I STILL WANT TRACKS, DAGNABBIT!!!

[buddy]

Twain twacks, HELL NO! I'm talking about tracks left by incredibly heavy vehicles in soft earth - this would add so much to the game, I think, because it would be another sign like "sounds - possible infantry".

You could see that a tracked vehicle went through here at some point. You could also look at the map when you were through and "read" what happened - starts, stops, reverses - IT WOULD BE COOL. Couldn't the tracks just be modified terrain like craters after a mortor/cannon blast?? I want some feed back here. THE GAME RULES!

[SS_PanzerLeader]

hey man good idea if would be sweet if they could do it -- anyknow if we can place minefields :-P hehe that will be awesome too

SS_PanzerLeader ... out

[Fionn]

My understanding is that to include tracks would raise the graphical requirements for the game significantly (VRAM and all that jazz).

As to minefields.. Well if the scenario designer gives you some and allows them to be moved then yes you can place minefields. I've made some absolute deathtraps using minefields and obstacles to channel the enemy

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Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Guest Big Time Software]

Would be cool, but it is not possible.

How would we draw them? When a tank is driving it is making new tracks continiously, without pause. A shell crater just appears. Slap down a couple of polygons and there you go. So a vehicle on the move would require some complex drawing/stretching code every milisecond the vehicle is in motion. It would have to dynamically map to the terrain (no precalculations like shell craters) and conform to contours and the slightest change in direction of the vehicle.

If a vehicle goes back and forth over one spot, we would have to have multiple layers to put the tracks on. This means that each track graphic would progressively get higher and higher off the ground. It wouldn't take many times for this to look like floating dirt

Then there is the problem of the polygons that are needed. If there are a couple of vehicles moving around a lot there might soon be more track polygons than all the vehicles and units combined. So even if we hardcoded it to something stupidly small, like 5 vehicles per side, it still would get way out of control and the game would crap out on you no matter how fast your system is.

And what about vehicle scaling? Tracks for Realistic size would look silly for +2, and vice versa. And NO, we can't dynamically change the track scaling on the fly because, as already stated, there would be too many polygons for the thing to be working in the first place

There are more reasons, but any one of the above is reality check enough. Technology just isn't where it needs to be at the moment.

Steve

[This message has been edited by Big Time Software (edited 11-19-99).]

[Guest John Maragoudakis]

Could you just change the 'tracked' area towards a shade of brown? Just change the color of the pixels , don't add polygons. Everytime the tank passes over, the pixels get darker brown. Two lines of darker brown pixels.It's the same terrain underneath.

Is that possible? Kinda like how you added shadows.

Now if that's possible, you could use the same technique to add footprints(little grey dots). Imagine a winter scenario where the enemy is hidden and you see footprints/tracks in the snow leading to/behind a house.Hehehe, where did that wabbit go.

[This message has been edited by John Maragoudakis (edited 11-19-99).]

[Bullethead]

I'd like vehicles (and even grunts) to leave tracks, also.

{dons his fireman bunker suit and SCBA}

There's this game called Myth II that has a lot in common with CM (3D, same type of view-point controls, to name a few). In this game, units leave tracks (and blood trails, and body parts <G>). Really adds a lot to it.

From what I can tell, the tracks in Myth (and the blood, and the body parts) are 2D sprites glued flat on the terrain, no polygons at all. They get around the directional problems of sprites as compared to polygonal models by using lots of small, symmetrical sprites to build up bigger shapes. That is, a big footprint with a definite directional orientation is made up several round dots arranged in an overlapping pattern on the ground. So while the individual sprites always have the same orientation as the viewpoint rotates around them, the PATTERN they form stays pointed in the same direction. And you have to zoom in closer than game allows to be able to see the fixed-aspect sprites anyway. For smaller tracks, they just use 1 small round sprite.

In huge battles, there can be a LOT of tracks. Too keep this from bogging things down, Myth tracks fade out fairly quickly. This is rationalized because in deserts, the wind blows them away and in snow, more snow falls.

Anyway, this is all just to show that adding tracks don't have to mean adding polygons.

-Bullethead

[Guest Big Time Software]

John, there is no such capability with 3D. You work with whole textures stretched over polygons. You can change the sape of polygons, or change the textures (VRAM hit!), but never an indidvidual pixel like what you described.

Bullethead, I know Myth well. All those sprites are drawn on polygons. The trick is that the sprite gives the units their depth and detail, so generally only two polygons are needed for an entire figure, where we use about 100 times that for one of ours. Look at the smoke in CM to see a clear example of this. This is just a sprite animation blasted onto some polygons.

Becaues Myth's figures are basically 2 polygons (or so), and ours are more like 150 (soldier) to 550 (some of the complex tanks), we have FAR less polygons available to use for "fluff". Myth has plenty, but even they have to remove them so that they don't get too many on screen at once. As for drawing them... putting down tracks is a LOT harder for a tank than it is for foot sloggers. A one to one ratio of foot to footprint isn't necessary because the eye will never notice such a small detail, but tank tracks will be VERY noticable.

And there are still more problems that you didn't touch on listed above Sorry, but it really is just not possible to do, no matter how cool it would be (and it would be cool, don't get me wrong!).

Steve

[Thomm]

Do not forget that you would also have to do a visibility check for each and every footprint and track on the map, otherwise traces would appear where you are not supposed to see them.

Will take years before we will see something like this ...

[Guest John Maragoudakis]

You guys are right, you would still need to check LOS to the tracks. You wouldn't want a player to see hidden tank manouvers from an overhead view by observing track movement.

Well I tried

Thanks

[Bullethead]

BTS: bummer about the polygons

John and Thomm: Hell, LOS is just the tip of that iceberg, now that I think about it. What about the effect on the graphical representation of units under Fog of War? For instance, you see a grunt unit shown as "infantry?" with only 1 man--you can't tell yet whether it's a squad or team. But you also see its tracks from close enough to get a fairly good idea of the number of guys in the enemy unit.

Again, bummer

-Bullethead

[Herr Oberst]

As an AFV designer, I would place boots around the tread of all my AFVs. Imagine the talk on the other side.

Colonel: "What's the scouting report soldier?"

Private: "Uh, well sir, we are in deep trouble..."

Colonel: "Armor? Tigers? Panthers?"

Private: "Well, no sir. We didn't see any track marks. Just lots and lots of footprints."

Colonel: "I don't see why infantry should be any problem for us..."

Private: "Well sir, from the size of the holes these guys left, they have some mother big infantry running around..."

[Guest Big Time Software]

HAHA!! Sgt. Schultz gets a transfer to the front

Thomm! Holy Crap, even *I* didn't think of that! Yeah, we would have to do that and actually that is harder to work around than all the other things combined I would think. Yesh... we might not be able to do this for several years

Bummer!

Steve

[Reverendo]

Aye, that was a stupid thing that happened with Myth. It had some sort of FOW, but you could know there were troops behind a hill in multiplayer games if you saw water crippling while they walked. FOW worked for units, not for their effects... I lost many games at bungie.net before I noticed...

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Regards

Reverendo