Empty ride!

[CIPPOZ]

?Hello everyone, can you help me by giving me some advice on how to orient myself when in multiplayer there is no map with the black triangle of your tank, and I can't figure out which side is the battle or the point to reach. The only thing there is the compass that marks N-E-S-West, but the map doesn't show where north is etc. For me it is a new and interesting problem and I wonder how do you orient yourself without knowing the map perhaps with the sun??
Yesterday I walked around in a wood for half an hour then I stopped, I like this thing because it's very real but in reality they had maps to orient themselves and they were probably even more detailed, we don't! Thank you

[IckyATLAS]

The only thing that I can say is that maps should always be shown with Geographic North (True North) or North Pole direction upwards. Otherwise on the map there is a symbol of an arrow showing the True North direction. Some maps may have both indications of Geographic North and Magnetic North and even the trajectory of Magnetic North. If the map can be rotated (but here I do not think it is the case) and you know where North is from your compass, then rotate the map according to the North arrow on the map to match the compass North which is the Magnetic North. There is an important difference between Magnetic North and Geographic North. In 1940-44 the difference between the two poles was about 1500 km south in Canada. Which is huge and seen from Europe and clearly you could end up with large routing errors. The Magnetic North Pole has moved since towards the Geographic North and in 2017 was at only 390 km (closest) from it and now is moving south and going further again. The Magnetic Pole motion has accelerated a lot in the last decade and now moves at about 50 km/year which is pretty fast. In 2022 the distance between Poles is about 500km and increasing.

I have included below a picture of the trajectory of the Magnetic North Pole since the 1840.

The higher up in latitude and the more important things become because the angle between you and both North increases, and you can pretty quickly mix things up and miss the target by tens of kilometers. Any trained pilot gets full course on these things, at least those flying with oldies and classic instruments. When I first started training in the eighties you can see from the picture below that the difference was large and so the deviations where not a mere rounding error. In that case you have the plane compass calibration date and the deviations between True North and Magnetic North mentioned on a small, printed card fixed in the cockpit to allow you to make the corrections. No computers and GPS back then.

For sure the impact is on longer travel distances, and for short hops around your airfield it does not matter much.

I suppose now with the last digital cockpits you probably even do not care anymore, computers do everything, and they auto calibrate, have true GPS North etc. etc.

No more fun besides just flying and pushing joysticks (joy really?).

 

[No_Face]

If you want to orient yourself on a server that doesn't show your position, you need 2 things, the compass and to know the place where you spawn.

 

Example:

 

 

In game, the maps will always be oriented this way with north at the top.

If your goal is to reach CP 1 (capture point number 1) :
 

Either you have chosen to appear at the spawn n°1, in this case you will have to go down to the south in order to join a road (first red point) and then to go to the east (in game, you will have to turn to the left as you go down). You will arrive at the 2nd red point which is an intersection, checking the presence of this intersection allows you to make sure that you are not mistaken in your route.

 

Either you choose to appear at the spawn n°2 and in this case, the fastest option to reach the CP is to go up to the north, then once on the road (red point) turn right. Here, as the map indicates, you will cross a village.

 

Having easily identifiable landmarks is essential for good navigation.

 

It can happen that you spawn in the plains, without any real landmarks, in these cases, just look at where your spawn is located in relation to your objective and you will know which direction to follow to reach it.

 

You can use natural elements to find your way (river, lake, forest,...) but it's more difficult in a tank than in a plane (because you are at ground level) and as you said, the map is not very detailed, there are some forests that don't appear on it, which can be annoying, that's why we prefer human constructions.

[moustache]

in addition to all that has been said, it can be useful to know your approximate time to cover a certain distance, when you do not have a reference object (for example the North of Kuban is made up of large flat fields, with very little visual cue...)

 

for example, to cover one side of a large square (i.e. 10km) in a Panther on the road (average speed around 48km/h), it takes about 12min... on land (so rather an average speed of 25km/h) , it will take about double...