0.2.23 To my kids 8 October, 22:30

Weather and time of day

8 October, 20:26 to 22:21

A red tank with snow on its hull and turret in a snow-covered street, with snow falling and the street lamps fading into white — Snow by day. The pictures on this page are from 0.2.29.

A dusk version of the town had been on the list since 4 October, along with other new maps, and I had put them all off. On the evening of the 8th I suggested changing the conditions on the town we already had, which looked like less work than a new map. The agent came back with a plan: two new rows in the lobby, and bad weather and darkness that shorten sight for the players, the radar and the bots alike. Headlights worried me, because they give your position away, so I asked for a way to switch them off, and for bots on the easy levels to leave theirs on. I agreed to the rest, said night could be very dark, and left the tuning for after we had played.

The agent built it that evening, in under two hours. Wet roads and lying snow are drawn in one pass over the picture that darkens or whitens every surface facing up, so roofs, cars and tank tops get their snow without a second set of materials for the town. One table of distances says how far you see in each weather and at each time, and the fog, the radar, the off-screen arrows and the bots all read from it. The agent took screenshots of all twelve combinations and ran ten tanks at night in snow at 193 frames a second, against 204 on a clear day.

The build went to my kids at 22:30, with the darkness, the fog and the ice as first guesses.

In this build

Two new rows in the lobby. Weather is Clear, Rain, Fog, Snow or Random, and the time of day is Day, Dusk, Night or Random. Random is rolled once when the match starts, so everyone plays in the same conditions.
Rain falls, splashes, darkens the roads and has its own sound. Night rain brings lightning and thunder.
Snow lies on the roads, roofs, cars and tank tops, with wind. The ground is icy, so tanks slide in turns and take longer to speed up and to stop. Bots drive a little slower on it.
Dusk has a low orange sun and long shadows. Night is very dark, lit by the moon, the street lamps, headlights, and the flash of shots and explosions.
You see about 30 metres in daytime fog, 35 in snow and 45 in rain, and less at dusk and at night. The radar, the off-screen arrows and the bots see no further, and a faint ring on the radar shows the distance.
Headlights at dusk and at night, on the L key or the gamepad's Y button. They light the road ahead, and a tank with them on is noticed from twice as far. Dim red tail lights stay on after dark.
Bots on the easy levels keep their headlights on, Normal bots switch theirs off once they have spotted an enemy, and bots on the hard levels drive dark.
A line under the battle timer names the weather and the time of day.

A red tank firing down a dark, wet street in falling rain, with the far buildings grey in the haze — Rain.

A red tank at a road crossing in fog, with the street beyond it fading to grey — Fog.

A red tank beside a road barrier in a street under an orange evening sky, with another tank faint in the haze — Dusk.

The lobby's match options: mode, battle time, kill target, and the two new rows, with the weather set to Snow and the time of day to Night — The host's two new rows in the lobby.