In the last two Dev Diaries, we talked about the limited visibility caused by artillery smoke and smoke grenades. This will be supplemented by fog as a natural challenge that will be added with the gas update and which we will tell you about today.

Occurrences of Fog

Fog will occur as an additional weather effect in the game and will influence both the battle and the trench phases. While fog cannot occur in hot or sunny weather, there is a certain probability of it occurring in moderate or rainy weather, as well as in cold snaps (in order of increasing probability).

Effects of Fog in Battle

During a battle, fog drastically reduces visual range to about half of the normal distance. This makes movement through no-man's land less dangerous, as generally there are fewer enemy troops in sight.

However, careless movements can also be extremely risky, as you can now move into close combat or grenade range of one or more enemy troops that were previously out of your sight.

Fog in the Trenches

In the trench phase, fog reduces the danger of all tasks and also affects other circumstances: while enemy snipers, for example, can no longer carry out their tasks, which further lowers the danger level, the probability of an enemy attack increases.

Unknown Factors

There will be another change in battle: if a movement poses dangers from enemy troops that were not previously visible, this information will be hidden. This also applies to tactical attributes such as flanking or close combat. It does not matter whether visibility is restricted by terrain, fog, smoke or other factors.

This is supposed to make movements through fog or smoke more interesting and encourage cautious, short movements. Positions that can be seen by many enemy troops are generally more dangerous, but also give the player more information about the battlefield. The aim is to create a new strategic weighing of safety and information gain. NPC troops are subject to the same restrictions.

Graphical and Technical Improvements

As part of the integration of the fog effect, further adjustments were made:

The shader has been modified in such a way that the graphical outlines are now also influenced by the fog, which previously caused unwanted artifacts in the distance, especially at low resolutions.

Both screenshots in low resolution without anti-aliasingThe transitions to the skybox, especially in hot and sunny weather, have been optimized, which overall leads to a more beautiful appearance in the depths. This has also prompted us to tilt the camera up a little during the battle so that it can now see further into the distance.