3D spotting

[Mjolnir]

I think the BF2142 style 3D spotting was the best implementation; only enemies that were very close by would be 3D spotted, and then only to your squad. In order to 3D spot an enemy you had to actually SEE them; you couldn't just spam Q like in the current "Battlefield" games. Otherwise, spotting was 2D map only spotting.

[Jimmuc]

sorry, i'm slightly confused on what "3D spotting" is exactly..is it the icon above an player's head?

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by Stardouser

I said "True enough, most of us won't quit over it", I never said it wasn't game ruining, I never said it wasn't a big deal. My view has not changed. If I didn't think it was ruinous, I wouldn't be talking about it. You might assume that just because someone continues to play a game that it means the problems aren't ruinous, but you have to understand that there is another concept that drives things: No viable alternative, aka, choosing the lesser evil. I do want to play shooter games, and MMO shooters with huge maps especially, I will not miss the opportunity to do so for 3D spotting, but it is still like a stinky turd on the same plate as my favorite food. No game will be perfect, that doesn't mean that game ruining features should be silently accepted.

You're dwelling too much on this I think, it was a moot point I made. I'm not going to argue the semantics of ruinous, but a ruined game is a crap game, I don't play crap games. You're clearly using some alternative definition to "ruined" than I am. On another note, I think you're drastically over emphasising here. I feel like you're taking this just a little too seriously.

As far as how to teach, it should be a simple matter of running players through an on-rails tutorial that exposes them to all aspects of the game. Using what you might call "bots" or simply scripted NPCs. The game says, "walk here", so you walk there, and it says, "see the enemy standing there? Look at your minimap", and then a red dot will blink on the minimap, and an explanation will pop up telling you why it is there, and what to do with it. For example.

A one time tutorial that takes at most 20 minutes (any more is just going to piss people off) and runs through everything in the game? No, throwing mechanics at people like that and then saying "here, go play the game" doesn't solve the problem for the section of people we're discussing. It does not teach them to use the mechanics, it teaches them of their existence. These are two different things, as I tried to explain with an example of teaching to use (zelda) in the prior post. Teaching to use in multiplayer is however exceedingly difficult because huge amounts of it are completely out of control of the designer though. It's a major issue that faces the changeover of gaming from predominantly single player to predominantly multiplayer.

[Stardouser]

Of course I take it seriously, this is a bitter pill to swallow that all these games will be casualized without end.

It's not about elitism, it's about fair play and skill on skill, not your skill and the help that the game gives you to even it up, against skill. And it's not about hardcore either.

Focusing on Battlefield since I can't speak for CoD or many other franchises, we all learned how to play with fair tools like 2D spotting prior to BC2, and it was easy. So long as the crutches are there, no one will need or even be able to learn. Once Battlefield did it for BC2, they were locked in, forced to do it for all future games because everyone who started with BC2 needs it due to having had no opportunity to learn to play without.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by Stardouser

It's not about elitism, it's about fair play and skill on skill, not your skill and the help that the game gives you to even it up, against skill. And it's not about hardcore either.

Now you are inferring that it is a mechanic that benefits some while not benefiting others. Fairness doesn't come into this argument at all, it's a mechanic that everyone uses and can use, therefore it is inherently balanced, it affects everyone equally because it can be used by everyone, equally.

I would however agree with you had your argument been aimed in the opposite direction, not suggesting that it's a matter of fairness or balance but that the mechanic benefits the organised and the skilled more than it benefits that of the casual. A side of players of relatively high skill level will utterly, unequivocally, without comparison, destroy teams of people that are disorganised.

[fod]

NO 3D spotting please
to me its one of the worst things in FPS games (bfbc2 and bf3)

we did just fine without it and games were much more fun

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by fod

NO 3D spotting please
to me its one of the worst things in FPS games (bfbc2 and bf3)

we did just fine without it and games were much more fun

Reasoning. Include it.

[Eyeklops]

3D spot speeds up kills, but it doesn't really help noobs too much. Why? Because, on the one side it helps noobs aim faster, but on the other it helps other people aim at the noobs faster as well. It's a double edged sword.

One thing it does for sure is lower the average lifespan. These "low skill" players that people say spotting will help are the ones that run out in the open, don't use cover, don't take cover fast enough, don't take cover facing the right direction, and do all sorts of other dumb shit that will get them killed faster with a spot over their head. You will have tons of noobs dying all the time because they are lit up like an x-mas tree and don't know it. At least if there is no 3D spotting they have a chance of running around longer before some sniper vet blows their head off shooting at a random spot marker.

Also, having a spot lowers the learning curve. To me, games with really low learning curves get boring fast if they make everything too easy. Granted, massive, long learning curves (EVE) can also turn players away, a balance has to be made. I think long range, large spot box, 3D spotting would make the game too easy.

So whats more frustrating? Having to look for your targets, or getting killed constantly because you have a damn spot over your head? I personally will take the option that keeps me alive a little longer and gives me some challenge.

I would however be ok with a 3d spot under either of these two conditions:

1. A person gets shot at and takes some % of damage. Light them up with a 3d spot for 5 sec tops, or until they duck behind cover.
2. A person is hiding behind cover, but is fully suppressed for more than 5 seconds. Put up a different marker that shows the general cover they are hiding behind. Drop the marker if they become less than some % suppressed.

[Kran De Loy]

Edit: I screwed this one up while trying to post a new reply, blarg. I ended up losing a piece at the bottom, grr...

Originally Posted by Jimmuc

sorry, i'm slightly confused on what "3D spotting" is exactly..is it the icon above an player's head?

Yes. Some games use it when enemies shoot at you, some when they're in radar range, some when a player uses a hotkey command line. I personally think it should be used for all vehicles and MAX units WHILE UNDER FACTION OWNED RADAR (within range of bases, variables depending on if bases are upgradable or the type of the base)

[ThirdCross]

Skitrel your major argument seems to be that 3D spotting is a substitution for VoIP for newer players and those players that choose not to use it. The problem with 3D spotting though is that it goes above and beyond the benefits of VoIP. You get a marker directly on the player spotted, the marker then tracks the player and even if the player gets behind cover it will continue to track the player when he leaves that cover.

Aside from that 3D spotting doesn't even allow you to do things that you could do with VoIP such as, spotting enemies beyond your teammates direct line of sight. You know, what spotting is generally thought as. 2D spotting, such as what was in PS1, covers this well for the most part.

2D spotting along with some kind of spotting menu system, e.x. being able to mark a building as being occupied or being able to mark cover as having enemies behind it with 3D markers, could create a psuedo-VoIP spotting system for those players that won't use VoIP.

[Kran De Loy]

Also regarding 3d spotting on infantry, if the SL and Infil are the only ones to be able to spot and only for their squad, or if the SL can spot for multiple squads that he commands then it would be great for teaching n00bs where to look for enemies (again, only Static spotting) as it would be a limited use thing when against infantry as only the SL in charge would be able to use them. Also if there are multiple squads working together like in my 3 squad example those noobs in say Squad 1 would get 1 spotter while those in Squad 2 would get 2 spotters and those in Squad 3 would also get 2 spotters.

[Duddy]

I think the use of 3D spotting only within your squad/platoon and only by infiltrators is a good fit.

2D for everyone else otherwise.

[Kran De Loy]

Oh also, 3d spotting is single target only, has to be in LOS of the spotter.

And Static. Doesn't follow the player spotted.

THis way it would be an excellent target calling mechanism without being broken. Specially if it's for Squad Leaders and Infil only.

It's not 3d Spotting that teaches n00bs. It's target calling that teaches n00bs.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by ThirdCross

Skitrel your major argument seems to be that 3D spotting is a substitution for VoIP for newer players and those players that choose not to use it. The problem with 3D spotting though is that it goes above and beyond the benefits of VoIP. You get a marker directly on the player spotted, the marker then tracks the player and even if the player gets behind cover it will continue to track the player when he leaves that cover.

I agree, it goes too far. No argument here at all. I believe I mentioned somewhere in the many walls of text that I feel like 3D spotting might work properly with some adjustment however.

Personally, the changes I would make to it would be to mix together model visibility checks (easily done client side) with the suggestion for static markers. If an enemy is 50% visible then he gets marked and while he remains mostly visible to the person marking he remains marked. When he moves to cover however that mark remains as a static marker at the cover, disappearing after 3 seconds. The same goes for say an enemy concealed in foliage, it will instead place a static marker that disappears after 3 seconds.

The key in this is that it is ONLY the marker's visibility affecting the marking, nobody else's, this represents a simulation of individual soldiers communicating what they specifically see. None of this magical marking behind cover for a few seconds or seeing moving markers through smoke.

A few other measures that need taking for such a system, smoke, or in general any particle effects whatsoever. When these take place in a part of the screen a marker is present the client should make the marker invisible. The data might still be sent but his client is making it invisible so as to remove the benefit. No extra strain on server, not really an issue for hacking because if they're going to hack they're just going to use full on wallhacks anyway.

Most importantly of all, absolutely zero 3D markers should show to any player through any walls, ever. Markers should only ever show when a player can also see the enemy. You can't preaim an opponent utilising a marker as he rounds a corner with this method.

This, in my opinion, removes many of the issues with spotting, players aren't cheated when they know they're not visible but get prefired by someone who knew their presence due to an earlier mark as they round the corner, despite not being visible to anything at that point in time, and so on. And, beneficially, it preserves the beneficial aspects of 3D spotting towards teamwork, or more specifically, the problem of simulating voip communication at a military level.

2D spotting along with some kind of spotting menu system, e.x. being able to mark a building as being occupied or being able to mark cover as having enemies behind it with 3D markers, could create a psuedo-VoIP spotting system for those players that won't use VoIP. The spotting menu system could be broken up into spots from your friends, squad, platoon, outfit, and empire. This way you could choose to only see spots from your squad or outfit.

I feel like this kind of thing has been tested before for some reason, it just feels, generally, dated. For some reason I have that feeling in my mind about it but I'm not sure why. Regardless, I don't disagree with you, the issue being that it would need to be rather highly visible, and the further issue being that "enemies in that building" is often blindingly obvious and nowhere near specific enough in any form of communication, so it might be a little superfluous to even have something like that at all.

[Hmr85]

I voted none. I am of the opinion of just keeping it out. With the built in Voip in the game this go around people should have the ability to communicate to the people around them when they identify targets. Essentially calling out where they are at and where they are hiding. This is assuming the built in Voip works as they have said.