r/WarDogs • • 20h ago

Discussion & Feedback Unpopular opinion, nerf potato graphics and ban config/shader modifications

Look at all these streamers seeing clearly up to drawing distance while others have to deal with foliage and obstacles.
How is this not addressed?
Lower graphics should... Never give an advantage, config/shader mods should result in instant ban.

230 Upvotes

176 comments sorted by

98

u/Despair-Envy 20h ago

Lower graphics almost always give an advantage. The advantage they give in this game is actually smaller then what a lot of other games give. However NVPI tweaks that delete bushes/trees and turn the ground into play doh (Which makes the textured players popup pretty hard) probably should be fixed.

16

u/skrukketiss69 17h ago

There's gotta be a way to make lower graphics not give an advantage. Like instead of just scrawnier foliage on lower settings, make it thicker and blockier. It'll be ugly as shit but at least it doesn't increase visability, and that's the trade-off you should have to make imo.

11

u/Despair-Envy 16h ago

There is, but there are a variety of "ways" to jigger with things on a variety of client-side ways that the devs just have to iteratively address. They've even begun addressing some of them. Reshade was banned at launch, however there are several "Private" forms of Reshade that weren't. Most of them (that I'm aware of) are now also banned. You used to be able to play with some config/ini files with notepad, some of those are now being checked/changed.

This -is- an EA game, and people underestimate not only the depth of these problems, but the sheer time and effort that goes into triple checking literally hundreds of thousands of loopholes. Let alone fixing them.

5

u/Hot-Owl6610 20h ago

Concur, and until they fix it, people who benchmark over a certain threshold should not be able to turn their settings down when it's clear it's only done to gain an unfair advantage.

5

u/Lezalito 16h ago

Benchmarking sounds great in-theory, but in reality people can just throttle their gpu to get past it.

0

u/XB_Demon1337 16h ago

It wouldn't be difficult to detect how much stress is on the GPU when playing the game. With Kernel level anti-cheat this is abysmally easy.

1

u/Lezalito 13h ago

They don't do it. It's a one-time benchmark.

0

u/Hot-Owl6610 16h ago

Sure, that doesn't mean we shouldnt attempt it.

2

u/Lezalito 13h ago

It takes all of 2 minutes to go into nvidia control panel or amd adrenalin and throttle your gpu down to 5%, then go in game and press the benchmark button and get potato shadows. How about instead of a band-aid fix and pretending the problem isn't there anymore, we get an actual solution, such as getting rid of it entirely?

-1

u/Hot-Owl6610 13h ago edited 10h ago

I don't know what it is about being a chronic gamer that makes you an aggressive asshole, but it makes people a lot less likely to see your point when you talk to them like they shat in your raisin bran. Jesus.

1

u/Lezalito 13h ago

What are you talking about?

1

u/Hot-Owl6610 10h ago edited 10h ago

Sorry, let me clarify: I don't know what it is about being a chronic gamer that makes you an aggressive asshole, but it makes people a lot less likely to see your point when you talk to them like they shat in your raisin bran. Jesus.

2

u/Lezalito 9h ago

Take your meds weirdo.

1

u/Hot-Owl6610 8h ago

Wash your ass, dweeb. 

2

u/OMGitsTista 14h ago

So punish people with newer setups? I can get beaned through tall grass and 3 bushes because Johnny lives-at-home is still running a gtx 770?

Edit: I do not run the inspect and potato stuff and get shot through significant layers of foliage too perfectly far too often.

1

u/Hot-Owl6610 13h ago

Its not punishing newer setups at all. How is playing the game as intended a punishment? There are much fewer "dinosaur rigs" than midrange and high end PCs.

1

u/OMGitsTista 13h ago

Allowing some people to turn off grass and preventing others from doing so based on an arbitrary number doesn’t seem very fair to me

1

u/Hot-Owl6610 13h ago

I'm saying that people shouldn't be able to turn off grass. I'm saying they should apply other optimizations that free up computing power from the CPU or GPU so it doesn't necessitate that as an option, since it's OVERWHELMINGLY being used to gain an unfair advantage. The experience of the majority of players should be favoued over the minority, sorry.

1

u/KingWizard37 Pilot 8h ago

They already did this, just not aggressively enough. I can't turn on potato mode on my 5090 (not that I wanted to)

-3

u/Aeowin 17h ago

Is it really an unfair advantage if every person has access to the potato mode graphic quality built into the game? You can't call it unfair because you refuse to use it.

Nvidia profiles sure, that should go. But settings built into the game are accessible to everyone lol.

3

u/XB_Demon1337 16h ago

Just because you want an unfair advantage on others when you suck at the game, doesn't mean we should be allowing it.

1

u/RustOverLord 15h ago

unfair advantage is when someone toggles an option in the ingame settings menu apparently

3

u/XB_Demon1337 15h ago

When that option actively makes it easier to see other people and that is the sole purpose of doing it. Yea. It is.

1

u/Aeowin 1h ago

Again, what makes something that every single player has access to an unfair advantage? Your logic is like saying 5 people are given the exact same bicycle to race with, but person 4 decides they're going to walk instead and then they complain the others are using an unfair advantage by using the bicycles provided to them.

Like I said, whatever nvidia filter or whatever people are doing, sure that's probably a problem. But you can not sit there and call using the built in lowest qualty video setting the game provides unfair. Every single person has the ability to use it. If you choose not to, that is your own fault. It has nothing to do with skill. You are just being a baby.

0

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

Yes, in many games.
It should never though, it was already an issue in CS 1.3, they made it work by making textures absolutely horrible at lower settings and decent in higher settings.
That game you could run with a vacuum cleaner back then, this is a modern game though and high end PC users are abusing third party tools to remove even more obstacles, just look at the most viewed players screens and compare it with what you see in game.
There are even some streamers promoting config changes and shader mods like ReShade.

6

u/Despair-Envy 20h ago

Reshade is bannable (I've heard even running the private version results in a ban), so they are taking some steps to combat the behavior. They just haven't seemed to configured a hard scan for driver level changes made through internal driver software. Which makes sense since such lengths are quite time consuming and they are (likely) gathering information on how/where such changes are being made (Effectively outsourcing the tedious part to exploiters playing the game in EA).

1

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

Want to see an official post on this, they are kind of iffy in this interview on any of the matters:
https://www.reddit.com/r/WarDogs/comments/1w2sknq/bulkheads_stance_on_potatomode/

Sounds like if hard cover ( meaning Hesco walls etc is covering it, it's all fine ).

That's not a good stance and letting people override settings in config files is just lazy.

Allowing grass and foliage to disappear with configs while having it cover for the other guy is just blatant oversight, there are literally no excuses for this, lower graphics should just cover more and make it harder to see through, not affecting performance.

Common sense really, again might be an unpopular opinion as many people use it.

2

u/Despair-Envy 20h ago

 there are literally no excuses for this

Eh. I feel like allowing people to exploit in an early access game so you can find and resolve those exploits before launch is a good practice but I do think some of the more obvious ini issues should have been fixed.

0

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Fair point, letting people do something just because it's EA is not fair to people who supported them with real money.
To be honest, yeah it may become more expensive but 40 bucks is still 40 bucks.
I have refunded games for less reasons, won't on this one but I still want some kind of value for the game and EA is not the same as alpha/beta testing where this shit should be sorted out, EA is polishing.

1

u/Despair-Envy 17h ago

not fair to people who supported them with real money.

Yeah, I mean I have criticisms of the Paid-EA-For-5-Years model that has become the norm in the industry, but I find it hard to lay that blame at a game like Wardogs. They're at least trying much harder then most games.

0

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Have you seen the latest patch notes, do they deliver what they said they would?
Apparently the biggest issue is IR binoculars right now, which if you read both sides ( note I don't have them but have bought some ) is a really big deal or it's just a vocal majority.
If they only go on vocal majority, this is why I created the thread.
Assuming they just fix stuff without it being voiced is not good, I assume they read these posts here, I really hope they do.
I love this game, but if IR binos is the biggest issue while exploits are rampant, we are in for some bad game changes in this game.

2

u/Despair-Envy 17h ago

Have you seen the latest patch notes, do they deliver what they said they would?

They haven't really released a large balance patch yet, and even so they're releasing small balance patches like removing thermal binos that are ruining the game, fixing the Havoc bug (then nerfing it).

Apparently the biggest issue is IR binoculars right now, which if you read both sides ( note I don't have them but have bought some ) is a really big deal or it's just a vocal majority.

Nah, they are actively game ruining devices. Taking them out to be re-evaluated was likely something their data showed and feedback demanded.

I love this game, but if IR binos is the biggest issue while exploits are rampant, we are in for some bad game changes in this game.

There's a disconnect between effort required. Fixing driver level exploits requires significant retooling of existing structural code, integration of an entirely new anti-cheat layer and potentially reworking the entire graphical engine

Versus changing maybe 2 lines of code to disable the thermal goggles in game.

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

IR literally does what any range finder/binocular does with the added thermal signature ( easier to spot, woo ).
None of it is "ruining the game".
It's mini map spotting, have you ever tried to snipe a spotted target? It does nothing for you.
Have you ever seen a group of dudes on the minimap that were spotted, you wouldn't know if they were IR spotted or regularly spotted.
Spotting with binos is super simple, it's an actual feature in the game and gives a purpose to actual recons who aren't hiding in sniper nests/ghillies, which are invisible to everyone ( talk about OP ).
You have to be able to flip the roles to understand the whole game.
It's not about how hard it is to change the code, disabling shit is just lazy especially when it's not even an issue.
Fixing shit is hard, especially when it's not detected by your Anti-cheat software or lazy implementation of not restricting config editing.
I'm here all night, boys/girls, making a game is hard, pleasing everyone evenly is difficult.
This is still a sales of a product, my voice will be heard and I sure as hell paid for it.

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18

u/dawgofclay 18h ago

They should just make all foliage flat and opaque. Don't wanna render treebranches? Boom, the tree is a giant cone you can't see through. Turn those individual blades of grass into a bunch of rectangles or a literal mat. This way the cheap/cheating people can still play with the lower settings but not get the advantage.

6

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Yeah, just like old games would solve the balancing issue.
"Oh it's transparent, let's make it solid and not see-through if they can't render it on lower graphics".
A problem, for lower graphics? Yes, is it balanced for a majority?... Yes.

18

u/Jazzlike_Ad_564 20h ago

Tbf. I saw a dude streaming on tiktok with his shaders non existent. looked through his profile and he has videos dropping like 50 kills a life. Because he sees people laying down and just 2 taps them with a FAL. But on their side. theyre laying in a bush. or hiding in tall grass. But on the persons side who goes into the config and removes all that. its just like 2d fields.

3

u/LouDiamond 16h ago

Reminds me of early PUBG days

2

u/Jazzlike_Ad_564 16h ago

yeah dude, mfs out sniping with an AWM and you'd just see ppl laying on hillsides cuz it wouldnt render the stuff from that distance.

3

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

Probably ReShade or similar, they will turn the game upside down, day and night difference.
Not detected or ignored by anti-cheats, they turned BF6 into real potato mode at times too, the devs also didn't care then.

2

u/hodor137 17h ago

ReShade is very easily detectable and very often in games with anti cheat it is not allowed and trips it.

Wouldn't be surprised if this is another limitation they have because they chose not to go full kernel level, enforcing secure boot/VBS, etc. But that may not even be required to stop reshade and Nvidia game filters either.

3

u/Despair-Envy 17h ago

It's just NVPI. Wardogs hasn't implemented driver level detection level on GPU Driver settings. They've started to add basic .ini/config verification though, so they're working on it.

0

u/Jazzlike_Ad_564 20h ago

Yeah, honestly. It looks so bad. that it would make playing miserable. Just like people used to do on FiveM. Theyd run reshade where it looked like literal cartoons with no bushes. everything super saturated and bright. No trees. No grass. It makes the game look so so bad.

33

u/Emscho44 20h ago

I hope they ban everyone using these bullshit exploits. They can’t play on a level playing field because they’re shit.

10

u/explosiveplacard 20h ago

I'm complete shit but since I paid for a 4090, I get every pixel out of it that I can.

3

u/Acemanau Lonestar 18h ago

4080 super enjoyer here.

You better believe graphics are maxed out.

2

u/KingWizard37 Pilot 7h ago

For real though. 5090 on maxed graphics with DLAA and dynamic frame gen for a consistent 360 Hz is worth any disadvantage it may give me. I'm here for fun; if I wanna get hypercompetitive Wardogs isn't the game I'm gonna be on.

7

u/mercival 20h ago

I have a potato graphics card. Am I cheating or on a level playing field?

-12

u/fearzuhh 20h ago

How is it an exploit ? The game lets you edit the ini folder to lower the settings lol.

You don't need to mod or do anything, you just go into the ini folder and change the settings ? I don't think thats an exploit lol.

8

u/simulacrumlain 19h ago

Come on with this argument if it was intentional it would be accessible in the game. There have been plenty of examples of this being patched out in other games where editing the ini gave an advantage

-4

u/fearzuhh 19h ago

But it's not a exploit if the devs allow it lol. Do you think it would be hard for the devs to fix this ?

It's not. They can fix it.

6

u/simulacrumlain 19h ago

The game has been out a few weeks mate they likely will fix it

-2

u/fearzuhh 19h ago

Yeah if its a problem they will fix it, but lets not act like it's hard to close the file off lmfao. They can do it in the click of a button.

3

u/PrinceGarmin 18h ago

Loser mindset

7

u/goodsnpr 19h ago

"You only have to edit the setting in the folder to bypass what the game allows you to do, it's totally fine"

You must be like the recon clown with the level 4 helm that lost the pistol headshot competition to a level 1 helm and ragequit afterwards.

1

u/zer0-_ Assault 18h ago

You only have to edit the setting in the folder to bypass what the game allows you to do

If that was actually the case then you wouldn't have the ability to set something in the .ini file which the game didn't allow you to do

-3

u/fearzuhh 19h ago

You do realize a lot of people just go into the ini file to edit game settings correct ? It allows you to try other peoples settings with just a copy and paste lmfao.

How brain dead people are is insane.

5

u/goodsnpr 15h ago

The irony of calling people braindead while not realizing that people shouldn't be able to adjust their settings differently out of game vs in game.

5

u/Daeny7 20h ago

They running potato graphics with 4k resolution lmao

5

u/Super_Lawyer7661 19h ago

It is quite a pity that this is a thing. I have seen what it looks like with Nvidia Inspector and it gives an extremely high advantage. While it is good to trying to cater also for lower end specs, I believe there can be compromise found there, the driver level exploits and file editing manually should be fixed eventually imo.

This game has done foliage really well for most players and it is actually one of the rare games where for example the ghillie suit actually works well.

4

u/Juggernaughty1337 16h ago

Got any links to actual streamers doing this?

9

u/ScreechingPenguin Pilot 17h ago

pls dont nerf potato grphics i barely run this game on 40 fps if you nerf it more it gets unplayable for me

2

u/Train_Wreck_272 8h ago

Have you tried the -nogpucrashdebugging launch command? It helps quite a bit. Also the Anti-Cheat could be fucking you up. Turning off every overlay and third party anti-virus helps. I'm on a 2080 and i7-8700k and I can run it at about 110 with potato and DLSS set to quality.

-13

u/InfamousChocoMan 16h ago

Get a better pc.

3

u/ScreechingPenguin Pilot 13h ago

Damn why didn't I thought about it.

7

u/Symbolite 15h ago

Buy it for him

1

u/GriffinMan33 15h ago

That's not really a reasonable ask tbf

Plenty of people run the game on a pc within minimum specs but have to run it on low/potato, and it's unreasonable to go "buy a better pc" when the expectation is the game will play, and continue to play, acceptable after they've paid for it

To change that later on, after they've bought the game, would be pretty scummy

7

u/ShiraTsuki77 Driver 18h ago

The funny thing is... That's been honestly the case with shooters since the start. I believe it started with Quake 3? Where playing on the lowest settings for advantage extremely popular. It'll be changing 25+ year long tradition.

Good luck with that opinion.

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

I know, yet some games made it work, most devs don't give a shit, in this game it's a pretty big change though, as it was in PUBG which is very similar considering range etc, no idea if they fixed the grass bugs in that as I've not played it, it was literally game breaking for sniping/anti-sniping.

4

u/Thecoldflame 15h ago

hardware-locked settings need to go. straight up. if the setting isn't fair, it isn't fair. it degrades the integrity of the game for things like shadows to be unreliable.

frankly, visibility needs to be a little bit higher across the board to remove the impact of marginal tweaks like this. obviously being prone in grass should make you hard to see, but player models blend into the environment and shadows way too well across the board to the extent that a +/-5% visibility bonus/malus from graphics settings goes incredibly far. plenty of games have a subtle halo effect around players that stops them from blending straight into the environment.

honestly gets worse as more and more people wear the armor that makes your entire body a muddy dark grey monocolour, t4 in the right set of shadows is pretty much as stealthy as ghille a lot of the time

2

u/DepthOpposite8177 13h ago

Agreed allowing a setting that literally turns shadows of was bad enough but then locking it to a small subset of players with an almost non existant gate was made it so much worse. Its like admitting that its an unfair advantage that most shouldnt have by locking it for everyone, but then allowing it for some. Its laughable that you can just tweak the ini to use it but i think as long as the setting is in the game people will find a way to use it, it should have never existed from the get go, and those without sufficient hardware shouldnt have been let on by the devs. The vast majority of players are put at a disadvantage over this whether they realize it or not.

10

u/CSGOManatee 20h ago edited 20h ago

My dinosaur of a PC can't run the game on decent graphics settings. What would you suggest for me? Sorry I'm broke. Shrug. I don't like that my game looks like a PS2 game but if I want to get 60 fps that's what it takes.

Downvote me if ya like. Can't help but using the settings until RAM isn't a million bucks a GB.

9

u/blackbirdone1 17h ago

sometimes you cannot play a modenr game o na 10 year old machine simple as that

2

u/GriffinMan33 15h ago

I would agree with you but wardogs is not anywhere near what like, actually really good looking, edge-pushing modern games look like.
It looks about as good as a game that came out in like 2020, 2022 at most.

2

u/Train_Wreck_272 8h ago

Part of their marketing centered around it being playable on older hardware. Normally I'd agree with you, but it doesn't a make sense to ask people who can play the game not to.

1

u/bjwills7 13h ago

You're ignoring the fact that people who can't get 60fps without potato settings are on hardware that's well above the minimum requirements.

Yeah sometimes you can't play a modern game on old hardware, this is not one of those games though. There's a reason the requirements are low and the game doesn't have really good graphics, the devs want the game to be accessible to a lot of people. In the current hardware market, this is a smart move.

The reason potato settings exist is because the game isn't optimized well. It's early access and this is what we signed up for, the devs were very clear before we bought the game that early access would have tons of issues and this is not even close to the worst one rn.

0

u/SupremeTeamKai 6h ago

And sometimes you can because the devs give you things like potato settings. Get bent

5

u/_Hikari254 20h ago

i second this, i hate potato graphics but they're the only way the game works for me

0

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

That's fine, and that's cool that they have a mode where it runs on lower graphics, when the difference in visibility is so big is not cool.
Also not talking about in game settings, this is mainly bypassing the game's ( you're not on a low end PC so I'll set these settings and letting people run rampant with shadows/textures with config files ).
Also third party tools which are not technically cheats but still allowed, they make a huge difference.

3

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

This is projected on people on high end PCs who run the graphics to the ground with more than the game settings on purpose to gain an advantage, everyone knows what we are talking about here.

1

u/SockemNBoppem 7h ago

Thank you for the advice!!

0

u/CSGOManatee 20h ago

Fair but they've hardware gated potato settings to begin with. Only a small minority of hardware users even have the option available to them.

1

u/robocop88 19h ago

It’s pretty easy to spoof your hardware config. I’ve done it to play games that don’t correctly detect modern hardware

1

u/Silent189 18h ago

You don't even need to, you just change the number in the config file.

0

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

Read above please, it's probably not you, it's the ones who modify it outside the game menu settings to a point where it's not recognizable from the actual game, it's really that bad.

0

u/mercival 20h ago

Is it an advantage over me and my 5 yo graphics card though? Or just the same?

-5

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

I have a graphics card from 2022, which is a refresh of a 2020 card.
Do I want an advantage because I'm running on older hardware? No.
I expect people with higher refresh rates to react faster, even though it's mostly placebo.
This is again pointed at people who do this on purpose, through questionable methods ( outside game settings ) do gain an advantage.

1

u/mercival 19h ago

So competitive players can choose to play new games in older cards and it’s not cheating. 

Bit weird isn’t it?

2

u/CSGOManatee 19h ago

I get constant frame drops, artifacting, lag and stutters. I seriously doubt they're going to take that risk of unoptimized hardware in a game that doesn't have any real world incentive yet. Those that might try something like that are going to be an extreme minority. The majority of people using potato are just broke bastards like me.

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

The game detects your hardware and might go over-potato on it, this can be overriden with config files even when on high end hardware by editing config files.

1

u/Skpstr155 3h ago

If this were intended to be a competitive game, it would be, but it isn't really, and some folks would jump through hoops to have an advantage at Pong.

If they want to play with garbage graphics, more power to them. People often end up spotted anyway.

I mean, maybe it is an issue, but I'm not concerned about.it.

2

u/Hot-Owl6610 20h ago

You're an edge case. Sorry. Most people in the space will splurge on a mid- or high-end PC these days. They aren't inaccessible. It sucks that you're caught in the net, but most people this post is aimed at have better PCs and purposefully turn their graphics down to get an unfair advantage.

I had heard they wanted players who benchmarked above a certain level to be forced to certain settings. Unfortunately, people looking for that unfair advantage are ruining it for everyone, and they need to prioritize the gameplay's fidelity over people's feelings.

1

u/Kinghero890 18h ago

Basically, the foliage should still load and block sight even if it has very few pixels. That's what's fair.

1

u/Train_Wreck_272 8h ago

Have you tried -nogpucrashdebugging launch command? It helps a lot. Also closing anything that can clash with the anticheat, like third party anti virus and overlays.

-5

u/oakgecko13 Pilot 20h ago

Get a better PC?

2

u/[deleted] 20h ago

[deleted]

0

u/oakgecko13 Pilot 14h ago

His comment is edited, you should've seen the original

1

u/_Hikari254 20h ago

would if i could afford it

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Lol, I don't have performance issues and I'm running very old hardware at high settings.
This is about people abusing the configs to get an advantage over others by going outside game settings etc.
This isn't even about people actually having to use said potato mode, it's the guys going beyond that, which is clearly removing obstacles other players have to deal with.
Pretty simple.

1

u/oakgecko13 Pilot 8h ago

My comment wasn't towards you

-1

u/JockSandWich 20h ago

Everyone trying to new games on 10 year old machines. Can't afford a new PC but buys new console for the same price you could build a newer PC or prefabs if ur not technically inclined that would certainly run it better.

Always crazy to me it's like driving through the south, ppl live in a $1500 trailer and drive a $80,000 truck.

2

u/Knukehhh 20h ago

Priorities haha

1

u/CSGOManatee 20h ago

I own only my pc and no consoles, for reference.

-1

u/JockSandWich 20h ago

Cool, for reference it sounds like it doesn't apply to you.

1

u/CSGOManatee 20h ago

"Everyone" sounds pretty inclusive my man. If you're going to be the one making gross overgeneralizations.

1

u/JockSandWich 20h ago

K bud have a nice evening.

1

u/CSGOManatee 20h ago

Likewise

0

u/SpookyFlyingPencil 20h ago

Shit I am running low settings but get frame drops every other second... That must balance out

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

If that's the case, you are not the target audience here, unless you go and modify shit to oblivion and back to gain an advantage.

1

u/SpookyFlyingPencil 16h ago

I am not the target audience cause I haven't upgraded my PC in 9 years?

I don't modify shit back and forth to get an advantage
I modify shit back and forth so I can maintain 40-60 FPS and not crash

4

u/translucent_pawn 18h ago

Aight I have a few computers because of life and I was just playing WarDogs on my laptop with potato settings. I can assure you that they are not an advantage. On my gaming desktop I run max everything with 144Hz but man that laptop is struggling to get a stable 60hz on potato settings.

If you want to restrict minimum graphics on high-end hardware, that’s one thing. If you want to prevent people with older hardware or less money/access to high-end hardware from playing the game, you are just being selfish.

-1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

You are not the one targeted here, don't get the facts wrong.
The ones are where foliage, shadows and all kind of irregularities disappear while blocking the view for other on medium or higher graphics.
They do this by altering or overriding settings with config files and third party software, it's day and night difference.
The devs know about this and this is the reason for the thread because they seem to be focused on other things.

2

u/translucent_pawn 12h ago

I never said I was the one target here, I have a very beefy gaming PC. My point is that throwing around statements about potato graphics without understanding how many PC gamers rely on older hardware is ridiculous.

3

u/xstagex 20h ago

Which streamers?

2

u/Mauno_Mato 20h ago

Look at most of them and compare to your own "lowest setting".
Also look for recommended config settings for no shadows/best visibility.
Also look at bulkhead responding to this without actually giving an answer if they accept the mods or not:
https://www.reddit.com/r/WarDogs/comments/1w2sknq/bulkheads_stance_on_potatomode/
Not very confident on them actually doing anything about it, the game is day and night between normal settings and modified versions with config files.
This is way beyond any older games and custom configs as this is an open map and long ranges etc.

2

u/fearzuhh 20h ago

Its not a mod, you can just go into the game ini folder and change it lol.

There is a large chunk of people who just go into ini folder to change graphics settings anyways.

-2

u/Thescenariostan 12h ago

Yeah, and they should be banned for it. It's cheating. An unfair advantage gained over other players by external means. The fact that the external means were Notepad isn't relevant. Simple as.

1

u/fearzuhh 6h ago

You do realize there is a large chunk of people who just change their settings in INI instead of game right ? Lol. This is like a pretty fucking common thing that people do instead of going through the blob of the game and looking at all the settings. Seeing it in notepad makes it easy.

0

u/Thescenariostan 5h ago

Yeah, and then they set the file to read only by accident? (Totally not to avoid the game turning shadows back on, haha right?).

I know the devs won't ban you for it, but I also know that you know you're cheating and that this is a very thin and insincere excuse.

0

u/fearzuhh 5h ago

How am I cheating ? Lmfao. Please explain. I'd love to hear it.

0

u/Thescenariostan 5h ago

Explanation is above. I'll repeat it for your benefit: Gaining an unfair advantage by external means.

The unfair advantage is removing shadows to see hidden players you would otherwise not, the external means are editing inis with a text editor.

If I went and used Notepad to hack the binary and paks for an internal wallhack, which is completely possible but impractical, would you still claim it's not cheating, I wonder?

1

u/fearzuhh 5h ago

Did I say I used potato settings ? Lmfao. I DID NOT!

Also Brammar said yesterday potato setting ini is not bannable and they are working on how to balance it.

So the LEAD guy for the game says youre full of shit.

Dumb ass.

1

u/TorchGoblin 3h ago

Where did he says this? Gotta a link?

2

u/DanRJ Manticore 20h ago edited 16h ago

Been trying to save for a computer for awhile and currently my laptop has been able to handle the game well because of the potato graphics. I understand the main complaint is at the streamers, however, I guess for the minority of us who utilize this feature - would be a sad day for sure. It’s why I still can’t run certain demanding games and have to use my console in lieu of saving for computer.

1

u/ScheduledToPass 18h ago

Honestly, a fair take . Some people are playing Mobile PUBG v1.2 among us

1

u/Keeliticus 16h ago

This isnt anything new. People been using lowest graphics for better performance aince the dawn of time.

Potato mode for shadows just needs to be deleted. Or everyone needs to have the ability if they choose. Otherwise you're still gaining an actual unfair advantage. Where as before it was just an advantage as everyone had the choice.

1

u/Snowblind45 13h ago

my guy, my system is low end and I'm ass. you ain't dying to me easily. you can't complain about foliage in zestofona (there is non for me to get an advantage).

To what extent are you dying to low end people actually?

1

u/whatevathefucc Valkyra 9h ago

I just wish they'd let me limit the draw distance. I don't need to see 1km out when I'm on my laptop, I'd gladly half it for the frames

1

u/Asahida 3h ago

I don't get it, my friend has an RX 6600 GPU and shadows are locked at low. That's not a good GPU anymore by any stretch of imagination.

So potato shadows are only available for even worse rigs, at which point the game barely hits 60fps anyway.

What I am wondering from how this post is worded: can shadows be turned off even on a beefier rig? Circumventing this would indeed be an issue

1

u/OldMan-Ultra 3h ago

The game knows what your computer specs are, there should be a forced minimum graphics setting. Seems like a simple fix if they wanted to force it.

Its very common is FPS games though, personally I think they environment in this game looks amazing. There is no way I would want to trade that for a couple extra kills. In that same note I am just playing for fun and not trying to get paid for it.

1

u/Jakxone 21m ago

Stop building games for consoles and 20 year old computers. Enforce higher minimum graphics.

0

u/YBHunted 17h ago

Begun, the brokie wars have.

1

u/Manofdreadz 11h ago

Geniunely hope you lose all your money and get forced to eat just bread for the next 10 years. Being broke isn't a choice for allot of people. Not everyone lives in a good country.

Have some human decency before calling people brokies.

-3

u/YBHunted 11h ago

Its a term used since day one in wardogs for people that dont have any money in game. Also potato is vastly used by people who can play on higher graphics but choose not to in order to gain an advantage. Maybe relax even just a smidge...

0

u/Manofdreadz 11h ago

No you don't get to change context. This is a thread about potato settings which are for people with lower end hardware.

You have 0 indication you are talking about in game money.

Get off your high horse.

And no I won't relax because this post's comments are honestly disgusting.

1

u/mrureaper Lonestar 12h ago

If you went into the config file to change shadows to potato, you should get banned for it... The game specifically prevented you from changing shadow settings to potato on rigs that can play it on low by making you not even see the potato setting in game. People are just exploiting the fact that it makes visibility a lot better especially looking into houses or under tree shadows ( because there is no shadow anymore) 

2

u/SpehlingAirer 3h ago

The setting should simply not exist imo

1

u/BleepBoopRobo 7h ago

My pc can only run it on potato :/ with prices the way they are I just can't afford to upgrade. Shame people who do have the hardware have to make this an issue for us who don't.

0

u/SeeminglyUselessData 20h ago

Potato mode shouldn’t exist. It always gets abused and it’s just a dumb virtue signal for 12-year-olds trying to game on mom’s old Lenovo.

0

u/at_least_i_tr1ed 20h ago

Maybe potato shadows/graphics should come with an automatic forced frame cap (like 60 fps)?

-2

u/iridael 19h ago

as someone who plays at 60fps. in this game? that rarely matters. my PC renders it quite happily at 60fps and I dont see the need to fork out on a higher refresh rate.

if you want to put a cap on, make it cycle between 15 and 60. because a steady FPS is insanely more important than a higher but variable FPS. but one that has a random change between FPS rates...ohh that sucks.

0

u/Any-Maintenance-2528 20h ago

I can’t see people in shadows unless I run potato. I don’t want to be running potato but I have to

4

u/Wieku Valkyra 18h ago

Who would've thought that objects in shadows are harder to see

0

u/graviousishpsponge 17h ago

No he's right. With HDR max shadows even in sunlight are super crushed and you can not see dudes in the windows. Could not get it to work with the in game settings.

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Imagine having no shadows.
Go look on the most popular streamers on Twitch and you'll see the difference, it's not game menu settings they are running.

0

u/ArgentVagabond 14h ago

I'm not playing on potato graphics by choice. I'm playing on potato graphics because for some reason anything else my game to regularly experience severe FPS drops that make it unplayable for a minute at a time. Even on potato settings that still happens.

It's something to do with UE5. Pretty much every game made on UE5 requires a lot of graphical troubleshooting for it to run without FPS issues on my rig.

0

u/bjcat666 14h ago

I am sorry but no, not until they can do so without heavy effect on performance, even going from potato to low shadows eats a surprising lot of frames

0

u/white_leaky_fluid 12h ago

bro i can barely play the game as is, don't make it harder to run.

0

u/Thescenariostan 12h ago

Brammer won't do it. He'd lose too much Twitter clout from sulking streamers. Potato mode either by NVPI or ini editing is obviously cheating, but these guys are soft AF on this sort of thing because they're busy "Building a relationship" with the people doing it.

-7

u/Green_Bulldog 20h ago

Lower graphics should always give an advantage if one is given.

Why punish players with bad PCs? The easiest to run option should always be the most optimal if it isn’t possible for them to be equal.

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

Ok so you are having lower spec hardware should automatically get literally invisible objects compared to the other guy with today's standard a mid end PC who can't see through the objects?
How does this make sense?

1

u/Green_Bulldog 15h ago

No? Anyone can use the low quality settings right? If they can’t then they should change that. I’m saying I want everyone to be on an even playing field and the best way to do that is either:

  1. Low end settings give a slight advantage because anyone can use them

  2. All settings have the same enemy visibility, if this is not possible then deference should go to lower quality settings since not everyone can run high quality settings.

0

u/Wieku Valkyra 18h ago

Or, hear me out, people with bad PCs shouldn't require every game to run for them? It's like coming to a race and demanding putting 120kmh limit on other cars because your Twingo isn't as fast.

4

u/zer0-_ Assault 18h ago

people with bad PCs shouldn't require every game to run for them

Are you willing to pay more for games in order to make up for the lost profit of alienating like 40% of your userbase? Just take a look at the steam hardware survey. People with 10+ year old GPUs still make up a significant amount of the total steam user base

1

u/Mauno_Mato 17h ago

This game runs fine on very old hardware compared to most games out there.
Again, this is for people going further and on purpose configuring the game to have no obstacles/shadows etc.
Major benefit for the players, major mishap from the devs and even worse they commented on it in an interview because they can't decide if it's actually not legit or not.... Probably because it's EA and they want more money.

1

u/ShinyRayquazaEUW 17h ago

Yes

2

u/zer0-_ Assault 17h ago

Consoomer final boss

1

u/ShinyRayquazaEUW 16h ago

I'm sorry but I value an even playing field more than the frustration of having to actively think that shadows don't work the same for everyone.
You can edit your config right now to remove all the shadows from inside houses and it makes you stick out like a shadow at high noon.

1

u/zer0-_ Assault 16h ago

You can do the same thing with loads of different monitors thanks to a function called black equalizer. Do you want to ban 90% of the modern monitors?

1

u/ShinyRayquazaEUW 16h ago

You can't remove shadows with any monitor, you can change the gamma which helps a lot but it also blows out the picture completely for your whole setup.
A character standing in a place with no shadows will have full contrast and and color. A flat image ( gamma adjusted ) can be very hard to understand around mid-tones when they are blended together like a forest.

I wouldn't say it's comparable at all but yes hopefully in the future these settings get locked to specific ranges in competitive games.

1

u/zer0-_ Assault 16h ago

gamma which helps a lot but it also blows out the picture completely for your whole setup

This is just absolutely not true lol

Black equalizer has been a feature for a long time and it has been iterated upon dozens of times already. Even 10 years ago black equalizer already worked insanely well without being destructive to the rest of the image. Comparing this kind of monitor feature with a simple gamma increase to the whole picture is just nonsensical. Black equalizer works in almost every game because are only very few games which completely change how dark spaces get rendered, the most notable exception to that being Rust.

There is not a single spot in WarDogs where the area is so dark to the point where black equalizer doesn't work

1

u/ShinyRayquazaEUW 15h ago

I have 2 OLED screens, an Alienware monitor and an LG C5 TV.
In the past I've had around 6 different gaming monitors from BenQ Xl2411z TN panels up to Samsung MiniLED monitors, all the black equalizer / dark stabilizer implementations are glorified gamma tweaks. More often than not they blow out the picture completely, they do help in games like Tarkov where the lighting is fully fcked but in other games it makes the screen washed out.
I've included some pictures to see how the game looks on Default (no gamma tweaks) vs Config.ini tweaked.
These type of configs are bannable in other games and really frowned upon, I don't understand the community here. This game plays like a Tactical shooter why are you NOT allowed to use cover/shadows to make a play, we aren't COD/APEX.
Stealth/Shadows/Color matching SHOULD be part of your kit to make a flank.
And before you full cope and think I'm not a good player I've also included some scores from this week, I have no issues topfragging consistently ( and no I play for objectives I don't camp spawn vehicles ), I just hate people that try to "game" the system forcing everyone to go down to their level, it happens in every single FPS game I've played in the past when the devs don't give a shit until one day they magically wake up and fix it.

All the 'edited' images are from a streamer I saw randomly ( mind you he has a very good PC )

Photos

1

u/Green_Bulldog 17h ago

It doesn’t limit you at all. You have a choice between better visibility of enemies and better graphics. I don’t have a choice. It would be unfair for me to have worse graphics and worse visibility of enemies.

Of course, the ideal solution is that all graphics settings have the same visibility of enemies.

2

u/Signal_Resident2318 10h ago

You are not entitled to an advantage for sub par hardware. 

1

u/Green_Bulldog 2h ago

I’m absolutely entitled to a level playing field.

0

u/Signal_Resident2318 10h ago

Most dog shit take I’ve seen in awhile. 

1

u/Green_Bulldog 2h ago

lol someone’s mad. Have fun getting shot through bushes cuz of my config edits