Two very basic EF questions

[Maus]

Sorry, I'm sure this information has probably come up already, but I havent been able to find it in a search.

1) What precisely is EF? Is it in the same realm as SF, or more like an official map pack?

2) Are there performance issues? The reason I don't have SF is that my clanmates tell me it's more demanding on the system than vanilla BF2, and my system is only just able to give me a nice framerate in vanilla - if EF is simply new maps and weapons then I'm sure it'll be a doddle but I'm a little wary, not least of all because of those nice smoke effects I see in screenshots of the oil fields map.

[perry]

It's more like an official map pack that integrates with standard BF2. You can play Karkand one round and Great Wall the next.

I have not noticed any performance issues, but, of course, YMMV. There are new maps and weapons and vehicles.. If your framerates in regular BF2 are acceptable then I can't really see you having any trouble with these maps.

[TychoCelchuuu]

To answer your first question more completely:

EF is a component of Vanilla BF2. Unlike Special Forces, which requires a seperate server running only SF maps, EF runs on a normal Battlefield 2 server and mixes in with the regular maps. Vehicles, maps, and weapons in EF are all new but they still work on a normal BF2 server. You can run a BF2 server with or without EF. If you join a server that is running a normal BF2 map and you don't have EF, you'll be fine until it switches to one of the 3 new EF maps, at which point you'll be kicked unless you have EF.

[Shafik]

And the second question: One map, The Great Wall, features lots of...well...walls. If you stutter when in buildings, expect the same here.

Also, in Operation Smoke Screen, one portion of the map has a huge cloud of smoke through it. Expect some slowdown on older cards when there's lots of action there.

Other than that, it's all good.