Spotting compared to the game

[SCG_motoadve]

Spotting is not that easy in real life.

Easier than in game though.

Here some  scenes of a tail chase I did yesterday, spotting a camo plane against the ground.

 

 

Edited December 7, 2019 by SCG_motoadve

[GreenSound]

But I easily see the landing white Cessna, imprinted against the sky, from the parking garage next to the airport. Therefore the spotting in this game is literal garbage, and I demand that I can see camouflaged planes underneath me from miles away with the same ease

[Lusekofte]

It is easier to spot vehicles too in real life. 
but it is what it is. 
Nice flying

[SharpeXB]

Nice video!

[216th_Jordan]

Ingame a lot of contacts are simple lost because of pixel clarity problems by resolution. Also, there is an incredible amount of noise in a rendered scene (pixel level variations in large numbers due to small differneces in rendering angle). When you get rid of that noise by filtering however, you also usually decrease the size of contacts, making them harder to see.

 

To the physical laws the ingame spotting is correct, but due to rendering it gets harder (and much more straining!) than IRL.

I've recently come to the conclusion, that in the current engine a slight smart scaling approach might really be the best way to deal with this situation.

[MasserME262]

I saw a post once in here the forums where someone compared the human eye with a monitor (display), it was quite good and summarized.

All I have flown in my life were just Cessnas (150), and just about 80 hours. But I can totally assure you with this little experience that spotting a plane in real life, being lower or higher than you, its an universe easier than spotting a plane in this game even with a white camo in a summer map.

[Barnacles]

1 hour ago, 216th_Jordan said:

Ingame a lot of contacts are simple lost because of pixel clarity problems by resolution. Also, there is an incredible amount of noise in a rendered scene (pixel level variations in large numbers due to small differneces in rendering angle). When you get rid of that noise by filtering however, you also usually decrease the size of contacts, making them harder to see.

 

To the physical laws the ingame spotting is correct, but due to rendering it gets harder (and much more straining!) than IRL.

I've recently come to the conclusion, that in the current engine a slight smart scaling approach might really be the best way to deal with this situation.

Contacts certainly were scaled slightly when we had max render range of 9.5k.

[-=PHX=-SuperEtendard]

Yeah, currently I find spotting really hard at close ranges (from 1k to 5k or so) because the planes are rendered with such a small amount of pixels with really low contrast they are really hard to be noticed, and you can even lose them when aiming for a shot.

This is a Bf 109 at only 1200 meters closing on my 7 o clock







This is way too little size or clarity for a plane at such close distance 1.2 km. And there seems to be an effect with lighting on the LOD that once below 5 km they don't seem to scale with distance much or sometimes even go smaller until they are closer than 1km when they can be seen easily again

This is the very same 109 from a different position against the sky background, took screenshots as it got closer and closer



The 4.6 km model was similar to the 1.5 km distance model in regards on how easy they were to spot... however the intermediate ones were harder to see.

Here if you want to look at the full size screenshots:
 

Spoiler

4.6 km away icons on



3 km away icons on



3 km away icons off



2.6 km away icons on



2.6km away icons off



1.96 km away icons on



1.96km away icons off



1.53 km icons on

 

[69th_Mobile_BBQ]

Admittedly, I don't have anything to go on but subjective observation but, it seems to me, even though it's very close, the in-game scale of the fighters at close-ish range seem just a couple of % too small. 

[Avimimus]

It is always really nice to get input from real pilots.

 

How do you find spotting of ground vehicles? I find I have about a 20% chance of spotting a convoy of trucks... I figure that convoys might have been larger or more numerous in some areas during wartime... and once attacked any smoke or anti-aircraft fire would give away their positions - but I do wonder if it might also be harder in the sim than in real life.

[MasserME262]

39 minutes ago, -=PHX=-SuperEtendard said:

[...]

and you can even lose them when aiming for a shot.

[...]

Sometimes I'm at their 6 approaching from very near to shot and...

Magic! they disappear, and when I stablish contact once again, they are already far from me and in a safe position.

 

This is very annoying indeed

[216th_Jordan]

I'd think this sim would profit massively from these three things and I think while 1 is imperative, at least either 2 or 3 should be implemented:

 

1.) Object size vs. distance fixed so that targets don't get smaller

2.) Smart scaling (at best with custom size settings) for people who want it a bit easier sometimes or always

3.) Custom Icons - some players want to see more without going all arcady (like showing only friendy ground/ air units closer than 3km etc.)

 

Going by all frustrated responses during the last months I think this is of prime importance for the sim.

Edited December 7, 2019 by 216th_Jordan

[BladeMeister]

58 minutes ago, 216th_Jordan said:

I'd think this sim would profit massively from these three things and I think while 1 is imperative, at least either 2 or 3 should be implemented:

 

1.) Object size vs. distance fixed so that targets don't get smaller

2.) Smart scaling (at best with custom size settings) for people who want it a bit easier sometimes or always

3.) Custom Icons - some players want to see more without going all arcady (like showing only friendy ground/ air units closer than 3km etc.)

 

Going by all frustrated responses during the last months I think this is of prime importance for the sim.

This +1000. Right now I only fly with mods on and the icon mod. I use 2560x1440 resolution and it is like flying blind without some aid. I really can't understand why the 1C team hasn't figured out a solution to this problem. These three problems along with stopping the AI from chasing you back to your aerodrome and seeing & attacking the player through the clouds, would really help the Single Player experience loads.While the new content is awesome, I am still waiting for Jason and 1C to get the SP experience firing on all 12  cylinders. Hopefully someday soon.

 

S!Blade<><

[Sybreed]

I too, must admit having difficulty spotting with my 2k screen... yet I refuse to use the easy visibility setting.

[LColony_Kong]

Yeah this is definitely the single biggest problem with the game right now. Spotting is such a tactically significant thing a flight sim that much of what is otherwise a great sim is significantly diminished by the current spotting issues. If the developers would fix this issue in a patch it would instantly make this game twice as good as it already is.

 

With the current system, I can routinely sit 20-40km from an airbase and watch people take off well enough to count them. Once these planes get to about 6-8km, the almost always vanish unless I manage to keep sight on a single pixel by going max zoom all the way to intercept. Spotting at 20km? No problem. 3km? Too close.

 

 

[SeaW0lf]

Thank you very much for posting this video.

 

It is not that hard to spot a plane in real life, even in a 1080p video and through a 29" monitor. The plane interacts with lighting and the terrain, and it has volume, contrast, shadows. I did not lose it once when it was down low, and I was looking back to simulate a check on my six, when here in Il-2 you can't do that or else you won't find your target again. Even if you only focus on the target ahead, many times they just disappear against the terrain in front of our eyes. I have countless dogfights in Flying Circus (WWI module) that I had to disengage because I could not find the enemy anymore, and WWI dogfights happens in a very narrow area, much smaller than in WWII.

 

It is beautiful to see the sun lighting up the wings at basically every turn, and the weather was cloudy. The human sight cannot be underestimated.

 

It would be nice if other real life pilots could post these videos so that people can have an idea and these things get demystified.

[[DBS]TH0R]

23 hours ago, 216th_Jordan said:

I'd think this sim would profit massively from these three things and I think while 1 is imperative, at least either 2 or 3 should be implemented:

 

1.) Object size vs. distance fixed so that targets don't get smaller

2.) Smart scaling (at best with custom size settings) for people who want it a bit easier sometimes or always

3.) Custom Icons - some players want to see more without going all arcady (like showing only friendy ground/ air units closer than 3km etc.)

 

Going by all frustrated responses during the last months I think this is of prime importance for the sim.

 

Seconded wholeheartedly. Also, the option of having two broken spotting systems needs to go.

 

To add to the list above - contacts shouldn't disappear on wide (sometimes even normal) FOV like they do now.

[SharpeXB]

23 hours ago, 216th_Jordan said:

 

2.) Smart scaling (at best with custom size settings) for people who want it a bit easier sometimes or always

Smart scaling ie Serfoss nonsense, is awful. Just to show how awful it would look in a game, here’s a screenshot (by a proponent who actually thought this looked ok). The 3rd aircraft on the right is “Serfoss sized”. That’s awful looking. His silly academic paper wasn’t written for a game where you’d see the scaled aircraft in context with other objects which aren’t scaled. The whole idea is a very flawed concept. 

On 12/7/2019 at 4:47 PM, Avimimus said:

It is always really nice to get input from real pilots.

It sure is. You say that like 1CGS doesn’t have any real pilots though. 

 

 

Edited December 8, 2019 by SharpeXB

[Avimimus]

Oh, no! I'm aware that 1C has real pilots giving feedback, that some of them have experience flying aircraft, have even had experiments done for them etc.

It is just that I'm not 1C ...so I appreciate my understanding increasing too (even if it doesn't help development)!  

[MasserME262]

17 hours ago, [TLC]YIPPEE said:

[...]

If the developers would fix this issue in a patch it would instantly make this game twice as good as it already is

[...]

100% this.

Im usually an "AI behavior" whinner, but I think devs needs to work on spotting more than anything else, even more than BoN. 

 

I UNDERSTAND you need to earn money and attract new customers but... You cant plan already on releasing a new module, when the spotting isn't acceptable.

 

The number 1 priority on any pilot, civilian or military, would be to spot other planes, enemy planes to attack, and allied planes to not to collide against. 

Eyes are the best weapon for a pilot because it gives you the most important thing that is situational awareness, in this game I sometimes feel blind, and I would love to see this fixed before seeing my favorite planes added to the game.

[216th_Jordan]

12 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

 

Smart scaling ie Serfoss nonsense, is stupid. Just to show how stupid it would look in a game, here’s a screenshot (by a proponent who actually thought this looked ok). The 3rd aircraft on the right is “Serfoss sized”. That’s awful looking. His silly academic paper wasn’t written for a game where you’d see the scaled aircraft in context with other objects which aren’t scaled. The whole idea is a very flawed concept. 

 

 

 

To be honest I do not really see the issue. I do not want smart scaling by default but even with the picture I can see why it's useful. Picture is highly pixelated and objects are hard to see while view on target is good. Smart scaling reduces that effect. Might not be as realistic, but weights in for other issues. I don't see why these other issues of rendering induced visibility problems are downplayed or don't get mitigated by more or less appropriate functions available. For one spotting should not be harder than IRL.

 

I've always been against easy mode and as I fly myself I know that spotting isn't easy. But if I try to spot things in Il-2 I don't see a lot due to rendering (and believe me I have spend a lot of time in finding optimal spotting settings which work quite well) and get a headache after a while. That surely doesn't happen when I'm flying IRL.

 

[SharpeXB]

1 hour ago, 216th_Jordan said:

 

To be honest I do not really see the issue. 

It looks really awful when you see scaled aircraft up against other objects that are not scaled. That issue should explain itself. 

Those aircraft in the screenshot are only 1mi away. So you would see that effect very clearly in the game. Scaling also wrecks the ability to judge range to targets etc. 

And what about ground targets? What about ground and air vehicles seen together?

No game today would use something silly like this, it would be a total joke. 

[ACG_KaiLae]

I've been...well, raging in various discords about this issue because it's killing my fun with the game. According to steam, I have 1300 hours playing this game. However, I've had recently a series of severe personal issues that basically stopped me from playing for over 6 months, which means that I went from what would be referred to as the "old system" - where there was a 10km bubble - to the new. I'll never be a super ace but I would previously have characterized myself as competent. Usually landed my plane. That sort of player. Right now however, I never do because I'm getting killed by guys that I don't see. While this is historical, the fact that I'm literally looking right in the spots they are coming out of before is not. I just can't see most people unless:

 

A. Something shoots at them, or they shoot at something

B. They turn on their lights or shoot a flare

C. They set someone on fire letting me know where to look at max zoom

D. The lighting conditions and the aircraft paintwork give a reflection that shows where they are

 

It's just not possible currently for me to pick up people generally unless I'm under full zoom, and you can't fly like that all the time (or most of the time). I'm confused why the old system seemingly was totally junked. The 10km bubble wasn't ideal - you could be looking at someone (usually full zoomed in) and he'd just vanish as the plane would be un-rendered - but you could generally pick up guys that were close to you. While it wasn't easy - took practice to learn - it was generally ok, other than the range limitation. Now we have a different system where you can't see guys at long ranges or as SuperEtendard has noted, nearly at point blank. There's a private video that DerSheriff posted where he and Blackhound are flying together and trying to form up, and he can't see Blackhound until he's literally on top of him (not using zoom). 

 

You cannot fight things you can't see. You also can't cooperatively fly with wingmen you can't see either. The "solutions" to this that I've heard so far are to decrease the gamma in the config file to the point that your cockpit is nearly black, which I hate. My simple question is before the change, the close range spotting was...ok. Why can't we have that back again?

[SharpeXB]

35 minutes ago, ACG_Kai_Lae said:

I went from what would be referred to as the "old system" - where there was a 10km bubble - to the new.

The only things that are new about visibility are:

There is no 10k bubble. Possibly there is some sort of scaling algorithm but it seems exactly the same as before. It’s still very difficult to see another aircraft farther than 10k

 

There is an Alternate Plane Visibility setting where aircraft are visible for extreme unrealistic distance. 

 

Otherwise visibility didn’t change. If you could see well before you should still be able to see now. Not sure what you’re talking about.

There are a few bugs but they aren’t very common.

Edited December 9, 2019 by SharpeXB

[ACG_KaiLae]

1 hour ago, SharpeXB said:

The only things that are new about visibility are:

There is no 10k bubble. Possibly there is some sort of scaling algorithm but it seems exactly the same as before. It’s still very difficult to see another aircraft farther than 10k

 

There is an Alternate Plane Visibility setting where aircraft are visible for extreme unrealistic distance. 

 

Otherwise visibility didn’t change. If you could see well before you should still be able to see now. Not sure what you’re talking about.

There are a few bugs but they aren’t very common.

 

This is patently false as can be seen by the graphics shown in this thread. I don't know what they've done but it's not an improvement.

[[DBS]TH0R]

It was already explained to you in several different threads @SharpeXB that original 2000 or so version of Serfoss scaling has been improved and modified to a great degree. You simply refuse to read what is being posted due to your "anal realism approach" to flight sims, that clearly don't work in practice. As evident with more and more unhappy customers voicing their opinion - even more important real pilots like OP.

 

Please stop trolling every single spotting thread with your anti-scaling agenda. Don Quijote fought windmills just as hard as you are fighting "scaling Bogeyman" in every new thread that pops up. ?

 

9 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

There is an Alternate Plane Visibility setting where aircraft are visible for extreme unrealistic distance. 

 

Otherwise visibility didn’t change. If you could see well before you should still be able to see now. Not sure what you’re talking about.

There are a few bugs but they aren’t very common.

 

Blatantly false and incorrect, nothing new coming from you though. Here is a video I made a year ago with old spotting system - one of the first at 1440p. Notice how contacts are way larger at 9.5 km bubble range than they are today at same distance (0:30 mark):

 

 

Before you jump on me with the useless "jagged mess" comment - I used AAx4 at the start of this year.

 

Visibility is riddled with bugs and are very much common and easily reproduced. HDR support and 4K resolution is not going to solve anything, no matter how many times you keep repeating it.

Edited December 9, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[SharpeXB]

Before starting another giant thread about this same issue over and over it’s useful read Jason’s last communication that I am aware of, on this topic

 

My advice would be if you if you want them to actually look at something then it needs to be a specific bug report. 

And keep in mind what a “bug” actually is. 

- Statements like “I can’t see this or that” or “it’s easier to see in real life” are too vague. 

- Game features that don’t work exactly the way you personally want them to aren’t “bugs”

- The fact that this game doesn’t exactly replicate features from other games like “smart scaling” isn’t a bug. 

 

Show something specific. Make a video. Post a track from the game. Include your settings and system specs. They’ll pay attention to that and fix these things. Otherwise it seems there is very little chance that any of this will change anytime soon. And what we have now is actually an improvement overall considering that the 10k bubble is gone. 

Edited December 9, 2019 by SharpeXB

[[DBS]TH0R]

I see that you are out of the loop with latest development... Here is AnPetrovich looking for info on how to fix spotting:

 

https://forum.il2sturmovik.ru/topic/12833-видимость-контактов-проблемы-идеи-предложения/

 

Why they haven't created a similar thread here in english speaking section is beyond me.

 

As for the rest of the people reading this, if you want something changed feel free to chime in on few of the bug reports we have made:

 

 

 

 

Edited December 11, 2019 by [DBS]TH0R

[Bremspropeller]

You could also give us a similar option as in DCS, where you can dot-label.

ID'ing won't be helped, but keeping visual track is much easier.

[SeaW0lf]

I'm of the opinion that expert visibility should be just one mode - a well done mode that takes into account reflection, shadows, dot size, object size, volume and all that for all monitors. Then they can do labels and icons of any kind, but the "no icons / labels mode" should be just one.

 

The current expert mode and alt vis was a mistake to me, especially because neither of them work and it divides the community even further. How can we fly in two servers that have different spotting systems? I rather pick one and ignore the other, splitting the player base, something we can’t afford in my opinion.

[Alonzo]

I feel like there's two problems here:

• There is definitely a bug in multiplayer, where sometimes planes are not shown to other players. This leads to the "flak firing at empty clouds" problem, and the video by DerSheriff where suddenly a plane appears behind him and shoots him down. I suspect this is related to the (significant, welcomed) changes to the server to allow a > 10km bubble. Aircraft are now reported to game clients at much longer ranges, and for this to work at all the server needs to send fewer updates for further-away planes. I think there's some kind of bug or sync issue when a plane gets closer, so a game client sometimes doesn't see the plane immediately. This is a full-on bug to do with the netcode, and is hopefully fixable.
• Spotting of contacts in the 1 - ~5km range is very difficult. That's the comments many people have been making in the thread, for example the screenshots above with a plane at 4.5km about the same number of pixels as at 1200m. I'm not sure what the fix is, but it certainly seems that intermediate range spotting like this is harder than it ought to be.

[SeaW0lf]

Today I went through two dogfight situations that are common, routine in Il-2. Mind you that I’m talking about WWI planes (Flying Circus), then the radius of the fight is way smaller than for WWII, sometimes not more than 200 yards apart.

 

It was during an afternoon (4PM) mission, but the sun was still high, no sunset colors, fog, nothing.

 

First case – I saw two Fokker D7s following a SE5a inside our lines (I saw the tracers). I dove with my Camel and cut their path, firing at the last Fokker already on the deck. The first Fokker just vanished from the map. I imagined that he was busy fighting my peer somewhere. I turned a couple times with my foe and little did I know that the other one came from nowhere (I saw tracers). He got my engine, and then we started turning and I almost shot him down with half rpm, but he fled. Never saw again the first foe that I was fighting (he probably lost me as well). So we were just bumping into each other and losing each other at very close distances.

 

Second case – I saw some tracers and flak some 2 or 3km away. I came close and saw a Dr1 chasing a Bristol. I was in a Camel. Since I was ahead of them, I crossed the Dr1 100/150 yards above and going in the opposite direction with the sun on my 4/5 o’clock. I turned to bounce him, now with the sun at 10/11 o‘clock, but no glare, nothing, just daylight, but when I dove he had simply disappeared. Since I was near the other side of the mud, I just climbed back looking for him (never found it) and I started to record a track to check where he was later on. I went home. Viewing the track, he did not make a move. He just kept going straight for the Bristol on the same path that I had seen, which makes me think that he did not see me 100 yards above crossing him on the opposite direction as well. This one was even worse. He did not see me, and when I started the bounce, I lost him, and we both kept on with our businesses as if nothing had happened.

 

This happened in the same mission, some 20 minutes apart. I logged off without a single kill, mainly an uneventful 2 hours mission since we can’t even see who we are fighting with.

 

That’s the routine everyday in the Flying Circus servers. Talking with others, several people have the same experience. The dawn missions are just a tossup. You might ram a friendly landing in your own airfield.

[SharpeXB]

Documenting visibility bugs is certainly better accomplished from SP. Online it can just be connection problems. I’ve seen planes teleport and disappear in these games all the time. 

[gimpy117]

yeah but sharpie, I don't think the "teleportation" issue is all that's going on here. you know that. I don't think there is any difference other than occasionally net-code causes a few planes to warp. I think though this is mostly when you get the flood of "outdated hit data". but this has little to nothing to due with the extreme difficulty many have seeing aircraft in this game. 

[SharpeXB]

Yeah but if you can document the problem in SP it’s more reliable. At least you eliminate one factor. 

[Alonzo]

20 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

Yeah but if you can document the problem in SP it’s more reliable. At least you eliminate one factor. 

 

That will help with the spotting problem but not the aircraft disappear in multiplayer bug that is also a concern (and possibly a greater concern in some ways -- an effectively invisible plane that sneaks up on your six can ruin your day totally, whereas a hard-to-spot but at-least-rendering-a-few-pixels plane gives you some chance to detect it).

 

This is why I'm categorizing these as two issues, one graphical, one netcode. Both need to be looked at.

[SCG_Wulfe]

On 12/17/2019 at 5:20 PM, Alonzo said:

 

That will help with the spotting problem but not the aircraft disappear in multiplayer bug that is also a concern (and possibly a greater concern in some ways -- an effectively invisible plane that sneaks up on your six can ruin your day totally, whereas a hard-to-spot but at-least-rendering-a-few-pixels plane gives you some chance to detect it).

 

This is why I'm categorizing these as two issues, one graphical, one netcode. Both need to be looked at.

 

Fully agree. I think this is something most of the community can agree and come together on. 

[RedKestrel]

On 12/17/2019 at 5:20 PM, Alonzo said:

 

That will help with the spotting problem but not the aircraft disappear in multiplayer bug that is also a concern (and possibly a greater concern in some ways -- an effectively invisible plane that sneaks up on your six can ruin your day totally, whereas a hard-to-spot but at-least-rendering-a-few-pixels plane gives you some chance to detect it).

 

This is why I'm categorizing these as two issues, one graphical, one netcode. Both need to be looked at.

It's hard to separate the 'spotting problem' from the current visibility bugs. If a few of the reflection and contrast bugs could be fixed it would go a long way to making spotting easier in the middle distance, and also make it easier to determine what is a design flaw/problem and what is simply not functioning as designed. 

I half suspect that the stuttering issue some people are encountering (including myself) is either caused or exacerbated by the increased spotting distance online, so I'm hopeful that if the netcode aspects of disappearing planes get a tweak, that issue may also be resolved or at least have the root cause diagnosed. IMO the netcode needs a similar overhaul to what the AI is currently slowly getting. 


 

[Legioneod]

On 12/7/2019 at 11:05 PM, [TLC]YIPPEE said:

 

With the current system, I can routinely sit 20-40km from an airbase and watch people take off well enough to count them. Once these planes get to about 6-8km, the almost always vanish unless I manage to keep sight on a single pixel by going max zoom all the way to intercept. Spotting at 20km? No problem. 3km? Too close.

 

 

This is the main problem imo, the fact that they get smaller/disappear when I close in. They shouldn't render in less pixels as you get closer (like they seem to do now), they should either stay one size until close enough to render in larger pixels or gradually get larger as you close in.

 

I'm glad they made visability distances larger but in order for that to be of any use I need to be able to see contacts that are within 5-10km as well but currently they disappear or become near impossible to spot when close.

[19//Moach]

I have a suggestion on why airplanes seem to disappear at ranges between 1km and "pixel dot distance":

 

What appears to be happening, is that as long as aircraft are rendered as 3d models, there is a marked tendency of them becoming swallowed away by sub-pixel aliasing (even with anti aliasing, the problem persists)

 

While there are even various seriously scientific papers on this very subject of "how to render distance aircraft in flight simulators", which is a major issue for military pilot training, there seems to be little that can be done in ways of a fully technical solution to bridge the perception gap between the pixel and the eye.

 

 

Does that mean there's no way around it?  Of course not!

 

While it is a ludicrously difficult task to make the underlying problem go away (you can't easily get rid of pixels) - There is a very simple workaround that effectively negates the symptoms (degraded spotting conditions) without requiring any changes to software code.

 

Which is what I suggest now:

 

 

 

 

 

Problem:

 

Airplane surfaces become less-than-ideally visible as they enter distances where their sizes* are less than two pixels across. 

 

*note: I mean surfaces, (read "wings", "tails", "bit of plane") this is not implying that the problem be limited to only when an entire airplane should fit inside that small an area.  

 

This is easily explained with a picture: (happens in DCS too, which is where this pic came from)

 

 

As you can see,  that airplane is still within 3D model range - yet even with anti-aliasing techniques, almost half its surfaces get omitted by the renderer due to their apparent size.

 

This, of course, should not happen IRL, as the human eye does not reticulate objects down to pixels before feeding the image to the brain - it does a lot more complex biological gooey things instead, which have the result that this kind of thing should not affect a real pilot's ability to spot such an object.

 

This is most critical with engagement-range contacts, which are especially critical to keep an eye on.  Yet this is precisely the distance where most screens would have them rendering at sizes where their surfaces visibility becomes erratic.

 

 

Symptoms:

 

Airplanes are frustratingly prone to having their visibility degraded such that even highly skilled pilots with perfect eyesight and high-end hardware will frequently lose track of them in dogfighting range. (between 1.5 and 5km, typically)

 

Once an airplane becomes distant enough to be "smaller" than pixel size, the game now is capable of correcting their complete invisibility by substituting the rendering method to something more suitable to such far-away conditions. (Rendering whole plane as a dot)

 

Competitive players become more successful as they gain practice in anticipating the movement of a momentarily invisible opponent. (Detrimental to enjoyment: Exaggeration of non-primary skill relevance in emergent challenge conditions, leading to Competitive Reduction of Gameplay) - Practice with in-combat view zoom management serves to work around the issue to an extent, but this causes more problems than it solves by introducing another alien-to-context skill requirement (and hardware advantage) to the competitive environment.  This effectively makes MP almost completely un-enjoyable for all but an elite few who have the necessary hardware and willingness to develop the unusual skills that would minimize the severity of the issue.

 

 

 

SOLUTION:

 

No coding changes are necessary to overcome the sub-pixel mesh rendering issue.  All symptoms can be mitigated by clever adjustment of 3D LoD models.

 

 

To overcome the problem of sub-pixel 3D surface areas being less-than-ideally visible, one needs only adjust the distant LoD meshes by "Bloating" them increasingly over distance.

That is:  The more distant a LOD mesh is intended for, (less vertices it has)  The more each vertex should be displaced outwards along its own normal vector.

 

In 3dsMax, (which I am aware is the tool used for BoX models) this can be easily accomplished by applying the Push modifier to each farther-LoD mesh, and use a greater value on it for each further-away model.   This will displace vertices along their normals, causing a model to balloon out

 

Thus, distant meshes can be prevented from degrading into reduced visibility by having them made to effectively take up more pixels.  The closest LOD (highest res) model should have zero push added to it, of course.

 

 

 

This should not drastically enlarge distant aircraft in general along their primary dimensions. Wingspans and fuselage lengths should remain relatively coherent even with large displacement values.

 

But with some trial and adjustment, it should fully correct the issue by ensuring that all surfaces of a semi-distant airplane remain visible even in the most adverse pixel aliasing situations.

 

 

 

This may or not have already been done, but if so, it could be necessary to go over the process and adjust it to the latest rendering conditions which were introduced with recent visibility changes.

 

Cheers.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 21, 2019 by 19//Moach