More Realisim

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More realisim in bzflag battle simulation.

Poll ended at Thu Mar 24, 2005 12:18 am

Yes everything you suggested in post as time permits.
2
17%
Set server, client settings and flags to eliminate unrealistic stuff and improve realisim.
0
No votes
Leave it the way it is.
10
83%
 
Total votes: 12

jumpman
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More Realisim

Post by jumpman »

I have some thoughts for making BZ flag more
realistic, some may be simple and others are more
the sort of thing requiring a large expense in coding time

First up the easy ones.
Realistic shot velocity any real tank cannon will fire it's shots at over 800 meters per second , present shot speed in game is not even 200 meters per second (estimated).

Ammunition should be limited to about 50 rounds which is all a tank can hold in reality.

Remove unrealistic flags ie jumping , invisibility , lazer.

In reality a frontal shot on a modern tank is not necessarilly going to defeat the heavy frontal armour, and shots impacting at less than 30 degrees to the armour are also unlikey to destroy a tank, my suggestion is add in incremental dammage to sides front and back section of tanks, to allow better realisim and play.

Side shots could disable the tank from turning in one direction for example.
A rear shot could disable the radar perhaps.

Allow user selectable chemoflarge colours for all tanks.

Increase reloading time for the large guns - should be at least 5 seconds ( real tanks only manage ~10 per minute)

Now the trickier stuff.

How about uneven terrain , ie valleys , ridges , and allow tanks to fire at any reasonable tilt angles.

Addition of grasslands , or woodlands ( as to limit visibility and provide places to hide.)

Larger maps should be at least 3km long with one team at each end which is then approaching the typical limits of engaging an enemy by visual contact and nearer to the limit of the tank guns used.

Anyway the possibilities for increased realisim are there.

I may yet join the development team and try to get some of them incorporated in a future version or a derivative version perhaps :-), What are other people thinking about this ?
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Lan
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Post by Lan »

You forgot the "No, it's fine" choice in your poll :)

I personally feel the game is great the way it is, and making it significantly and distinctively realistic might make it more frustrating than more fun, but I also feel too unrealistic isn't good either. I think it is fine the way it is.
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DTRemenak
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Post by DTRemenak »

The idea of bzflag is not to be realistic, but to be fun to play. If you read Chris Schoeneman's history (http://www.bzflag.org/wiki/ProjectHistory), he originally had tank and shot velocities and map size close to "reality", and it wasn't any fun.
Once that was fixed, the second bug became clear: it was impossible to play. I had tried to base the BZFlag world on the real world, so the playing field was 10km on a side and shots moved at around Mach 1. It took forever to get from one end of the board to the other and you couldn't even see a shot before it hit you. So we scrapped some realism in favor of playability. After a few more tweaks, we had a pretty fun game.
Realistic shot velocity sucks - basically think "everyone has laser".

Limited ammunition poses lots of problems - what do you do when you run out? The reload time system works much better for a continuous game, which is what bzflag is.

The unrealistic flags are fun. Fun...see? That's the point. Aside from which, jumping is very much a traditional and distinctive element to bzflag.

Multiple shots to kill or a zoned damage system has been discussed and discarded for the sake of simplicity. One of bzflag's goals is to be easy to learn, but hard to master.

User selectable colors/textures has been discussed. All-rogue FFA games might get this someday; team games won't for obvious reasons. Texture overlays have also been discussed (e.g. logos on the tank) and might be implemented.

Reload time is already adjustable.

Uneven terrain will never be implemented. Tanks will not tilt. See the above comment about simplicity.

Grasslands/woodlands are a possibility with bzflag 2.0. Drivethrough mesh faces with partly-transparent textures can simulate grass, trees can be implemented as meshes also. Someone just needs to make a map that incorporates these features.

See Chris' history for why the playing fields aren't huge.

The possibilities are there but they will never be implemented as part of bzflag. See OpenCombat if you want to push some of the stuff we've rejected.

BZFlag is a simple, fun game, with awesome gameplay, and it will stay that way. It's unique because it's not realistic. Dodging bullets and jumping are easy concepts, but they take a lot of practice to perfect, and they're just darn fun to do. Computer-based worlds don't have to be limited by reality, and BZFlag takes advantage of that to make a game that's a heck of a lot more fun.
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Post by JeffM »

just go play a m1-a1 tank sim if you want realism. bzflag is suposed to be simple.
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Post by sid6.7 »

yeah its a very shady poll when there is only 2 choices
and pertty much then same theme to both...

tell me how realistic is it for tanks to jump?


ever seen a real teleporter before? where?


this is a "fantasy" tank game...


although i've made a few shay pols myself now and then...

:)
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JeffM
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Post by JeffM »

sid6.7, I have seen one, but if I told you I'd have to kill you :)

What jumpman is describing is a branch that basicly becomes a new game.

More power to anyone who codes that sucker up :)
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Workaphobia
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Post by Workaphobia »

JeffM2501 wrote:More power to anyone who codes that sucker up :)
I think it's a little unfair to say that when you're the one working on the closest thing to it. ;)
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JeffM
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Post by JeffM »

actualy I'm prety stalled, right now, so I have a great amount of admiration for anyone who can finish one, cus I haven't been able to yet :) Tho I'm not using bzflag as a base.
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jumpman
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Therte were actually supposed to be 3 poll options DOW.

Post by jumpman »

The final option was meant to be "It's ok like it is" ,
but somehow it did not work - i wrote it in obviousley needed to press add option one more time which i did not :-(

Nonetheless the total number of viewings and the number of votes in either category is still interesting information. :-)

Agree BZflag 2 ( which i havent tried yet) does implement
at least some of these ie ability to hide behind visible only
sceenery. And it i did not know adjustable reload time existed allready,
why not also make shot velocity adjustable ?.

Adding realisim should really improve game play and make it more interesting because read on >>>

Thoughts you run out of amunition - so you need to find or pickup ammunition , and avoid being plastered while doing so, which should add an interesting element to the game :-)

More realistic damage - instead of dying instantly at the slightest touch the shot may deflect off you or you may only get disabled ie
you can only turn right but may still fire back , meaning the other player still has to try to finnish you off with a better aimed shot,
this goes hand in hand with having realistic shot velocity, yes it's easier to get hit but only a particularly well aimed shot will totally kill a modern tank the front slope wall armour is very strong.

Uneven terrain is should not be difficult to implement and adds a whole new dimension to the game :-) ie bz version 3 should be when the 3rd dimension is added :-)

Many of the flags good and bad in the game , represent the normal sorts of factors experienced in reality for example slowdown due to engine damage , loss of the radar , invisibility because you are using smoke screen, Running out of ammo or having the main gun disabled. machine gun flag = an actual usable machine gun (though a real tank mounted machine gun has longer range and higher rpm but is probably only capable of disabling a tank rather than destroying it in one shot.
Ie how easy would it be to make it possible to manually switch to a machine gun mode - pretty easy it's already implemented as a flag.
Loss of a track due to damage, is an excellent senario to have to deal with.
Having random flags removed and real causes or terrain causing the various effects would be easier to understand for many people.
Arbitary and random flags are not easy to understand they make it more a game of chance than a game you can learn or understand easily with real cause and effect.

I have come across many arcade games and PC games or simulators and think more realisim is better, in one particularly enjoyable game it was possible to drive through and demolish the terrain for example which gave a great sense of being in a real tank. :-)

Anyways thanks for all the responces so far :-)
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toaster
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Post by toaster »

Well, you have to read the results of this the next best way, then. There are 1196 registered users here. So far, 2 voted for adding the features, option 1. That's less than 2%.

Even discounting the inactive forum members, still a pretty small percentage voting yes.
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JeffM
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Post by JeffM »

jumpman
I fixed your poll for you. The edit button is a wonderfull thing.
And what some others were insenuating is that you may want to read the info on the "open combat" forum in this board.


toaster, way less then even 1% :)
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toaster
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Post by toaster »

Heh. Yeah, I know, missed typing the decimal point. Was supposed to be .2% .
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"So there I was, all alone, facing all of the enemy. I started driving in circles, until I had them surrounded, and then I escaped in the confusion."
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