Concerning cameras

[Tecmos Deception]

Is mouse-wheel zoom back going to remain on green at launch (and/or forever)? I thought it was going bye bye.

And on that note, I started playing with the camera options you can cycle through with F9 and rebound them all to specific keys and was toying with the different ways you can manipulate those views. You can basically get an improved (though finicky to master) version of the "mouse-wheel zoom back view" with the other options available in the client as is right now anyway, and I'm learning some of the others views can be great for a lot more than just taking screenshots or watching a wide angle for kos pathers while you're medding (especially with tweaking the angles/zoom)!

Are things like adjusting the up-down angle of the other F9 camera views, zooming them in and out, shifting them left and right, rebinding the views to specific keys, etc., are those all classic controls too? Or should those also be axed?

[flacidpenguin]

Play in first person for the classic feel, it's easier for you to just not scroll out than for them to deeply modify the client camera system.

[loramin]

Play in first person for the classic feel, it's easier for you to just not scroll out than for them to deeply modify the client camera system.

P99 isn't about "easy": if either the devs OR the players stuck to "easy", this place would be deserted and everyone would be on live :)

I think the more relevant question is whether it's doable, and personally I haven't seen a staff response one way or the other on removing it.

[Deathrydar]

Not game breaking so, whatever.

[Gustoo]

Everything but the mouse wheel scroll was classic in my memory.

[akagami]

Should note even if it's not classic, you can't hold down mouse1 and look around yourself, which really what makes 3rd person view strong. Like auto running and looking around yourself, peaking around corners etc. It's much weaker in its current version.

[Daldaen]

I would like to see mouse wheel to 3rd person to be disabled on green. It provides a very easy wider view of your character and access to visual information behind your character.

While the same is achievable through F9 views they are a bit more cumbersome to use especially in tight spaces like dungeons. Which directly correlates with how difficult it is to pacify split or pretarget before breaking rooms.

However it sounded like the devs had a method to remove it but weren’t inclined to last I heard.

[Tecmos Deception]

Play in first person for the classic feel, it's easier for you to just not scroll out than for them to deeply modify the client camera system.

I used first person in classic as a chanter, but it was far from my only view. Which is basically how I have always played on p99 as a chanter. It didn't take a rocket scientist to realize CC was easier when you could see more of the battlefield and could more easily select the right targets in the background and whatnot.

[El-Hefe]

I’m split on third person wheel zoom. On one hand I find it to be helpful in mitigating how janky the 16:9 implementation in EQ is. On the other hand, shit ain’t classic.

Keep it and I’ll use it.

Get rid of it and I’ll adapt.

[Deathrydar]

I never use it!

[JesterMcgee]

I just want to be able to steer with my mouse without getting motion sick from the swinging animation.

[kotton05]

Play in first person for the classic feel, it's easier for you to just not scroll out than for them to deeply modify the client camera system.

This blueb dies from trains on the daily

[soronil]

Everything but the mouse wheel scroll was classic in my memory.

September 25, 2001 3:00 am
Mouselook will now work a little differently when in the first two
third-person camera modes (overhead and chase). They will work similarly to first-person mouselook (i.e. your character's heading will change when you move the mouse left or right, the left and right movement keys will cause your player to strafe, and the camera angle will pitch up or down when you move the mouse forward or back). These changes should make those first two third-person camera modes more useful.

Third person camera sucked for over 2 years, that's why most people used first person a lot.

In this post, Secrets mentioned he may try to help recreate classic 3rd person, not sure if he wound up working on it at all
https://www.project1999.com/forums/showpost.php?p=2972527&postcount=116
Sounds like something I'll cook up this weekend and submit for Green.

I know exactly the situation this is referencing. Would be great to have it era locked.

[Ashenden]

Didn't Haynar say he found a way to disable mousewheel 3rd person? Something that would add a ton to Green, no matter how much Bluebies might cry about it.

EQ needs all the difficulty you can add to it.

[zaneosak]

Ive been using first person as much as possible because it's what I did back in the day. 3rd Person I only used for screenshots but blue has spoiled me. I use 3rd person on green to check corners, if I wasnt able to. I'd be cool with it !

[Tecmos Deception]

September 25, 2001 3:00 am
Mouselook will now work a little differently when in the first two
third-person camera modes (overhead and chase). They will work similarly to first-person mouselook (i.e. your character's heading will change when you move the mouse left or right, the left and right movement keys will cause your player to strafe, and the camera angle will pitch up or down when you move the mouse forward or back). These changes should make those first two third-person camera modes more useful.

I don't know how they're supposed to work, but currently on beta, mouselook in these views does NOT let you change camera angle.

[omgmo]

I'd prefer they remove advantages like this, no matter how arguably small (though imo this is a pretty big advantage). People will claim "don't use it if you don't like it", but there's something gnawing about having an advantage there that other people are using, compelling me to use it so that I'm on par with everyone else. It's just not the same, playing in my own little bubble; gotta be a shared experience imo.

[El-Hefe]

I'd prefer they remove advantages like this, no matter how arguably small (though imo this is a pretty big advantage). People will claim "don't use it if you don't like it", but there's something gnawing about having an advantage there that other people are using, compelling me to use it so that I'm on par with everyone else. It's just not the same, playing in my own little bubble; gotta be a shared experience imo.

Kind of reminds me of people who downplay how fun Green is going to be by saying “YoU caN alReAdY PlaY wIThout TwInkinG oN BlUe!” completely ignoring that being the only person in a group on Blue that doesn’t have 50k worth of gear still isn’t as fun as rolling with a group of traditionally geared players.

[Verityn]

At the very least I kind of wish I could disable it or change the hotkey to zoom out to 3rd person. I find myself scrolling down by accident a lot like when I'm frantically trying to survive something or when I move my mouse over to a website and scroll down.

[soronil]

I don't know how they're supposed to work, but currently on beta, mouselook in these views does NOT let you change camera angle.

Not sure what's wrong with your client, but my green beta client behaves exactly as blue has always behaved:
Mousewheel zoom out.
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + move mouse left / right = heading changes
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + move mouse up / down = camera angle changes
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + keyboard left / right = strafe

This is the EXACT behavior that the patch notes descibe as being introduced in 2001. It is not classic and it makes the game MUCH easier, because:

3rd person gives you more situational awareness
classic 3rd person had the disadvantage of being very clunky to control

So in classic, 1st person vs 3rd person is a trade off. Many people played 1st person. The way p99 is now, 3rd person is really superior for all but immersion.

[Tecmos Deception]

Not sure what's wrong with your client, but my green beta client behaves exactly as blue has always behaved:
Mousewheel zoom out.
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + move mouse left / right = heading changes
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + move mouse up / down = camera angle changes
Mouselook (hold right mouse button) + keyboard left / right = strafe

This is the EXACT behavior that the patch notes descibe as being introduced in 2001. It is not classic and it makes the game MUCH easier, because:

3rd person gives you more situational awareness
classic 3rd person had the disadvantage of being very clunky to control

So in classic, 1st person vs 3rd person is a trade off. Many people played 1st person. The way p99 is now, 3rd person is really superior for all but immersion.

You do this in top down and chase modes? I know this is how it works in 1st person and mousewheel 3rd. We know the latter isnt classic. I started this thread talking about the f9 modes and THEIR adjustments.

On green beta right now, chase mode mouselook up+down didn't change camera angle. It moves the camera up and down vertically. Mouse wheel doesn't affect either top down or chase cameras. Etc.

[soronil]

You do this in top down and chase modes? I know this is how it works in 1st person and mousewheel 3rd. We know the latter isnt classic. I started this thread talking about the f9 modes and THEIR adjustments.

On green beta right now, chase mode mouselook up+down didn't change camera angle. It moves the camera up and down vertically. Mouse wheel doesn't affect either top down or chase cameras. Etc.

there are 6 modes that i toggle through when i press f9, i don't know what all of them are called. The first 3(first person w/mousewheel, high up, right behind) all have the same behavior that I do not think should be classic in any but 1st person mode.

[Tecmos Deception]

F9 modes = first person, top down, chase, user defined 1, user defined 2, and some tracking camera.

I'm gonna go ahead and believe that you didn't just log into green and test these things in the way I just did. Mouse wheel doesn't affect zoom on top down or chase. Mouse look via right click and moving the mouse up&down does change angle on top down, but changes camera height, not angle, on chase camera.

I don't know what "first person w/mousewheel" means to you. First person is first person. Top down is what happens when you're in first person and press f9 once. Chase is a second f9.

Going into third person from first person via mousewheel isn't classic and isn't one of the f9 modes and doesn't have the exact same controls as the other modes on green right now.



I guess there's a small chance you did double check your results like I did and somehow we have different camera behavior. But I doubt it, one way or the other.

[soronil]

F9 modes = first person, top down, chase, user defined 1, user defined 2, and some tracking camera.

I'm gonna go ahead and believe that you didn't just log into green and test these things in the way I just did.
I did, in fact.
Mouse look via right click and moving the mouse up&down does change angle on top down, but changes camera height, not angle, on chase camera.
But in both, it allows strafing and changing heading. One could argue "angle" has an intentionally different meaning in top down. Either way, the behavior is MOSTLY what is being described as introduced in 2001 (not classic)

I don't know what "first person w/mousewheel" means to you. First person is first person.
It means that today, on green beta, the first (default) f9 mode is first person, which allows you to use mousewheel to zoom to third person. hence the name i gave it. I think we both agree what this mode does and that it's not classic and should be removed.

I guess there's a miniscule change you did double check your results like I did and somehow we have different camera behavior. But I doubt it, one way or the other.


Based on patch notes these patch notes from 2001:
Mouselook will now work a little differently when in the first two third-person camera modes (overhead and chase). They will work similarly to first-person mouselook (i.e. your character's heading will change when you move the mouse left or right, the left and right movement keys will cause your player to strafe, and the camera angle will pitch up or down when you move the mouse forward or back).
I would argue that first person, overhead, and chase are all currently not classic, and need to be changed such that:
First person -> remove mousewheel (introduced outside of our timeline)
overhead -> heading does not change using mouselook. mouselook+left/right movement does cause strafing (introduced september 2001)
chase -> same as overhead. Also does not change camera angle angle when mouselooking up and down

[Tecmos Deception]

How are you concluding that the current camera functions aren't the way they worked before this patch, excepting the mouse-wheel transition from 1st to third person?

Mouse wheel doesn't work in top down. Mouse wheel doesnt work in chase. Right-mouse-click + forward&backward mouse movement doesn't change angle in chase; it moves the camera higher or lower on the same vertical line with no change in angle the camera is pointing. Those are pretty significant differences.

The patch notes you provided only talk about how the camera works AFTER the notes. And what green does now is fairly different from that. I get your claim that it's similar, but it's not the same, so I don't see why it would be safe to make assumptions. How are you coming to your conclusions about how the camera should behave prior to the patch you mentioned if not a guess?

[soronil]

How are you coming to your conclusions about how the camera should behave prior to the patch you mentioned if not a guess?
Logic. If the patch notes say that a mode was changed to change your heading while mouse looking, that most certainly means that the mode previously did NOT change your heading while mouse looking. Seems binary enough to me.

[Ashenden]

All of this is cool but remember our primary goal should be to get mouse wheel third person removed, then we can argue about how all the F9 cameras should or shouldn't be more terrible.

Forced first person or awkward cameras that slide around in unintuitive ways when you right click for life, enjoy your 4:3 /viewport or suffer from bad vertical FOV.

[soronil]

All of this is cool but remember our primary goal should be to get mouse wheel third person removed, then we can argue about how all the F9 cameras should or shouldn't be more terrible.

Forced first person or awkward cameras that slide around in unintuitive ways when you right click for life, enjoy your 4:3 /viewport or suffer from bad vertical FOV.

The issue is that chase view, when zoomed out, with the 2001 behavior, is very similar to the mousewheel 3rd person behavior... The differences being that you use ins/del to zoom in and out... and that mousewheel + mouse up/down raises/lowers the camera instead of changing angles ( was actually wrong about that one above) . But the main thing is that I do not think there should not be a 3rd person mode in which you can change the heading of your character or strafe with mouselook. that's what makes 3rd person very "usable" when running around and what make things easier. Just eliminating mousewheel does not sufficiently nurf 3rd person.

[Ashenden]

Sounds good to me. TAKP has the newer old behavior for its cameras, but someone with access to EQClassic could probably tell us what it's like on there for each one.

[Tecmos Deception]

Logic. If the patch notes say that a mode was changed to change your heading while mouse looking, that most certainly means that the mode previously did NOT change your heading while mouse looking. Seems binary enough to me.

I mean, except for the fact that the adjustments in question are demonstrably NOT binary... then sure, you'd be making sense.

Mousewheel from first person zooms out here, but not in classic. But mousewheel doesn't zoom out on other cameras in classic OR here.

Mouselook and up+down in top down view and chase was changed from an unknown (which could include "doesn't do anything at all") in classic, by the patch you mention, to changing the angle of the camera. It doesn't do anything in top down here, and it does something entirely different in chase mode (raising or lowering the camera, but not the angle of view).

Here, mouselook side-to-side in those two views does turn you, and the directional keys do strafe, as your patch notes suggest classic was changed to.

That's quite a garble of stuff. It is far from "logical" to decide that things are "binary" when we have an examples of it NOT being so right in the stuff we're talking about.

[Baler]

Haynar knows how to remove the mouse wheel zoom.

I hope it never happens on P99, blue.

[Solist]

First person and 4:3 viewport setup is win. Targeting shit isn’t an issue when your not cluttering your field of view with inventory crap and chat windows.