Spotting Ground Targets 1.5.x vs 2.x

I have a lot of trouble spotting ground targets in DCS 1.5.7. Ground target visibility is often perfect from one direction/altitude and zero from another. I wound up grudgingly turning on labels, but I remained unable to see the same targets I couldn't see previously. Someone suggested to me that this experience is LOD related, and that seems to make sense with the difficulty spotting air targets the a2a guys mention.

I know there probably isn't an easy solution, and there might not be any at all in 1.5.x, and I can live with that. What I would like to know is whether there is any reason to expect visibility of ground targets to improve with the 2.5 merge.

I do not have any mods installed. I've tried 1080p, 1440p and 1600p resolutions, and I've tried all three with AA at x2 and switched off. I've tried visibility set to extreme and high. I've tried flat terrain shadows as well as default. I've tried depth of field as bokeh, simple and off. Clutter/grass is at zero. I've tried tree visibility at default 6000 and max. Preload radius is max. All other settings maxed out. GPU is MSI Gaming X 1080 Ti, monitor is AOC Agon AG271QG, CPU is Intel i7-7770k, mobo is Asrock Fatal1ty Z270 Gaming K6.

Any input is welcome.

I think there are two reasons for difficulty spotting ground targets.

First is the fact that most vehicles in the game are camouflaged. Green on green is not supposed to be easy to see. If they were bright red or yellow tanks, it would be a piece of cake. You might have a better chance by coming 90 degrees to the sun so that the shadow is visible. I've noticed using illumination flares at night casts some huge shadows that makes targets super easy to spot.

Second is the poor terrain quality. I fly down low IRL and you can spot vehicles from 3 or 4 miles easily even if they are near bushes or similar color to the terrain. But there is far far far more detail in the real world than can ever realistically be expected to be in any video game. So instead of having a sharp contrast of a squareish vehicle in front of a raggy bushline, you have a squareish vehicle on top of a blob of green shades that doesn't have any logical pattern to be interrupted. Basically you can spot things by noticing something is out of place, but if everything is random there is nothing to pick up on. Even if they replaced the ground textures with accurate satellite imagery, the resolution would be too low. Maybe in 15 or 20 years. Unless they hand draw high rez textures and have a 50GB texture file.

Also keep in mind that in the game you have tanks driving on top of flat forests. The textures are supposed to look somewhat real, and IRL there are often lots of forests. They can't draw trees everywhere so you have them included in the texture. The complex nature of the colors makes it hard to spot a green speck among many green blobs. If the game were nothing but flat green ground, you'd spot everything no problem. Just look at vehicles on roads. They are very easy to spot because they are on top of a flat sharp texture.

Oh and I think the new map is supposed to have a better lighting engine as well as sharper textures, so that might bring an improvement. We'll have to see.

I think there are two reasons for difficulty spotting ground targets.

 

First is the fact that most vehicles in the game are camouflaged. Green on green is not supposed to be easy to see. If they were bright red or yellow tanks, it would be a piece of cake. You might have a better chance by coming 90 degrees to the sun so that the shadow is visible. I've noticed using illumination flares at night casts some huge shadows that makes targets super easy to spot.

 

Second is the poor terrain quality. I fly down low IRL and you can spot vehicles from 3 or 4 miles easily even if they are near bushes or similar color to the terrain. But there is far far far more detail in the real world than can ever realistically be expected to be in any video game. So instead of having a sharp contrast of a squareish vehicle in front of a raggy bushline, you have a squareish vehicle on top of a blob of green shades that doesn't have any logical pattern to be interrupted. Basically you can spot things by noticing something is out of place, but if everything is random there is nothing to pick up on. Even if they replaced the ground textures with accurate satellite imagery, the resolution would be too low. Maybe in 15 or 20 years. Unless they hand draw high rez textures and have a 50GB texture file.

 

Also keep in mind that in the game you have tanks driving on top of flat forests. The textures are supposed to look somewhat real, and IRL there are often lots of forests. They can't draw trees everywhere so you have them included in the texture. The complex nature of the colors makes it hard to spot a green speck among many green blobs. If the game were nothing but flat green ground, you'd spot everything no problem. Just look at vehicles on roads. They are very easy to spot because they are on top of a flat sharp texture.

Oh and I think the new map is supposed to have a better lighting engine as well as sharper textures, so that might bring an improvement. We'll have to see.

Thanks for all that information Sideslip, here's hoping the new map helps. Do you think viewing from a different altitude might help? My problems have been in the 25T, so I'm thinking a switch to the viggen (and tree top level attacks) might help...

Bit of a cheatish suggestion is to have a FAC-team in your mission. It doesn't even have to exist in the mission editor, you can just trigger some red smoke markers over the target area once you approach it. Or if it's a night job, perhaps illumination bombs every now and then. Also, having an active enemy with APCs help. Them green tracers they fire (BTR-80) are usually quite helpful for locating. Just don't fly into them ;)

with the pbr coming to 2.5 it might be possible to have light reflect from vehicles when looking from certain angles. this should of course not be overdone, since military vehicles are not very shiny for a reason. giving the limitations of the engine in regards to spotting, i think a low amount of glare would be acceptable though...

for static vehicles/FOBs/SAM-sites etc. it would also help, if dcs would offer assets and tools to increase the visual footprint of static/dug-in units.

decals for tire marks and larger patches of dirt/mud from heavy use,defensive ramparts and more logistics/support assets to "litter" ground sites with.

of course that would not help with moving vehicles, but i think that moving vehicles are not too hard to spot, as they are easily visible on road surface and generate quite an amount of dust when going offroad

Thanks for all that information Sideslip, here's hoping the new map helps. Do you think viewing from a different altitude might help? My problems have been in the 25T, so I'm thinking a switch to the viggen (and tree top level attacks) might help...

I'm not sure how low you were going. I mainly fly the su-25a as I find it's a challenge to engage your targets without the help of a TV system. I have my fov bound to a zoom axis on my x-55 throttle and while I fly around at 100 degrees, I make attack runs at either 75 or 50 degrees. I have the privilege of having a 1440P ultrawide that fills about 60-70 degrees of RL fov, and despite all that sometimes I can't spot a huey until the last 3 or 4 seconds.

Generally, to have a good chance of seeing ground targets I have to fly at 1000m or bellow. The LOD levels aren't perfect, but they are better than they used to be. You may notice the changes to the models as you come in, but I don't think it has much effect on their visibility.

As mentioned above, if you don't know where to look for the targets, you have a much better chance of spotting tracers or SAMs.

I'm not sure how low you were going. I mainly fly the su-25a as I find it's a challenge to engage your targets without the help of a TV system. I have my fov bound to a zoom axis on my x-55 throttle and while I fly around at 100 degrees, I make attack runs at either 75 or 50 degrees. I have the privilege of having a 1440P ultrawide that fills about 60-70 degrees of RL fov, and despite all that sometimes I can't spot a huey until the last 3 or 4 seconds.

 

Generally, to have a good chance of seeing ground targets I have to fly at 1000m or bellow. The LOD levels aren't perfect, but they are better than they used to be. You may notice the changes to the models as you come in, but I don't think it has much effect on their visibility.

 

As mentioned above, if you don't know where to look for the targets, you have a much better chance of spotting tracers or SAMs.

Thanks once again Sideslip :) Seeing your comment about needing to be at or below 1000m to spot targets, that's really helpful. I've been sticking closely to the suggested altitude and I find it tough when I do so. When I get down low it's far easier to spot targets, and in fact I've often had targets that seemed invisible suddenly spring into clear view as I've descended, even when shadow doesn't seem to be visible from my angle. So it would be considered ok to deviate significantly from the wp altitude for attack runs?

with the pbr coming to 2.5 it might be possible to have light reflect from vehicles when looking from certain angles. this should of course not be overdone, since military vehicles are not very shiny for a reason. giving the limitations of the engine in regards to spotting, i think a low amount of glare would be acceptable though...

 

for static vehicles/FOBs/SAM-sites etc. it would also help, if dcs would offer assets and tools to increase the visual footprint of static/dug-in units.

 

decals for tire marks and larger patches of dirt/mud from heavy use,defensive ramparts and more logistics/support assets to "litter" ground sites with.

 

of course that would not help with moving vehicles, but i think that moving vehicles are not too hard to spot, as they are easily visible on road surface and generate quite an amount of dust when going offroad

Thanks twistking. I do hope light behaves differently when it illuminates metal rather than plant material. Here's hoping ED recognizes that ground units do need to be more visible for 2.5 and beyond.

So it would be considered ok to deviate significantly from the wp altitude for attack runs?

The waypoint is really just to get you to the target area. How you choose to proceed when you get there depends on the threats you face, the targets you're attacking, the armaments you have and the risks you are willing to take. The SU-25T's shikval is really not that great for finding targets as you have to already be flying towards it giving you a limited time to engage and avoid enemy fire. If you can first identify the threats by getting them to fire, you can then eliminate them from a safe distance with guided missiles and then go in closer using rockets and bombs.