Third Person Aiming---please straight answer! Thanks in advance | Forums

[FighterForJC]

Excellent video. Demonstrates perfectly the issue I have with a lot of contextual cover systems, and my seething hate for the people that so feverishly defend them. Shoulder-to-cover and then peek-shooting enemies is simply bad form. I'd much rather be able to lean and stand a step or so back from cover, rather than predictably expose myself ( a lot myself, in fact) because the cover system decides this is what I should be doing.

I can assure you, realism was NOT Ubisoft's motivation, but laziness and convenience, however realistic the (non) cover system is in Wildlands supposedly may be according to the end all be all video that is undoubtedly the ultimate authority in realistic cover systems.

[ThePollie]

Honestly, I'd figure it easier to go with stand(lean left, right), crouch(lean left, right), and prone than to create cover animations and script every little necessary environmental object to operate with the system.

[EchoFiveKilo]

I would agree that a simple leaning/peeking system wouldn't be a cover system. However as far as I can tell from the videos showing off the system so far, and from first person accounts, there is more to it than that. I haven't personally played the E3 2016 playable build, so I can't comment on specifics.

However your character does seem to interact with certain cover automatically. Hugging it more than simply placing your character model next to it. There are animations involved in this.


Another user mentioned a couple examples in the thread already IIRC.


The video you posted depicts some inaccurate cover utilization. I'm an actual firearms instructor, and that's honestly not how you should be doing it. Your back should NEVER be to a wall on a corner like they find themselves doing, unless you're planning on giving up that position within the next few seconds.

Here's a little video showing how most soldiers and LEO's are trained to use cover (specifically around corners) in today's world:

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I wanted to expand on this video, but after you posted that fairly inaccurate representation, I feel like I'd be doing a disservice if I didn't post this now.

Edit: OMG the longer I watch that video the worse it gets. Running into an open field, seeing an armed technical and a cluster of bad guys and decide to stop in the open field, standing, and engage them. That's a great way to get yourself killed IRL.

Most games I've seen with cover systems like Future Soldier and Gears of War implement a horribly incorrect animation set in conjunction with their cover. However, they need to do this so that cover isn't extremely "OP". They need to force the player model out more than it needs to be in order to balance the conflict between a player in cover and a player getting caught in the open. Because it's a game, and having extremely unfair mechanics actually makes for some pretty not fun gameplay.

Implementing perfectly realistic cover animations, like the ones I demonstrated in the video, would result in such small hitboxes being exposed on characters in cover that it would be EXTREMELY hard to take people out that are tucked neatly behind cover.

Even if Wildlands has no cover system (pretty sure it does, as discussed above), you can still "use cover" correctly by SLOWLY sidestepping out of cover and "slicing the pie" around a corner. Obviously if we could lean a little, like in games such as Arma, it would be a bit more realistic. But again, it could be less fun to some degree.

I know the video I posted isn't 'real life' but it's still a decent example of what I envisioned. Also, it's called Peeling/suppressive fire. Two guys running away and doing nothing are going to get shot in the back. 1 provides suppressive fire, the other moves, rinse and repeat.

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Go to 2:40 in this video - I want to be able to lean like this in GR:W.

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2:21(the guy firing the M4) in this video, and 5:28 (guy leaning behind cover), are what I envision should be in the game, its similar to what we could do in FS. This is more realistic then stepping out of cover and exposing your whole body, it seems way too arcade. inb4 this gets refuted as being too unrealistic and exposing whole body is better than leaning/hugging cover.

[ThePollie]

Snap-to-cover systems are just crap. There's no getting around it. If the developers allow us to properly control stances and to lean as necessary, you will never need a magical button to glue yourself to objects to survive in combat. It's as simple as that.

[topeira1980]

Snap-to-cover systems are just crap. There's no getting around it. If the developers allow us to properly control stances and to lean as necessary, you will never need a magical button to glue yourself to objects to survive in combat. It's as simple as that.

there are limitations to the controller. not enough buttons to allow leaning in two directions etc etc. the cover system is something that compensates to that. one button does it all.
there is no excuse to not allow us to crouch and prone whenever we want (like Watch dogs or the division or GOW) but a cover system doesnt necessarily mean we cant do those things.

attaching the back to cover is more an aesthetic choice than a gameplay mechanic but it does have some gameplay reasoning. it's mean for two reasons -
1) make sure the player understands he is in cover mode. it's very obvious from the animation.
2) make the player behind cover expose as little of himself as possible when he isnt leaning.

the "leaning out of cover a lot to balance things" is BS. it has nothing to do with balancing so the player in the open wouldnt be to underpowered. a game with a cover system wants to give advantage to a system the devs worked so hard to create. in a realistic game using cover SHOULD give a large advantage. peaking behind cover SHOULD give small hitboxes. that's what using cover is meant to create and i dont find it boring gameplay at all. i would find it unique.
but for that to happen there should also be an accuracy penalty for moving and firing.


the videos that came from "Strike back" show a set of moves that every military based game should allow - a lean of the body as close to cover as possible. being able to do that without a cover system that glues you to cover will be hard (because the player will need a super delicate finger on the thumbstick) and i think it could be achieved with a good cover system, but without a cover system (the one Cortexian claims GRW might have but never really brings forth evidence and only sends me searching elsewhere in vague places :P ) a leanign system would be better than nothing.

[Lolssi]

So once again we would be hindered by the controller?

[FighterForJC]

Snap-to-cover systems are just crap. There's no getting around it. If the developers allow us to properly control stances and to lean as necessary, you will never need a magical button to glue yourself to objects to survive in combat. It's as simple as that.

Snap to cover systems are AWESOME. They look awesome and it takes un-lazy developers to implement them. There's a million things you can complain about military shooters that aren't realistic (like say, ANY type of health recovery system, may it be automatic health regen or magical health kits), cool cover systems isn't one of them.

[Sp--pyBrown]

Snap to cover systems are AWESOME. They look awesome and it takes un-lazy developers to implement them. There's a million things you can complain about military shooters that aren't realistic (like say, ANY type of health recovery system, may it be automatic health regen or magical health kits), cool cover systems isn't one of them.

They are easy to screw up tho. Usually it ends up looking like a flashy hollywood-esque ******* manouver that doesn't even add anything useful to the game. They also affect level design with the "half- and full-cover" pieces that have to be dotted around the map.

If you're into flashy animations and unnatural-looking levels, more power to you.


Are ArmA 3's devs lazy for using a manual "cover system"?

[ThePollie]

Well, no. Actually I can complain about anything I want. If I find a fault in a game, no matter how grand every other aspect is, I will attack it for the fault. I don't expect perfection, but I do expect the attempt.

Controllers have plenty of buttons, if you're more creative than just assigning one button per stance. ARMA III used control+S to lower stances. From a full stand, control+S goes into a low stand, then into a high crouch, crouch, low crouch, etc. Most controllers easily sport 8 buttons, plus the directional pad, and the analog sticks. I highly doubt either console are so restricted that you can't fix commands to be prompted by multiple button presses. The only argument here that holds any weight is that controllers are severely restricting in one's ability to actually operate them.

They aren't as accurate as a mouse for aiming, much of your hand is dedicated solely to holding the controller upright, while the keyboard+mouse is supported by a desk and can afford the use of every finger. The directional pad can easily be used to control movement. Down/Up for stand/crouch, left/right for leaning. It will take a bit of practice to switch stances rapidly and precisely, but that's true of all game mechanics. You practice, you get better. But dumbing down a game solely to cater to the poor design of console controllers is a slap in the teeth.

[DanHibikiFanXM]

I'll just leave this here...