Suggestion: re-enable model enlargement (at least to some degree)

[Santi]

So, the update to 1.5.2 saw model enlargement instantly disabled as it was to be expected. I (and many others from what I've seen) really appreciated it and think it should be brought back - although if possible, capped to medium or something like that, or perhaps after ED tweaks it more (I agree large was too big).

Why should it be brought back?

1) Because it was a feature that encouraged gameplay diversity: with the setting off, everyone is forced to use their radars/RWR 90% of the time in order to find planes, which I find gets monotonous and dull. With the setting on, there is a far better mix of both visibility/looking out the canopy and looking at your radar/RWR. The setting encourages players to stop having their heads jammed on their displays and look out the canopy, which is always a good thing. It also rewards players who choose a different gameplay style (flying radar-off and finding planes with RWR + mk1 eyeball), which is barely possible with the setting off. This gave the Mig21 an increase in popularity, again increasing said diversity in the server - never before had I fought against Mig21's before and it was a new interesting experience.

2) Because it increases personal gameplay involvement: maybe I'm the only one who experienced this, but by being able to see some of my friendlies and foes, I felt I was more involved in fights - looking at blips in a display is more abstract and not as interesting. It is much more rewarding to find jets yourself, instead of having your plane find them for you.

3) Because it forces those flying at medium/high altitudes to be more careful and promotes thinking about whether you have been seen: with the setting off, you are pretty much guaranteed to be able to fly at any altitude and not be seen (excluiding contrails), whereas with the setting on, the altitude at which you fly matters as you are more (or less) likely to be seen depending on your altitude, path and tactics. This is nice because it encourages critical thinking and planning your flight/reactions accordingly.

4) Because the setting itself is meant to compensate for limitations of a monitor vs real life: I agree it needs further tweaking and it is a bit overkill, but I think it is much more worth it to have it on for the time being because of all the reasons above. It is incredibly annoying to have to sit 1 inch away from my monitor trying to discern pixels to find a plane at 5km and I think it removes a lot of fun out of the game, for me and for a lot of other people. 

There are a few more opinions in this reddit thread, and I'll make sure to link it there so people can chime in here.

Thanks for reading!

[:RIPTIDE]

Model Enlargement is cool. It just isn't implemented right. I don't have a black/white opinion on it, but at the moment, when you zoom out fully you can see things at ridiculous range. And even plane type and aspect. When it's fixed up, we'll consider putting it back in.  There was plnety of guys equally crazy when ground units were all super sized little tanks from 20 miles away on the ground.

 

 

[Santi]

I agree, the enlargement for ground units made them look like cities, and its true that the sprite size in pixels was consistent across all zoom levels (shouldn't be like that). From what I heard, it looks like model enlargement has been tweaked in 2.0 and is back to what it used to be like at the very beginning of 1.5. Good to hear you don't have a fixed decision on it, though.

[Gazuuu]

In my opinion, as bad as it is enlargement should be on. Santi's reasoning was spot on, and as a mig21 player myself this patch made a underdog jet basically useless. Radar and RWR are so primitive on the thing that now even getting a lock is almost impossible. As Santi said it's like 90% radar+rwr and It's not fun at all, you always get killed because basically fighting a invisible target (not poop35). I think the FC3 planes, especially the f15 has enough superiority over the mig21. Could you please consider having it on as it is until it gets fixed so there's room for everyone to play? To end this I can simply say the game like this is not enjoyable to play like it is at the moment. 

[Santi]

Just an update: someone found a way to make the sprites consistent regardless of monitor resolution, maybe it could be implemented in the server.

https://www.reddit.com/r/hoggit/comments/3wpsnf/i_fixed_the_model_visibility_sprites_so_they_are/

[IronMike]

we didn't forget that, Santi, there is still no viable solution though.

In a way, the enlargement is unrealistic though, because check out this:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7c/Aircraft_crossing_paths.jpg

And that's one big aircraft pretty close up. The problem is more at the point where aircraft ingame become visible / invisible as of when their model is rendered. that of course would change with weather, heat, etc, altitude... now it changes with zoom in a strange way. Because if your eyes are really good and you look sharp and weather conditions are fine, you should be able to spot (although more by chance) aircraft up to 20 km away. However those pilots who could, were exceptions with extreme sight. Mostly you can spot aircraft up to 10km away. And that is when you know where to look at, and much depending on background and lighting/ angle of sunlight, which also is not represented ingame.

Additionally through the lack of long range BVR ingame (in FC2 we attacked at 40nm) there is way more spotting and WVR now than it has ever been before. That the Mig21 was broken further is unfortunate. But even if not broken the challenge for underdogs like that is to a) coordinate themselves with stronger radars and b.) trick the enemy into a WVR fight where it has a higher chance of winning.

Since DCS is a simulator though, there is no right to balance whatsoever. You have to be 100% clear what you bring to the fight, and you cannot expect that an outdated aircraft like the Mig21 will ever have great chances against modern aircraft like the F-15 or Su-27. Thus more rewarding it is, when you do score a kill. If I choose aircraft like that, I choose them knowingly for exactly that reason.

To conclude, the enlargement can't be used if it exceeds a certain range (around 10km), since it would further scale down the range of BVR and eliminate the tactical requirements to force a bandit into proper WVR.

We do try to simulate modern warfare that devides itself in ----------------------BVR---------------------- // ---------WVR-------- // ---BFM--- //

In certain aircraft you are confined to the latter two. And an enlargement mod, as much as I agree that it should help you to some extend, should not break that.