Project Reality v0.6 to v0.75 constructive criticism.

[M.Warren]

Of course I know all of you are not going to agree with every one of the mentioned ideas in this thread and we can spend days arguing each and every aspect that was pointed out. But please, let's keep this to be constructive criticism. The major focus of what we're looking at here is to think up some of the positive ideas (Not just the ones mentioned here by myself alone.) that were present in previous patches and to reevaluate them and judge if it is still necessary to have them removed from the mod or have them brought back and implemented once more as of the current v0.75 patch leading into the v0.8 patch.
<Note: Ideas that are not permitted to be stated in this thread are: Weapon Deviation System, Spawn System or the Minimap Removal as there is another thread specifically designated for that in the "Sticky Thread" section of the PR Suggestions and Feedback forum.>

I've been a big Project Reality fan since the last few weeks of the v0.5 patch into the v0.6 patch. It's nice to know that there are people out there who appreciate a modern military based realism game. Also the major aspect is that there are a number of players willing to teamwork in a unexpected and highly professional manner. But even as an avid player I've found myself putting the game down on occassion for atleast 2 to 4 weeks at a time simply because of how some aspects of the game down spiraled.

Personally I appreciate the evolution of the game play dynamics in referance to a players ability to spawn, the removal of the SL spawn and APC spawns was a good idea as we transitioned from v0.6 to the v0.7 patch. Along with the removal of the infantry minimap screen. However what drove me up the wall was these other alterations to the game such as...

1. Removal of Heavy AT missle tone and increasing target aquisition speed.
<Note: Yay for one-shotting APC's without a chance. Looks like it's just as overpowered as in v0.6. But then again, atleast in v0.6 you had a chance to get out of the way as you can hear the warning tone.>

2. Removal of Officer kit flashbangs.
<Note: Simply a handy tool to have. Matter of fact it'd be more valuable now than before seeing grenades are nearly useless.>

3. Reduction in the effectiveness of fragmentation grenades.
<Note: Welcome to v0.75, that big baseball sized green thing in your hand no longer kills people. However now you can place it in the enemies mail box and blow up the box of cookies thier mother sent to them for psychological warfare.>

4. Removal of BF2 artillery for JDAM.
<Note: JDAM's are nice but are used improperly more often than not. Personally I think the BF2 artillery should be brought back and given the same timer the JDAM has. This will also increase the value of Spec Ops. Why? Well it looks like they have something to blow up other than just a Command Post. Besides, who need's a JDAM? We have aircraft already capable of dropping 500lb bombs that are ten times more effective.>

5. Removal of quality maps.
<Note: Such as Helmand Province, ah those were the days...>

6. Removal of the Crewman wrench.
<Note: Honestly, the Crewman wrench was taken out to do what again? Oh yeah, to get rid of those pesky one man tankers... Wait, we still have one man tankers to this day don't we?>

7. Removal of Engineer repair trucks.
<Note: Don't get me going on why they scrapped the Engineer repair trucks. I don't have enough advil to explain as it's simply rediculous. Along with the fact that they reduced the effectiveness of the engineer wrench a patch later... Matter of fact, someone once said to me "I wish they had repair trucks that you can drive around for support reasons." he was shocked when I told him that we once did and they were removed.>

8. Removal of kit requests from supply crates.
<Note: Personally if you have a supply crate nearby it most likely means someone drove those supplies to you or had them dropped off by a chopper. So why can't you use them as an alternate means to request kits off of? It was a good idea the first time, turns out that it still is.>

9. Removal of kit requests from APC's
<Note: This should have been left to increase the value of effective mechanized infantry squads. Wait, what do you mean there's no mechanized infantry squads? Oh yeah, that's right... All the APC's were blown up by that v0.6 Heavy A--- erm, the v0.75 Heavy AT.>

10. Removal of the "Dizzy" near death experience as seen in the v0.6 patch.
<Note: Not sure why they got rid of the "dizzy" effect when you're near death for what's currently seen as the "black and white screen" effect. I thought the first version was more realistic, afterall if you get shot and lose blood you'll most likely become "dizzy" or feel faint.>

Sometimes I wonder if the mod is progressing. Since the v0.6 to the v0.75 patch I feel we've not moved forward much but spent more time making trade offs for one thing over another. But in all honesty, I look forward to the v0.8 patch to bring balance and to correct the issues presented in v0.7 and v0.75.

The only thing I'm looking forward to in v0.8 is the possible introduction of the Fighter/Bomber class jet and Sangin, as the rest of the maps appear to be of the amphibious assault category. Truely those types of maps take a very large amount of coordination and player skill to accomplish. Without those two aspects present... Expect a very frustrating round ahead. Like I've said before in another post, there's nothing fun about getting shot at while advancing across a beach.

Well, all is not lost. Do what you must and let's get v0.8 to be "all that and a bag of chips" as I think we're all in need of a big treat. Hopefully one day they'll revive all the better aspects of the v0.6 patch because as time goes on we forget alittle more and more.

It's obvious that there were quite a few high quality ideas that were removed to confront certain gameplay issues/circumstances. Most of which were later fixed by a signifcantly better solution at the cost of some really well thought-out gameplay dynamics and now have faded away into the past and if not completely forgotten about, now that truely is a shame. A real shame indeed...

Once again... Of course I know all of you are not going to agree with every one of the mentioned ideas in this thread and we can spend days arguing each and every aspect that was pointed out. But please, let's keep this to be constructive criticism. The major focus of what we're looking at here is to think up some of the positive ideas (Not just the ones mentioned here by myself alone.) that were present in previous patches and to reevaluate them and judge if it is still necessary to have them removed from the mod or have them brought back and implemented once more as of the current v0.75 patch leading into the v0.8 patch.
<Note: Ideas that are not permitted to be stated in this thread are: Weapon Deviation System, Spawn System or the Minimap Removal as there is another thread specifically designated for that in the "Sticky Thread" section of the PR Suggestions and Feedback forum.>

May the v0.8 patch take Project Reality to a hightened level of success that we've never seen before. Take care gentlemen.

[[R-DEV]Outlawz7]

I suggested bringing back the crewman wrench and the idea got beaten to death by the parole "engineers encourage teamwork"

5. Removal of quality maps.
<Note: Such as Helmand Province, ah those were the days...>

I LOL'd. Helmand was no were near being a 'quality map' just a sniper fest for British riflemen. 0.5 version was fun though

[Morgan]

I like the thought out post. Good work .

Originally Posted by M.Warren

1. Removal of Heavy AT missle tone and increasing target aquisition speed.
<Note: Yay for one-shotting APC's without a chance. Looks like it's just as overpowered as in v0.6. But then again, atleast in v0.6 you had a chance to get out of the way as you can hear the warning tone.>

Agreed. Bring back the warning tone because at the moment APC's are just big, tin coffins.

2. Removal of Officer kit flashbangs.
<Note: Simply a handy tool to have. Matter of fact it'd be more valuable now than before seeing grenades are nearly useless.>

Never used them, so don't see the point. Also I thought they weren't utilised by frontline troops?

3. Reduction in the effectiveness of fragmentation grenades.
<Note: Welcome to v0.75, that big baseball sized green thing in your hand no longer kills people. However now you can place it in the enemies mail box and blow up the box of cookies thier mother sent to them for psychological warfare.>

Couldn't agree more. I threw a 'nade into a bunker on EJOD the other day and stormed in after the explosion to be promptly cut down by a bloke lying in the corner.

4. Removal of BF2 artillery for JDAM.
<Note: JDAM's are nice but are used improperly more often than not. Personally I think the BF2 artillery should be brought back and given the same timer the JDAM has. This will also increase the value of Spec Ops. Why? Well it looks like they have something to blow up other than just a Command Post. Besides, who need's a JDAM? We have aircraft already capable of dropping 500lb bombs that are ten times more effective.>

Now, yesterday on Qinling we hit Chinese FOB with a JDAM and it proved quite good. At other times though they can be a bit iffy. Do agree that arty would give Spec Ops more purpose.

5. Removal of quality maps.
<Note: Such as Helmand Province, ah those were the days...>

Helmand was good but didn't the Dev's not like the way it made the game play, so out it went...

6. Removal of the Crewman wrench.
<Note: Honestly, the Crewman wrench was taken out to do what again? Oh yeah, to get rid of those pesky one man tankers... Wait, we still have one man tankers to this day don't we?>

Leave the Crewman wrench out. Tanks with 2 crewman and 1 engy are brilliant and focus teamwork.

7. Removal of Engineer repair trucks.
<Note: Don't get me going on why they scrapped the Engineer repair trucks. I don't have enough advil to explain as it's simply rediculous. Along with the fact that they reduced the effectiveness of the engineer wrench a patch later... Matter of fact, someone once said to me "I wish they had repair trucks that you can drive around for support reasons." he was shocked when I told him that we once did and they were removed.>

Not really fussed. I do like the support it offers and sitting in the 50. on tanks can be a bit dangerous for engies.

8. Removal of kit requests from supply crates.
<Note: Personally if you have a supply crate nearby it most likely means someone drove those supplies to you or had them dropped off by a chopper. So why can't you use them as an alternate means to request kits off of? It was a good idea the first time, turns out that it still is.>

9. Removal of kit requests from APC's
<Note: This should have been left to increase the value of effective mechanized infantry squads. Wait, what do you mean there's no mechanized infantry squads? Oh yeah, that's right... All the APC's were blown up by that v0.6 Heavy A--- erm, the v0.75 Heavy AT.>

Don't think you should get kits from either APC's or Supply crate. Just doesn't fit for me. Each to his own.

10. Removal of the "Dizzy" near death experience as seen in the v0.6 patch.
<Note: Not sure why they got rid of the "dizzy" effect when you're near death for what's currently seen as the "black and white screen" effect. I thought the first version was more realistic, afterall if you get shot and lose blood you'll most likely become "dizzy" or feel faint.>

This needs to be sorted. I hate the current effect, it makes no sense. Please, please, please change it!

[[R-MOD]Mongolian_dude]

Firstly, i'd like to say sorry for breaking down your post into chunks, as you clearly put effort into it.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

1. Removal of Heavy AT missle tone and increasing target aquisition speed.
<Note: Yay for one-shotting APC's without a chance. Looks like it's just as overpowered as in v0.6. But then again, atleast in v0.6 you had a chance to get out of the way as you can hear the warning tone.>

Well, the warning tone was just very unrealistic.
It gives tank crews a 6th sense that they just dont have IRL.
With HAT not being wire guided anymore, increasing the ability for evasion would just be unbareable.
IRL, HATs, such as the SRAW/Eryx have the capability to outright destroy even the latest MBTs, with a direct hit. If an APC were to survive such a round, I think it would just give armour a advantage that would be unrealistic and bad for gameplay/balance levels.
There is something annoying about getting destoyed as easily as you do in an APC, but i cant see a way to fix it properly

Originally Posted by M.Warren

2. Removal of Officer kit flashbangs.
<Note: Simply a handy tool to have. Matter of fact it'd be more valuable now than before seeing grenades are nearly useless.>

I liked the flashbangs and miss them so, but I understand why they were removed. Perhaps not so from the SF kit, as i would suspect them to have more specialised and less conventional gear than standard troops.
However, I do recognise that few front line troops do have acsess to these, IRL.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

3. Reduction in the effectiveness of fragmentation grenades.
<Note: Welcome to v0.75, that big baseball sized green thing in your hand no longer kills people. However now you can place it in the enemies mail box and blow up the box of cookies thier mother sent to them for psychological warfare.>

Well, i think it makes more sense how the frag grenades are now. They have a larger blast radius, but inflict less damage. Ofcourse, the closer you are, the more damage will be inflicted. This was changed to simulate the fact that, since frags fragment, shrapnle would travel further than the limiting blast radius of previous versions in PR.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

4. Removal of BF2 artillery for JDAM.
<Note: JDAM's are nice but are used improperly more often than not. Personally I think the BF2 artillery should be brought back and given the same timer the JDAM has. This will also increase the value of Spec Ops. Why? Well it looks like they have something to blow up other than just a Command Post. Besides, who need's a JDAM? We have aircraft already capable of dropping 500lb bombs that are ten times more effective.>

Yeah, the JDAM is really insignificant.
It is too rare and too weak. I think the timer should be reduced from 30mins to 15 and the blast radius considerably increased. Compared to that of the payload of assets in game, they are just a novelty; only resulting in spammed text on the server about too much smoke and too few bodies.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

5. Removal of quality maps.
<Note: Such as Helmand Province, ah those were the days...>

I think this was a good move to remove the map. "PR has grow out of it", much like other past greats. However, it is not to say that the terrain and geography was not appriciated and that similar, but larger and more realistic maps of this sort will not retun in the future.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

6. Removal of the Crewman wrench.
<Note: Honestly, the Crewman wrench was taken out to do what again? Oh yeah, to get rid of those pesky one man tankers... Wait, we still have one man tankers to this day don't we?>

The crewman wrench was not really that good or that bad a move in my eyes.
Engineers are always available as a standard spawn kit, and if the tank is to be crewed fully(3 personel), than the 50cal is available for an engineer to travel along.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

7. Removal of Engineer repair trucks.
<Note: Don't get me going on why they scrapped the Engineer repair trucks. I don't have enough advil to explain as it's simply rediculous. Along with the fact that they reduced the effectiveness of the engineer wrench a patch later... Matter of fact, someone once said to me "I wish they had repair trucks that you can drive around for support reasons." he was shocked when I told him that we once did and they were removed.>

Yeah, now this is something I found quite odd.
I too would like to see the return of these vehicles, hopefully with a greater repair/rearm rate than that of a standard engineer, to dipict the wider range of tools and abilities available onboard a truck, as opposed to a single soldeir/engineer.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

8. Removal of kit requests from supply crates.
<Note: Personally if you have a supply crate nearby it most likely means someone drove those supplies to you or had them dropped off by a chopper. So why can't you use them as an alternate means to request kits off of? It was a good idea the first time, turns out that it still is.>

I think this could also make a return, however, it could possible become problematic if all kits were avilable. Perhaps line-squad kits should be available from them (Support, grenedier, marksman, LAT) and not specialist kits(AA rifle, HAT, sniper, SF.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

9. Removal of kit requests from APC's
<Note: This should have been left to increase the value of effective mechanized infantry squads. Wait, what do you mean there's no mechanized infantry squads? Oh yeah, that's right... All the APC's were blown up by that v0.6 Heavy A--- erm, the v0.75 Heavy AT.>

I was unaware that this was the case and was under the impression this was still possible
If this is the case, than perhaps then line-squad should also be available from the doors of APCs.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

10. Removal of the "Dizzy" near death experience as seem in the v0.6 patch.
<Note: Not sure why they got rid of the "dizzy" effect when you're near death for what's currently seen as the "black and white screen" effect. I thought the first version was more realistic, afterall if you get shot and lose blood you'll most likely become "dizzy" or feel faint.>

I dont think this has changed much. I doubt either of us has bleed to death, IRL, and know what it is really like. Im not bothered, as long as it impairs the ability of the wounded to a decent level.


Well structured and mature post. I think you brought out some good points that were not properly adressed.

...mongol...

[M.Warren]

Originally Posted by [R-MOD]Mongolian_dude

(Commenting upon the v0.75 Heavy Anti-Tank.)
Well, the warning tone was just very unrealistic.
It gives tank crews a 6th sense that they just dont have IRL.
With HAT not being wire guided anymore, increasing the ability for evasion would just be unbareable.
IRL, HATs, such as the SRAW/Eryx have the capability to outright destroy even the latest MBTs, with a direct hit. If an APC were to survive such a round, I think it would just give armour a advantage that would be unrealistic and bad for gameplay/balance levels.
There is something annoying about getting destoyed as easily as you do in an APC, but i cant see a way to fix it properly

I will accept the truth that Heavy AT does not emit a detection sound as that is realistic. However, would it be possible to simply slow down the missle's velocity? Currently as is, it's almost laser-beam quick. Maybe if it's just abit faster than the standard BF2 speed it'll be more realistic. If I remember correctly there was an individual who was modding the Eryx and attempting to adjust it's velocity and add a "swirl" effect to the propulsion section. This may be as close to a solution we may ever get to balancing Heavy AT and maintaining it's realism.

Originally Posted by [R-MOD]Mongolian_dude

(Commenting upon the Helmand Province map.)
I think this was a good move to remove the map. "PR has grow out of it", much like other past greats. However, it is not to say that the terrain and geography was not appriciated and that similar, but larger and more realistic maps of this sort will not retun in the future.

Good to hear that more of these style maps may emerge. It is very tough to pit iron sight weapons against the finest scoped assault rifles of the day. I just felt that the balance between scoped weapons and the "fog of war" helped maintain a balance. Along with the fact that civilians awarded 10 tickets to the team that either had the civilian arrested or mistakenly killed. I suppose more people felt that it was too... Run-and-gun like for Project Reality which is an acceptable reason. I myself never thought that Helmand Province was unbalanced though if that's what people may be thinking.

[Death_dx]

1) Yeah can't argue. Just the other day I got 15/1 KD on seven gates, from APC kills, using the same HAT kit (saved by SL on death) the entire round. Perhaps most realistic solution would be the HAT not insta-blowing the APC, instead making it inoperable and wounding if not killing operators.

2) /Agree

3) I like the grenade reduction, it's elminated grenade spam nearly entirely. They are nearly if not impossible to map the realistic probability of being hit by a fragment, nevermind the probability of being killed by it, therefore I prefer this versus the previous massive kill radius and short timer. Now if only they didn't make you suppressed.

4) /disagree don't always have the aircraft, either with competant pilots, or with the map setup.

5) 0.6 and above here.

6) I thought it was removed because fools would jump out and repair their exploding apcs, giving them just enough HP not to blow up, and then the crewman would be killed and their apc stranded. Don't see why they should have them unless they only work at main base. I'd prefer having a repair asset so that armour need to go back to base for repairs. Rarely are the days of engineers actually repairing armour.

7)I thought I would diculous once, but I had to rediculous to get it right. Yeah but if it's realistic sure why not, I have no real knowledge on engineer field repair of tanks, but I'd imagine it'd be hard to repair damaged armoured plating.

8 ) /Agree

9) /Disagree, seems fine now.

10) I'm more concerned about how the blood goes back into you.

[Waaah_Wah]

Crewman wrench will just make it easier for people to tank, and make solo tanking alot easier. It will be like in 0.6 when you could hit tanks 10+ times with the HAT coz they would just back up a bit so you cant hit them, repair and pop back up. Now only fully crewed tanks have this advantage. And thats how it should stay (IMO)

[maverick551]

1. I completely agree. It is way to simple to kill enemy apc's with the hat kit. Went 27/4 And never died with the hat in my possession on Qwai yesterday. 2 tanks and 2 apcs to my record that round.

2. I think that the frag's just need to be tweaked again, but give the flashbangs back to the SF class.

3. Agree

4. Undecided, I really do not have much of a preference for what happens to the Area Attack.

5. Yes those were the days :P

6. I think that the Crewman should get a wrench back as well. But, I would mabey limit it in some way (Make it not as efficient as a Engineer Wrench etc.)

7. Agree

8. Agree

9, Agree, I would like to see this replaced with the request from supply crates.

10. Can not really make up my mind don this one. I like the effect because it is realistic that after a person is wounded enough, their ability to fight is greatly diminished. Would like to see some tweaking with this however. Also, I think that the player should still be able to see what is happening after being "Critically Wounded" Seems to me that a Critically Wounded Person could still see what is happening around them, unless they were of course blinded in some way. A black monitor while being critically wounded is a little much if you ask me. But should defiantly kept for when the person is KIA.

[Rudd]

2 and 3 these are arguments for increasing frag effectiveness, rather than implementing flashbangs which are not realistally presented ingame.
4. Removal of BF2 artillery for JDAM.
AFAIK, the devs are working on making the JDAM more effective. I prefer this over the artillery barrage since the barrage seems somewhat unrealistic and requires less teamwork
5. Removal of quality maps.

<Note: Such as Helmand Province, ah those were the days...>

I loved helmand also, but I think I will love sangin more.
6. Removal of the Crewman wrench.
I think that this has worked very well, I so much more often see engineers manning the 50cals.
7. Removal of Engineer repair trucks.
I agree with their return, in a squad of 6 you either get 2 fully manned tanks, or 3 two man tanks, but you still need engineer support. The engineer truck ensured that was a reality.
9. Removal of kit requests from APC's
you can still get officer kit which leads on to rally points...
I love mechanized infantry squads.

[Wolfe]

Originally Posted by M.Warren

1. Removal of Heavy AT missle tone and increasing target aquisition speed.

The HAT is overpowered, no question. Its range, accuracy, destructive power, and relative high access to ammo makes it highly effective against virtually everything. And there's FOUR of them per map; two for each team. For the sake of paper/scissors/rock gameplay, no weapon should be that powerful, nor that accessible. But it's not all the HAT's fault, most maps are too small, and have too much wide open space for such a weapon.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

3. Reduction in the effectiveness of fragmentation grenades.

Grenades are better than ever. Some people don't like that you can't spam kill with them, but that's exactly why I like them. They're a niche tool, only useful in certain instances; not a randomly thrown haha u r dead ball.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

4. Removal of BF2 artillery for JDAM.

BF2 artillery was lame. Point, click, everything dies. The Jdam is a step in the right direction, and I agree that it's frequency is too rare, but I have a problem with any weapon with that much power used that easily... it just ruins the game when overused.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

6. Removal of the Crewman wrench.

The crewmen wrench was removed to prevent tanks from being hit, rolling back, quickly repairing, then rolling forward again to take another shot. But I agree that tactic could have been prevented without removing the wrench... simply reduce the wrench's repair power, making it take longer to repair a tank.

Forcing a 3rd person (engineer) to repair a tank looks nice on paper, but in-game it's just a bad idea for four reasons:

1. The engineer dies far too often. They are completely exposed with no protection from explosive rounds. Worse, there's nothing they can do to stop it; frustrating to say the least.
2. The engineer has no spawn point, since the squad leader is most often the tank commander and therefore cannot lay down a rally in most cases. Combined with their frequent and unavoidable deaths, the fun meter sharply falls.
3. The engineer's only role is to either constant ducking to avoid sniper fire, or staring at the tank treads while repairing. It's restrictive and uninteresting. A very unfun experience for most.
4. Most tank maps lack adequate numbers of infantry, and forcing a 3 man crew for tanks makes it worse. Due to the limited number of players on a server, the engineer is far more useful in an infantry squad than ducking in a tank.

Originally Posted by M.Warren

7. Removal of Engineer repair trucks.

Agree for the 4 reasons stated above.

---

All in all, PR has moved in the right direction over the years, but lately, some of the decisions have been questionable. There are too many toys, too few infantry, too easy to kill each other, and too predictable and linear. I personally would enjoy it more if there was some dynamic randomness to flag objectives or if firefights were more than 5 second engagements moving the mouse a 1/2 inch then clicking rapidly.

But I don't see this changing any time soon. The dev community seems fractured, with no clear vision on what PR should be. Each person contributes interesting ideas and coding, but often not considering how it will affect the game as a whole and its direct impact on fun.