Vehicle Loadout Indication

[BNuts]

I think the individual vehicles will look different with the side-grades. A UI is nonessential. If you aren't in an outfit and want to know what the guy has and you cant tell immediately by the side-grade visual cues, then /tell him or whatnot. The amount of side-grades that your character will be able to have is going to be crazy, and for you to have a UI (even a small texture square) to see everyone else's side-grade for that vehicle... That's allot of time rendering textures that requires coding, which will delay beta.

But for reals; You walk up to a f-16 or an ah-64, guess what, it has hardpoints, where things that go boom are mounted to, and you can see and identify them visually. So weapon loadouts in game on a vehicle will be just like RL

As far as maneuverability / armor / speed upgrades. I would assume the same. Maybe bigger exhaust ports or afterburner shrouds, some canards or thrust-vectoring panes, thicker skin or color-change of textures.

Let's see what the Dev's have cooked up 1st. A small HUD indicator that would be available to an individual query would be ok, but forcing everyone to have a bargraph readout painted on the acft is a little off.



*thread hijack!*

16H40.. So that means you joined the Army with my dad in the 70's.. Did you serve in a Nike missile unit by chance? I was in Hanau, Germany with a bunch of Patriot guys, some of the older chiefs were on some of the old legacy systems. The stories they told me made me wince. I am more afraid of our own AA than the enemy, lol. (uh-60 guy)

[beekergunship]

Originally Posted by BNuts

But for reals; You walk up to a f-16 or an ah-64, guess what, it has hardpoints, where things that go boom are mounted to, and you can see and identify them visually. So weapon loadouts in game on a vehicle will be just like RL

As far as maneuverability / armor / speed upgrades. I would assume the same. Maybe bigger exhaust ports or afterburner shrouds, some canards or thrust-vectoring panes, thicker skin or color-change of textures.

I like this idea. The size of the attached models could be tied into your sidegrade values. Yes, you can walk up to jet and tell what is hanging off the hardpoints, but you have to crack open the aircraft forms to read what software your jammer is running and what version of your radar OFP is loaded, etc. That's what I want to account for. If there is an artistic way to do this like you suggested, I'm for it!

Ask any aircraft maintainer. Every bird you step to is different.

[headphase]

I think the slickest way to accomplish this (if physical cues aren't obvious enough to identify vehicle upgrades) is to forget about labeling the vehicle itself, and rather have a transparent infobox appear on the player's screen (maybe over the vehicle itself?) when the player's crosshairs are "moused-over" the vehicle in question.

This would simulate a kind of 'augmented-reality visor' similar to the concept behind Google's real life "Project Glass". This video demonstrates the concept very well in the scene with the train (1:23)

[Toppopia]

Originally Posted by headphase

I think the slickest way to accomplish this (if physical cues aren't obvious enough to identify vehicle upgrades) is to forget about labeling the vehicle itself, and rather have a transparent infobox appear on the player's screen (maybe over the vehicle itself?) when the player's crosshairs are "moused-over" the vehicle in question.

This would simulate a kind of 'augmented-reality visor' similar to the concept behind Google's real life "Project Glass". This video demonstrates the concept very well in the scene with the train (1:23)

I brought forward that idea but people don't like it because it clutters the UI with more stuff than thats necessary, and why does it matter what tank you jump in if it belongs to someone else? You are there for the ride mostly, if you want to be in a certain vehicle with certain stuff equipped then ask if someone has that tank.

[Xyntech]

This is where I suggested that the pop-up info box only appear when you hit the interact button while mousing over a friendly vehicle. That way, it isn't clogging up the UI most of the time, yet you can easily at a glance check out what it has on it.

For all of the visual indicators and other solutions that people have mentioned, I still think it would be good to have an easy to use that unobtrusive way to double check exactly what a vehicle has equipped.

The same goes for infantry. Hit the interact button while your crosshairs are over a friendly (but aren't close enough to physically interact), and their loadout and customization information appears above them/around them.

There wouldn't be much of a problem of enemies hopping empires to spy on loadouts either, because you could just add a similar feature that you could use on enemies through the use of something like an Advanced Targeting implant.

Honestly, I think it will be a lot more useful at times to use it against enemies, because otherwise it may be difficult for an aircraft to spot whether that tank they are about to engage has an AA turret equipped.