bullet or two. Its a matter of being afraid of meeting a force that is numerically superior. The BF2 spawn system encourages seperation and lonewolfing. That's why you see those 7-8 people run around with pistols. They know that they wont face 10 people with machineguns having an entire alley covered by massive defensive firepower. They know that there is a much bigger chance of 1 enemy rounding a corner and it'll turn into a pistol duel. When attacking a flag, you also know there wont be 10 people defending it or suddenly coming in with an APC. Spawning doesnt work like that, they drop in every now and then no matter where they are... And you take them out 1 by 1. Even the allmighty squad system is still drop-in spawn.

So basicly, the moment we know that 5 people could be coming down a street is the moment we start to fear that street. Does this happen in BF2? Sometimes. But we know its rare to see. So we dont think on it very much.

But dont underestimate Conquest. DICE has a very dull approach, doesnt mean PRMM has to have the same. What if a 16 player map had 16 tickets for each side and a single objective you either assault or defend (no ticket loss)? That might just cause you some of the realism you seek, when you know that an entire 16p team may be dug in by a flag.

To have a one-life system work in BF2 we'd need servers running 128 or more players. Or significantly smaller maps with just a couple of flags.

One thing that could be tried out is to increase the spawn time to 30 seconds or more, even to 60. At least see how it effects the gameplay. Potentially it might make the players a bit more careful at least, even if not make them "fear" for their lives.

Perhaps instead of having each player have their own respawn time, we could have a system of a common spawn time, which would apply to the whole team. This would make spawns a little more like a planned attack, with quite a few people spawning at a time. This would make defencive spawns pack more power, and make planning attacks easier.

realism is based on physical aspects of gameplay, but it is very hard to perfect, because many things have variables, such as death. It is fairly easy to get physical realism right, such as gun recoil, bullet affects, etc, etc. This rest is not so easy. Apologies if that went slightly off topic, I didn't read everything.

Exel wrote:To have a one-life system work in BF2 we'd need servers running 128 or more players. Or significantly smaller maps with just a couple of flags.

One thing that could be tried out is to increase the spawn time to 30 seconds or more, even to 60. At least see how it effects the gameplay. Potentially it might make the players a bit more careful at least, even if not make them "fear" for their lives.

Its been done before and it doesnt really help as its still individual. Either way you see it, someone IS going to die. Even if you make every last player fear death and cover behind sandbags, someone HAVE TO die or the game would grind to a halt. And when they do die, you're back to square one... As they will still drop in one after another randomly and incohesive, whether that be after 30 seconds, 60 seconds or 10 minutes.

pretty much agreeing with dawdler.

However, I've noticed that with the exception of America's Army, the single death matches still have pplz being gung ho. The round is quicker, maps are smaller, and there's not a lot of down time till the next round. That, and the map loading times are a LOT less in those other games too.

that is all.

The gameplay style of BF2 and mods based on the game doesn't work with one life playing. The games would be boring, aggrevating and overall, fairly uneventful. I don't think longer spawn times are the answer either, as basecamping makes this extremly annoying. Main base and squadleader spawning with a 20 second respawn time is the way to go in my opinion.

As a roleplayer, I would be all for the pure realism approach. I agree with the arguments said, though. Having people wait out the entire battle once their dead, will probably make players leave the server rather than waiting. If you want to appeal to a group greater than the pure fanatics, gameplay needs to be considered.

'[R-PUB wrote:BrokenArrow']The gameplay style of BF2 and mods based on the game doesn't work with one life playing. The games would be boring, aggrevating and overall, fairly uneventful. I don't think longer spawn times are the answer either, as basecamping makes this extremly annoying. Main base and squadleader spawning with a 20 second respawn time is the way to go in my opinion.

Only allowing main base/squad spawns and keep the short respawns is one way, yes. I'd rather walk a minute to the battle than wait a minute and spawn right into the mayhem. On larger maps one could have a cappable intermediate base. Think the center hill on Zatar as being spawnable, but none of the other flags. That way the main battle will either go on to the left side (MEC vs USMC base) or to the right side (USMC vs MEC base) and focus the battles with more people... And thus more dangers.

Sidenote: Ignoring AAS of course. I dont like the current AAS implementation, I think its too static in what it allows. Against that, I prefer intelligently designed Conquest scenarios.

Agreed, AAS is okay on some maps but only where the battle is made linear in the first place (think Foy in FH). Maps like abaden it doesnt work well on and El Al the layout is bad as well.

Unfortunately it's a bit wiggy atm where AAS is not compatible with Conquest on the server. It appears to be all or nothing, meaning you cannot have some maps AAS and some maps Conquest.

I prefer AAS over Conquest .. imo .. I think the game is much better with AAS than without.

Regards this topic .. I think you need to be careful about going for too much realism in the BF2 engine. The engine just does not lend itself to it. The only vehicles that would be left would be jeeps and hummers, because armor and aircraft in BF2 are not and can never made to be realistic. More balanced, yes .. but not realistic.

Steel Beasts on the ground with Falcon 4 in the air is not going to be achieved with the BF2 engine. That's such a shame too hehe, cuz that'd be a game I'd sink my teeth into. Think WWIIOL in a modern setting made by a crew of people with the money and the mandate to do it right. Now think costs and quarterly shareholder reports hehe....

We all know that the BF2 engine is a limiting starting point for vehicle simulation .. not trying to restate the obvious .. just saying that the application of realism factors needs to be applied across the entire game world.... realistic for infantry, but not tankers and airmen won't be fun.

Just my 0.02.

egg

I think that AAS is what makes PRMM as good as it is. It helps focus the battle and prevents all the stupid flag hopping and such nonsence. It creates a virtual "front" to the battle and directs action to that area. When you are able to just grab any flag, you get more lone wolf types that just flag hop, all over the map taking flags by themselves. And then your army has to have some lone wolf types go and take back those empty flags. It shifts focus away from firefights and head on battles, to random people running around everywhere. Take oil fields for example. On a 64 player, that map is rediculous. Even with a full server, you can't find any concentrated action. It's always, take flag, move on, hit flag, move on. Maybe find some random guys that spawn there to kill.

With AAS, you wave a common goal, even if it isn't comunicated between eachother. And just because it is linear in the way flags are taken, doesn't mean your approach to getting that flag has to be linear. That's the beauty of it. I believe that AAS is a key part of this mod and should stay that way.

There is no doubt aas is good but there are some maps that just don't fit with it.

Oh yes, to the topic.

I think it should be as realistic as possible without degrading gameplay. I believe that is the goal of PR anyway, is it not? To make a more realistic BF2, not a Mil Sim. As stated, it isn't built into the engine to do so. Realism is great up to a point, then when it becomes a burden to you, it becomes no fun and you don't play. If noone plays the mod, there is no point to make it. IMO.

And why did my avatar and sigpic get removed along with my postcount. WTF? It won't let me put up another pic either. Wrong thread to post thi, I guess.

mg_roadster wrote:I think that AAS is what makes PRMM as good as it is. It helps focus the battle and prevents all the stupid flag hopping and such nonsence. It creates a virtual "front" to the battle and directs action to that area. When you are able to just grab any flag, you get more lone wolf types that just flag hop, all over the map taking flags by themselves. And then your army has to have some lone wolf types go and take back those empty flags. It shifts focus away from firefights and head on battles, to random people running around everywhere. Take oil fields for example. On a 64 player, that map is rediculous. Even with a full server, you can't find any concentrated action. It's always, take flag, move on, hit flag, move on. Maybe find some random guys that spawn there to kill.

With AAS, you wave a common goal, even if it isn't comunicated between eachother. And just because it is linear in the way flags are taken, doesn't mean your approach to getting that flag has to be linear. That's the beauty of it. I believe that AAS is a key part of this mod and should stay that way.

I have no quarrels with AAS per se as it offers a chance to focus forces, which is realistic. Bush wouldnt speak in front of 100,000 saying "OVER THERE IS IRAQ, CAPTURE IT!" and then leave them standing. I just dont like this specific implementation of AAS, where you only have a single line no matter what. In JO for example, there where no such limitations. One flag could open up to two, back down to one, up to 3 and so on. But granted, it would be complicated to hardcode this behaviour without access to new flag variables in the map gameplay files, its still cudos to the AAS devs that they've made it at all.

Its maybe a little offtopic, but the gameplay mode does have a very strong connection to realistic gameplay, after all.

I dissagree. It works in Counter-Strike, nuff said.

What? when's they last time you seen someone playing tactical and fearing for their lives in CS because they only have one life?

Sig215 wrote:What? when's they last time you seen someone playing tactical and fearing for their lives in CS because they only have one life?

Maybe 4 or 5 years ago, I cant remember exactly.

It also works in Operation Flashpoint... The ultimate realism military sim (so far). Maybe CS was the worse of examples. In CS it works due to the fact its very small levels. Cant translate that to BF2 unless someone makes such small levels (havent seen it so far as even the smallest level is larger, lol). In OFP it works due to objective gameplay mode and cooperative play (killing 50 AI soldiers and then die is a little more fulfilling than killing 1 player and then die). BF2 doesnt have that though. So its hard to translate that to BF2 too.