Differenciated Radar Blips and The General Approach to Intel

Well, there was a whole thing about making radar only function as a high altitude vision layer for air and orbital things. Those two theaters have faster units and much more ground that needs to be covered, so a superior vision system is a natural fit to contend with it.

Thus, you get:
Standard vision: Short range ground+air
Radar: Long range Air+Space
Sonar: Something something water.

you agree that radar blips should be distinguished in 4 categories?

The way I suggested it, you'd only need one. "thing in air". Done.

I voted more in depth, although I do think you should have to get a visual first before it determines what is what, it will encourage radar and scouting, which are the strong points of a decent RTS for me.

as said earlier in the thread this would be just splitting into the categories upon having radar/sonar intel.

There's tons and tons and tons of benefit from going scouting at that point because you'd find out what the units are specifically and then THAT info would stay on the radar. like which unit is the commander.

I can't see it another way for the reasons that follow.
Sonar is one piece of technology, radar is another, they do not work the same way.

If you build a specific structure to scan for units underwater, what's the point of loosing all the intel you gained by making an indistinguishable (albeit localised in the pond) blend of the two intels.

It also doesn't make sense to me that if an amphibious tank entered radar range on land and went into the water it's icon would be changed. If there is one radar blip that disappears right on the shore at point 5 ; 86 ; 1 and at the same exact time, what seems to be a submarine appears in the water at 6 ; 86 ; 1.... it's the same damn unit! how dumb are the robots you delegate strategic intel synthesis to???

also, as I've stated before it is easy for one such robot to determine after sayyyyyyyyyyyyyy one second that a blip on the radar has not moved one nanometer on the readings, it is thus safe to assume that it is fixed, it is a structure, and if it was gifted with wheels, tracks or struts and was pretending not to be able to move, a nanometer of movement due to a bit of dirt crumbling under it's weight over time would have been detected. (and don't tell me they wouldn't have instruments this precise 2.000.000 years into the future, I'm not asking for a planetary petscan device, I'm asking for radar)

and finally there is such a thing as radar height currently if an airborne unit is in the air it shows up as the same damn radar blip as a tank or anything else for that matter. I think when a unit is 100 meters or more into the air it's safe to assume that it's an airborne unit!

And you'll (you-anybody) notice you're perfectly capable of telling which blip is a structure due to it's fixity. YOU, the primate

And I'll bring back this quote I've used just a page earlier

do you see how my idea plays a part in defeating the omnipresent tank spam strategy problem we currently have?

Currently noone cares to know what the other has because concretely, they don't know.

They have meaningless blips on the radar which they could go and identify but frankly they have other sheep to heard and even with a constant spam of air scouts over his base its hard to keep track of what's there as the intel lights on and off like a christmas tree.


So to cap it off why I want this is because if we're truly striving for a game that aims "to be macro" or .... "the ultimate macro game"

Code:

http://youtu.be/qqDSh34VoPY?t=6m27s

it's at 6:26
then this game is not heading the right way because having to make those distinctions yourself (which remember you CAN do, you can even do it very well) requires a tremendous amount of micro that if you're aiming to make a game oriented towards reflection, structured thought, rational or bright decisions and good management of a large amount of units and structures, a vast base.... then you don't have time for details like that!

It's a talent I'll admit it, but not a talent that makes the gameplay interesting or fun or one that can be looked up to ....except by coreans... I kid, I kid.


this illustrates how the intel was laid out in SupCom and basically shows what we could have in PA :

You have a fair point there mate, and I agree with what you say now.

Agreed.

However, an interesting sidenote, is that you (can) know all the units that can possibly exist. And you further (can) know their speed. So, except for units with the same classification (land / air / orbital / navy / submarine / building...) and the same speed, or units that are moving in formation, your radar should - theoretically - also be able to tell you which units are heading your way.

It always slightly bugged me that this wasn't the case, because if I could be bothered to memorise these details, I could have known it by myself.

Still, Supreme Commander 1's radar was fine enough.

Yes but, in supcom, I only ever used the speed estimation technique to ID coms end experimentals, or tell appart asf and restorers.

And it worked really well mind you.

I remember epic moments of hillarity and extasy when having thrown an expesive-*** nuke or bomber run into total darkness (I used the fixed text ping as a map marker, it's a technique I coined.) and snagging a com in the pond that would have moved had we spyed him seconds ago to make sure.

the bomb run was particularly epic since he was in the small pond on setons and thus did not show up on the radar but i'd skimmed him with t3 scout vision much earlyer in the game and placed a well-gauged marker, and I told my friend playing air to ground-fire that spot with bombers (he was cybran hence cloaked t3 bombers) and he'd never done it before. We were on the edge of our seats as the bombs were coming down onto seemingly nothing (you donot get reveal on a submerged com unless you have sonar intel (of which the t3 air scouts are equiped but on a smaller radius and takes time to scan) but then, against all odds, there was the explosion, I was extatic.

I forgot to mention it but I really also agreed with artamentix viewtopic.php?p=761114#p761114

check it out, he posted a bit of his idea around the forums and I like it alot. I HATE the idea of a minimap but his solution makes alot of sence to me.main thread where he explains it a bit more :viewtopic.php?f=71&t=49275

who likes the idea of intel as illustrated by artamentix ?

Me, after reading your post I went and gave my humble opinion, it looks like a decent idea and as far as I can tell would work well.

I'd like to bring something new to the table and I've considered making a new thread for this for a long while now :

I think radar should be the one exception to two tier levels.
I'll explain :

currently radars cover a puny area and this puny area can make sence as a really cheap intel at the very beginning of the game where you'd be rewarded on a very small planet for immediate intel.
however as of patch 52168 we are ramping up on planet sizes and things are getting serious, we now have a tier one radar that is utterly useless on such a size planet and a tier 2 one that is in the same case unless it is at the enemy's base dorstep and in the center of your own base to serve as better coverage for the anti-air.

it would take somewhere around 50 equidistant tier two radars around the globe to cover all of the biggest planet you can currently play on adequately.

I think a more expensive and harder to access tech (watever method you will be able to access Big units such as the unit cannon, teleporters and the space units factory through, if it's simply any tier two engie then heck, do it that way) radar is in order. Keep in mind there are still larger planets to come.

I think the radar blips should indicate the size of the unit, it's really wierd when in supcom some harmless looking half oval turns out to be a super giant robot, surely the radar technicians could output a radar profile on my HUD no?

Also i think the orbital factory(ies) would be a good place to build an effectively t3 radar, obviously still t2 but as a satellite radar it would be more potent and you could maybe even move it about, depending on how satellites work.

Very much this. Size (well cross section, so stealth would look much smaller) and really height should be obvious from radar. So from a UI perspective, the dots should at least show relative size.

In the end I tryed a 100-radius planet and it required 60 well placed t2 radars not counting the seas.

Don't forget about satellites. A mobile radar is much more powerful and useful for planet coverage. Probably good enough to be considered T3.

wow yea, I was kinda forgetting that. okay then it should balance the issue out.

you probably shouldn't assume the orbital radar will be mobile, assuming of course there is one to begin with.

Why would an orbital satellite be stationary?

It doesn't look like Uber are implementing the orbital layer to include actual orbits. It looks more like it's going to be an extra air-layer. Of course nothing confirmed in concrete yet but that certainly seems to be the direction they're looking at.

The current plan (subject to change as needed) is that most every unit that is put into orbit will be mobile, but expect it to move quite slowly, when compared to terrestrial speeds.