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IR-goggles

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DarkRain:
Just FYI Night Vision versus Thermal Imaging and no they can't see through walls or even clothing, but Thermal Imaging seems to be able to see through smoke and plants?

Anyway even assuming that by 2084 night vision and thermal imaging technologies are much more advanced than today, currently IR googles are still too much powerful, more than intended actually:

--- Quote from: Cdr. Paul Navarre ---These goggles pick up all infrared emissions in the area and display them on the inside of the lenses. They can be easily worn for the duration of a nighttime engagement, greatly extending a soldier's visual range in the darkness and allowing him to see targets through thin walls. Thick walls present a greater obstacle and may obscure targets inside entirely. Of course, there is no way to distinguish between the IR signatures of civilians and those of aliens whenever we do not have direct line of sight. Any readings taken through walls or other obstacles will not be conclusive.

--- End quote ---

First they are only supposed to see through thin walls, (and I think one can assume that only at a short distance)

Second you are not supposed to be able to even distinguish friend or foe from such through wall contacts, much less have complete information about the subject in question.

Maybe implementing them as planned would balance them more.

homunculus:

--- Quote from: DarkRain on March 24, 2012, 05:52:57 pm ---Just FYI Night Vision versus Thermal Imaging and no they can't see through walls or even clothing, but Thermal Imaging seems to be able to see through smoke and plants?[...]
--- End quote ---
taking another look at the exact comparison spot in the video, to me it looks like it does not see through leaves.
the human was just hidden in the shadow and was not visible because of the contrast of the more brightly lit leaves around him, but there were no leaves between the human and the viewer that became transparent in ir.
when the human starts moving it should be especially apparent that ir doesn't see through leaves.
if anything, it rather illustrates that ir cannot even see through leaves, why should we be talking about walls here?

how thin would the wall need to be to feel the heat of the person in the next room on your cheek?
and could you focus the heat so that you could get an image of the person moving?
it is just heat, not x-ray, and to me this discussion starts to sound like 'desperately trying to prove that bricks are soft'.

one of the reasons they use red light for alerts is because low frequency light disperses less in fog than blue light.
ir just disperses even less in fog or smoke than red light.
that probably depends on the size of the smoke particles, or something like that.

even considered that when you walk at night, and someone is, say, round the corner, holding a lit lantern, you can see the light from the lantern on the surroundings even if you do not directly see the person behind the corner.
now, warm objects could act like a light source in ir, like holding a lantern that is only visible in ir.
but i do not seem to notice that effect in the videos, so i am afraid it wouldn't even work that way.

DarkRain:

--- Quote from: homunculus on April 13, 2012, 04:32:58 pm ---taking another look at the exact comparison spot in the video, to me it looks like it does not see through leaves.

--- End quote ---
Hmm... taking a closer look it seems you are right.

Anyway that's not the point I'm trying to convey here:

--- Quote from: DarkRain on March 24, 2012, 05:52:57 pm ---Anyway even assuming that by 2084 night vision and thermal imaging technologies are much more advanced than today[...]

--- End quote ---
^^
Read that as "even assuming that by 2084 see-through-walls technologies are a reality" if you like.
The point I was trying to make with the quote from UFOpaedia, in my previous post is that IR googles are way more powerful than described, and that if they were implemented to match the description they might not be so unbalancing. But that would probably have to wait for the visibility system to be implemented.

Whether the underling tech is IR or something else is problem of the writers :P

homunculus:

--- Quote from: DarkRain on April 13, 2012, 06:43:36 pm ---[...]"even assuming that by 2084 see-through-walls technologies are a reality"[...]
--- End quote ---
that sounds much better : )))

i mean, it seems that the data is not there in the ir.
or maybe it is, as everything in the universe is supposed to be inter-related ; ))
being evil, i would rather put it this way: 'even assuming that by 2084 we can calculate the see-through image from the song of the bird'.

didn't douglas adams write about projecting the universe from a cookie?
by 2094 we can probably also do that.

anyway, i shouldn't be writing about how see-through tech could be possible, because the tech is bad for gameplay imho.
i should be trying to reason how it shouldn't be possible, otherwise i would be arguing against my own suggestion.

hitch-22:
Yeah, overpowered and to some degree fun-breaking, although I do have to say I love how it eliminates scouring every corner for that last alien which can be a total bitch if it happens repeatedly. (Maybe there could be a mission timer of some sort where "the last alien got away" if it was unseen by round 25 in applicable mission types)?

"Realistically" speaking, thermal imaging or indeed any such detection methods should have serious limitations. Imaging through the near-impenetrable hull of an alien spacecraft? The hull that tolerates atmospheric entry, not to mention our best laser weapons and rocket barrages for quite some time leaks heat radiation (or whatever it's supposed to be) to such a degree you get an exact image of the aliens? Hmm..

But I agree, "realism" should take a backseat to gameplay fun, just as practically always.

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