Ranger Archive
Thread: A small enhancement I'd like for AreaTrack
Page 2 of 2
Odajja
Tue Jul 27, 2004 10:33 pm
#14
Why not make it a arrow with out the beam? Make the ability only available at master. And make it way better than the seeker droid so the BH has to pay for the service.
Adifi
Wed Jul 28, 2004 6:05 am
#15
I really dont like the idea of a waypoint. Tracking sure is not an exact science so why would we get an exact wp ?
By looking at the tracks i have discovered that creature A is exactly 432m 72cm at grid reference A343.6 , E932.1...
or
By looking at the tracks i have found that creature A is roughyl 400 NE.
Which seems more realistic ? Waypoints would make it far too easy to track, and its really not like this game needs to be made even easier is it..
By looking at the tracks i have discovered that creature A is exactly 432m 72cm at grid reference A343.6 , E932.1...
or
By looking at the tracks i have found that creature A is roughyl 400 NE.
Which seems more realistic ? Waypoints would make it far too easy to track, and its really not like this game needs to be made even easier is it..
DaveG
Wed Jul 28, 2004 6:28 am
#16
Adifi,
I'm afraid your argument doesn't stand up because/areatrack does indeedgive you an exact spot, by virtue of giving you two exact numbers/ordinates. Like I said before bearing and distance is equivalent to North and East, they're just two equivalent coordinate systems. I'm talking about the presentation of that data.
Fred_Skinner
Wed Jul 28, 2004 7:21 am
#17
Springbok wrote:
To roleplay or not roleplay. That is the question.
Rangers find things: tracks, spoor (poop), and bent grass, are not a perfect science, however close to the well trained Tracker. You lose a track, backstep until you pick it up again, then go again, sometimes they just wash out to nothing, ala range, weather conditions, etc. (ie. do /ar again, sometimes mob despawns, killed by another, etc.)
Or you can have a waypoint, or flowy directional thing like in /find, or a targetting arrow but no skylight tube...but that is flawless. We are good, but c'mon. =)
Obviously you know my take on this now =)
Camina
MR/TKM/CH
Shadowfire
Not to mention the occational Bothen in the punch bowl...
"You have successfully high-jacked the thread. You gain 233 high-jack experience."
Calculus_Entropy
Wed Jul 28, 2004 7:36 am
#18
I wouldn't say it gives and exact spot, but it will get you close. There are many times when something will show as east and if you head east, you may miss it because while it is generally east, it is actually a little southeast...
DaveG wrote:
Adifi,
I'm afraid your argument doesn't stand up because/areatrack does indeedgive you an exact spot, by virtue of giving you two exact numbers/ordinates. Like I said before bearing and distance is equivalent to North and East, they're just two equivalent coordinate systems. I'm talking about the presentation of that data.
Phenix1050
Wed Jul 28, 2004 9:56 am
#19
exactly what calc said. If there only 8 directions we can track the creature in(N,S,E,W and the combinations thereof) there are always the "inbetweeners". If North is 0 degrees, East is 90, South is 180 and so on, there will always be 45 degrees in which the creature can be found(A creature will show being Eastevenit's not due east, since "East" is anywhere between 75 degrees and 105 degrees, assuming North is 0). If you're talking about a creature 500 meters out, a 45 degree swath can actually be quite a large area to work with. Assuming a circle of 500 meter radius, that yields a cirlce with an area of approximately 785,398 square meters. 45 degrees of this same circle is 1/8th the total area, yielding a total of 98, 174 square meters. Quite a large area to be working with even given an approximate direction, a target far away will have a large area to be in. Again, if you know the creature is 500 meters out in a particular direction (1/8 of the circle), you'll have a large path to search. Consider this: the diameter of the total circle is 3, 141 meters. That means that just in that one track, you have 393 meters of ground in which that creature can be...and that's if they don't move.
Giving me a waypoint doenst' make sense, since there are 393 different potential positiions for that waypoint, assuming waypoints can only be set at 1m intervals.
Springbok
Wed Jul 28, 2004 11:08 am
#20
I'll agree completely there too. The way it is now simply allows the possibility of failure.
The PDA type argument is fair. But I prefer to think rangers more like the "senses" type ranger. While of course this is SW so having devices to aid sounds reasonable...I'm old school I guess. Allow the analogy of theifs who open safes: you have touch and feel openers and then you have those whom use technology, stethoscopes, drills, etc. But they still perform the same job. (sorry for the rambling)
Perhaps instead of different methods to aid us in tracking more accurately and efficiently, there could be modifiers to the senses? See better in the night (the more so the longer in the wilderness we are...), to be able to see greater distances (in which we can see creatures, npc's, and pc's at longer range, or our ability to see through brush, foliage instead of tearing through to see if the mob we want is through it...(even though our /ar tells us it is in that general direction.)
Camina
MR/TKM/CH
Shadowfire
Jasynn
Wed Jul 28, 2004 12:06 pm
#21
Why not compromise. I agree that a wp to the creature would take all the fun out of it, but I wouldn't mind having and qutomatic wp generated for the spot I'm standing on. It would be nice to know how far I've gone and how to get back to move on to oter sightings. Flame away. 
DaveG
Thu Jul 29, 2004 4:31 pm
#22
I'd absolutely agree with that too.
When you're in a busy area you can get totally lost in a long list. If you could sort by different columns as described above I'd be a very happy wookiee indeed.
eakop
Fri Jul 30, 2004 12:08 am
#23
Figured I would chime in here....
The waypoint is a bit much, there is a built in chance of failure with out it. Otherwise we would have to put up with having it fail at times.
I would love to see N, S, E, W on the Compass. Or at least make it an option, that would be handy.
Another enhancement I would love, while on the subject of area track is columns with headers for creature, direction, and distance. These columns would be sortable based on which one was selected. It would save a ton of time scrolling up and down to see what creatures are in what direction, and how close.
Just my two cents.
-eakop-
The waypoint is a bit much, there is a built in chance of failure with out it. Otherwise we would have to put up with having it fail at times.
I would love to see N, S, E, W on the Compass. Or at least make it an option, that would be handy.
Another enhancement I would love, while on the subject of area track is columns with headers for creature, direction, and distance. These columns would be sortable based on which one was selected. It would save a ton of time scrolling up and down to see what creatures are in what direction, and how close.
Just my two cents.
-eakop-
Phenix1050
Fri Jul 30, 2004 12:17 am
#24
eakop wrote:
Another enhancement I would love, while on the subject of area track is columns with headers for creature, direction, and distance. These columns would be sortable based on which one was selected. It would save a ton of time scrolling up and down to see what creatures are in what direction, and how close.
Just my two cents.
-eakop-
That is part of the Outdoorsman proposal. We're proposing just that. This is one of the simplest and easiest ways to make /areatrack a more manageable interface. I'm very glad to see that this idea is still important to Rangers!!
Page 2 of 2