47 replies to this topic

[MadPanda]

Up until yesterday I've been playing mwo with my 5 year old computer on "low" graphic settings. Now I got a powerhouse of a comp and I cranked everything to "very high" and I don't like what I see. I'm noticing extra vision impairing effects all over the maps. For example River City; it's full of some sort of burning junk that puts out a lot of heat so when I'm on my heat vision, I can no longer be positive that the heat I see is enemy or this stupid effect. None of these effects existed in "low" settings so my view in heat vision was crystal clear.

Obviously I'm not going to go back to "low" as I got a comp that runs "very high" on steady 60fps. I don't think it's fair that I'm punished for it. Gameplay changing effects should be same on all graphics settings, just lower the quality of them.

[MadPanda]

BINGO!

After cycling through different graphic settings I found the culprit; it was the Particles. Put the Particles setting to Low and it's gold again. No annoying crap smoke blocking your vision. Enjoy.

[Kunae]

Your basic point remains valid though:

There should be no difference in basic vision and obscurables at any graphical level. Otherwise people will play with things turned off to gain an in-game advantage against people who don't.

PGI: Please ensure that no one can turn off anything which changes the basic abilities to see, spot, and shoot your enemies.

[steelblueskies]

this for truth.

much like how the lowest settings result in only being able to see enemy mechs with vision or thermal at 50% of high and very high range.

i can understand options on the basis of performance, but it was clear there were serious issues once i picked up on that specific element, and then discovered that no, i was not imagining it. low sets mech draw at .5 of whatever per map value specified. medium gets you up to .8 and you don't get the full equalized mech view distance until high.

for the sub sliders this seems to be controlled by the object sliders ball of settings.

used to be fine with y'know enhanced targeting ranges allowing for target locks at ranges equal to high settings while on low, but with recent changes...

[Snib]

Kunae, on 01 January 2013 - 11:47 AM, said:

Otherwise people will play with things turned off to gain an in-game advantage against people who don't.

As in every other shooter. Casuals buy them for the graphics while competitive players turn the eye candy off. This game is no different.

[TexAce]

Kunae, on 01 January 2013 - 11:47 AM, said:

Your basic point remains valid though:

There should be no difference in basic vision and obscurables at any graphical level. Otherwise people will play with things turned off to gain an in-game advantage against people who don't.

PGI: Please ensure that no one can turn off anything which changes the basic abilities to see, spot, and shoot your enemies.

THIS

[Lazytron]

Snib, on 01 January 2013 - 02:42 PM, said:

As in every other shooter. Casuals buy them for the graphics while competitive players turn the eye candy off. This game is no different.

Does that mean it shouldn't be different? It is already different in a bunch of other respects, why is gameplay parity between graphical settings the sticking point where it can't possibly improve?

[Snib]

Lazytron, on 02 January 2013 - 05:35 AM, said:

Does that mean it shouldn't be different? It is already different in a bunch of other respects, why is gameplay parity between graphical settings the sticking point where it can't possibly improve?

I wasn't saying it's a good thing, I was just saying it's been the reality in many shooters for many years. I'd like it to be different but for many issues I don't think that's an option unless you force everyone onto a console with a controlled hardware environment.

[Volume]

I just hope it doesn't become something like r_picmip or brightskins.

For those of you who don' t know, players would literally turn textures down to an extreme minimal detail with command console/config edits in order to remove visual obstructions.

Compare the following shots, at differing levels of picmip:

http://img73.imagesh...shot0001wz5.jpg
http://img390.images...ub3aeroqyu5.jpg
http://img66.imagesh...shot0005it4.jpg
http://img139.images...shot0002gx1.jpg

I'm sure if people had the option, they'd bright-skin all enemy 'mechs to display as neon pink / neon green / bright white

[Flusensieb]

Did I unerstood right that I have to set the Grapics to low particles and highest objects to have best view and max view distance?

[Snib]

Volume, on 02 January 2013 - 07:33 AM, said:

I'm sure if people had the option, they'd bright-skin all enemy 'mechs to display as neon pink / neon green / bright white

Easily doable. You can also change the colour scale for heat vision.

[Av3nGer]

Snib, on 02 January 2013 - 05:50 AM, said:

I wasn't saying it's a good thing, I was just saying it's been the reality in many shooters for many years. I'd like it to be different but for many issues I don't think that's an option unless you force everyone onto a console with a controlled hardware environment.

Exactly...

[Flapdrol]

MadPanda, on 01 January 2013 - 07:17 AM, said:

Obviously I'm not going to go back to "low" as I got a comp that runs "very high" on steady 60fps. I don't think it's fair that I'm punished for it. Gameplay changing effects should be same on all graphics settings, just lower the quality of them.

No pc plays this on a steady 60 fps, maybe you can get 45 as minimum if you have an ivy bridge close to 5 Ghz. Having 7 mechs onscreen makes the fps dive regardless of settings.

As to the very high settings it's indeed a mess, effects, particles and postproccesing are the biggest culprits, turn those off and you should be good.

Edited by Flapdrol, 02 January 2013 - 08:22 AM.

[steelblueskies]

Flusensieb, on 02 January 2013 - 07:45 AM, said:

Did I unerstood right that I have to set the Grapics to low particles and highest objects to have best view and max view distance?

to answer the question, if you are not using a custom user.cfg, then you need object detail at high or very high for the maximum mech view distance, and yes particles down to low for usng diminished numbers of the blargh effects xtreme.

so.. almost yes? high object detail, lowest particle detail. very high object detail only makes the fluff like brush and a couple other things draw for longer ranges or use the higher quality models for longer ranges. so only high is needed for object detail.

[MadPanda]

Flapdrol, on 02 January 2013 - 08:21 AM, said:

No pc plays this on a steady 60 fps, maybe you can get 45 as minimum if you have an ivy bridge close to 5 Ghz. Having 7 mechs onscreen makes the fps dive regardless of settings.

As to the very high settings it's indeed a mess, effects, particles and postproccesing are the biggest culprits, turn those off and you should be good.

It's 60 every time I look at it, and obviously I'm not looking at it in the heat of a battle. That's good enough for me.

And why turn off effects or postprocessing? Unless you are now talking about perfomance boosts, those don't concern me. I was only worried about the extra vision impairing effects which were caused by the Particles setting.

[MeepSire]

Yeah it is a little un fair... But if particles were on on a weak machine, it would go too slow... A fix should be made...
As for me, I'm running med settings and I could go to high settings if I wanted, but I don't... Med is a good compermise.

[steelblueskies]

MeepSire, on 02 January 2013 - 11:33 PM, said:

Yeah it is a little un fair... But if particles were on on a weak machine, it would go too slow... A fix should be made...
As for me, I'm running med settings and I could go to high settings if I wanted, but I don't... Med is a good compermise.

enjoying enemies being able to see your mech from 20% further out than you can see them? if they run high and you run medium that is what you have. of course you still have the advantage over "low" users by 30%.

[Snib]

steelblueskies, on 03 January 2013 - 04:02 AM, said:

enjoying enemies being able to see your mech from 20% further out than you can see them? if they run high and you run medium that is what you have. of course you still have the advantage over "low" users by 30%.

You keep saying that but I tested it, set everything to low from my usual very high, had no trouble seeing enemy heat sigs straight across the map (RiverCity, spotting from south base into north base, distance 1200m). What more distance do you need?

PS: That said, got lot of graphical issues when setting to low, looks like the mountain backdrop was overlaid instead and things like that. *shudders and goes back to very high*

Edited by Snib, 03 January 2013 - 04:20 AM.

[Flapdrol]

MadPanda, on 02 January 2013 - 02:26 PM, said:

It's 60 every time I look at it, and obviously I'm not looking at it in the heat of a battle. That's good enough for me.

And why turn off effects or postprocessing? Unless you are now talking about perfomance boosts, those don't concern me. I was only worried about the extra vision impairing effects which were caused by the Particles setting.

Postprocessing often blurs things or makes games look like fable. Not done a real comparison, just turned it off and didn't miss it.

[SJ SCP Wolf]

Flapdrol, on 02 January 2013 - 08:21 AM, said:

No pc plays this on a steady 60 fps, maybe you can get 45 as minimum if you have an ivy bridge close to 5 Ghz. Having 7 mechs onscreen makes the fps dive regardless of settings.

As to the very high settings it's indeed a mess, effects, particles and postproccesing are the biggest culprits, turn those off and you should be good.

Oh really? Are you a betting man or just a fool without an accurate understanding of how this game scales against hardware?