Mumble - Gaming Voice over IP with positional Audio

BishopC · Post by **BishopC** » Sun Feb 01, 2009 7:16 pm

Hello everyone,

I stumbled upon an alternative to Team Speak, called Mumble.
http://mumble.sourceforge.net/Main_Page

Our public squad (in other words, Hugh Winter, Herr Doctor and me) have tried that out, and it was a lot better than TS, it is latency optimized, which means that it does not has the TS "1 second lag" ("To your right!" - "I know, he killed me 2 seconds ago." - "I told you in time."), voice quality is fine, and it has this funny little feature called positional audio, which means, if in Battlefield 2 one players figure is standing to your left, you will hear his voice coming from the left. Which is rahter funny, we used it to play hide and seek on Karkand, where one (from the other team) is hiding and says "peep" from time to time, so you can locate him by audio

But this would also mean, that you can locate your squad mates by listening to them and coordinate a little better. It also has this neat little configurable overlay, which shows WHO is speaking on your screen, so you don't have to guess all the time and mix people up (this means YOU, goggles

). Not very relevant to me, since I have a second screen, showing TS, but for those with one it would be helpful, I think. (And if you dont want to use TS Overlay, because it's development stopped like 2 years ago).

You can also set it up so that Squad members become more silent the farther they are away, and this is configurable in detail, you can switch this function off, or you can limit it very strongly, so that you can always hear your mates, just a tiny little bit less loud, or you can set it up realistic, so that you can only hear someone who is close to you. Which is funny, but useless, I guess.

It is server based (like TS) and open source, but it takes a few minutes to configure it correctly, since it CAN BE quite complex if you want to set it up to your liking. Make sure to SWITCH THE SETTINGS MODE TO EXPERT! The default settings mode is more or less useless.

I have not yet found out if the channel command thingies can be set up, perhaps that is only possible with the server programm called MURMUR, but I will try to find out.

Have a nice one and PM me if you have problems

The Bishop

nUber · Post by **nUber** » Sun Feb 01, 2009 7:18 pm

got 125xxx GAMEHOOK for that leet program

BishopC · Post by **BishopC** » Sun Feb 01, 2009 7:20 pm

How the hell can you answer that fast? I stopped typing this post like 1 minute ago!

BishopC · Post by **BishopC** » Sun Feb 01, 2009 7:28 pm

Ah, I goggled, er, googled a little, and it seems it is the OVERLAY that PB (falsely) identifies as "Gamehook", because everything that is shown on screen and does not belong to BF2 is registered as cheat. So the overlay would be a bad idea. Hmm. Punkbuster. Seems that punkbuster only allows hacks and injectors, but is kicking and banning everyone else. Gnarl!

Post by **matsif** » Sun Feb 01, 2009 9:00 pm

we've had previous discussions over mumble and vent in the past and have always stuck with ts.

AusbilderSchmidt · Post by **AusbilderSchmidt** » Mon Feb 02, 2009 2:23 am

Ragedavis, Kenny and me tested it in 2007. Rage wrote some scripts for it and we tryed many other things with mumble. The ingame voice location is really cool, also the quality and the speed is better then TS.

The problem was: We didnt found a way to speak with other squads like we do in TS by Channelcomander. Thats why we stopped this project since two years ago.

Post by **Ash2Dust** » Mon Feb 02, 2009 2:50 am

There are several GC players running overlays in BF2 without being kicked for level 2 restrictions. Maybe they can provide input on what PB is accepting. Also, older version tend to be accepted while newer versions can take a little time.
Also voice/text overlays are not considered cheats, but could cause kicks if its not an approved program hooking into your video output.

I'd rather have PB monthly (sometimes weekly) updates than wait for DICE/EA to provide a patch a year or 2 later. PB is not perfect, but it does catch alot of the trash and does get updated. Tho in the Gen.Champ case, it took a month or 2 before he was globally banned. I wouldnt think of playing on a server without PB. But I wish PB updated daily like an anti-virus.

BishopC · Post by **BishopC** » Mon Feb 02, 2009 10:41 am

Yip, I was just nitpicking on PB, I hate to be wallhackedspoofcheathackedaimbottedwhatever on servers, so I filter out non-PB servers, I just wish they would be more effective. But I get wallhackedspoofcheathackedaimbottedwhatever and carbombedcontinousartied on PB protected servers, so the feeling is that I only notice PB when I get kicked because PbstrA.exe cant connect or update is slow or it thinks my map is somehow not vanilla or some other false positive. btw, where is the patch 1.5, dammit.

Good to see that there already have been experiments with mumble. Perhaps sometime in the future it will have the requested functions, then we might want to think about switching. I'll keep an eye open for it.

Have a nice one

Bishop

AusbilderSchmidt · Post by **AusbilderSchmidt** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 5:53 am

Since the last two years was many mumble updates...the SL probs are fixed now but Commander must talk ingame by VOIP:

If we will give it a try, this must be the settings:

Squad Leader communication in Mumble

***Currently, we must have all the channels on our Mumble server set up to a accommodate communication between Squad Leaders. To make use of this as a Squad Leader, follow this simple guide***

1. Set up a "Force Center Position" shortcut key. This is what you will use to talk to other Squad Leaders.

2. Join the correct channel. See below for further explanation...

The above diagram shows us the TCombat channel on the PR Mumble server. The channels "TCombat Chicago", "Squad Leaders Team 1" and "Squad Leaders Team 2" are all linked. This means that when transmitting normally, everybody will here everyone else in any of these three channels. However, if Scott in the "Squad Leaders Team 1" channel was to trasmit using his "Force Center" key, only the other players in that channel would hear him.

Using this in combination with BF2 voip gives extremely satisfactory results,

Mumble Comms

* Squad Leaders and Grunts can communicate by transmitting normally. This will be 3D positioned if they're in-game, and transmitted directly if they're not.
* Squad Leaders can communicate to each other by using their "Force Center Position" key. This isn't transmitted 3D, so it's essentially like radio communication for Squad Leaders.

BF2 Comms

* Commanders use BF2 voip as usual. For speaking to specific Squad Leaders, or to all Squad Leaders at once.
* Individual Squads can still make use of BF2 voip. Using it for distant communication that's only relevant to their squad. As well as inter-squad vehicular communication.

EDIT:

Here u can see a short video how does it works ingame.

This are the settings from the PR-Community.

Btw...i´m a new fan of PR

Post by **Ash2Dust** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 12:17 pm

Scenarios:

1) Couldnt Commander be his own squadleader?

2) Can a squad hear their own squad leader if hes on the other side of the map?

AusbilderSchmidt · Post by **AusbilderSchmidt** » Mon Mar 09, 2009 12:41 pm

Ash2Dust wrote:Scenarios:

1) Couldnt Commander be his own squadleader?

2) Can a squad hear their own squad leader if hes on the other side of the map?

1: Don´t know i never checked this. Two years ago i used Mumble.
We have to test it. Today i will install Mumble again.

2: Yes they can, but its low. If i remember right it was between 30 - 50 %. In the near of him they can unsterstand him loud and clear. This will hold a squad together.

Here u can find the "How to" and the last version:
http://www.realitymod.com/forum/f10-pr- ... de-pr.html

BishopC · Post by **BishopC** » Sat Mar 14, 2009 4:36 pm

The volume reduction can be set to your very own likings. You can even completely switch it off, so that you always here the others with the same volume no matter if he stands beside you or on the outer rims of the battlefield universe (which creates a funny idea for a new BF total conversion), or you can set it to ... well, whatever you like. I use 10m min distance, 25m max distance, 0.10 Rolloff and 50%bloom.

gomimin · Post by **gomimin** » Sat Apr 18, 2009 3:58 pm

Mumble seems more and more interesting (hello PR), i'd like to suggest to see whether it can be installed and tested on our Euro Server.

I'm aware that someone

has some workload to do so:

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/FAQ

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/BuildingWindows

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/Running_Murmur

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/Murmurguide#Windows

AusbilderSchmidt · Post by **AusbilderSchmidt** » Sat Apr 18, 2009 7:24 pm

PR Forums wrote:
Mumble for Project Reality

***Please use the following guide step by step to ensure the best use of Mumble in Project Reality***

* 1. Make sure you uninstall any current Mumble install you may have (leave the "user preferences" box unchecked during uninstall, it will remember all your settings and servers etc). Install this new one,

* 2. Install the latest mumble:

Link: http://mumble.sourceforge.net/Main_Page Latest Snapshot

* 3. Run the audio wizard to get yourself setup initially.

* 4. Go to configure->settings---> select the "User Interface" tab and check the "Expert Config" box.

* 5. Go to configure->settings---> "Audio Input" tab

Mumble Audio Input
Transmission
- Transmit = Push to Talk (Mumble's "voice activation" feature is extremely well implemented but should only be used by advanced users)

Compression
- Quality = 10 (this can be lowered to accommodate those with bandwidth limitations. If you notice in-game lag, lowering this setting will help)
- Audio per packet = 20ms (this can be raised to accommodate those with bandwidth limitations. If you notice in-game lag, raising this setting will help)

* 6. Go to configure->settings---> select the "Audio Output" tab and use the following settings...

Mumble Audio Output
Red = Official PR settings that should be set exactly as noted
Green = Recommended settings that may be altered according to user preference

Mumble Audio Output
- check the "Positional Audio" box.
- volume - 60% (while setting BF2 ingame effects to 50% and voip to 100%)

Volume Attenuation
- check the "Headphones" box (if using headphones)
- minimumdistance - 1m
- bloom - 100-175%
- maxdistance - 70m
- minimumvolume - 0%

* 7. Go to configure->settings---> select the "Overlay" tab and untick Enable Overlay (keeping the overlay enabled may cause random punkbuster kicks with BF2)

* 8. Go to configure->settings---> select the "Plugin" tab and tick "Link to Game and Transmit Position" (if you don't do this, 3D audio won't work)

INSTALL NOTE:
Here's a common install issue people been having

1. Go the Connection, setup the server, port, username and then click ADD.
2. Select the server from the list to the left and then click Connect.

Putting the server information and clicking Connect directly doesn't work for some reason, use the method above.