Rural and urban mapping tools

    Firstly... If this kind of thing can't be implemented, then fair enough :)


    As the subject suggests, I am suggesting some 'mapping tools' to mark out rural and urban areas. This would be particularly useful for an area which is simply grass, trees and more grass... For example, you wouldn't get random industrial fires, or commercial fires popping up in the middle of an area with nothing but open fields and the occasional house! Similarly, you wouldn't expect to see field fires in the middle of an urban city.


    To make some sense of this... Your average fire service for example wouldn't base a platform truck in the previously described area with the majority of land being used for fields/farming.


    So what I am wondering is - is it possible for us to have a way to map out sections as such for different area types (e.g. rural/urban). Drawing lines on the map to divide them perhaps? Or somehow placing markers, that signal a certain radius around them as being a rough outline of a particular area type? I could go one step further and say we could also specify industrial areas so that certain missions are generated, but I think that makes things way too complicated (if they're not already with my suggestion... :D )


    This idea is of course for those who want to go the extra mile... So I would suggest making it an option, not compulsory.


    As I said, it is just a suggestion/idea of mine - nothing is set in concrete. Feel free to discuss and offer your opinion about all this below!



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    (Update from TACRfan) Please see page 2 for a poll relating to this features implementation time.

    I think this is a very good idea and will go very well with many player's set ups.



    Instead of us drawing lines, you could just set it up per station (or for a whole dispatch centre (preferably the first option)).


    Now, I'm not entirely sure how this game is coded, but it could be pretty hard to put into the game. I'm happy to wait a while as this would be a very useful and realistic feature.

    Heyo, hope all is well! Appreciate and quite like the idea!


    I have many Country Fire Stations spread north from my main city and playing a realistic set up, this should help those who struggle or are set back due to this fact. Although I don't believe this should affect everyone and, just because we want to play a certain way, as it varies in a number of ways throughout this community.


    I believe this idea would be difficult to incorporate, nor a priority. However, the possibility and what you can do with this game/programming are almost endless. I think when it comes to planning and suggesting this idea, how, what and more reasoning/detail to what it does could be helpful to devs and other people reading this, to get a better idea.


    I do believe some form of system, player made or via the games functions to disallow certain calls in many areas, so they don't spawn certain calls. I have many long stretches of road with either nothing/farmland, or just small houses and I get an industrial fire. Doesn't make the most sense. So I see how that could be something that could be worked on. However this game is just a game and obviously it's not as fun when you can't tackle a situation proved difficult. This game I feel has gotten a little easier over the past year or so.


    The dispatch centre does have a function however, if you set certain buildings to do, with specific appliances, calls will only appear around the buildings assigned to the dispatch centre if it has the required level of appliances needed. That's as far as I am concerned and believe. I believe this is a good and working function in the game.


    I do believe, if people are choosing to expand and play their game in the country side, with long stretches of road and are particularly playing realistically, haha... They should know they are getting themselves into a challenge personally. When I broke off from my city, I found it a bit hard for a whole, until expanding enough.


    Anyways.. I do agree with you and think this is a potential idea! However believe it needs more discussions, ideas and to be expanded on. I'm not completely sold yet, particularly on making Industrial fires POI :/


    Thanks, good luck & all the best :))


    Pommy

    Thanks for the feedback - you have raised some valid points.


    I too like a challenge, but at the same time I try and keep things as realistic as possible. I can pretty much take care and have enough of all vehicle types, with the platform truck the only exception... :D


    Expanding into rural areas of course has its challenges, but like I brought up in a recent thread - there are particular missions that the platform truck requirement should be adjusted/removed, to cater for those with setups who don't use them for vehicle accidents for example.


    I didn't suggest a POI for industrial fires, I meant it as a third 'area' we could divide our game into (urban/rural being the other two).


    If we can really start a discussion around this, and see what others views are... Then that will go a long way I think. Having some thoughts from people from various countries around the world will do it good, as we can try and get an idea how it would work with different country setups :thumbup:

    So the exploitation of this *facepalm* the problem with the game is that you get these stupid calls in the middle of nowhere and then you have to wait 45 minutes for your first arriving truck company so exploiting i would not see a problem with it because you can just put every unit at every station and handle all these calls with one station which would result in exploiting the game again.

    Quote from TheNorCalGangster

    So the exploitation of this *facepalm* the problem with the game is that you get these stupid calls in the middle of nowhere and then you have to wait 45 minutes for your first arriving truck company so exploiting i would not see a problem with it because you can just put every unit at every station and handle all these calls with one station which would result in exploiting the game again.

    If this is happening to you, I think you may have stations too close together, this may be the anti-cheat function telling you to spread your stations out.


    Failing that, you've exaggerated wildly and there's no problem at all.

    Quote from me181

    If this is happening to you, I think you may have stations too close together, this may be the anti-cheat function telling you to spread your stations out.
    Failing that, you've exaggerated wildly and there's no problem at all.

    So you dont understand the concept of rural departments if i need three trucks in the middle of nowhere first truck is 5 minutes out second is 15 and third is 25 and in RL there might be one truck that responds. Now if you Look at Marion County in TN (which is over 824 sq miles) they only have three truck companies in the entire county so this is challenge of this game to make it realistic.

    Quote from TheNorCalGangster

    So you dont understand the concept of rural departments if i need three trucks in the middle of nowhere first truck is 5 minutes out second is 15 and third is 25 and in RL there might be one truck that responds. Now if you Look at Marion County in TN (which is over 824 sq miles) they only have three truck companies in the entire county so this is challenge of this game to make it realistic.

    I fully understand the concept of rural departments. However I also understand the concept of a game...

    Quote from TheNorCalGangster

    So you dont understand the concept of rural departments if i need three trucks in the middle of nowhere first truck is 5 minutes out second is 15 and third is 25 and in RL there might be one truck that responds. Now if you Look at Marion County in TN (which is over 824 sq miles) they only have three truck companies in the entire county so this is challenge of this game to make it realistic.

    The same for rural Australia. There are certain areas that are simply open land with limited infrastructure - meaning there is no need to have a lot of firefighting vehicles located there (which wouldn't be possible anyway, as you need people to be in the trucks. And there are few people... :P ).


    So if you were to base 1 fire station somewhere, it might start generating calls that need a lot of resources. Like suggested above - the first truck may get there quickly, but then it's a huge waiting game for the remaining units.


    I don't see how this could be exploited, as we simply want it to be more realistic in what calls it generates. Maybe even a little setting on the station edit screen that says 'rural station', which you can tick? :thumbsup: This would then allow the station to only spawn missions with the need for only 1 or two trucks.


    We understand that this is a game, but having a way to more appropriately spawn missions would get the support of a lot of players.

    Quote from wings203

    The same for rural Australia. There are certain areas that are simply open land with limited infrastructure - meaning there is no need to have a lot of firefighting vehicles located there (which wouldn't be possible anyway, as you need people to be in the trucks. And there are few people... :P ).
    So if you were to base 1 fire station somewhere, it might start generating calls that need a lot of resources. Like suggested above - the first truck may get there quickly, but then it's a huge waiting game for the remaining units.


    I don't see how this could be exploited, as we simply want it to be more realistic in what calls it generates. Maybe even a little setting on the station edit screen that says 'rural station', which you can tick? :thumbsup: This would then allow the station to only spawn missions with the need for only 1 or two trucks.


    We understand that this is a game, but having a way to more appropriately spawn missions would get the support of a lot of players.

    what i mean by truck is a platform truck or Quint but that would be the same concept the rural stations could maybe spawn call with out the need for a ladder truck for the call mostly the field fires and traffic accidents and such

    Quote from wings203

    The same for rural Australia. There are certain areas that are simply open land with limited infrastructure - meaning there is no need to have a lot of firefighting vehicles located there (which wouldn't be possible anyway, as you need people to be in the trucks. And there are few people... :P ).
    So if you were to base 1 fire station somewhere, it might start generating calls that need a lot of resources. Like suggested above - the first truck may get there quickly, but then it's a huge waiting game for the remaining units.


    I don't see how this could be exploited, as we simply want it to be more realistic in what calls it generates. Maybe even a little setting on the station edit screen that says 'rural station', which you can tick? :thumbsup: This would then allow the station to only spawn missions with the need for only 1 or two trucks.


    We understand that this is a game, but having a way to more appropriately spawn missions would get the support of a lot of players.

    It would be nice if it were that simple.


    People will have different expectations of how big they want missions to be. Some will want a certain selection of missions, while others will want less or more. Trying to apply realism to games and then expecting all the same rewards doesn't work as the balance will be mucked up.


    If you struggle to get resources from other stations then they are too far away, this is a limit you are imposing on yourself, the game fully allows you to have closer buildings, but you have chosen not to.


    There is always the opportunity for big calls to come in in rural areas, granted they are less likely, but this still has to be taken into account.


    You can always separate off a station by creating it's own coverage area with a dispatch centre. I'd rather see some mechanic that works off this as it's a tried and tested method that prevent's exploitation rather than something which changes the call types in general.

    I would be all for it - I have brought up a situation about platform trucks recently, see here :)


    Like I stated there, I have 9 platform trucks/quints covering a land area of nearly the same size as California, Nevada and Arizona combined!


    Now that I think about it... I like my idea of having a setting in the station edit screen where you can specify if the station is rural or not. And your decision with that setting will ultimately determine what missions will spawn.


    Thinking about the exploit side of things - this would be the opposite in my opinion... 8) If you are spawning missions that require fewer units, typically they reward you with far less credits. So, I would simply see this as an option for those who want more realism. It would take the player much longer to generate the necessary credits to continually expand their covered area.

    Quote from me181

    You can always separate off a station by creating it's own coverage area with a dispatch centre. I'd rather see some mechanic that works off this as it's a tried and tested method that prevent's exploitation rather than something which changes the call types in general.

    There's a limit for that though isn't there?


    I would certainly just do that if there was no limit, and I'm sure many others would too - all depending on how they wish to play :D

    So I can finally see somewhat of a consensus. However there are still some sprinkles of random that are thrown in which don't help.
    Keep to the topic of rural stations and we'll get a clear solution.


    If an option were to be selected, then only calls already in game such as little wild fire and power line down would spawn when the rural station option was selected, this bit is clear. I'd run that by the staff team to check the viability. Questions still remain as to the exact specification as different areas will have different breakdown of emergency calls. However a general stereotypical american rural option would probably work well. I'm not a fan of stuff being implemented purely for the focus of realism, it limits progress that the game could be making on topics that increase the depth of the game and realism in one.

    Quote from me181

    If an option were to be selected, then only calls already in game such as little wild fire and power line down would spawn when the rural station option was selected, this bit is clear. I'd run that by the staff team to check the viability. Questions still remain as to the exact specification as different areas will have different breakdown of emergency calls. However a general stereotypical american rural option would probably work well. I'm not a fan of stuff being implemented purely for the focus of realism, it limits progress that the game could be making on topics that increase the depth of the game and realism in one.

    I think pretty much all missions that require either 1 or 2 fire trucks should be able to spawn - the variety in those calls is still good. The only exception I would make is letting the large field fire spawn, as they are rather common in rural areas. I think for that one particular mission type, we could try and gather the necessary units... :thumbup:

    This is something that the moderator team have discussed on several occasions in the past. It could be possible but it would take time to implement and categorise calls etc. Plus you would have to accommodate semi urban environments such as large city parks where you can get wildfires etc or the outskirts of cities.


    It it was to be added it also probably wouldn’t affect POI’s as these have to be played placed anyway.


    It also wouldn’t be only small missions as that is unrealistic and missions such as building collapses can happen anywhere but maybe the spawn rate can be reduced for rural stations.


    I also get what you are saying with areas having long response times with the lack of equipment (especially platform trucks) but (and this is going to sound harsh), it’s the price you pay for having realistic buildings. As a person who plays 100% realistic I have the same problems with 2 platforms covering an area of 2686 Square Miles so the response times can be well over 30 minutes. This is however realistic and IRL could be longer with traffic.


    I get that the solution would be to add rural variants of missions and yes this would work and would probably be a good idea, however the implications of implementing such a feature may out-way the good points. We would have to create a new call sorting system and spawning system, a new rural feature for stations, duplicates of the majority of missions to have a rural variant etc. This will take at least 2 months and would mean putting other projects of hold. This is most likely possible but because of these implications it would have to receive a lot of support from other forum members as it would mean putting a lot of other things on hold to do.

    I get what you're saying, but waiting hours (with my setup) would not be realistic as per what actually happens.


    The majority of the 9 platform trucks/quints that I will/do have are based in the capital city. These units do not venture any further than about 30km in any direction from the outskirts of the city :thumbup: Massive structure fires being the only exception really, but that happens maybe once or twice a year.


    The same applies to dedicated rescue trucks, hazmat etc. Unless it is absolutely necessary, they handle the incident with the resources they have available in the area. Meaning - some trucks/battalion chiefs would carry hazmat or rescue gear that is not normally seen on those types of vehicles etc. It saves them from having to have specialised vehicles for certain calls which would happen once in a blue moon. Instead, they can use the same vehicle for a variety of calls.


    The above paragraph soon turns into a discussion about combination units if you look at it that way... :D


    For example - if a mission required a platform truck, but the closest is over 2 hours away... They would instead use what equipment they have nearby, ruling out the need to 'pinch' one from a built up area, where they would be needed much more regularly.


    Hope that is all making sense...


    I personally think at the end of the day, it would be worth it. But then again, it depends on how you look at it. I think some further discussion around this whole 'rural mission' idea wouldn't hurt!

    This is the problem with adding even touches of realism. It takes an unrealistic amount of time to implement unless it's something simple that doesn't affect the current system.


    Adding realism can limit how people want to play, which ruins the universal side to the game, this is something the game does so well at.


    I have nothing against combination units, but they have their own threads and discussions. It's rather distracting to be bringing them into discussion here rather than adding on to previous topics.


    If you're playing a realistic rural setup, you're going to have to accept longer times for stuff. It's unfair on other players to be putting so much time into an update that's relatively small


    The constant, 'it's not realistic,' just doesn't cut it anymore. This is primarily a game, as has been mentioned far too many times.

    I play with a city setup :P , but as you know... Cities don't go on forever, they turn into rural countryside eventually.


    I understand that certain people don't like it when realistic things are suggested, but I frequently see things suggested that would add to the realism. Most suggestions are worthy of some discussion... What you have to realise is that there are thousands who aren't even registered on the forums, so we have no idea what their thoughts are on anything that is discussed here. There could be many more supporters, who knows!


    I brought combination units into my discussion as they simply supported what I was saying :thumbsup:


    If we really want to see what others think of suggestions like this, then we have to consider both the goods and the bads.


    For a 'rural mission system' like what @TACRfan suggested were to be implemented, then lets focus on that. And lets find out if the negatives truly do outweigh the end positive result... Would others want to see it happen? Would they be alright with other features being put on hold? Etc...

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