Differenciated Radar Blips and The General Approach to Intel

Referrence

I find it would be logical to have different radar blips for:
-flying units
-land units
-naval units
-and structures

as well as blips staying identified once the enemy units have come within visual range (for units while they are still on radar, for structure, regardless... updated if you have visual again (perhaps it was destroyed in the meantime, perhaps you destroyed it, you can't know without seeing)

Just like FA.

It's a memory trick to remember what blip is what unit once you've seen it, and this memory trick is unnecessary in light of, the game being worked on here isn't starcraft 3. starcraft didn't have any blips. why are we burning retrograde here? why are we taking a step back from FA?

This game is supposed to be macro focused yet it seems more and more like we are introducing (tedious and extravagant) micro elements.
Vote! Debate!

EDIT: I'd like to add to this that full-on vision is a big NO-NO.

EDIT 2: this is said later in the thread but I also disagree with faction ID by radar. until you have ID'ed it should remain grey and without details as to the specific unit or structure.

Re: Radar Blips

I don't think it should be like this. If RADAR gives away too much what is the point of having visual sight on the enemy.

Re: Radar Blips

Identifiying it?

As I said you can already ID any radar blip.

If like me you look at it and can imediately (or relatively fast) tell by the speed and way it's moving, and if it doesn't what it is approximately. Get in visuall range and you will know, loose that direct sight intel and you still know because you remember. But you've got other sheep to heard, right?

Or is that what PA is about to you?

Re: Radar Blips

If you have radar coverage of something and then have a visual, you should be able to identify it, but only if it stays within radar range, if it leaves radar range and re-enters it should be unknown.

Re: Radar Blips

This is something SupCom did well.

Though I agree with differentiation between land and air, it isn't hard to tell whether or not a radar blip is flying.

Re: Radar Blips

Why overload the UI with even more icons then?

Re: Radar Blips

Because it will discourage newbies with specific counters come around. Lets say a pro spots an oncoming T1 Land Army and prepares Pelters to smash them up, while that newb wouldn't have the same chance.

Re: Radar Blips

The more powerful radar becomes, the less reason there is to consider it any different from standard vision. It may be better to not leave the burden of that difference to the player, but rather to have it detect different things from normal vision (like orbital or air only).

I think it's best to get this out of the way:

Less skilled players have always lost to better players, since the dawn of games. That's HOW skill is ultimately determined.

Re: Radar Blips

That would be cool. Doesn't neccessarily mean more icons. Maybe implement unit ghosts for identified units? Like the current implementation for structures, but not static/permanent.

Re: Radar Blips

First I would like to see doplar style spinning radar (intel wise) so radars arent so cut and dry

Re: Radar Blips

that's already the way it's done in supcom and what i explained in the opening post.

Overload the UI??? do you mean like disk space or too complex and unreadable? apparently you don't want to know what's comming at you.

I want this because I believe radar should pay it is clear that intel has always been the main key to strategy from time immemorial. lots of modern rts players however, don't bother.

In Starcraft II they send 1 engineer to scout at the very begining and that it! THAT'S IT! only one race has a radar (the terran) and it covers a very small area. and you don't see it being used much anyhow. Nobody bothers.

Do you build radars when you play PA ? I know I do. I get the tier 2 one ASAP.
most people don't bother at all. It doesn't matter what the other guy has, they just focus on having something win-worthy, playing in an attitude of you win, you win; you lose, you lose and expecting to win alot.

You can't; you just can't be a winner if you don't try to gather intel in a true strategy game.

here's a quote from another thread that explains my idea :

Re: Radar Blips

I might put a t1, or even t2 in my base, for protection, but I usually don't place em willy-nilly. I try to find the opposing player visually with scout units, then place a radar or 2 to keep an eye on things like movement out of the base, etc. Also, by using visual scouts first, I don't feel like I'm wasting energy placing that radar down. I know it will be useful.

Re: Radar Blips

I does not sound good to me. As soon as u build a radar near and enemy base so u keep track of all his units and building all you will hear is one huge bleep lol.

Sup com had the radar down well. The radar kept track of everything in range. And you got a grey symbol. If u scouted it the radar would remember what the unit was and show you the symbol on the ground. If you lost power however which happens as you build ur economy :-( your radar goes off line. You cant see where any units are. When you regain power the units some back as grey symbols and all intel is lost. You have to rescout.

Stealth units could not be detected by level 1 and 2 radar. But lvl 3 radar can a second smaller inner intel ring that could detect stealth.

God damm the game needs t3 :-(

Re: Radar Blips

exatly pureriffs I my eyes there is no good reason to go astray from sup com 1's intel model, it had the most strategic depth and was more macro then any other model.

now we're back to the micro intel from starcraft 2

now with poll, come cast your vote!

Re: Radar Blips

This.

I think radar should simply show up blips with no context whatsoever until you gain visual confirmation of the unit. Once you do then I think it's perfectly acceptable to just have the relevant strategic icon in place of the blip. That way you can make assumptions as to whether what you're looking at is air, land, structure etc by the way they move (or don't), but visual contact is necessary to confirm. Once you have had a visual of them you know what that blip is provided it remains within radar range. If you lose it, the next time it appears it should be unassigned again.

agreed but there is nuance to this, there's still a world of difference between differenciated radar blips and actual icons.
-you don't know where the com is
-you don't know what type of specific unit in that category

The main reason I want this is because there is no good reason for radar blips for buildings to show up as the same symbol as a moving unit.

This is especially hard to bear on a spherical map because it's a bit harder to tell they're not moving, but you need to know this, hence you have to do this extra ID-ing effort.

It really is a question of micro.

I also want this because i think radar is underused, where it is of great strategic interest and that's a bit of a shame.

Regardless of how much I like the idea or not, this poll is horribly loaded in terms of how it is phrased.

sorry couldn't make it any shorter

so? any new input?