Archwing: frustrating fluid dynamics in space

[fake00]

i'm not sure, if this is actually a bug, but here it goes...

i was doing archwing rush mission farming, when i realized, why these are so frustrating to most players. when you cut thrust and change direction the archwing behaves like a rigid body in water (e.g. torpedo). It moves in the new direction, even though thrust is cut. This behavior makes sense in liquids, but this is in vacuum. If you have to use fluid dynamics for some reason the mass of the medium (vacuum) should be set to 0, if the used model allows that. This way the archwing has only inertia after thrust is cut.

If you have played a lot of space simulations like descent, etc., this behavior is really frustrating.

 

tl:dr: please don't use fluid dynamics in space!

 

00h

[Cyborg-Rox]

Well, I mean, it kinda makes it easier to control and not bang into walls left and right, doesn't it? Unless you just happen to be very used to something different.

[Autongnosis]

3 minutes ago, Cyborg-Rox said:

Well, I mean, it kinda makes it easier to control and not bang into walls left and right, doesn't it? Unless you just happen to be very used to something different.

Yeah, but it's jarring to anyone who ever put their hands on some actual spaceflight syms.

To be honest though i wouldn't really make this a forced change. Maybe introduce it, but with a slider (like the "experimental controls") so people can get proper space flight or what we have now based on preference.

 

And no OP, it isn't a bug.

Edited August 6, 2017 by Autongnosis

[Shalath]

There is an AW movement toggle in the options, have you tried that?

[Autongnosis]

On 6/8/2017 at 2:19 PM, Shalath said:

There is an AW movement toggle in the options, have you tried that?

Doesn't solve it. It only removes the Y axis lock and makes you fly in 6 DoF. Still uses fluid dynamics. 

[polarity]

The same thing happens when you're aim-gliding.  I don't see any use whatsoever in changing your direction to match where you're pointing while gliding.  It's a near useless crutch for piss-poor players who can't aim properly at the point they want to land at, or make use of their slide to change direction right before landing, and a damned nuisance for anyone who wants to shoot at stuff as they fly past it, and still end up where they aimed at (never-mind that gliding would be so much better if the aiming part was optional).

As for archwing, I played through Prey recently, and its zero-g movement was so much better than what Warframe provides.  You have momentum/inertia, and the limit of fluid dynamics is that you slow down due to drag if you're not applying thrust, and have a maximum speed if you are.  You can move one direction/shoot another, and have the complete ability to correct your course at all times, because it always provides full 6DOF, instead of crippling you when you want to move faster.  And get this, you have brakes.

Edited August 10, 2017 by polarity

[Caelward]

Archwing is something the Devs have publicly admitted not being happy with. They didn't like the first iteration of it. The second version of it was a great way to start an argument. The last change was to put in that toggle that lets you change between control sets, and that's what we've got for the moment.

I'm sure someone is taking pokes at it, but DE isn't saying anything until they have a substantial change for us.

So yeah, Polarity has the right idea. If we gotta talk about it, lets try to being attention to the things that work.

[CK-1996]

The 6 DoF flight mode, or as it's called in the options, 'Experimental Flight', is fine and all in Grineer Open Space and, while some people might get motion sick, I find it fun. It is, however, an absolute pain when navigating tighter areas like the Corpus maps because you have an innate inertia when turning, as in, if you snap your mouse to a position where the camera is perpendicular to your current direction, it will take a noticeable amount of time for you to sweeeEEEeeep round and start travelling in the new direction. This makes turning very clunky.

If you instead turn off 'Experimental flight', this inertia is heavily reduced, as in, if you do the same snap turn, it takes FAR less time for you to re-orient and start travelling in the new direction. This controls far better and feels tighter, allowing me to make better sense of my movements. I don't know why the inertia in 'Experimental Flight' can't be the same as it is for normal flight as if it were, I would most likely use it more often 'cause it's fun.

[Brasten]

As I said during the Feedback on the Experimental Mode, inertia in Archwing makes no sense based on the overt technology and capabilities of the Achwings themselves. The only time inertia needs to be dealt with is when your Velocity exceeds your Acceleration. If you are only traveling 10 m/s, and can accelerate at 100 m/s^2, you can stop essentially instantly.

Archwing's cap their Velocity to match their maximum Acceleration (Sprint + Boost) within a second or less.

Archwings are also Omni-directional flight systems. You can make a case for having to reposition the thrusters, but I can also point out the amount of control required to swing heavy melee weapons with no appreciable counter reaction. If find it best to just take it as a wash and call them Omni-directional.

Thus they should always be able to cancel their velocity along any vector in under a second. This should produce humming bird like flight, with no noticeable drifting/sliding/momentum. Which is appropriate for magical space jet-packs, flown by space magic ninjas.

With the current presentation, no Archwing should ever slide when trying to change directions at anything slower than full Sprint + Boost. Go slower and you should have a near instant course correction. And yes I did record this and time it out on video. The way they are currently programmed is to "slide" to a stop over about 1.5 to 2 seconds, regardless of your velocity. This should not be happening. Normal, Sprint, and Boost movement all take about 1.5 seconds to slide to stop. Only Boosting movement should take that long, barely. Sprinting movement should be canceled in under a second. Normal movement shouldn't even slide at all, it should stop instantly.

On 8/13/2017 at 3:15 AM, CrasherK said:

while some people might get motion sick

This remains a major no go . If your game is causing your player's increased Simulation Sickness you've done something very wrong. No game should make the player physically sick to play. Players were reporting increased cases of Simulation Sickness, even players who'd never had a problem with it before, while using Experimental.

But the causes of that were explained at length during the Feedback portion of that mode. If you are interested in the major causes start with Extra Credits video on Simulation Sickness, and go from there. One of the biggest contributors is the over-large Archwing model that dominates the screen and is offset, the second is the lack of UI to help establish and track orientation, third was the lack of control over Roll.