An new way to move via mouse, makes mouse box obsolete.

[Tankie]

Ok this might sound stupid because it's hard to explain.

But, instead of just having the mouse in a stationary position within the mouse box to control speed and direction, it would be neat if you could scroll the mouse upward to gain speed. Like if you moved the mouse to the top of the mouse box, lifted it off the mouse pad, set it back down at the bottom of the mouse pad and moved the mouse up to the top again and again, ect. to gain speed. Basically it would make the mouse box obsolete.

In essence, BZFLAG would not control your speed and direction based on where the mouse is located in the mouse box, but rather on how fast you were moving the mouse upward, sideways, and backwards.


So if I moved the mouse upward and stopped, the tank would move foreward a little bit and then slowly stop. I would have to keep moving the mouse upward to keep the tank moving forward. And the same sideways and backwards.

[Skeeve]

Nah...

It will be extremly difficult to control. especially if you want to click at the same time.

But bzflag is open source. So go ahead and implement it.

[Tankie]

Nah...


But bzflag is open source. So go ahead and implement it.

You can't be serious...

I can't just go and start changing the source code, I wouldn't even know where to begin, I'm not into programming.

[Skeeve]

So convince someone that this is a good idea. TBH: Back in 1986, when I was in my 3rd Semester, we had to program a maze. Our team leader, an older semester, wanted us to implement some mouse movement like you described. All of us easily convinced him that some other means of moving will 100% be better than this.

[rowrbazzle]

I'd thought about this a bit myself; the method you describe would I think make dodging more intuitive, but otherwise the mouse box is much better. The speed/turning limits are so important to BZFlag -- you only have limited tank maneuverability to avoid those bullets; it's all about skill. These limits are built into the mouse box. The "motion-based method" (i.e. the tank follows pretty much the same path as the mouse) makes sense for things like FPS's where you can shove the mouse to the side and you'll spin right around in the game, but BZFlag's speed limits would make it feel unnatural and hard to control, it seems to me. Plus imagine having to trek across the map, picking up the mouse every half-second

Maybe there could be a dual-mode: press some modifier key to switch from box-mode to dodge-mode... similar to "a" for slow keyboard...

Or my suggestion which I think would make it more motion-based while still using the box.

[too much loving]

In essence, BZFLAG would not control your speed and direction based on where the mouse is located in the mouse box, but rather on how fast you were moving the mouse upward, sideways, and backwards.

If I understand you correctly I see two problems in the idea.

1) You will need a very large table to be able play bzflag on a largest maps

2) You have to define what happens if you move the mouse faster than the speed of the tank. Should the tank slowly start moving towards the position that you have specified? I think that this behavior would result in a problem that is similar to you mouse box problem.