Why485 Member

Join Date: Sep 2014 Posts: 223

Universal Model Visibility Setting Mod



I've long maintained that model visibility is one of the most important issues facing DCS. I'm very happy that ED has finally decided to address it, but I'm not satisfied with the solution. Ideally, it should be something that is robust enough that it works equally well across all platforms, and provides a realistic level of visibility. Prior to EDGE, this was an atrocious shortcoming of DCS, and while it's now significantly better, the system is hampered by its own flaws which in turn causes many servers to disable it for various understandable reasons.



Here are the two essential changes needed in order to make this the solution DCS needs:



1. Objects MUST become harder to see with distance.





When this doesn't happen, you get situations like the above picture where you see ground targets from ridiculous distances the size of football stadiums, and 200ft long F-15s taking off from runways 50km away. It's primarily a scaling problem. Not only is this unrealistic, but it also just looks strange and immersion breaking.



2. Resolution must NOT significantly impact the ability to see objects.





This is absolutely critical as if everybody is seeing something different, then nobody can even begin to discuss what's realistic or not. I'm also very adverse to the idea of punishing somebody in an area so important as seeing your target for reasons largely out of their control. In the current system, the lower your resolution the bigger your impostors. Before the model visibility setting in 1.2, the higher your resolution, the better you could see.



Additionally, if it were up to me, this would also be a system that is simply on or off, with the default being on. For those that would rather play with it off for one reason or another, they should have that option. However it should be designed so that everybody runs the same settings, everybody sees the same results, and servers default to running with it on.



Rather than continue to make threads about this topic and repeat myself ad nauseum about how and why this is so important, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I've made a mod that makes some very critical tweaks the model visibility setting to demonstrate that not only is it entirely possible for DCS to work like this, but it could be done with the information that was already there, but unused.







Download the mod here.



To install, just drop the Universal Visibility folder into your JSGME mod folder. If you'd rather do it the old fashioned way, you can extract the contents of the Universal Visibility folder into your DCS World folder. Although, I wouldn't recommend that as you'll just overwrite your files.



Here's a rundown of what this mod does, and what I think ED's model visibility system should be doing:



Impostors now reduce in size with distance.

Objects now reasonably fade into view versus always being the same pixel size at any distance. This prevents giant F-15s 50km away, and prevents SAM sites from being silly visible at extreme range.



Contrast of objects now increases with distance.

Bright spots on planes are much brighter, and dark spots are now darker. Being a bright white color is no longer a cloaking device, and the contrast makes things stick out at longer distances



All visibility settings are now the same.

For uniformity, and because this is meant to be a universal setting, there is no longer a difference between low/med/high. As long as it’s not off, the system is on and working.



Impostors scale with resolution.

Lowering your resolution no longer means you get larger planes and tanks, and a higher resolution no longer lets you see further than others. Everybody now has the about the same level of effectiveness when it comes to seeing things at a distance, regardless of resolution.



Alpha of the object adjusts depending on field of view.

Zooming into a distant object now lets you still easily see the object. In fact, the further you zoom in, the easier it is to pick out. Conversely, zooming way out (e.g. >120 degree FOVs) is no longer a “let me see everything magnified and huge” button.







Overall, the end result is objects that are very difficult to see >20km, but still there if you look really hard and get lucky with aspect. Between 10-20km is where things start to become more visible, and objects <10km are very visible.



Expect to see dots. Whereas before, it was always an F-15 of the same size no matter the distance, far objects will now turn into high contrast dots as they get further away. They only start to turn into discernible silhouettes as you get closer (usually around 10km) and they start to maneuver.



In terms of the actual values, I’ve been a bit conservative with how visible things should be as well. I'm actually expecting some to say they still can't see anything with this. However, I would rather under-do it than over-do it for a first run. This is no 1.5.1 where you could see everything with almost comical ease. As much fun as I had with that, it wasn’t right. This is fairly close to what I feel is realistic.



Under 10km you can see targets perfectly fine, but in that gray roughly between 10 and 20km, how visible something is can vary quite a bit. Sometimes you’ll spot them from further out, sometimes closer. It’ll depend on shape, background, and aspect. The current model visibility system is flawed. While 2.0.1 and soon 1.5.3 will fix the inconsistency issues that 1.5.2/2.0.0 introduced, ED has still only been making tweaks to a fundamentally flawed system. No matter what settings they find, they will always have shortcomings in certain scenarios, be it at extreme ranges, at certain resolutions, and so on.I've long maintained that model visibility is one ofmost important issues facing DCS. I'm very happy that ED has finally decided to address it, but I'm not satisfied with the solution. Ideally, it should be something that is robust enough that it works equally well across all platforms, and provides a. Prior to EDGE, this was an atrocious shortcoming of DCS, and while it's now significantly better, the system is hampered by its own flaws which in turn causes many servers to disable it for various understandable reasons.Here are the twochanges needed in order to make this the solution DCS needs:When this doesn't happen, you get situations like the above picture where you see ground targets from ridiculous distances the size of football stadiums, and 200ft long F-15s taking off from runways 50km away. It's primarily a scaling problem. Not only is this unrealistic, but it also just looks strange and immersion breaking.This is absolutely critical as if everybody is seeing something different, then nobody can even begin to discuss what's realistic or not. I'm also very adverse to the idea of punishing somebody in an area so important asfor reasons largely out of their control. In the current system, the lower your resolution the bigger your impostors. Before the model visibility setting in 1.2, the higher your resolution, the better you could see.Additionally, if it were up to me, this would also be a system that is simply on or off, with the default being on. For those that would rather play with it off for one reason or another, they should have that option. However it should be designed so that everybody runs the same settings, everybody sees the same results, and servers default to running with it on.Rather than continue to make threads about this topic and repeat myself ad nauseum about how and why this is so important, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I've made a mod that makes some very critical tweaks the model visibility setting to demonstrate that not only is itpossible for DCS to work like this, but it could be done with the information that was, but unused.To install, just drop the Universal Visibility folder into your JSGME mod folder. If you'd rather do it the old fashioned way, you can extract the contents of the Universal Visibility folder into your DCS World folder. Although, I wouldn't recommend that as you'll just overwrite your files.Here's a rundown of what this mod does, and what I think ED's model visibility system should be doing:Objects now reasonably fade into view versus always being the same pixel size at any distance. This prevents giant F-15s 50km away, and prevents SAM sites from being silly visible at extreme range.Bright spots on planes are much brighter, and dark spots are now darker. Being a bright white color is no longer a cloaking device, and the contrast makes things stick out at longer distancesFor uniformity, and because this is meant to be a universal setting, there is no longer a difference between low/med/high. As long as it’s not off, the system is on and working.Lowering your resolution no longer means you get larger planes and tanks, and a higher resolution no longer lets you see further than others. Everybody now has the about the same level of effectiveness when it comes to seeing things at a distance, regardless of resolution.Zooming into a distant object now lets you still easily see the object. In fact, the further you zoom in, the easier it is to pick out. Conversely, zooming way out (e.g. >120 degree FOVs) is no longer a “let me see everything magnified and huge” button.Overall, the end result is objects that are very difficult to see >20km, but still there if you look really hard and get lucky with aspect. Between 10-20km is where things start to become more visible, and objects <10km are very visible.Expect to see dots. Whereas before, it was always an F-15 of the same size no matter the distance, far objects will now turn into high contrast dots as they get further away. They only start to turn into discernible silhouettes as you get closer (usually around 10km) and they start to maneuver.In terms of the actual values, I’ve been a bit conservative with how visible things should be as well. I'm actually expecting some to say they still can't see anything with this. However, I would rather under-do it than over-do it for a first run. This is no 1.5.1 where you could seewith almost comical ease. As much fun as I had with that, it wasn’t right. This is fairly close to what I feel is realistic.Under 10km you can see targets perfectly fine, but in that gray roughly between 10 and 20km, how visible something is can vary quite a bit. Sometimes you’ll spot them from further out, sometimes closer. It’ll depend on shape, background, and aspect. Last edited by Why485; 02-13-2016 at 05:13 PM .