Vision

[Per]

The current vision rules in Warzone is an unstable mix of realism and unrealism. As I've written before, the vision and shooting systems are based on raycasting, not merely distance. However, it is not a 'perfect' raycasting in any way, and its implications might be quite non-intuitive even if it were.

Some points to think about concerning the current system:

• Just because you can see a tile (tile not under "sensor fog"), does not always mean you can see units on that tile. If the unit is small, the angles of surrounding terrain may still hide it.
• Conversely, just because you cannot see a tile (tile in "sensor fog"), does not mean you cannot see units on it. In fact, you might always be able to see units on this tile, even if you cannot see the tile itself.
• As a result of the two above points, the sensor view system, that was so much requested, is in fact a lie. There are very often large, false blind spots in it that can urge you to build far more sensors or place units to watch areas than you need. Unfortunately, there is no way to really fix this, as there is no way to accurately illustrate the area where you have vision.(1)
• Just because a unit can see another unit, does not mean it can shoot at it. This is because the vision system does not take into account buildings in the way, while the shooting system does.
• Walls cannot see things, and they can stop you from shooting, but you cannot hide behind them.
• You cannot shoot through friendly defenses (eg walls) or buildings, negating much of the point of building walls in the first place.
• Direct fire defensive buildings may easily be obstructed by angles in the terrain that you cannot see when viewing the terrain in the usual camera angle (from above).

I hit the points above head on when making ECM jammer support. Since you need to cache vision results quite heavily to avoid a severe performance degradation, I made it rely on the results of terrain vision, which is also how we calculate the sensor view. This means that whether or not your vision (radar) is jammed at a tile would depend on whether you can see the terrain tile. The resulting area covered by the jammer will by patchy (and when on a moving unit - can be quite shifty) when obstructed by terrain. This makes it even harder to understand why or when you can or cannot see something.

I am not sure what to make of all this. The requests of for more 'realism' have been heeded lately in the code, as everyone agreed that it looks weird when projectiles go through terrain. It was only natural then that projectiles also would not clip straight through buildings. But the consequences for game play may have been considered sufficiently in either case.

Comments and ideas welcome.

1) Not entirely true. You could get very close if we made light rays come out of each game object capable of seeing and used a ray-tracing engine to draw our graphics. But this is not within the realm of the feasible.

[Deus Siddis]

* Just because you can see a tile (tile not under "sensor fog"), does not always mean you can see units on that tile. If the unit is small, the angles of surrounding terrain may still hide it.
* Conversely, just because you cannot see a tile (tile in "sensor fog"), does not mean you cannot see units on it. In fact, you might always be able to see units on this tile, even if you cannot see the tile itself.
* As a result of the two above points, the sensor view system, that was so much requested, is in fact a lie. There are very often large, false blind spots in it that can urge you to build far more sensors or place units to watch areas than you need. Unfortunately, there is no way to really fix this, as there is no way to accurately illustrate the area where you have vision.(1)

Isn't this also kind of a good thing though? For example, if you hide a squad of cyborgs behind a hill while a column of enemy main battle tanks passes by, then you run into their base and start torching it. . . that sounds more like using good terrain and stealth tactics than an exploit, IMO.

I mean it seems reasonable that your recon data isn't fool proof, that it has small gaps that a very clever enemy maybe could use against you.

* Just because a unit can see another unit, does not mean it can shoot at it. This is because the vision system does not take into account buildings in the way, while the shooting system does.
* Walls cannot see things, and they can stop you from shooting, but you cannot hide behind them.

I don't think this is critical to have, but could the engine's vision system take buildings into account? Maybe this should be a request for a future feature- structures should obstruct vision like terrain.

* You cannot shoot through friendly defenses (eg walls) or buildings, negating much of the point of building walls in the first place.
* Direct fire defensive buildings may easily be obstructed by angles in the terrain that you cannot see when viewing the terrain in the usual camera angle (from above).

Again I think this is a matter of using good tactics (that you weren't rewarded for using until now). Put short bunkers and emplacements in front of taller towers and hard points. Put mobile units on your flanks (like cavalry in the ancient days).

In general, arrange units and structures into formations where they have fields of fire on any nearby choke point. Use high ground whenever possible to shoot well above any obstructions. Maybe factor terrain when planning VTOL attack routes as well (if they are affected by this change?)

Use the view rotation to check line of site when necessary, before deploying defenses or planning invasion routes. The view orientation features might get more usage now.

[milo christiansen]

Use the view rotation to check line of site when necessary

True, if you rotate the view level with the ground you can see dips and valleys that may become blind spots, very helpful.

If targeting takes buildings into account why can't vision?

Can the vision system place a imaginary unit on every tile and use that to determine vision? or would that create problems with different unit sizes?

I personally like the new "can't shoot through your own buildings" thing. I think it adds a lot of realism to an already realistic (for an rts) game. The only thing that needs to be fixed is diferent height buildings firing over each other.

The one thing I hate about most rtses is the physics and realism, or lack thereof. Warzone is the one notable exception to this and the vision system ices the cake.

[effigy]

I don't have any issue with the current vision system, and I can't say much more than I have already about targeting (I don't think my opinion has changed much).

However, I'll summarize:

• Walls should stop enemy fire and friendly, and give a place to hide
• Direct fire defensive structures should be able to fire through like structures.
• Forts should fire over Hard points > hard points > towers > walls & bunkers
• Bunkers should be able to shoot through towers, but not hardpoints, etc
• units should be able to shoot over bunkers, and through towers, but not hardpoints, etc
• Base structures should allow friendly fire
• Direct fire defensive structures should "see" units that are touching it
• terrain should stop projectiles
• Indirect fire weapons should fire over terrain

I think that's a nice balance between realism and fun game play.

[lav_coyote25]

I don't have any issue with the current vision system, and I can't say much more than I have already about targeting (I don't think my opinion has changed much).
However, I'll summarize:

• Walls should stop enemy fire and friendly, and give a place to hide
• Direct fire defensive structures should be able to fire through like structures.
• Forts should fire over Hard points > hard points > towers > walls & bunkers
• Bunkers should be able to shoot through towers, but not hardpoints, etc
• units should be able to shoot over bunkers, and through towers, but not hardpoints, etc
• Base structures should allow friendly fire
• Direct fire defensive structures should "see" units that are touching it
• terrain should stop projectiles
• Indirect fire weapons should fire over terrain

I think that's a nice balance between realism and fun game play.

What? you mean it doesnt do this now???

[effigy]

AFAIK, some of those items are in the current Master.