c3k Posted September 27, 2010 Share Posted September 27, 2010 Folks, Just thinking aloud, as it were. Currently walls are placed in the center of a terrain tile. That's dandy for a lot of purposes. However, I was trying to make some terraces and realized that a wall which allowed an abrupt elevation change would be nice; a retaining wall, for example. That would require a wall be placed on the EDGE of the terrain tile. (As well, the underlying elevation algorithm would have to recognize the wall and adjust the sloping function.) Another use would be to create a firing platform behind the wall. Imagine a 2-3 meter tall wall. Behind the wall is terrain 1 meter taller than the rest. Men could stand on the firing platform to gain LOS/LOF over the wall. If they wanted shelter, a crouch (HIDE) or step back would give them the cover of the wall. A buried wall, such that the top of the wall is level with the ground, would thereby replicate a trench (with firing platform, if desired). The crux of this would be the ability to have TWO DIFFERING elevations on EITHER SIDE of the wall. Thoughts? Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Wenman Posted September 27, 2010 Share Posted September 27, 2010 Did someone say sunken lanes ! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeyD Posted September 27, 2010 Share Posted September 27, 2010 Did someone say sunken lanes ! I believe the dirt road self-levels so you can place a road (straight or angled), run a line of elevation numbers along it then do higher banks on either side. The road stays flat and the sides are impressively 'banked'. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
c3k Posted September 27, 2010 Author Share Posted September 27, 2010 Yes, the roads do self-level, but not nearly enough to create terraces or trenches; especially with firing platforms along the sides. Sunken roads would be possible with what I'm describing. Currently the sloping algorithm creates cliffs if adjacent elevations are too far apart. What I'm suggesting seems to be more like a user placed cliff. If the user could also specify one or both of the elevations while maintaining a "cliff", that would open up user created trenches and sunken lanes. As well, the ability to create raised roads, would exist. We could even start looking into the world of dykes. Or dikes. Having walls exist at the EDGE of a tile would be a subset of this idea. A user created abrupt elevation edge, be it a wall or a cliff, would be a nice addition to the map editor tools. Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 27, 2010 Share Posted September 27, 2010 There will be no changes to the behavior of walls on the overall terrain mesh. Probably not ever. It would require far more work than it would be worth. Remember things like this would change assumptions made for LOS, LOF, AI, and probably lots of book keeping stuff that isn't as sexy. Change is possible, of course, but the need for it has to be proportional to the amount of work to make it happen. This is a case where the equation isn't favorable to the request. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
c3k Posted September 27, 2010 Author Share Posted September 27, 2010 Steve, Steve, Steve. It's not a lot of work. I just checked in the editor. All you need to do is move the heavy black wall bar from the MIDDLE of the square over to the EDGE of the square. (Hint: change the thin white font on the edge of the square to a large black font.) Sheesh. Game designers and programmers always try to make you think that this stuff is hard! Thanks for looking in and answering. Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Guest Posted September 28, 2010 Share Posted September 28, 2010 deleted per user request 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
c3k Posted September 28, 2010 Author Share Posted September 28, 2010 Not really. I started with trying to get 1 meter terraces. A one meter elevation difference will never yield a wall (cover from uphill). A wall will give cover, albeit different than a crest blind spot, but it also will cover the other side of the wall. A terrace would not. Melding that idea into firing platforms such that ___|-- So someone standing on the -- side could see over the wall, |, to the ground, ___, would allow fortifications. Raising the ground side so it was even with the top of the wall allows for trenches. The widths would then allow it all to morph to roads/railroads, sunken or raised. In all, these are only 1-3 meter elevation differences with the requirement that they be steep. Shrug. Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Guest Posted September 28, 2010 Share Posted September 28, 2010 deleted per user request 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
c3k Posted September 28, 2010 Author Share Posted September 28, 2010 Okay, (sorry to drag on a topic which Steve has said is closed to changes): 9,10,7,7 : That is NOT a terrace. The 3 meter difference 10 to 7 means a unit on 7 cannot see or fire at a unit at 9. The next example also give a little hummock with that 10 elevation. Neither one achieves what I was trying. I had tried a 2 meter difference, 10,10, 8, 8, with a wall on the first 8. That didn't work. If there were a terrace, the terrain would be 10, 10, terrace, 9, 9. Men at 9 could see and fire on anyone on the 10 level. If fired upon, the men at 9 could HIDE and be totally covered. See: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ABattle%20of%20Wanat.jpg?uselang=en Look just over the helmet of the rightmost soldier: that kind of terrace predominates in the cultivated hillsides common in the Afghanistan valleys. This is minor. The subset of terrain which requires/uses a stepped characteristic versus a slope is quite small. However, they do include sunken lanes, trenches, raised railway beds, firing platforms behind walls, actual terraced terrain, etc. Steve has weighed in on this, so it is up to players to work around it. Regards, Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elmar Bijlsma Posted September 28, 2010 Share Posted September 28, 2010 I'm not sure what you would want this for. We are going to get purpose made fortifications. This improvisation, if made possible, doesn't seem to add much value on top of that. Or am I missing something? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
c3k Posted September 28, 2010 Author Share Posted September 28, 2010 Shrug; maybe. The difference being the fine-tuned nature of the terrain. Right now do we have trenches in which units can walk upright? Then, when wanted, can they move to the edge and fire from them so that their torsos are not exposed? Narrow creeks or gullies? What started this, to me, was the manner in which the editor places walls in the center of a terrain. That way the elevation on both sides of the wall is the same. If you could vary the terrain height on either side you would gain some model fidelity. As always, there is a cost. The time spent on modifying the code, etc., has been deemed not worthwhile by Steve. That's fine. (Hey, even if it wasn't fine, that's the way it'll be.) Purpose made fortifications? Tell me more... Ken 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elmar Bijlsma Posted September 28, 2010 Share Posted September 28, 2010 Purpose made fortifications? Tell me more... Yes, Steve, tell us more. He mentioned a range of defensive works (foxholes, trenches and other stuff) that were subject to LOS and placeable during setup. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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