Here is one for ya

[para]

When a vehicle is hit and starts to smoke, the smoke goes directly skyward. Is it possible to get the black/dark smoke to drift across the battlefield with the wind like placed white covering smoke?

[mjkerner]

Para, old pal, if the wind is strong enough, it should drift. I'm certain I've seen that before.

[JRMC1879]

When a vehicle is hit and starts to smoke, the smoke goes directly skyward. Is it possible to get the black/dark smoke to drift across the battlefield with the wind like placed white covering smoke?

easy to test I would have thought

[para]

So far I have only seen it go directly upwards. Unless someone knows differently? I just played a game and although the white smoke drifts across the black went straight up.

Which is at odds with the wind and the white smoke. The burning smoke should behave like the white smoke shouldn't it?

[Boche]

AFAIK black smoke does drift with strong winds, happened in CMSF aswell...

[para]

It does drift but it goes mainly upwards and does not behave like popped smoke or smoke shells etc.

[Mr. Yubby]

With the improvement in the shaders with the MG module, smoke and dust effects look great, really adds to the immersion. The smoke effect from brewed up vehicles is a different animation, more of a "legacy" smoke effect. Even when wind is causing smoke/dust from artillery strikes to drift at near ground level, which IMHO is more realistic, smoke from burning vehicles in almost all cases rises in a narrow vertical column. In a windy situation, seems that all smoke should drift at a fairly low altitude. The current state of the game engine seems to support that effect pretty well.

What would look really cool would be something like the CMBN loading screen image that shows 2 Sherman tanks in the foreground with the battlefield in the background (really nice photo BTW). The smoke from what was probably a brewed up tank is drifting across the battlefield relatively close to the ground (probably due to wind). Maybe we'll get improved burning vehicle animations in CMx3.

BTW, many thanks to Battlefront for the Market Garden module, I've been having a LOT of fun with it.

Regards,

Mark G.

[Pak40]

It does drift but it goes mainly upwards and does not behave like popped smoke or smoke shells etc.

This seems quite logical to me. After all, a burning vehicle is hot and hot smoke tends to rise. Why should hot smoke behave the same as smoke from grenades and smoke shells that were designed to provide cover?

[Ithikial_AU]

I have hunch (based on nothing but the currently curry lunch fueled brain) that changes will come about if and when BF gets around to implementing terrain fires into the engine. Where there's fire there's smoke.

[JonS]

This seems quite logical to me. After all, a burning vehicle is hot and hot smoke tends to rise. Why should hot smoke behave the same as smoke from grenades and smoke shells that were designed to provide cover?

Yeah, except no.

(and any other number of similar videos)

Smoke from vehicle fires does go up, but it also tends to create quite large LOS obstructions in the local area. But ... it's really flukey and variable. In the video above ground level LOS changes from completely blocked, to partially blocked to completely clear and then back again several times, depending on how intense the fire is and what the wind is doing. If you were behind or off to the flank of that motorhome, observing towards the other flank, the effect would be even more marked.

I'd like smoke from vehicle fires in CM to have a greater tactical effect, but I suspect that there are some other improvements that would have to come first and which could in turn be leveraged to improve the behaviour of smoke.

[para]

Yeah, except no.

(and any other number of similar videos)

Smoke from vehicle fires does go up, but it also tends to create quite large LOS obstructions in the local area. But ... it's really flukey and variable. In the video above ground level LOS changes from completely blocked, to partially blocked to completely clear and then back again several times, depending on how intense the fire is and what the wind is doing. If you were behind or off to the flank of that motorhome, observing towards the other flank, the effect would be even more marked.

I'd like smoke from vehicle fires in CM to have a greater tactical effect, but I suspect that there are some other improvements that would have to come first and which could in turn be leveraged to improve the behaviour of smoke.

Thank you JonS, that is a good example of what I am talking about.

[Pak40]

It really seems to me that you can see right past the burning vehicle for the majority of the video, especially once the traffic is stopped which was probably causing disturbances in the air flow. The smoke is mostly going UP and not really obscuring much past the burning vehicle. You can clearly see the cars stopped on the other side. Start around the 2:00 mark and you can clearly see what I mean. Hot smoke goes UP. Yes there are some times when the wind blows the smoke and passing cars causing disturbances in the smoke, but for the most part it's going UP.

[Fuser]

And then,...flamethrowers in grain fields...Ukraine small villages after SS visit,...fire smoke will need to be we enhanced in the future for obvious reasons,...