new Grass settings in Viewdistance script

[Poonikins]

Hi, 

 

quiet some time ago you have removed an option to disable grass aka *low* terrain quality in Viewdistance script. I have been told that if community wants to have that option back, they should say so - and thus I am bringing it up for conversation. As far as I am concerned it is a matter of simple switch in a script...

Now onto some arguments why that option should return.

 

Reason #1

ARMA engine is terrible when it comes to resource utilization. We all know that. We know that our Crysis3onultra-capable gaming rigs barely run I&A at non-powerpoint framerates. Purpose of viewdistance settings is to allow each individual player to adjust settings easily to fit his/hers computer. Currently we can lower/increase terrain settings which in return change a distance at which is grass rendered for the very same reason.

 

Reason #2

I&A is a cooperative mission thus if one player has grass enabled and the other has it disabled, it does not bring unfair advantage in firefights as we are shooting AI, not each other. If it was a competitive mode, I would undestand necessity to have same conditions for everyone.

 

Reason #3

AI does not give a shit about grass. If you are about to have a firefight over slight horizon, you are about to lose. AI will engage you before you can even see them because you have all the foliage in your face and all you can do is lob some nades... Especially southern parts of Altis have these low hills with very mild slopes that are AI paradise...

 

Reason #4

We already had it working before and I haven't seen anyone complaining. It is totally ones choice to disable/decrease/leave as it is/increase grass levels according to their taste. You are giving people free choice, not enforcing it for everyone.

 

 

Could you please tell me your reasons why it was disabled in the first place and also could we discuss reasons why this request can or can not be accepted? Thank you for your precious time!

 

 

PS- also feel free to add viewdistance script action to pilot VAS so that pilots do not have to run towards infy armory to change it. I know that you have added it to AA jet directly for instance, why not add it to pilots VAS as well? Can't hurt anyone.

[FrOzT]

there is a viewdistance option at the vas guy..scrollmenu will give you a view distance setting opiton

[ranarick]

yeah but frozt thats what he is saying, the pilot spawn doesn't have the view distance script so they have to run to the vas guy to change it

[MDCCLXXVI]

Ill take the blame ...

 

Disabled 'no grass' long long ago, then after reports that the button was broken, I removed the button as well. Since then I can count the complaints I've heard about No-Grass on two hands.

 

Simply put, IMO no-grass is unsportsmanlike in any game mode, even against AI.

 

You may think COOP is not competitive, however if you are prone next to someone, both firing at the same target, the one with grass disabled has a much better chance of connecting with the target, and more safe too as they can shoot with less body exposed due to not having to fire through grass. Thus 'race to the bottom' occurs and you end up with everyone running 'No grass' to get their share of the action. Around the time I removed the button, I monitored everyones terrain setting on the server for awhile to see if/when they were using grass/no grass. Invariably, people would set up on a hill, go prone, then disable grass to start shooting.

 

It's an 'easy mode' feature that sounds nice but when everyone has this 'easy mode' button just 2 clicks away, sadly it becomes the norm as it is easy to use and when the chips are down, it got used.

 

For the same reason that a long time ago Rarek decided 40 players shouldnt be running around as rambo elite Sniper/AT beasts (most do if they are able to), I decided there should be at least some standard for difficulty in firing and choosing a firing position.

 

 

 

Taking it off the action menu was a matter of performance and streamlining the action menu. Having it on the action menu consumes more resources than you'd think, and it also doesn't belong on the action menu. Would be better on a GUI interface, but never bothered to create the interfaces. 

 

 

Re performance, you'd have 50-60+ FPS if few/no AI in the session, regardless of your grass setting. Beside the FPS drag caused by AI, many other performance considerations--especially client-side ones--are naval gazing, consuming a lot of time/stress/thought/effort, with little to nil performance gain.

 

cliffs:

 

- grass has almost no effect on performance in I&A, compared to AI.

- having grass on levels the small arms 'lay on a hilltop' tactic playing field. It's already extremely low-risk tactic, so at least the guy beside you is playing by the same rules and can't lay a few meters back exposing far less of himself, while having a better field of view. 

- Its a fallacy that AI can see through grass. They just notice small details (pixels) better than players. They are affected by grass and bushes, whatever claims are made to the contrary . On the other hand, they don't have Nightstalkers and generally don't shoot Katiba from 700m as players do. They also can't grab a quick resurrection from their buddy after you kill them.

 

Just my two cents, I think your opinion is entirely legitimate and probably one held by many (dare I say, majority?). Unfortunately for you, I&A was developed for a time by someone who sought to make the scenario more difficult for you (and all players equally) in many small ways, and to remove easy crutches, and nudge the gameplay toward requiring cooperation, and making one-man-army play less rewarding ... for good or worse ...

 

As for re-implementing a grass setting ... Its easier to pulll the existing system out and drop in a newer version, than to revert the current. That and the decision to (or not to) is up to Master Bacon.

 

 

As for the menu not being on the pilot VAS, that was simply oversight. An update was rushed out at one point and that was simply forgotten in the chaos.

 

 

 

--

 

Now a question for you ...

 

Since according to you I&A not competitive .. 

 

How come 80% of players run around with:

 

Nightstalkers instead of RCO...

 

Titan AT instead of PCML ...

 

Mk18 instead of MX ...

 

Zafir 7.62 LMG instead of MX SW ...

 

Carryall instead of Assault Pack ...

 

 

Is that pure preference, or is there some other consideration?

[FrOzT]

yeah but frozt thats what he is saying, the pilot spawn doesn't have the view distance script so they have to run to the vas guy to change it

i might have misunderstood, but there is a vas guy in the hangar where pilots spawn is there not? unsure wether you are refering to him or the vas guy at the regular respawn point?..

[Poonikins]

i might have misunderstood, but there is a vas guy in the hangar where pilots spawn is there not? unsure wether you are refering to him or the vas guy at the regular respawn point?..

 

There is one (2 actually if we count helirepair pad VAS as well) however it has only VAS script option - it is missing Viewdistance settings option, which VAS at infy spawn does indeed have. If pilots spawn and want to change viewdistance, they can do so only at infy spawn.

 

 

 

 

Simply put, IMO no-grass is unsportsmanlike in any game mode, even against AI.

 

You may think COOP is not competitive, however if you are prone next to someone, both firing at the same target, the one with grass disabled has a much better chance of connecting with the target, and more safe too as they can shoot with less body exposed due to not having to fire through grass. Thus 'race to the bottom' occurs and you end up with everyone running 'No grass' to get their share of the action. Around the time I removed the button, I monitored everyones terrain setting on the server for awhile to see if/when they were using grass/no grass. Invariably, people would set up on a hill, go prone, then disable grass to start shooting.

 

It's an 'easy mode' feature that sounds nice but when everyone has this 'easy mode' button just 2 clicks away, sadly it becomes the norm as it is easy to use and when the chips are down, it got used.

 

I agree to some extent only. Yes, I do realise that it makes it rather easy but just given how grass is implemented in arma series (only to some distance from player viewmodel, depending on setting) and fact that you can not effectively hide in grass beyond that distance because it does not render at distance - thus from the enemy perspective, you are totally exposed on a flat ground... I think it is just a broken concept in a first place which was born due to engine and computing limitations somewhere deep in BI studios back in the days.

 

 

 

 

- grass has almost no effect on performance in I&A, compared to AI.

 

Imo it does make difference to some players. For me, having grass, even to the lowest settings vs. having no grass at all means just a couple of FPS but when you are in the AO, with all the action happening, every single FPS makes a difference - at least to me. Playing below 30fps literally makes my head hurt and makes it hard to focus. As someone who has some competitive background in FPS games I seek every possible performance boost I can get and trust me, if there was any computer setup that could run I&A at or above refreshrate of my monitor (144Hz), I would sell my kidney, soul and firstborn son to have it. Meanwhile, I can run everything on ultra with 8xMSAA because Arma is barely utilizing my GPU to 50-70% on a good day... yet switching grass off still gives me performance boost because it has effect on main worker thread and CPU time (less impact on higher end OC systems, more impact on lower end systems)

 

 

 

 

- Its a fallacy that AI can see through grass. They just notice small details (pixels) better than players. They are affected by grass and bushes, whatever claims are made to the contrary . On the other hand, they don't have Nightstalkers and generally don't shoot Katiba from 700m as players do. They also can't grab a quick resurrection from their buddy after you kill them.

 

Do not even get me started how AI sees you and how they track you even after they have lost the line of sight. AI is superior in tracking targets even beyond solid horizon or objects, no kidding, anyone can test this out on your own if you feel like arguing about this one - hop into editor, make enemy squad run away from you over the horizon. Let one friendly AI be your leader and wait until he assigns you target. Even when target moves beyond visible horizon, your "attack" marker will remain attached to that guy for 10 more seconds, following his movement changes before it gets stuck to last known position. It is hardcoded in game engine and while changing direction or taking cover behind bushes may or may not confuse AI (depending on their skill) it gives them advantage. Whether grass confuses them to any useful extent, I doubt it. It is just how the game works. Once they spot a single pixel of you, you are locked on and only their poor marksmanship and your evasive maneuvers may save you.

 

 

 

 

 

Now a question for you ...

 

Since according to you I&A not competitive .. 

 

How come 80% of players run around with:

 

Nightstalkers instead of RCO...

 

Titan AT instead of PCML ...

 

Mk18 instead of MX ...

 

Zafir 7.62 LMG instead of MX SW ...

 

Carryall instead of Assault Pack ...

 

 

Is that pure preference, or is there some other consideration?

 

I would say that it is a result of logical thinking (well, you can more often than not see that some players lack this) and game knowledge more than competitive nature of the gameplay. If I understand it correctly, mpmissionparameters can change general availability of thermal scopes, DMRs, machineguns and make them role specific only. I would like to see that used, just once - but I can guarantee that majority of players would just not be bothered to play that way because they couldn't get a single kill.

 

Why nightstalker/TWS instead of using let's say DMR scope for shooting and laser designator for spotting? Why carry 3 AT missiles in a carryall backpack instead of just 2 in smaller one? Why carry lesser AT system? Why use a rifle that needs 5-6 bodyshots to kill that laggy and flinching AI  instead of one that needs 3-4? Why would any reasonable player not do that? Because some people think. For the record, I have loadouts with MX SW as well, I don't mind it, I can play with that as well.

 

I understand that you want to remove advantage nograss brings but final question for you - how many people have argued that they are not getting kills because they run all the grass while guy next to them does not have any grass and wrecks kills? How many people felt like in a disadvantage? Was it more people than those who who suffer now from nograss?

 

 

In other words, what is the net outcome of people who were suffering from not getting kills because someone is running nograss minus people who suffer now from grass in their scope and couple fps worse performance? If the outcome is positive, so be it, well done. If it is negative, then it is fair to say that it has done more harm than good. If it is the way mission creators want us to play this game, I accept it. I opened this discussion just to figure it out and I will comply. In that case tho, maybe remove that option from the script at all. Because right now one can switch to lower setting than servers default, which again, arguably gives player some advantage to those who do not change that setting at spawn.

[FrOzT]

aaah--my bad then..seemed to remember i've done it at the pilot spawn one..but might be my memory making a fuzz of thing after a long week at work