MP on maps with grass and foliage. What do you think?

[RogueBlade 0]

Hey guys, just wondering what purpose grass and foliage servers when playing multi-player on maps like Chernarus (spelling?)

I was playing some warfare recently and something I love to do is find a nice hill outside of towns the enemy is on their way to occupying and sniping from there.

I get all into it crawling through the long grass to a perfect spot overlooking a town. Sniping from there and spotting/lasing targets for other units is a blast. I feel all cozy hidden in the long grass.

But after playing for a while and getting shot at and wondering how on earth they saw me (not the AI but human players), I realize all that grass I feel so hidden in doesn't even show for enemy human players. If I scope in on an area 200+ meters away from me, all the grass and bush objects and textures are removed and all you see is the flat textured ground. Makes it very easy to spot enemy units on opposing distant hills, all you gotta do is looking out for a few moving pixels against the still flat terrain. Your only cover is really trees, because those don't disappear the way grass and bushes do.

Kinda kills the immersion for me, not just sniping but the whole concept of making use of the landscape for movement and concealment. If that grass showed for all players, I could hide a 12 man AI squad and plan an ambush which would be awesome! But I can't......

Just wondering what you guys think of this.

Edited May 29, 2010 by RogueBlade

[galzohar 31]

Yeah, the grass isn't real, it's a technological limitation that exists in just about any game. Hopefully someone will make some islands that actually provide more solid cover (such as rocks and/or simply "less flat"/"bumpier" terrain) that actually works at any distance.

[jblackrupert 14]

"If I scope in on an area 200+ meters away from me, all the grass and bush objects and textures are removed"

Grass is removed but not the bushes, rocks, stone walls etc....

The trick is the remember that the grass is not visible over 200m and to find objects

to hide behind, don't lay right up against a tree or bush, lay a few feet behind it and

slide over enough to get a shot.

Use just your head instead of your whole body to scan for targets. [Hold left ALT key to move just your head] or get TrackIR.

TrackIR:

Grass can be pressed down by crawling or rolling over it,

If youre sniping just take some time to prepare yourself a clean line of site by rolling and sliding forward/back a bit.

When on top of hills don't run along the ridge because you'll stick out like a sore thumb

against the skyline. Run crouched just over the hill.

Scanning with your head instead of your whole body will decrease the likelihood of being spotted from a concealed spot 1000%.

[galzohar 31]

Some people confuse little elements of grass that look like bushes and actual bushes, which makes sense, as the only real difference between them is their size and the fact that the real bushes don't disappear while the fake/grass bushes do.

[bushlurker 46]

I'm not entirely sure whether its "video options"-dependant, but there IS a "grass layer" at distance, designed to (sortof) simulate the effect of clutter at distance... the engine really would grind to a halt if full detailed clutter was rendered properly at, say 200m+, however, in areas where there is clutter, you should see the grass layer have an effect... you should see enemy units perhape "buried up to their knees" in the ground - they aren't of course, its actually another layer above the ground - a simplified layer - approximating the height of the clutter in that area - if those enemy units go prone you should maybe only see their head and shoulders - again simulating (admittedly fairly crudely) someone lying in long grass... Where the clutter is particularly dense, you might see a unit at distance disappear entirely when it goes prone... movement might still give them away, but they are, in effect, invisible - because they're "in the long grass"...

Its a compromise - a compromise designed to keep you above 3FPS while you look thru your scope ;) - bit it IS there, and it DOES work - more or less - against AI opponents... most of the time... Against humans??? well... generally, they're smarter...

I'm not entirely sure how the grass layer is tied in to the settings in Video Options... it's gotta be something to do with Terrain Detail I guess - which isn't purely controlling the clutter but, as has been mentioned elsewhere recently - by Wolle or maybe Dwarden - it also controls the level of detail of the actual underlying landscape (eg: detailed shape of hill crests, etc) at distance...

One of the main thing for non-island makers to bear in mind is the actual resolution of terrain which island designers need to work with - generally, its not really practical to go below a 10m ground resolution... Beton tried it once... looked gorgeous, performance was... problematic....

Imagine the landscape as a grid of points - a whopping 10m apart... to make "bumpy" terrain, the best we can do is raise and lower those widely spaced points... if you just raise a single row of points to create a "small ridge" it's gonna be knife-edged and deeply unrealistic.... probably better to raise the points around them a bit as well.... out to - say - 4 points in every direction... that'll make it smoother looking - it will also make it a sizeable hill! - not a "bump" in the terrain... This is the main reason why trenches are simply not possible... in effect - its simply not possible to make any actual ground terrain "feature" smaller than 10x10m..... Objects, such as rocks, etc are a different story...

So... "bumpier terrain" is out, the "grass later" does exist, but may be of limited usefulness against real opponents...

That leaves lurking under bushes (a personal favourite since OFP :D) as your best bet.....

B

Edited May 30, 2010 by Bushlurker

[galzohar 31]

Terrain detail controls the max distance for grass, but even the highest setting is ~40-45m max before grass completely vanishes and the ground looks pretty much (or exactly?) like "very low" again.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Do you "get down to hide in the grass"? No, you "get down to make yourself a smaller target" if no solid cover can be found nearby. It also lets you return fire more accurately. The problem is lack of sway, or something that affects our shooting ability. Making yourself a smaller target isn't really as effective as it should be. You tend to be dead before you hit the dirt. The "proper firefight" is missing... This improves in organized games, where you actually establish a base of fire, and maneuver the rest of the units based on that fire. But for "public havoc games", the rambo style players help kill the firefight. Suppressive works good even against AI, but most only shoot at the enemy they see.

I know grass isn't effective to "hide in at a distance". But believe me it is deadly effective when you actually manage to get up close. So for me, turning off grass is just not an option. I prefer games with forced grass for everyone (like it is in vanilla game), so that everyone gets the same difficulty (even in coops), and I just leave games where it is forced off - completely ruins the immersion for me.

[galzohar 31]

Suppressive doesn't do much to AI in my experience. At least not if you're shooting in the general direction rather than actually hitting right next to them, for which you still need to see them so you might as well try to hit them as well.

In real life you suppress so that the enemy knows he will get killed if he moves his head out of his cover. AI doesn't have any behavior that simulates anything similar.

Edited May 31, 2010 by galzohar

[BCA Cat Toaster 10]

I love the grass and as everyone knows how it works in ArmA2 he should be able to act accordingly. I haven´t heard of one single AAS-Server yet - not even in Tournaments or Leagues - that disables it. If you´re going for cover, you need a bush, tree, treetrunk, wreckage or stone, but not grass. Grass can be great if you´re right in front of your enemy, why one should remove that?

Removing "cover" that is ineffective on 200m+ just completely? "Remove" cover completely that´s not working anyway? Sounds just weird for me and looks even worse...