Questions on 1.31 Jargon Meanings?

[actrade]

I wish I could quote Gophur's post, but since it's closed, I can't. So...here goes my questions that I'm sure a great many others have as well. Hard to test what you don't understand as to what was fixed compared to how it used to be. I am former military and know how easy it is to lose people using acronyms and jargon. I also realize that some of these changes may become apparent just by looking at them in game so I tried not to include questions in that regard. Mind you, I'm a day one player very familiar with the game so newer players may have even more questions. BTW, thanks for all you do as I'm looking forward to these changes, especially when I figure out what some of them actually do.

Game Engine:

- Added new ODE physics engine for infantry and trees

- Added new effects engine

What does ODE stand for and can you give an example of what the new physics engine does for inf/trees?

Capture (Online):

- All new capture mechanism (WIP)

- The capture timer will slowly revert to the owner over time

- Killing a player immediately after they submit a capture contribution will prevent them counting towards the current 'tick'

What is WIP? What does revert to the owner over time mean? Can you give an example? Do more players in the building capture the building more quickly?

Rank:

- Fixed a rank sharing bug with lower ranks

What was this bug? It's hard to verify its gone if you don't know what it was?

Infantry:

- Updated animation blending for smoother third-person movement

- Added new idle animations

- Infantry are now personalized offline

Can you give an example of what animation blending in third person? What is an idle animation? Personalized offline? Does that mean we can change our in game avatar's appearance when offline?

Infantry Stamina:

- Quick pose changes are now limited over time

Have no idea what a quick pose change is?

Paratroopers:

- Chute opening should be fixed

What was wrong with the way chutes opened?

Vehicles:

- Upgraded the Char model (damage model/looks?? How was it upgraded)

- Upgraded the Spitfire 1a model (same questions)

- Upgraded the Spitfire Vb model (same question)

- Upgraded the Bf109 E4 model (same question)

- PzIIIH replaced APHE with APHEC (Capped) (I know what APHE means, but what does the C stand for and how does it affect lethality)

- Crusader II replaced AP with APCBC (same question)

- Blenheim IV now carries gp500 bombs (same question)

- Hurricane IIc now carries mc500 bombs (same question)

- P38 fix to rear amour (fixed how?)

- Invalid crew positions are no longer available (what crew positions were invalid?)

- Weapons will no longer fire after switching positions (weapons for what, switching which positions?)

- Audited all trucks (and found what? more speed, traction, climbing ability, turn rate?)

* Laffly S-20

* Opel

* Bedford OY

Terrain:

- Added new terrain instancing to aid performance

What is terrain instancing? Instancing like a single instance in MMO games?

Foliage:

- SpeedTree has been upgraded with new models (over 1 million trees currently in game)

- Trees now have normal maps

What is speedtree? How do 1 mil. trees in 1.31 compare to prior number in 1.30? What are normal maps on trees?

PlayGATE:

- This is WIP and will not correctly reflect Live online status

- Added title link to original story

- Added read more to original story

- Removed feedburner added social networking site links

- Removed feedburner add

No idea what any of this jargon means?

I realize you're kind of busy now, but I'm hoping you have time to jot down a quick explanation for these questions. S!

[dkamerad]

ODE is a physics engine for rigid (non fluid) bodies. ODE allows for features like ragdoll.

WIP means work in progress. CRS has indicated the new capture system will be tweaked based on feedback from play testing. More details on how the capture changes work are here

The rank sharing bug effected your rank between sides. your rank is supposed to transfer for Air, ground or sea for all sides branches (UK/DE/FR) up to rank 5 or so. This hasn't been working correctly lately.

Idle animations - infantry avatars when you're not interacting with them (firing, moving, aiming, looking, etc)

Terrain instancing - This (unless it's doing something other than vanilla geometry instancing) let's the game engine say "I Want you to draw the same building/berm/whatever in a different spot." rather than having a different copy in memory for every single building/berm/whatever.

SpeedTree is the SDK(software development kit) used to make the trees in game, it is why we don't have the old billboard trees around anymore.

Normal maps are a way of adding detail to a 3d model. Normal maps let you render a lower quality model in game, but keep the details by giving the engine a "cheat sheet" so it knows how to light and shadows fall onto surfaces, giving the appearance of full detail. See wikipedia example here

I'm not a rat... but I did stay at a holiday inn express last night.

[actrade]

Thanks! Good info.

[gtanner]

I'm wondering how exactly the ODE physics works with trees, since they are now static?

[fearny]

Right, now, Google is your friend you know, lol. What i can answer off the top of my head though -

I wish I could quote Gophur's post, but since it's closed, I can't. So...here goes my questions that I'm sure a great many others have as well. Hard to test what you don't understand as to what was fixed compared to how it used to be. I am former military and know how easy it is to lose people using acronyms and jargon. I also realize that some of these changes may become apparent just by looking at them in game so I tried not to include questions in that regard. Mind you, I'm a day one player very familiar with the game so newer players may have even more questions. BTW, thanks for all you do as I'm looking forward to these changes, especially when I figure out what some of them actually do.

Capture (Online):

- All new capture mechanism (WIP)

- The capture timer will slowly revert to the owner over time

- Killing a player immediately after they submit a capture contribution will prevent them counting towards the current 'tick'

What is WIP? Work In Progress.

What does revert to the owner over time mean? Can you give an example? From what i've read and understand, the CP will revert back to the owner of the town over time. Better guard it now!!

Do more players in the building capture the building more quickly? Yes

Rank:

- Fixed a rank sharing bug with lower ranks

What was this bug? It's hard to verify its gone if you don't know what it was? I believe there was some issues with some rank not being shared across personas at low rank the way it should.

Infantry:

- Updated animation blending for smoother third-person movement

- Added new idle animations

- Infantry are now personalized offline

Can you give an example of what animation blending in third person? An example how? This means that if you are watching somebody running they should appear smoother in direction changes as opposed to the jumping around they do at the moment.

What is an idle animation? Idle as in, when standing around not doing anything.

Infantry Stamina:

- Quick pose changes are now limited over time

Have no idea what a quick pose change is? When you switch from one pose to another?

Paratroopers:

- Chute opening should be fixed

What was wrong with the way chutes opened?

This may be the bug where paras can steer after their chute has opened although i'm not 100%

Vehicles:

- Upgraded the Char model (damage model/looks?? How was it upgraded)It's an entire new model so yes looks and damage model.

- Upgraded the Spitfire 1a model (same questions)Same

- Upgraded the Spitfire Vb model (same question)Same

- Upgraded the Bf109 E4 model (same question)Same

- PzIIIH replaced APHE with APHEC (Capped) (I know what APHE means, but what does the C stand for and how does it affect lethality) Capped, increased.

- Crusader II replaced AP with APCBC (same question)Capped, increased.

- Blenheim IV now carries gp500 bombs (same question)From what i've read the 500lb MC was more effective than the 500lb GP, so that makes blens even more useless.

- Hurricane IIc now carries mc500 bombs (same question)The same but in reverse, making the H2C more lethal.

- P38 fix to rear amour (fixed how?)can't answer that, try the hangarites.

- Invalid crew positions are no longer available (what crew positions were invalid?) weapon loaders/radiomen in tanks I imagine.

- Weapons will no longer fire after switching positions (weapons for what, switching which positions?) Try it now, hold fire with your gunner and switch to observer, the gunner keeps firing even though you may not see the shots from your observer, when you switch back to gunner he's still going.

- Audited all trucks (and found what? more speed, traction, climbing ability, turn rate?) Doesn't mean they found anything... although they probably did

* Laffly S-20

* Opel

* Bedford OY Well this is now green :-)

Foliage:

- SpeedTree has been upgraded with new models (over 1 million trees currently in game)

- Trees now have normal maps

What is speedtree? How do 1 mil. trees in 1.31 compare to prior number in 1.30? What are normal maps on trees? 1million currently in-game, not 1million in 1.31. As for what is speedtree, just google that one!

PlayGATE:

- This is WIP and will not correctly reflect Live online status

- Added title link to original story

- Added read more to original story

- Removed feedburner added social networking site links

- Removed feedburner add

No idea what any of this jargon means? You know what playgate is no?

I realize you're kind of busy now, but I'm hoping you have time to jot down a quick explanation for these questions. S!