The new grass... is not meant to taxi over !

[Guest deleted@50488]

Just like IRL, I don't think any pilot in is normal mental state would taxi, specially a taildragger over the higher grass that is now very beautifully, and IMO plausibly represented in BoS.

 

You avoid it in the very first place because at that height, you don't know what lays bellow...

 

So I smile when some here complain about getting their tails damaged after having taxied over it from the parking lot to the rw, for a shortcut to the taxiways, which are actually there for some good reason

 

A different story would be grass strips, but we will probably get that in future maps ?

 

P.S. I can't but recall having landed out my glider on a field that appeared soft as silk, covered with grass just a tad higher than I would like, and ending up stopped by a big stone, luckily near the end of my rollout... Not big damage caused because it wasn't one of this modern "plastic" gliders...

Edited November 8, 2015 by JCOMM

[6./ZG26_Emil]

It's funny you've just posted this because I was literally re-watching the new gear physics video on the 1C channel seconds before ;D

 

I agree and think this feature really adds to the realism

[Finkeren]

I agree. Those who complain have clearly never seen a plane struggle on the ground off field.

 

There's a reason why bush planes have those ridiculously large wheels and strengthened landing gear.

[Alkyan]

I think it's a bit overdone, but it doesnt really matter.

 

However missions' maker need to acknowledge it (it's not in the patch notes) and delete spawns in grass. There are missions in MP where for some airfield you spawn in the grass, few meters away from the taxiway and it's enought for damaging your tail.

[unreasonable]

Just like IRL, I don't think any pilot in is normal mental state would taxi, specially a taildragger over the higher grass that is now very beautifully, and IMO plausibly represented in BoS.

 

You avoid it in the very first place because at that height, you don't know what lays bellow...

 

So I smile when some here complain about getting their tails damaged after having taxied over it from the parking lot to the rw, for a shortcut to the taxiways, which are actually there for some good reason

 

A different story would be grass strips, but we will probably get that in future maps ?

 

P.S. I can't but recall having landed out my glider on a field that appeared soft as silk, covered with grass just a tad higher than I would like, and ending up stopped by a big stone, luckily near the end of my rollout... Not big damage caused because it wasn't one of this modern "plastic" gliders...

 

Well here is the thing, most of the airstrips are effectively grass strips, just with the grass having been worn away by repeated use. On the autumn map, for instance, the bare dirt appearance of most strips is obvious.

 

There is a big difference between the risk of damage from a rock or pothole in a grass area and the mogul effect we now have. 

 

Personally I suspect that realism has nothing to do with it: it is just a game mechanic to prevent - or strongly discourage - the chaotic take off behaviour in MP.

[Potenz]

Every time i go flying at the local aeroclub, the instructor remarks me never taxi off the taxis to the runway

cause the ground isn't leveled.

 

so what we have in BoS is pretty well done.

[Dakpilot]

Having spent most of my Flying career operating often from improvised 'dirt' strips, it is very unwise to stray from the designated Taxiway. Even at a well used commercially operated perfectly maintained civilian Airfield

 

A quick shortcut from taxiway to runway can reveal hidden obstacles even in short mown grass, it is simply not done, especially in long grass

 

Wrong spawn points in MP is a different issue and should be reported politely to the mission makers or dev's in that instance

 

Having had to dig out stuck aircraft, and witnessed damage done in similar circumstances on many occasions I can speak from experience.

 

There are Charts of all airfields available, (BoS Airfields Reference, available in 3rd party apps) getting lost on route to holding point should not be an issue with a bit of pre-planning  or even a bit of familiarising in SP/QMB with external view

 

 

Cheers Dakpilot

[Finkeren]

Well here is the thing, most of the airstrips are effectively grass strips, just with the grass having been worn away by repeated use. On the autumn map, for instance, the bare dirt appearance of most strips is obvious.

 

There is a big difference between the risk of damage from a rock or pothole in a grass area and the mogul effect we now have.

 

Personally I suspect that realism has nothing to do with it: it is just a game mechanic to prevent - or strongly discourage - the chaotic take off behaviour in MP.

Even the simplest "grass strip" has been carefully selected, leveled, rolled, meticulously cleared of stones, roots, branches and pot holes and the grass cut down to size to make it suitable for operating aircraft. You can't simply pick any random open piece of land and make it an air field right away.

 

Sure, some strips of land might be more suitable than others right away and some might even be clean enough to use a relatively robust aircraft from without preparation, but that would be rare.

 

Overall I think the devs have done a good job of simulating the great difficulty and risk of operating aircraft off field.

[DeafBee]

I agree. I have always admired how the ground handling is perfectly made in BOS. And now it got even better. 

 

Thanks to 1C and 777 for making so good. 

[unreasonable]

Even the simplest "grass strip" has been carefully selected, leveled, rolled, meticulously cleared of stones, roots, branches and pot holes and the grass cut down to size to make it suitable for operating aircraft. You can't simply pick any random open piece of land and make it an air field right away.

 

Sure, some strips of land might be more suitable than others right away and some might even be clean enough to use a relatively robust aircraft from without preparation, but that would be rare.

 

Overall I think the devs have done a good job of simulating the great difficulty and risk of operating aircraft off field.

 

The problem is that you - and others - are confusing (or deliberately conflating)  what might or might not happen with a random piece of debris with what will happen with all BoS surfaces even just off the runway.

 

And we are not just talking about "off-field" we are talking about on field but not on the BoS designated AI tracks. If you look through Prien's books on JG3 and JG53, there are dozens of photos of planes on airfields in the USSR. Almost all of them are large open areas without obvious distinction of runway and taxiway. 

 

There is even a series of pictures of a 109 that has landed, wheels down, undamaged, out in the steppe because it had run out of fuel, being refuelled so that it can take off. The steppe (in summer) in the photos is short grassland as far as the eye can see. No trees, no rocks, no debris. It obviously does not need heavy machinery for levelling or rolling.

 

The Me 109 G2 manual has a section on emergency landing in which it gives the procedure for a wheels-down emergency power-off landing as well as for a belly landing. Basically just says be sure the area is flat and hard enough. I am not going to post it here, it is available on-line and I am sure all the experienced air-warriors already have it. 

 

Steppe, unfortunately, is completely missing from this game. Instead we have a repeating field pattern covering the whole area, much of which was in fact uncultivated grassland. The snow map looked much more realistic.

 

While there is much to admire in the new maps, these particular facets are unfortunate, in my opinion, and could be improved if the repeating field tiles were more limited to areas around settlements, especially in the south and east of the map, and the bouncing toned down quite a lot.

Edited November 8, 2015 by unreasonable

[=EXPEND=Tripwire]

Ive no issue with damage due to trying to taxi over rough ground. I quite like it.

 

I do have issue with planes spawning in the long grass or deep snow where taxiing over this ground is unavoidable - especially if it means your tail is going to fall off once you get airborne. That is what needs fixing.

[Dakpilot]

I am only basing my experience on thousands of hours of real world flying into rough strips/terrain, one picture of a 109 being refueled on the 'steppe' does not a hundred thousand square mile airfield make

 

I would suggest a trip on google earth  around the Don basin/BoS map area, it is just not really the typical Eurasian "steppe" you are thinking of Unreasonable

 

Cheers Dakpilot

Edited November 8, 2015 by Dakpilot

[unreasonable]

I am only basing my experience on thousands of hours of real world flying into rough strips/terrain, one picture of a 109 being refueled on the 'steppe' does not a hundred thousand square mile airfield make

 

I would suggest a trip on google earth  around the Don basin/BoS map area, it is just not really the typical Eurasian "steppe" you are thinking of Unreasonable

 

Cheers Dakpilot

 

Of course it is not now, 70+ years after the events in question, no doubt extensive extra farming has taken place, just as there are far more trees around in Russia now than there were in the period in question. In the 1940s, it would have looked very different. Steppe cultivation usually requires artificial irrigation: the reason there are no trees (or just a few near watercourses) is because it is too dry.  Most of the steppe agriculture came about post war using massive irrigation projects. That is why there is no Aral sea left: something that you will find on Google earth now that is also not true of 1942.

 

The point is that open steppe is NOT all rough strips/terrain, not that I am questioning your experience of whatever it is that you have experience of. Which does not, I am reasonably sure, include operating off grass airfields in USSR in the 1940s, hence why I find contemporary documentary evidence relevant even if you do not.

 

Now what will be interesting is that BoS is becoming a land vehicle game, and eventually there will be historic modules going back to the bronze age, (I hope) which means chariots! As I am sure you all know, the eurasian steppe was the area in which the horse was first domesticated and the chariot developed. Now I am fairly sure that no-one is going to claim that the chariots on the steppes only operated on areas that had been prepared, leveled and rolled. It would be interesting to see a light ground vehicle such as a chariot - or for that matter, a Kubelwagon crossing the steppe on BoSWorld's tussock-grass.

[Dakpilot]

Just look at the terrain of Don Basin, disregarding newer agricultural developement, although i think you underestimate the scale of collectivised farming in that area from the 20's-40's

 

You can disregard my flying Career experience but ..

 

"Which does not, I am reasonably sure, include operating off grass airfields in USSR in the 1940s, hence why I find contemporary documentary evidence relevant even if you do not."

 

I am pretty sure dirt has not changed that much in the 20th century...but I do know the difference between black cotton soil and a laterite strip

 

Seems your nickname is maybe there for a reason, I don't have anything left to add, just ask a Bf109 pilot (and I have met a few) if he would try landing wheels down in an unknown/unsurveyed area with long grass

 

Cheers Dakpilot

[Porkman]

My opinion is that it is has been a drastic improvement to the game to have friction and ground bumps modeled. It incredibly added to the realism factor while on the ground, taxiing and force landing/landing off strip. The friction settings seem to be pretty perfect, the bumpiness seems a bit too high, maybe reduce by 10-20%, and the aircraft flip and pilot kill might be a little bit too frequent now.

 

At first I thought the plane nosing over and pilot being killed was way overdone, but after getting used to coming down slower and With more nose up at touchdown, it hasn't happened as often. I think I was too fast with not enough nose up when it was happening frequently.

 

The bumpiness does seem a bit over-modeled at the moment, especially on the Autumn map. Of course speed is a huge factor and taxiing should be as slow as humanly possible when on unimproved ground, but even then it just "feels" a little too bumpy. I know this is very subjective and no real facts for any of this, but it just "feels" about 20% too strong.

 

Overall, though, tremendous update, there have definitely been more people flying online since winter finally ended which is great to see, and I am sure these things will be looked at by the devs and might be tweaked in future updates.

[[CPT]Pike*HarryM]

If they could just fix the "bunny-hopping" that the planes do it would be perfect. 

[Guest deleted@50488]

I have just recently started to use with intention of continuing to do so, another sim where ground handling feels great too - Rise of Flight.

 

I just wish I could find this quality and realism in any of the flight simulators I have used in the past - with a notable exception for Flight Unlimited 3, and Microsoft FLIGHT, where there were considerable improvements compared to the sims of their time.

 

IL-2 Battle of Series is again in the right track, carefully bringing good features and paying attention to detail. Superb!

[Uriah]

Dakpilot wrote "here are Charts of all airfields available, (BoS Airfields Reference, available in 3rd party apps) getting lost on route to holding point should not be an issue with a bit of pre-planning or even a bit of familiarising in SP/QMB with external view"

So that means I have to know the airfield ahead of time? And even if I know the field I have no idea where I am spawned on the field. A real pilot of the time and place would pick up enough clues just getting to the plane even it was just his first day there. This situation of being spawned in a aircraft with no good visual clues as to where to go I just think is not very real.

[Ace_Pilto]

I was always instructed to make outlandings where there were sheep if possible. They eat all the grass so you can be reasonably confident of the surface and they usually (very conveniently) stand facing into the wind.

 

There's always the risk of hitting one I suppose but a sheep is cheaper than a funeral.

[unreasonable]

Just look at the terrain of Don Basin, disregarding newer agricultural developement, although i think you underestimate the scale of collectivised farming in that area from the 20's-40's

 

You can disregard my flying Career experience but ..

 

"Which does not, I am reasonably sure, include operating off grass airfields in USSR in the 1940s, hence why I find contemporary documentary evidence relevant even if you do not."

 

I am pretty sure dirt has not changed that much in the 20th century...but I do know the difference between black cotton soil and a laterite strip

 

Seems your nickname is maybe there for a reason, I don't have anything left to add, just ask a Bf109 pilot (and I have met a few) if he would try landing wheels down in an unknown/unsurveyed area with long grass

 

Cheers Dakpilot

 

Classy, Dakpilot, that you prefer to sign off from our disagreement of what the actual terrain in southern USSR was like in the 1940s - which has nothing whatever to do with your flying experience -  with a personal insult.

 

This place sometimes reminds me a little of the EAW forum a while ago: while mentioning that while EAW was a fine game but that actually the M24 orbital motorway around London and decimal coinage were both anachronisms, I got exactly the same kind of angry, defensive comments from the partisans of that sim.

 

BTW collectivization was the process of forcing peasants to pool their individually allocated (although communally owned) strips of fields into factory style larger farms, supposedly with economies of scale and more modern techniques. It had nothing to do with expanding the farms as such. The mass planting of irrigated cash crops was much more of a post war phenomenon. Apart from anything else, the rural population had been devastated by civil war, government induced famine and migration to the cities during industrialization.

[6./ZG26_Emil]

Farming experience > flying experience

 

[andyw248]

 

 

Dakpilot wrote "here are Charts of all airfields available, (BoS Airfields Reference, available in 3rd party apps) getting lost on route to holding point should not be an issue with a bit of pre-planning or even a bit of familiarising in SP/QMB with external view"So that means I have to know the airfield ahead of time? And even if I know the field I have no idea where I am spawned on the field. A real pilot of the time and place would pick up enough clues just getting to the plane even it was just his first day there. This situation of being spawned in a aircraft with no good visual clues as to where to go I just think is not very real.

 

Exactly. Pilots at the time would have had an exceptional understanding of all airfields within range. It may have meant life or death to them.

[andyw248]

From Christer Bergstrom's book "Kursk - The Air Battle July 1943". If you skim through the photos in Christer's excellent books you will see many crash landings - all of them belly landings - wheels up - for reasons given by Dakpilot above.

[unreasonable]

Exactly. Pilots at the time would have had an exceptional understanding of all airfields within range. It may have meant life or death to them.

 

Nonsense. Many pilots would have only just arrived from training or reserve units and would be barely familiar with their own airfields, let alone any others. During rapid advances pilots could be making operational sorties out of fields they had flown into for the first time that same morning. That is partly why so many pilots got lost and ended up making crash landings. It is all well documented in Prien's books for those that care to look. 

 

 

Farming experience > flying experience

 

 

Never claimed that: I have claimed that the fact - which I have never contested - that landing off designated strips is risky, does not mean that all areas off designated strips should show the sort of bounciness that the new ground physics determines. Flying experience has absolutely nothing to do with my claim - Dakpilot is just using it to try to avoid discussing the actual issue.

 

From Christer Bergstrom's book "Kursk - The Air Battle July 1943". If you skim through the photos in Christer's excellent books you will see many crash landings - all of them belly landings - wheels up - for reasons given by Dakpilot above.

 

We all know that GAF pilots were ordered to crash land wheels up and that this was considered safer, no doubt correctly, so this is again irrelevant to the issue which is primarily whether taxiing 3 feet off the runway on a grass strip on dry grassland should be the ordeal it is now. The current treatment is extremely implausible - comical actually.

 

If the developers would just come out and say that they have done this for MP gameplay reasons to keep people from taking off without looking where they were going at least we could all just accept it without having to put up with the pretense that it is realistic. This whole discussion reminds me of the flak threads.

[1PL-Husar-1Esk]

Game balace ?? No please no. It is not WT.

[andyw248]

 

 

Nonsense. Many pilots would have only just arrived from training or reserve units and would be barely familiar with their own airfields, let alone any others. During rapid advances pilots could be making operational sorties out of fields they had flown into for the first time that same morning. That is partly why so many pilots got lost and ended up making crash landings. It is all well documented in Prien's books for those that care to look.

 

I see. I would have thought that they were familiar with common practices like dead reckoning etc, and that they had briefings before going on missions, but apparently I'm wrong.

[Finkeren]

Game balace ?? No please no. It is not WT.

What in the world would the new ground physics have to do with game balance?

[unreasonable]

What in the world would the new ground physics have to do with game balance?

 

On the face of it nothing, and balance is not exactly the right word. The question is:

 

1)Is current ground handling realistic, in the specific situation of areas on the airfield, but off the taxiway - runway, or on open grass steppe (theoretical since none exists in BoSworld ) ? I do  not believe so, but if the developers insist it is, so be it.

 

2)If no - will it be toned down in these specific cases? Possibilities:

 

-a) Yes: given time and resources, could be tweaked.

-b) No: the current physics imposes a severe disincentive to people from taking off all over the place in MP and causing chaos.

 

It is 2-b that is the bother, in that it replaces realism with an artificial game mechanic that is purely orientated to deal with the strange practices of MP gamers - like laser flak to avoid vulching. (Which almost ruined RoF SP, but has been substantially improved on in BoS for which I am grateful). But at least if this is why it is there, we should know and just have to adjust to it.

 

I see. I would have thought that they were familiar with common practices like dead reckoning etc, and that they had briefings before going on missions, but apparently I'm wrong.

 

I am familiar with dead reckoning etc and I know from experience (that awful thing ) that it is still easy to get lost in a vast unfamiliar terrain with few unambiguous landmarks, even with an accurate map and clear briefing, especially when you have other things to worry about. And that is travelling at 4-5kph, not 400kph.  So yes, you are wrong, sarcasm or not.

 

* * *

 

What I would really like to see is a video of a convoy of trucks and cars travelling over this grassland in a little mission....I suppose I will have to try to get my head around the waypoint system of the mission editor. Pity there are no motorcycles yet.  If they look as though they are moving over open dry grassland rather than swamp tussock grass then I will be convinced that all is in order.

[Dakpilot]

Yes BoS map is only cutivated farmland

 

 

Cheers Dakpilot

[unreasonable]

OK I freely admit that I had not seen that part of the map - I flew and looked around the southern airfields which the Germans used on their approach to Stalingrad, where I expected there to be considerable areas of my idea of steppe used for grazing in between settlements surrounded by cultivated fields, given the descriptions and photos I have seen of the area between the Don and Volga - Volograd Oblast more or less. But if this is what contemporary records suggest, fine.

 

What you are showing here is from the East bank of the Volga, which I think we all agree was undeveloped. So fair enough, there is steppe in the map, just not as much as I would have thought.

 

But that is not the primary issue, which is what happens to planes (and wheeled vehicles) when they cross it off road: or even just off the taxiway in supposedly prepared and leveled airfields..... 

[Cybermat47]

But that is not the primary issue, which is what happens to planes (and wheeled vehicles) when they cross it off road: or even just off the taxiway in supposedly prepared and leveled airfields.....

 

I was flying with the AAFC yesterday, and I saw plenty of planes rolling on grass (they were parked there) with no problems other than a Citabria losing it's tailwheel (which was soon reattached, and it flew the rest of the day with no problems). All of the other Citabrias and Warriors were fine on the grass. That's due to the fact that the grass at the airfield was nice and trimmed, not the long stuff we see everywhere in BoS, which is fine for the vast majority of the map, but, unreasonable, I take it from your post that even airfields like Pitomnik have this long, unkempt grass?

[Feathered_IV]

Pitomnik actually had the crap bombed out of it.  40 raids in 14 days at one point.  The ground would have been strewn with AAA shrapnel and stuff from bomb strikes.

Lucky for us tyre punctures are not modelled.

[Cybermat47]

Pitomnik actually had the crap bombed out of it.  40 raids in 14 days at one point.  The ground would have been strewn with AAA shrapnel and stuff from bomb strikes.

Lucky for us tyre punctures are not modelled.

Were these 40 raids in 14 days by the Germans trying to crush the VVS, or the VVS trying to starve the 6th Army?

[Brano]

Area around Stalingrad has been "resettled" in 1920-30s to feed ever growing need for food from quickly expanding industrial city.After ww2 it never recovered to its prewar military output.Excessive postwar farming experiments with gigantic dams on Volga and artificial canals dryied out the fertile land so we can say that nowdays Google map images would be much more farmlandish in 1940s.You can also check all those small villages and kolchoz/sovchoz estates on game map.They do not exist nowadays anymore.

[Feathered_IV]

Were these 40 raids in 14 days by the Germans trying to crush the VVS, or the VVS trying to starve the 6th Army?

 

That bit was the VVS attacking on top of the previous raids of the summer.  

 

Edit: Just checked (Beevor P.285) to confirm.  It was actually 42 raids in three days.  The 10th 11th and 12th of December.

Edited November 9, 2015 by Feathered_IV

[SvAF/F19_Klunk]

Of course there are in "reality" places that are more suitable than others to land on and of course kinder to landning gear and stuff and I am also sure that the developers Could adress that issue accordingly. However in My humble opinon, this is a tad overkill; ground handeling outside runways is something that should be way down the list of things to do for the team: what we have now is a In Game representation of rough area that probably is representative for the vast majority of land surfaces. Simulation of what goes on in the Air have to be, and is, first priority.

[Reflected]

I agree that there CAN be some fields that would enable gear down landings, but chances are the surface is rough. No wonder all pilots were instructed to land wheels up.

 

My glider club's field is constantly maintained by both men and sheep. Still ,there can be big holes, rocks, whatever. it's rough on gliders with low CG and their wheel basically inside the fuselage. A prop plane with longer undercarriage would face a bigger risk. That's why we have an even more scrutinously maintained landing strip in the center for them.

 

Long story short, what we have in BoS is a fair representation of 90% of wild fields as far as the risk they carry goes.

[SvAF/F19_Klunk]

 

Long story short, what we have in BoS is a fair representation of 90% of wild fields as far as the risk they carry goes.

pretty much my conclusion Reflect

 

... what we have now is a In Game representation of rough area that probably is representative for the vast majority of land surfaces. ..

 

 

I would think this is hard to argue against... or is it? 

Edited November 10, 2015 by SvAF/F19_Klunk

[Dakpilot]

I think one would have to be unreasonable to argue against it

 

(no malice intended)

 

maybe at a later date there maybe more than two types of 'friction' runway/taxiway and unprepared, maybe a setting in between for very smooth area, but as of now we have a good enough compromise, even on clear steppe there is much erosion happening when the spring thaw happens

 

Cheers Dakpilot

[RainMan]

Steppe, unfortunately, is completely missing from this game. Instead we have a repeating field pattern covering the whole area, much of which was in fact uncultivated grassland. The snow map looked much more realistic.

 

While there is much to admire in the new maps, these particular facets are unfortunate, in my opinion, and could be improved if the repeating field tiles were more limited to areas around settlements, especially in the south and east of the map, and the bouncing toned down quite a lot.

+1

 

Was thinking the same when I saw field after field after field in the middle of nowhere!

Edited November 10, 2015 by RainMan