Spotting.

[SharpeXB]

5 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

So, we should just leave it like that - limits of display tech simulating non realistic way of spotting objects in-game?  

What other choice is there? Monitors and displays are only capable of so much. A color depth of 16.7 million colors and a contrast range of about 1000:1. The size of monitors isn’t likely to change much as there is only so much size you can place on a desktop. 

There is room for improvement in color space and resolution. Eventually everyone will own HDR screens the same way that 1080p 16:9 flat panels replaced CRTs 

5 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

give us BMS/CloD/WarthunderSIM scaling

You act like 1CGS hasn’t seen these other games. Clearly they don’t think those solutions are better or they would have emulated them already. 

Edited October 21, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

 

9 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

What other choice is there? Monitors and displays are only capable of so much. A color depth of 16.7 million colors and a contrast range of about 1000:1. The size of monitors isn’t likely to change much as there is only so much size you can place on a desktop. 

There is room for improvement in color space and resolution. Eventually everyone will own HDR screens the same way that 1080p 16:9 flat panels replaced CRTs

 

And this is exactly what people are doing to give themselves and edge - increasing contrast by lowering gama & using reshade. Also, I have already shown the difference with dot pitch here:

 

which gives, depending on the monitor (dot pitch) size an advantage to certain users. Then there is 3Dmigoto mod that gives VR users a nice zoom effect...

 

Users will continue to find new solutions to this problem unless devs do something to mitigate it.

 

9 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

You act like 1CGS hasn’t seen these other games. Clearly they don’t think those solutions are better or they would have emulated them. 

 

Unless you can back up this statement with an actual quote, this is nothing more than your own opinion.

Edited October 21, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

And this is exactly what people are doing to give themselves and edge - increasing contrast by lowering gama & using reshade.

So if people think that helps then they can continue to do so. That’s why we have graphic settings. I think perhaps you can make the situation worse by changing your gamma to such an extreme though. 

 

What the Devs could do to help is give the game a gamma setting screen like many other games have. The trouble with trying to adjust your gamma so much is there is no calibration image in the game to tell you whether it’s correct or not. I get the impression many people are actually making the situation worse with all those adjustments. 

 

1 hour ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Unless you can back up this statement with an actual quote, this is nothing more than your own opinion.

 

 

It’s just fully obvious that the people at 1CGS have seen every other flight sim game that’s ever been made. Some of them made CloD. If they’ve chosen not to emulate certain features then it’s for a good reason. 

AFAIK no other sim has used “smart scaling” besides Falcon BMS. That doesn’t make smart scaling some universally good idea if only one game used it. 

Edited October 21, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

FYI: Forcing such low gama values increases contrast = makes spotting easier. OTOH (to me at least) it looks ugly and therefore I won't be using it no matter the benefit it gives.

 

Again, unless you can back up that statement with facts or an actual quote, it is merely your own opinion. Better, an assumption.

 

The only thing obvious here is that you have no clue what other solutions are being used and where (except ED's failed attempt), and why spotting works better in other sims. When you study CloD and WarthunderSIM you can come back to this discussion.

 

I will again make my suggestion: Either offer us a compromise as a new one-option spotting system, or keep the Expert for ShapeXB and similar hard core enthusiasts, and fix the borked ALT spotting (unrealistic rendering distance) with something that is proven to work in other simulators (e.g. Cliffs of Dover Blitz or Warthunder SIM mode).

 

Edited October 21, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[=EXPEND=Tripwire]

As a 1st gen VR user,  I prefer the normal visibility over alternate. Seeing dots way off in the distance, only to have them disappear within 10km feels wrong.

 

What has changed significantly for the worse is spotting and identifying from 1km to anything less than the original 9.5km range in either mode. It has gone from very hard (and something most VR players had to get used to - some giving up), to incredibly difficult, migoto mod and all.

 

[SharpeXB]

17 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

When you study CloD and WarthunderSIM you can come back to this discussion.

...

with something that is proven to work in other simulators (e.g. Cliffs of Dover Blitz ...

 

Did you know?

Cliffs of Dover was made by 1C Maddox Games

which merged with 777 Studios (makers of Rise of Flight)

to become 1C Game Studios. Who makes this game!

So you don’t think they know everything about Cliffs of Dover? ?

 

 

[[DBS]TH0R]

I do believe that I have made that statement (Blitz being a part of these very forums) at least twice in this thread. Thus, the point of your post eludes me.

 

Seeing for how long we were stuck with poor visibility in this sim, I doubt they paid much attention to this problem until recently.

 

Here is a question for you @SharpeXB: why isn't there a problem with visibility in Cliffs of Dover Blitz?

Edited October 21, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[Dakpilot]

Is it possible to run CloD Blitz in 640x480 and be an uber spotter?

 

I heard this was a  popular exploit in original CloD and IL-2 46 etc. 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

[Barnacles]

2 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

FYI: Forcing such low gama values increases contrast = makes spotting easier. OTOH (to me at least) it looks ugly and therefore I won't be using it no matter the benefit it gives.

 

Again, unless you can back up that statement with facts or an actual quote, it is merely your own opinion. Better, an assumption.

 

The only thing obvious here is that you have no clue what other solutions are being used and where (except ED's failed attempt), and why spotting works better in other sims. When you study CloD and WarthunderSIM you can come back to this discussion.

 

I will again make my suggestion: Either offer us a compromise as a new one-option spotting system, or keep the Expert for ShapeXB and similar hard core enthusiasts, and fix the borked ALT spotting (unrealistic rendering distance) with something that is proven to work in other simulators (e.g. Cliffs of Dover Blitz or Warthunder SIM mode).

 

It's a difficult question as it seems so dependent on who's playing as to what their opinion on each version of spotting. I really trust Thor's judgement and I'm hundred percent sure that expert is in no way realistic for him, but for me (without any low gamma monkey business or other such nonsense) expert spotting (which I'm sure uses some level of mild scaling btw) is, realistic for me. Ie it compares well for me in real life. 

 

The question is, how do the Devs make Thor and my system give a similar experience.

 

I think a good starter for ten would be to render distant contacts not as a discrete number of pixels but as a percentage width of a screen. Eg currently I reckon and suspect if one contact is rendered at 4x4 pixels at a particular distance on 1080p it'll be 4x4 on a 4k monitor. It should be 8x8. Ok so that means that they'll be equally as easy to spot, but the 4k user will have an easier time identifying, but when someone's got better kit, they're going to have some sort of advantage. This is coming from someone who has a rift cv1 or a hd monitor.

 

Ps for me il2 box is better at spotting than clod and DC's.

O

5 minutes ago, Dakpilot said:

Is it possible to run CloD Blitz in 640x480 and be an uber spotter?

 

I heard this was a  popular exploit in original CloD and IL-2 46 etc. 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

Yep because effectively clod used icons at long range, it just happened that that icon was a 1x1 pixel dot. With a shade depending on contrast.

Edited October 21, 2019 by 71st_AH_Barnacles
Ps

[Dakpilot]

With the lengths people go to gain an advantage it would seem that CloD type Spotting is not something to be put on a pedestal as ideal to be emulated. 

 

Does Bos alternate have the same issue running low res? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

[Barnacles]

13 minutes ago, Dakpilot said:

With the lengths people go to gain an advantage it would seem that CloD type Spotting is not something to be put on a pedestal as ideal to be emulated. 

 

Does Bos alternate have the same issue running low res? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

Not sure. probably not exactly the same. I'm not totally sure about the relative LoDs in BoX at different resolutions because I don't have a 4k monitor to check. I suspect it may not be quite as straightforward, because the game seems to do different things at different ranges, in both expert and alternative spotting. Remember alternative only came about because they got the scale factor wrong at one particular range of distances.

[RedKestrel]

17 minutes ago, Dakpilot said:

With the lengths people go to gain an advantage it would seem that CloD type Spotting is not something to be put on a pedestal as ideal to be emulated. 

 

Does Bos alternate have the same issue running low res? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

For reference I have a 1920 x 1080 monitor.

From what I can tell from my own experience and seeing others commenting on the forums, I would say that the higher your resolution, the less glaring the issues are with Alt spotting and the harder expert spotting becomes.  

Expert spotting, for me, does not present the glaring issues other people have, nor do I find it that much harder to spot and track aircraft at close ranges since the patch - it is about the same as before to me (although I think spotting against ground clutter in game is the real shortcoming in spotting, not the range at which contacts are spotted). Spotting past 9 or 10 km or so is difficult but not impossible and tracks reasonably well with my own real life experience.

For me, alt spotting at 1080p resulted in contacts being hugely inflated and colored bright white by scaling at extreme ranges and then nearly or actually disappearing when they got closer. From screenshots other people have posted at 1440p or 4K, it seems this effect is more subdued but still present at higher resolutions. 

So, in effect, I believe that long range spotting benefits somewhat from a lower resolution screen for both visibility systems, but under alt spotting it is magnified even more because of the scaling. At the same time, I think the rapid reduction in scaling as contacts cross the 8-10 km threshold is subjectively much worse at lower resolutions than it appears on higher resolution displays. 

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Here is a question for you @SharpeXB: why isn't there a problem with visibility in Cliffs of Dover Blitz?

I have not played Blitz

I do remember vanilla CloD being really awful at visibility. It had a bad inverse zoom effect, muted colors and lacked any antialiasing. 

Hopefully Blitz fixed these shortcomings but I’ve not played it. 

1 hour ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

 

I think a good starter for ten would be to render distant contacts not as a discrete number of pixels but as a percentage width of a screen.

How is the game going to know the width of your screen? Before you answer that it will read a hardware ID just consider how many different makes and models of monitors and displays there are. 

1 hour ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

Yep because effectively clod used icons at long range, it just happened that that icon was a 1x1 pixel dot. With a shade depending on contrast.

Which creates an inverse zoom effect and encourages players to turn down their resolution. No thanks. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

15 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

I have not played Blitz

I do remember vanilla CloD being really awful at visibility. It had a bad inverse zoom effect, muted colors and lacked any antialiasing. 

Hopefully Blitz fixed these shortcomings but I’ve not played it.

 

How come this phrase "I don't like that solution to the problem" sounds familiar...? Where did I hear or read about it before, in which thread? ?

 

What about the other example here, Warthunder Sim mode?

 

15 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

How is the game going to know the width of your screen? Before you answer that it will read a hardware ID just consider how many different makes and models of monitors and displays there are.

 

You've been told how already, yet you ignored the answer like you to with most of the arguments presented here:

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/win32/api/shellscalingapi/nf-shellscalingapi-getdpiformonitor

 

15 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

 

Which creates an inverse zoom effect and encourages players to turn down their resolution. No thanks. 

 

It was already established in this thread several times (also, just read few posts above) that smaller resolution (e.g. 1080p vs 1440p) gives the edge with pixel spotting... er, sorry realistic visibility. So tell me, how is IL-2 GB different in this regard?

 

EDIT: If SharpeXB can repeat himself so many times in this thread, then so can I... Once again, if the two visibility systems are here to stay - I would kindly like to ask the developers to fix the ATL spotting, or better yet replace it with one of the proven, yet imperfect solutions that work in other flight sims. That way the Expert visibility crowd can enjoy the Expert visibility, and those of us who don't like either methods can finally enjoy a realistic spotting in-game with an imperfect system that gets the job done. Thank you for sparing the time to read this.

Edited October 22, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

9 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

What about the other example here, Warthunder Sim mode?

War Thunder isn’t my thing... seriously do you think a guy here who obviously prefers realism is going to be playing War Thunder?

11 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

 

You've been told how already, yet you ignored the answer like you to with most of the arguments presented here:

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/win32/api/shellscalingapi/nf-shellscalingapi-getdpiformonitor

Why do I have a hard time imagining they’re going to have the game interpret your monitor size...? 

[[DBS]TH0R]

6 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

War Thunder isn’t my thing... seriously do you think a guy here who obviously prefers realism is going to be playing War Thunder?

 

Neither is mine, however I am always looking for solutions to the problem. That is like saying MS flight sim has poor FMs (apparently X-plane beasts MS by a long margin I'm told), we better not look anything they are doing... How yes no. Simply because that isn't a flight sim game on the same level of realism, it doesn't mean they didn't do few things better or deserve a comparison.

 

PS: You already have one guy here who plays both. I bet he isn't the only one in this thread.

Edited October 21, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

13 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

It was already established in this thread several times (also, just read few posts above) that smaller resolution (e.g. 1080p vs 1440p) gives the edge with pixel spotting... er, sorry realistic visibility. So tell me, how is IL-2 GB different in this regard?

Yes for what I gather Alternate Visibility gives lower resolution an edge in seeing distant aircraft, 

probably because their LODs are a fixed pixel size. I don’t see anyone stating that about Normal Visibility. It’s one of the things that’s broken or odd looking about AV

If any game is forcing the size of a distant aircraft to even one pixel, then;

- It’s going to make that distant aircraft “huge” relative to its environment if it’s very far away. 

- it would give lower resolutions with bigger pixels a boost. 

So it’s not a very good solution. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

7 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Yes for what I gather Alternate Visibility gives lower resolution an edge in seeing distant aircraft, 

probably because their LODs are a fixed pixel size. I don’t see anyone stating that about Normal Visibility. It’s one of the things that’s broken or odd looking about AV

If any game is forcing the size of a distant aircraft to even one pixel, then;

- It’s going to make that distant aircraft “huge” relative to its environment if it’s very far away. 

- it would give lower resolutions with bigger pixels a boost. 

So it’s not a very good solution. 

 

Didn't read anyone stating it or did you perhaps deliberately miss it? ?

 

Your ignorance never stops to amaze me. Hint: see @RedKestrel's post above. He even used Italic for the word "both".

Edited October 21, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

2 hours ago, RedKestrel said:

So, in effect, I believe that long range spotting benefits somewhat from a lower resolution screen for both visibility systems, 

Have you tested this on actual screens of different resolutions? How would you arrive at this conclusion?

38 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Hint: see @RedKestrel's post above. He even used Italic for the word "both".

Did RK actually test this on different screens?

2 hours ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

 

I think a good starter for ten would be to render distant contacts not as a discrete number of pixels but as a percentage width of a screen. Eg currently I reckon and suspect if one contact is rendered at 4x4 pixels at a particular distance on 1080p it'll be 4x4 on a 4k monitor. It should be 8x8. Ok so that means that they'll be equally as easy to spot, but the 4k user will have an easier time identifying, but when someone's got better kit, they're going to have some sort of advantage.

If you force a distant aircraft to any size besides what’s real. It will appear gigantic. If you don’t force it, it will become invisible as it de-renders smaller than a pixel. Rather a Catch-22

I think what we are getting now is

Normal = not forced 

Alternate = forced. 

Edited October 21, 2019 by SharpeXB

[RedKestrel]

11 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

 

Didn't read anyone stating it or did you perhaps deliberately miss it? ?

 

Your ignorance never stops to amaze me. Hint: see @RedKestrel's post above. He even used Italic for the word "both".

It must be said that this is my understanding from reading and posting on this forum. I don't know if it REALLY works that way. I am not a programmer, a graphics expert, or a pilot. I'm just trying to sort out why things look so differently on everyone's displays.

 

4 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Have you tested this on actual screens of different resolutions? How would you arrive at this conclusion?

Did RK actually test this on different screens?

I have only tested on 1080p, others have tested and shown evidence (screenshots, video, etc) from 1440 and 4k which look quite different to my experience on 1080p, which makes me believe that for normal vis there is a slight advantage at 1080p at spotting at a distance. People are showing contacts being invisible at 8.5km away plus at 1440p, while I know I have consistently spotted contacts at those distances under largely similar circumstances and settings, with the only real difference being screen resolution. I don't think these people are making arguments in bad faith, so I have to try and figure out why we get such different experiences.

I THINK the game renders a pixel at a distance that it determine an aircraft should be visible to the pilot given certain conditions, and the size of this pixel may be larger on a lower resolution screen than a higher resolution screen - ergo a given person may spot an aircraft earlier on 1080p since the pixel is larger. This may not be how it works, it is my theory based on what I have seen on my setup and evidence from others. 

Alt vis definitely has this, and at 1080p it makes the alt vis system very jarring for me. But for others, at higher res, the contacts don't seem quite so ridiculous. A collection of 4 pixels on my screen is larger than a collection of 4 on a 4k screen, so to them it is perfectly fine but for me it looks like a 747.

Others here may be more experienced than me and I am just stating my opinions and trying to help improve spotting for everyone.
 

[SharpeXB]

This is all moot anyways. Jason said they don’t plan on working on this “for the foreseeable future” or at least “for now, maybe later”. They appear to have other priorities 

 

 

 AnP is satisfied that Normal is realistic looking enough. 

 

 

Alternate is a gamey game mode for fun so it doesn’t justify any more work. It is what it is. There’s no point in trying to make fun game mode “more realistic”

Edited October 22, 2019 by SharpeXB

[gimpy117]

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

This is all moot anyways. Jason said they don’t plan on working on this anymore.

 AnP is satisfied that Normal is realistic looking.

Alternate is a gamey game mode for fun so it doesn’t justify any more work. It is what it is. There’s no point in trying to make fun game mode “more realistic”

and yes, we all know we don't want to have fun in a video game. 

I've played RoF, Clod, and this game and I can't recall spotting every being as difficult in this game especially now. and I think "realistic looking" only is under certain circumstances on certain hardware. 

I think the most disappointing thing to me is that something that challenged the status quo of super tweaked hardware and settings finally got challenged by somehting that was "a mistake" and the carpet was being pulled from under us. I've never had more fun in IL2 Bos than when spotting was pre hot-fix. also for some reason I never got the disappearing dots problem, I could stay in max FOV and follow a target in (if I didn't zoom in). I was under the assumption this was how it worked for everyone 

Edited October 21, 2019 by gimpy117

[CountZero]

14 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

 

So, we should just leave it like that - limits of display tech simulating non realistic way of spotting objects in-game? Or just wait for X number of years until HDR monitors become standard and in the meantime don't do anything to help and improve the flight sim we all love here. Even that is a "big if" HDR will help. Great thinking and logic = scr** the customers. ?

 

Alternate visibility is solving some, and inflating other problems. In other words, repeating the same mistake DCS did a while back. When developing a game (or any project by that matter), I don't see a logic in repeating other people/developer mistakes. Instead, one should look for successful solutions and pick up / improve from there. Especially in DCS regard, whose developers did not understand the problem to begin with.

 

The bolded statement: is the core of your thinking problem, right there. Replace "aircraft artificially rendered at 2x the size of what they see in IL-2" with "a compromise in order to bridge the gap of display technology and real life spotting". For which you have no understanding what so ever simply because you yourself do not have a problem on your system / don't like the solutions offered. More importantly, the simple fact is that in reality you just don't like scaling in any way, which you continuously back up (i.e. try to "hide") with one bad example / attempt at solving the problem as "a proof" that it cannot be done with today's hardware - yet we have listed many examples here how it can be and what benefits it would bring. Do you now start to notice the arrogance within your posts that gets so many people agitated here?

 

The bolded statement in red: no one here is arguing that, on the contrary. Once again, for n-th time: we would like to have realistic rendering distance with Scaling or Alternate systems. Not the "40km seeing-eye".

 

 

 

Here is a suggestion: leave Expert as is, and give us BMS/CloD/WarthunderSIM scaling as an ALT mode and let people chose which to use online. Or are @SharpeXB and @77.CountZero too afraid that people might flock to ALT spotting then? ?

 

As long as things stay like they are, people will find all sorts of solutions to help themselves out (e.g. lowering gamma to super low values, 3Dmigoto mod). Scaling or ATL spotting eliminates that need and gives everyone equal playing field.

 

Last but not least, IL-2 GB already features HUD scaling (predefined size no matter the resolution). Why not use the similar principle/algorithm for airplane contacts?

I belive if any changes come it will be to inprove alt ON, why would they tuch alt off when its how they belive realistic should be.

If ppl go to alt On more, i just join that server if it has more ppl when i play, like i say i dont like either option, but have no problem playing on them after i can se in tests what to expect, alt off is better as i have only one problem with it, alt of is worst as i have 2 problems with it, but if server is using on or off dont make big problem for me. But i dont expect any quick changes like some belive have to happend, from what i see devs make vis they wonted with OFF option, and only ON option could get modified if devs feal like it (have time off other improvments on schedule).

[Barnacles]

2 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

 

If you force a distant aircraft to any size besides what’s real. It will appear gigantic. If you don’t force it, it will become invisible as it de-renders smaller than a pixel. 

Not what I was saying at all, in fact quite the opposite.

4 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

 

How is the game going to know the width of your screen? 

It's not going to know that. It just needs to know the resolution. I think you got the wrong end of the stick here probably I was unclear. The physical size of the screen has nothing to do with my point about resolution. It's the size of the screen in pixels.

Edited October 21, 2019 by 71st_AH_Barnacles

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, gimpy117 said:

and yes, we all know we don't want to have fun in a video game. 

Well you’ve got it as an option now. Since that’s your definition of fun. 

1 hour ago, 77.CountZero said:

I belive if any changes come it will be to inprove alt ON,

Why try to improve Alternate Visibility when it’s just a setting for fun and there’s no real definition of what fun is? For some people it’s fun to see aircraft 40km away. For some it’s not. Also Alternate Visibility was already “corrected” by removing it since it was actually a bug. Why should they try to improve a bug? If people think it’s fun already then why bother?

12 minutes ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

 

It's not. It just needs to know the resolution. I think you got the wrong end of the stick here, the physical size of the screen has nothing to do with my point about resolution. 

What would be the purpose? If it’s to force a certain minimum size, even a single pixel, it’s going to artificially over-enhance other aircraft. That’s what we have in Alternate right now. So instead of seeing giant blobs more in 1080p you’ll see also them in 4K too?

[[CPT]Crunch]

In the end it isn't realism that's the deciding factor, its the wallet.  Good luck.

[[DBS]TH0R]

13 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

This is all moot anyways. Jason said they don’t plan on working on this anymore.

 AnP is satisfied that Normal is realistic looking.

Alternate is a gamey game mode for fun so it doesn’t justify any more work. It is what it is. There’s no point in trying to make fun game mode “more realistic”

 

Where did Jason say this? Link please.

 

Doesn't justify for you, since you prefer Expert why should you care what is being done to the ALT mode? Selfish reason or being afraid people will start to like it more?

 

11 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

Well you’ve got it as an option now. Since that’s your definition of fun. 

Why try to improve Alternate Visibility when it’s just a setting for fun and there’s no real definition of what fun is? For some people it’s fun to see aircraft 40km away. For some it’s not. Also Alternate Visibility was already “corrected” by removing it since it was actually a bug. Why should they try to improve a bug? If people think it’s fun already then why bother?

What would be the purpose? If it’s to force a certain minimum size, even a single pixel, it’s going to artificially over-enhance other aircraft. That’s what we have in Alternate right now. So instead of seeing giant blobs more in 1080p you’ll see also them in 4K too?

 

It is not fun seeing aircraft at 40km. I guess some things need to be repeated 100(0) times for you to understand: no we don't want to see planes at 40km. We want to see a compromise that better simulates realistic spotting and bridges the gap of today's display technology.

 

No, people don't think it is fun seeing planes at 40km. Some people have no option but to use it since Expert is "worse of two evil" for them. Will you now be telling people how to have fun?! LMAO...

 

Again, why should you care since you are so content with Expert? Selfish reason or being afraid people will start to like it more?

 

Like talking to a wall... ?

 

EDIT: If SharpeXB can repeat himself so many times in this thread, then so can I... Once again, if the two visibility systems are here to stay - I would kindly like to ask the developers to fix the ATL spotting, or better yet replace it with one of the proven, yet imperfect solutions that work in other flight sims. That way the Expert visibility crowd can enjoy the Expert visibility, and those of us who don't like either methods can finally enjoy a realistic spotting in-game with an imperfect system that gets the job done. Thank you for sparing the time to read this.

 

 

8 hours ago, [CPT]Crunch said:

In the end it isn't realism that's the deciding factor, its the wallet.  Good luck.

 

And there you have it. In the end, the wallet is a deciding factor. If scaling proves to be a hit and brings in many more players that do enjoy the game - it is the only logical way to go (without sacrificing too much of the elitist realism as shown here). But how will SharpeXB's around the world cope with it... I wonder. ?

 

 

16 hours ago, Dakpilot said:

With the lengths people go to gain an advantage it would seem that CloD type Spotting is not something to be put on a pedestal as ideal to be emulated. 

 

Does Bos alternate have the same issue running low res? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

 

Thank you for a constructive post and pointing out the downside of a different system. I am not trying to gain an advantage here, merely discussing different solutions and ways to approach the problem. And not dismissing it all together and burying my head into the sand like some here do.

 

Yes, old '46s did offer a spotting advantage if one wanted to play like it was 1998 @ 640x480 resolution (I just recently spoke with a dude who admits he was using this exploit 10 years back). However, all of this can be nullified with smart programming and many of such disadvantages can be programmed in to not work with today's hardware. As long there is a will to do so.

 

Neither system is perfect, and when you weigh pros and cons I value other solutions more than the two currently available in IL-2 GB.

Edited October 22, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

3 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Where did Jason say this? Link please.

Well my wording wasn’t quite right. The actual post is linked in my revised post. 

 

3 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

It is not fun seeing aircraft at 40km. 

Apparently 41.8% of people on KOTA do think it’s fun. Who am I to argue?

 

 

Edited October 22, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

Thank you for linking Jason's reply. I did indeed miss it.

 

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

Apparently 41.8% of people on KOTA do think it’s fun. Who am I to argue?

 

Yet again, completely missing the part "worse of two evil". ?

 

EDIT: Even funnier, it is actually 48.1%, not 41.8% as you posted. Can you even C/P correctly...? ?

 

 

After 8 pages now (especially after reading Jason's reply) I have come to the conclusion:

1. Devs still haven't got the message / info needed in order to improve the visibility further in this sim, for which many here have presented various problems - therefore it ever so more important to continue discussing and debating them, so that we can help them out.
2. Based on your replies one can presume you most likely don't read the majority of the things replied to your posts, and with 99.9% certainty I can now state that you:

• a) have no compassion for the people in this thread that have problem with visibility in this sim, as you yourself have none
• b) are not contributing to the discussion in any meaningful and helpful way, worse still, are deliberately attempting to stop 1. 
• c) are continuously misinterpreting replies posted back at you
• d) attempting to define how people should or shouldn't think, or funniest of all trying to define what is / isn't fun

 

Can we get this thread back on the subject and try to present our problems to the developers in the best way possible? Only then will Jason address this issue sooner than "later", as quoted...

 

 

Edited October 22, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R
poll screenshot

[Barnacles]

14 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

 

What would be the purpose? If it’s to force a certain minimum size, even a single pixel, it’s going to artificially over-enhance other aircraft. That’s what we have in Alternate right now. So instead of seeing giant blobs more in 1080p you’ll see also them in 4K too?

I don't know what would be the purpose. puzzled that you brought that up as my post was on how to treat contacts on different resolution screens, not scaling or single pixel solutions.

 

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

I don't know what would be the purpose. puzzled that you brought that up as my post was on how to treat contacts on different resolution screens, not scaling or single pixel solutions.

 

The only reason I can figure that the game would need to read your screen resolution would be to size graphics like icons or sprites. For example a 1 pixel icon at 1080p equaling 4 pixels at 2160p. And to prevent the cheat of just lowering your resolution. Such solutions haven’t proved themselves to be a good idea in other sims though. 

[Barnacles]

Just now, SharpeXB said:

The only reason I can figure that the game would need to read your screen resolution would be to size graphics like icons or sprites. For example a 1 pixel icon at 1080p equaling 4 pixels at 2160p. And to prevent the cheat of just lowering your resolution. Such solutions haven’t proved themselves to be a good idea in other sims though. 

Exactly, at the moment, all things being equal if you increase your resolution the contacts just get geometrically smaller, I think. If there's a technical reason why it's not possible then fair enough but _*for me*_ my monitor is great with standard visibility (not alternative). people with 4k can't see squat. 
 
The update to the spotting is great for me (not alternative), surely they should refine it by improving the standard visibility if it just doesn't have the same effect on higher resolutions (not just introduce glorified icons which alternative seems to look like _*for me*_)

 

[6./ZG26_Custard]

1 hour ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

The update to the spotting is great for me (not alternative), surely they should refine it by improving the standard visibility if it just doesn't have the same effect on higher resolutions (not just introduce glorified icons which alternative seems to look like _*for me*_)

The update to standard visibility was a marked improvement to what we had before, no 10 Km bubble and aircraft can now be spotted at a longer range but not to a ridiculous degree.

It's a shame that the devs didn't stick with this setting  for awhile (it definitely is a marked improvement for many but not all) before releasing the further update  that included alternate visibility setting. 

1 hour ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

my monitor is great with standard visibility (not alternative). people with 4k can't see squat. 

Standard visibility is great on my setup too. As for alternate visibility, I can see contacts that look huge from a distance but they get smaller as they approach, its a very weird effect and I really can't stand it. 

2 hours ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Can we get this thread back on the subject and try to present our problems to the developers in the best way possible? Only then will Jason address this issue sooner than "later", as quoted...

Unfortunately, it does seem to be the case that we should be careful what we wish for. Many in the community have been crying out for a "better" spotting system. There is no issue within the single player community as they can switch to whatever settings they want.

However, the problem we face is a very big divide in our multiplayer community. I think that at least for the foreseeable future the responsibly is going to fall heavily on the shoulders of the server admins and I really don't envy them. I hope I'm wrong.

One solution that is far from idea would be that we will get notification icons server side, so that we know what settings are being used.I would like to see icons in the server lobby to indicate what is being run.

 

Maybe something like this?

? Normal: With icons and any assists that the server admins want.

⛔️ Expert: No assists  

?  Custom : Anything goes

 

We are finding ourselves in a very difficult situation as we are getting very different player experiences based on hardware and resolution settings and until this gets a second look our list of options seems limited to choosing which server is running the visibility setting that best suits the individual. 

[SharpeXB]

3 hours ago, 71st_AH_Barnacles said:

Exactly, at the moment, all things being equal if you increase your resolution the contacts just get geometrically smaller, I think.

What I read about this system, this scaling effect is a change to the LOD (3D Model) size and not an icon or sprite graphic. So it shouldn’t be dependent on resolution. Yet most accounts describe the excessive size of distant aircraft to be more pronounced at lower resolutions. 

This would be easy to test but my machine is unconnected at the moment. Just run the same track at 1080x1920 on your 4K monitor and check to see what happens. 

If it is resolution dependent that’s a problem. Because it encourages players to lower their resolution and handicaps not only higher res displays but anything like super sampling or pixel density in VR. 

[[DBS]TH0R]

2 hours ago, 6./ZG26_Custard said:

Unfortunately, it does seem to be the case that we should be careful what we wish for. Many in the community have been crying out for a "better" spotting system. There is no issue within the single player community as they can switch to whatever settings they want.

However, the problem we face is a very big divide in our multiplayer community. I think that at least for the foreseeable future the responsibly is going to fall heavily on the shoulders of the server admins and I really don't envy them. I hope I'm wrong.

 

Fully agree with the statement we should be careful what we wish for, else someone can again misinterpret that we badly wanted a 40km spotting range.

 

I too don't envy server admins, there shouldn't be a divide in already small MP community as is. In the end, my prediction is that the majority will chose Expert simply due the fact it renders contacts at ludicrous ranges and too easy to spot. Many of us, depending on the hardware of course, are left with no real option to solve the issue of spotting. As it stands now, either go big size monitor TV with 4K resolution, or run of the mill 1080p in order to get the best spotting possible. Anything in between and you are handicapped with the ability to spot contacts.

 

Even if they don't change a thing, the issues here range from disappearing contacts depending on the zoom level, to the perfect blending in with the background when they shouldn't be.

 

Also, I don't agree with Jason's statement: "And real pilots didn't have 'zoom'." Zoom in-game serves not as binoculars, rather to better mimic what you could or couldn't ID with your own eyes. This is also an effect of the inverse zoom that I actually liked. You could zoom in on the contact, if it was too far away no ID was possible. If it was close enough, then by zooming in it would increase in size and enabled ID-ing. Not using zoom would prevent many VR users from enjoying the benefits of limited resolution of first generation devices as well. What I am trying to say here is that certain features like contact size and zoom should not be compared to the real life counterparts like binoculars. Rather mimicking what the real eyes can and cannot see. Not sure what I am on about? Who here doesn't zoom in when strafing a ground target? Is that considered unrealistic?

 

 

2 hours ago, 6./ZG26_Custard said:

One solution that is far from idea would be that we will get notification icons server side, so that we know what settings are being used.I would like to see icons in the server lobby to indicate what is being run.

 

Maybe something like this?

? Normal: With icons and any assists that the server admins want.

⛔️ Expert: No assists  

?  Custom : Anything goes

 

We are finding ourselves in a very difficult situation as we are getting very different player experiences based on hardware and resolution settings and until this gets a second look our list of options seems limited to choosing which server is running the visibility setting that best suits the individual. 

 

This is not a solution, this became a requirement now. Since developers decided to keep both systems and not offer us a compromise in a foreseeable future. Simple icon only related to what kind of spotting is being used would suffice IMHO.

[[DBS]TH0R]

21 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

What I read about this system, this scaling effect is a change to the LOD (3D Model) size and not an icon or sprite graphic. So it shouldn’t be dependent on resolution. Yet most accounts describe the excessive size of distant aircraft to be more pronounced at lower resolutions.

 

There was a link posted earlier on, describing 5 different approaches to solving the problem of Scaling - better still, explaining (read: claiming) which sim uses which one:

 

 

https://why485.itch.io/smart-scaling-demonstration

 

And it nicely explains a lot of things. Among some - why the contact stays the same size no matter the zoom. The "inverted zoom effect" and why it is used.

 

Yet SharpeXB threw rocks at people for bringing it up, merely dr. Serfoss' algorithm used in BMS:

 

Quote

Falcon BMS calls this Smart Scaling, War Thunder uses super sampling and "contacts", IL-2 46 used LOD models and a dot system, IL-2 BoX appears to scale models and raise their contrast. Even the Energy Air Force / Over G games on the consoles used a dot system to display distant aircraft on low resolution (by modern standards) console games. 

 

It would be interesting to know whether any of the above methods were used for ALT spotting. Based on the presented data, to me it looks as if they perhaps modified one of the solutions on their own...

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

As it stands now, either go big size monitor TV with 4K resolution, or run of the mill 1080p in order to get the best spotting possible.

If those two displays, which encompass the whole range of resolutions and sizes available, give you the best spotting possible, what’s the problem?

Why is anything in between (1440p?) handicapped?

29 minutes ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

There was a link posted earlier on, describing 5 different approaches to solving the problem of Scaling - better still, explaining (read: claiming) which sim uses which one:

We may already be getting scaling here, just not as egregious as BMS or other games

The 3.201b hotfix notes say:

“7. Airplanes long-range visibility algorythm was corrected to minimize plane size amplification effect;”

Note it says “corrected to minimize” the amplification effect. It’s doesn't say “removed” or “eliminated”

Taken literally that would mean Normal Visibility still involves a “size amplification effect” just not as enlarged as Alternate. 

 

Thanks for posting the example of Smart Scaling. In all the years this type of discussion has gone on, nobody ever posts an example of what this looks like. This scaling effect is HUGE! It’s no surprise why BMS players have so much trouble in other sims.

And the example from War Thunder states exactly the same thing you see in IL-2 GB Normal Visibility 

At 10km distance aircraft seen by the naked eye are “either not visible or visible as small black dots”

 

Edited October 22, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

If those two displays, which encompass the whole range of resolutions and sizes available, give you the best spotting possible, what’s the problem?

Why is anything in between (1440p?) handicapped?

 

There are 3 most often used desktop monitor resolutions (not counting the 21:9 wide and ultra wide ones):

• 1920x1080 HDTV 1080, FullHD, 1080p
• 2560x1440 WQHD, 1440p
• 3840x2160 QFHD, 4K, UltraHD, UHD-1

 

Of those three, 1440p is the sweet spot today as far as hardware requirements go. Especially in one wants to run AAA titles on +120Hz refresh rate with one of the two offered synchronization technologies. Within those resolutions, or a range of resolutions, a diagonal size plays a key factor with dot pitch size. Larger the better. And sub 30" for a 1440p the dot pitch is really small. Even worse with 4K - thus you need to go big or go home with that one.

 

 

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

We may already be getting scaling here, just not as egregious as BMS or other games

The 3.201b hotfix notes say:

“7. Airplanes long-range visibility algorythm was corrected to minimize plane size amplification effect;”

Note it says “corrected to minimize” the amplification effect. It’s doesn't say “removed” or “eliminated”

Taken literally that would mean Normal Visibility still involves a “size amplification effect” just not as enlarged as Alternate. 

 

Whatever scaling we are getting and if we are, seems minimal since "inverted zoom effect" appears to be minimal or almost non existent.

 

There is Scaling in ALT mode no question about it. After playing around with the demo available in the link (my previous post) IL-2 GB looks like version 1 (no scaling).

 

 

Edited October 22, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R
parts moved to last post

[[DBS]TH0R]

16 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

Thanks for posting the example of Smart Scaling. In all the years this type of discussion has gone on, nobody ever posts an example of what this looks like. This scaling effect is HUGE! It’s no surprise why BMS players have so much trouble in other sims.

And the example from War Thunder states exactly the same thing you see in IL-2 GB Normal Visibility 

At 10km distance aircraft seen by the naked eye are “either not visible or visible as small black dots”

 

 

FYI this was posted to you over at ED forums, then again here, and it took a third (that I know of) attempt at me reposting it before you took notice. Why is that?

 

That is 2. Serfoss, which article says BMS uses. ?

 

I will finally agree with you on one thing - I too don't really like it (version shown in the DEMO from the article). EDIT1: I don't know whether BMS uses the same one today, or has a new Scaling been implemented, to address the shortcomings.

 

Others though, do seem very interesting... From the article, cleaned up from formulas:

 

Quote

2. Serfoss
This is the standard Smart Scaling algorithm that Falcon BMS currently uses. It's based on a paper from 2003 written by Gary Serfoss. It uses rough information gathered from pilots on the ranges at which aircraft should be spotted and identified, and then scales the aircraft up on a flight simulator dome so that pilots can identify virtual aircraft at the same ranges as real life.

The main drawback with this method is that it was finely tuned for a specific projector system and dome. It does not take into account either variable resolution, or a variable field of view, as both of these are constant in the reference setup.

3. Chihirobelmo
Based on the Serfoss formula, and developed by chihirobelmo, this is meant to address the two shortcoming mentioned above. The field of view and resolution of the screen are factored into the calculation to get roughly equal spotting ability no matter what the resolution or field of view. 

As a result, this also addresses some visual artifacts that arise from the static Serfoss method, such as being able to zoom into aircraft on the ground from 20k feet and seeing an F-16 as wide a runway.

4. Sanpat v1
Created by Sanpat, this method uses the Serfoss result, but then processes it to compensate for field of view and resolution. Its purpose is to specifically maintain the distances at which aircraft should be identifiable across varying FOV and resolution. In Sanpat's own words:

My equation is not about the size on the monitor of the objects. It is to maintain the pixel number require to convey information perceptible IRL by pilots as per Serfoss’ research. So if it 5px on 1080p it will be 5px on 720p. Of course 5px in 720p will be a lot bigger than in 1080p. 

It will make things bigger so the size will not accurate as it is not the point of smart scaling. The different in current BMS implementation and my suggestion is at higher resolution than 1600x1200, mine will be smaller, but it is still magnified if needed and will be bigger than IRL.

Serfoss’ curve is not linear and the size in arcmin is not the focus. The focus is for pilots to be able to tell object information such as aspect, attitude, etc, at the same level as IRL.

5. Sanpat v1 (Clamped)
Since the Sanpat formula generates very large scaling values in some situations. This is the above formula, but clamped to the reference Serfoss value. This means that if the Serfoss value is smaller, then it will use that one instead.

 

6. Sanpat v2
Also developed by Sanpat, this is meant to address the issues that his first formula has with high fields of view and lower resolutions, while also smoothly blending with the Serfoss value under certain conditions.

This way the new proposed formula can be used with the res and fov setting worse than 20/40, by dampening the curve within 1 nm. The curve will now start from 1 at 0 nm as is desired. From 1 nm, the object will still maintain the correct pixel number from Serfoss’ research. May be this a better compromise for the case of worse than 20/40 setup. 

The trade off and downside of this method is, while maintains constant detail level at a given range as per the purpose of Serfoss’ research, the size will varies. People with low resolution monitors will see bigger objects, etc. But for its purpose, this is correct as the better screen resolution the lesser the need for scaling.

 

After briefly testing the demo, I will say that I like the 3 and 6 best if only they could be toned down a touch. Orange colored parts were most interesting to me.

 

EDIT2: This is just my assumption:

 

After checking out the included demo with various scaling options it seems to me this just didn't work with their desire to render stuff at 100km (primary reason for such a long range being ships perhaps?). Thus they simply removed it almost all together and kept the old system in with increased rendering range. In other words, for a scaling to work properly as shown in the demo we would need a separate system for planes than the one used for ships and ground targets which is now being used for all objects in-game.

Edited October 23, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, [DBS]TH0R said:

Within those resolutions, or a range of resolutions, a diagonal size plays a key factor with dot pitch size. Larger the better. And sub 30" for a 1440p the dot pitch is really small. Even worse with 4K - thus you need to go big or go home with that one.

If there is something pixel sized being used like an icon or sprite (like DCS did) then yes smaller pixels are getting punished. Also punished would be any form of super sampling or pixel density in VR. This is easy enough to test for, anyone with a 4K monitor just set it for 1080x1920 and watch for blobs that are 4x the size of what you normally see in 4K

From their posts it doesn’t sound like they are doing that though. The description of it is LOD sizes.