bzflag should have an aiming for the tank
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sora roxas
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bzflag should have an aiming for the tank
should the tanks have aiming like up and down
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Sky King
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Adding on to what Win XP said... the "founding fathers" of BZ Flag made simplicity a core design principle--the idea that the tanks themselves had to be pretty simple and intuitive, or else many people would loose interest before they got over the learning curve of just getting around in a tank.
Even now, you can still play a pretty credible game using only a 2-button mouse and the tab key, or, just the arrow keys and the tab key, without reading any manual or FAQ.
You loose that simplicity once you add things like gun elevation, or the ability to look around in a different direction than the gun is pointed, as they add more controls and more keys... neat features, but, they steepen the learning curve and a shallow learning curve is important.
The truth is, we've all been duped and deceived. We downloaded this seemingly simple game from SoureForge, unbeknownst that Chris, Tim, and the rest of the design team are masters of addiction... They knew just what balance of simplicity and complexity would get us all hooked, like moths circling a lightbulb.
Even now, you can still play a pretty credible game using only a 2-button mouse and the tab key, or, just the arrow keys and the tab key, without reading any manual or FAQ.
You loose that simplicity once you add things like gun elevation, or the ability to look around in a different direction than the gun is pointed, as they add more controls and more keys... neat features, but, they steepen the learning curve and a shallow learning curve is important.
The truth is, we've all been duped and deceived. We downloaded this seemingly simple game from SoureForge, unbeknownst that Chris, Tim, and the rest of the design team are masters of addiction... They knew just what balance of simplicity and complexity would get us all hooked, like moths circling a lightbulb.
I agree with not having gun tilt controls. The difficulty for players in adding another level of controls would detract from the fun.
However, I think there would be advantage in producing a flag that had a fixed angle for the shots say down 15 degrees so that you could shoot down at tanks from an overhanging or you could shoot up at tanks from the angled shots rebounding off the ground in front of you.
This approach is already an established tactic by shooting at slanted objects on the map, and while it is limited in how you can target others it certainly can have tactical advantages at times. Wings for one would have one more flag to worry about (there have been a few maps where slanted objects has allowed me to take winged tanks out from above - having a fully mobile means would be all the better).
However, I think there would be advantage in producing a flag that had a fixed angle for the shots say down 15 degrees so that you could shoot down at tanks from an overhanging or you could shoot up at tanks from the angled shots rebounding off the ground in front of you.
This approach is already an established tactic by shooting at slanted objects on the map, and while it is limited in how you can target others it certainly can have tactical advantages at times. Wings for one would have one more flag to worry about (there have been a few maps where slanted objects has allowed me to take winged tanks out from above - having a fully mobile means would be all the better).
"Hell, I'll kill a man in a fair fight, or if I think he's gonna start a fair fight, or if he bothers me, or if there's a woman, or if I'm gettin paid; mostly only when I'm gettin paid. But eating people alive, when does that get fun?"
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Sky King
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A number of maps make this capability available without modification to the tank or client. There's a map variable that determines whether a shot fired travels perfectly parallel to the ground, or whether the shot maintains vertical momentum... Thus, if you fire while jumping, or descending, your bullet (or laser) will travel up or down in flight accordingly. This vertical speed is a big part of the play on the tavern servers, for instance.RexFlex wrote:However, I think there would be advantage in producing a flag that had a fixed angle for the shots say down 15 degrees so that you could shoot down at tanks from an overhanging or you could shoot up at tanks from the angled shots rebounding off the ground in front of you.
This really comes in to play in the hide-and-seek server on brad.bz... you get very, very steep laser angles when you fire while jumping, and the bullets will even bounce off the ground if you fire the regular gun while descending.
Ah, so that's what you came to try out a few hours ago.Sky King wrote:This really comes in to play in the hide-and-seek server on brad.bz... you get very, very steep laser angles when you fire while jumping, and the bullets will even bounce off the ground if you fire the regular gun while descending.
And I'm with what everyone else said. No up-and-down movement for turrrets. Unless it's some kinda flag that has severe restrictions, such as making so you can only move it up and down, instead of only horizontal turret movement.