PWCG 17.1.1 Oh, your squadron needs a plane.

[Varibraun]

@PatrickAWlson Squadron Log Bug Report - aka the lesson of Hans-Joachim Marsielle "Don't be seen with the general's wife:"

 

Here you can see that on 9/28/44 poor Karlheinz Uthman has no victories and no missions (I refreshed this to be sure):

 

 

However, having flown with him on the 9/27, I knew this wasn't the case, the man was Tom Cruz in a 109.  So, I went to the squadron's log and saw his kills had been duly noted.  Oddly though, he had only that day been awarded his wings (but we all knew he had been around for a while):

 

 

So, we did some digging and found that both he and Vetter seemed to be removed from flight status every day, only to have the Squadron Commander, Maj Traub, buck the system and reinstate them the next day.  Finally, over more than a few Schnapps, they related the tale of that evening with Marseille and his groupies - evidently the General has a long memory.  

 

Thanks Pat for humoring me to this point.  It appears that some AI pilots are being renewed each day and their previous selves and records wiped clean on the pilot board.   I don't know if an error report helps you with this issue, but it is attached for the 9/27 mission.

 

On 4/14/2020 at 1:12 PM, PatrickAWlson said:

if only I could make Tante Ju fly fast enough to do a whole mission over lunch.

 

An intercepting flight of Yaks can keep you on schedule 

Edited March 24, 2021 by Varibraun

[CC_Gosdatura]

8 hours ago, HR_Tofolo said:

Hello Coloma, I'll catch you on TS to explain how to set this up for Coop. 

Salut company! 

Ep! Tofolo!!

Em sembla que ja ho he trobat! / I think I've got it!

Gràcies!

 

8 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

Looks like the new coop stuff needs an updated video. You need to associate a coop pilot with a user.  There is no longer any such thing as a host.  As stated by Murleen, the coop user name should be in the text box.  If you pick one from the drop down  that will populate the box, or you can type in a new name. 

 

There is an issue in that the user name must be alpha only and have no numbers or special characters.  I have a fix pending to allow numbers.   

Thank you Pat for your help and for your work!

The problem was the underscore in the user name (CC_Gosdatura), with CCGosdatura it works and I've been able to create a coop campaign. The fix you mentioned to allow numbers and special characters will be fantastic.

 

Thank you again!

Edited April 15, 2020 by CC_Gosdatura

[Utopioneer]

A couple more missions with unsuccessful AAR tonight.

 

Kuban202004151804905.zip

[PatrickAWlson]

PWCG 8.5.0
Added East Front 1944 Map
- Uses Stalingrad map
- Movement follows Soviet gains as map allows
- Lets Eastern Front continue through 1944
From Murleen:
- Binary list file generated properly
- US/British call signs added
- Flight Officer and Warrant Officer ranks added for USAAF/RAF respectively
Bugs:
Correct situation where services can be cut off in campaign creation
Fixed failure to open skin management screen
Correct situation where PWCG may get stuck generating missions for a secondary pilot
Loosened naming tolerances for campaigns to allow numbers - be careful, the game might not like it
Do not log pilot badges to squadron logs
Added blank line for default coop user to avoid confusion - user must select or type in coop user
 

[Nadelbaum]

Just heads up: I downloaded 8.5.0 -> Still no-go with mission debriefing at first. But, since Pat you said that it is fixed and you confirmed it again on your side I went to my IL-2 folder and deleted all the other mission log files that were present (from older PWCG missions, from old QMB missions etc.) -> Voilà now the debriefing worked for this problematic mission. So you probably had it right already in 8.4.1, but there was something in the other mission log files that caused the issue to persist.

 

Thumbs up!

[PatrickAWlson]

13 hours ago, Utopioneer said:

A couple more missions with unsuccessful AAR tonight.

 

Kuban202004151804905.zip 710.23 kB · 2 downloads

 

looking into it.  Without getting into mind numbing details I have the core issue fixed, but I have to write a little code to clean up data from affected campaigns.  Impacted campaigns would probably be limited to Kuban before August 1942.  

 

@Nadelbaum Honestly not sure what happened there. 

 

If you look at the log files they are grouped into sets, with each set being noted by the time stamp when the mission started.  Then each file has a sequence number in brackets.  In the first file of each set [0] there is a log that maps the logs set to the mission.  PWCG sorts the file sets in time stamp order, looks into the [0] file to find the mission, and then uses the newest file set for that mission.  This is how PWCG handles multiple reflies of the same mission - it always uses the most recent log set for that mission.

 

Edited April 16, 2020 by PatrickAWlson

[HR_Tofolo]

May I make a quick Coop suggestion?

If the whole coop is based on the same squadron, then you get the full-description briefing, with target, escort flights if given, etc.

 

But if we generate a coop mission with different coop pilots assigned to different squadrons (regardless of the role) there appears no mission description neither in PWCG Briefing nor in-game. 

 

Could it be possible that PWCG would show all of the mission targets from the selected squads?

 

Thanks in advance

[PatrickAWlson]

2 hours ago, HR_Tofolo said:

May I make a quick Coop suggestion?

If the whole coop is based on the same squadron, then you get the full-description briefing, with target, escort flights if given, etc.

 

But if we generate a coop mission with different coop pilots assigned to different squadrons (regardless of the role) there appears no mission description neither in PWCG Briefing nor in-game. 

 

Could it be possible that PWCG would show all of the mission targets from the selected squads?

 

Thanks in advance

 

I can look into that.  That could be done as long as everybody is on the same side.  Would not be good for competitive campaigns where players are on opposite sides.  

[Utopioneer]

+1 to that feature request, would be nice to be able to do bomber flight and escort from same side with mission descriptions and routes on map.

[PWNKsktcBTY]

Thanks for all the work you've been putting into pwcg, Pat. ?

[[808_BOB]_RlCK]

2 hours ago, HR_Tofolo said:

May I make a quick Coop suggestion?

If the whole coop is based on the same squadron, then you get the full-description briefing, with target, escort flights if given, etc.

 

But if we generate a coop mission with different coop pilots assigned to different squadrons (regardless of the role) there appears no mission description neither in PWCG Briefing nor in-game. 

 

Could it be possible that PWCG would show all of the mission targets from the selected squads?

 

Thanks in advance

 YES! YES! YES! I have tried making missions with friends where you have some in a fighter squadron and some in bombers. And I've always wanted something like this

[Nadelbaum]

Kudos Pat, I've now flown two new missions in my Bomber Campaign with 8.5.0. A few comments:

- The new map is extremely good, the target is finally on spot in the map. Previously I had the impression that I will only know the actual target by following the flight leader and guessing the rest (or just try to fly in formation as good as possible and drop bombs whenever the command is issued by the leader, this is however sometimes a bit challenging...).

 

- I also have a feeling that AAR has less and less duplicates, if any anymore, which is extremely nice!

 

- The ability to scrap a mission and tune the weights of different mission types even before each mission is also great! If you don't feel like doing high level bombing on a given day then just tune the values before generating the next mission.

 

That said here's one minor oddity to report. I'll put the pictures in the spoiler below. The mission was flown on the 20th of Oct (in game time). In AAR debriefing everything is showing the 21st of Oct. But then on the next page it is again correct the 20th of Oct. This is not a big deal for me, but wanted to report it to you anyhow. 

 

Spoiler

 

 

A few questions related to the bombing mission types:

 

- In an airfield attack I guess a successful attack is when the column of trucks is destroyed on the airfield, right? Or am I supposed to batter the airfield itself?

 

- I also had a bombing mission of "Attack transport and road facilities". The target was on top of a bridge so I thought that the bridge is the target (= transport and road facility) even if there were some "random" units around it. I hit the bridge spot on and could verify that it went into a million pieces (or at least in five pieces), but I wasn't credited for it in any way after the mission. Maybe this is expected?

 

- Is there a description somewhere that would go into a bit more details on the mission types with regards to what is expected to be accomplished?

 

Again many thanks for the excellent work you have done on creating and further developing PWCG and listening to us end-users complaining about things here and there. As a developer myself I'm at least quite used to hearing only about the bad things and not enough about things that are working perfectly ?

[HR_Tofolo]

2 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

 

I can look into that.  That could be done as long as everybody is on the same side.  Would not be good for competitive campaigns where players are on opposite sides.  

 

Exactly, that's the plan. Thank you very much for your hard work! 

[sevenless]

On 4/14/2020 at 6:10 PM, PatrickAWlson said:

I can look into it.  I do not do strict historical accuracy because of PWCG and game limitations.  Happy to place units in their correct spot when feasible, but the fact is that my front lines are not exactly what the real ones are, and that is a major consideration in placement.

 

I also have challenges around units that go away for periods and come back.  In general I will implement them as not going away.

 

Pat, thanks for considering that. Also I realized you have I./JG44 in as a Me 262 unit in the interceptor role flying from Eudenbach/Asbach in 2/45.

 

Was the name you gave that unit intentional or a typo? If you were thinking about "Galland´s Circus" or squadron of the experts which flew the jets from Munich-Riem from 4/45 onwards, that unit was called Jagdverband 44, abbreviation is JV44.

 

Keep up the good work.

[Murleen]

16 hours ago, HR_Tofolo said:

May I make a quick Coop suggestion?

If the whole coop is based on the same squadron, then you get the full-description briefing, with target, escort flights if given, etc.

 

But if we generate a coop mission with different coop pilots assigned to different squadrons (regardless of the role) there appears no mission description neither in PWCG Briefing nor in-game. 

 

Could it be possible that PWCG would show all of the mission targets from the selected squads?

 

Thanks in advance

 

In the latest version you should see flight paths for all friendly squadrons on the briefing map, with icons by the squadron's home airfield with a tooltip giving that flight's objective - do you not see this?

Edited April 17, 2020 by Murleen

[Varibraun]

On 4/15/2020 at 9:11 PM, PatrickAWlson said:

- US/British call signs added

 

Very nice addition - Thank you @Murleen!

[PatrickAWlson]

I'm working on something that is coming along surprisingly well - the ability to switch between player flights during the briefing.  The end result will be that you can edit and choose pilots for every player flight.  

 

Along the way I found an issue in coop mission generation: flights after the first flight wold inherit the flight type of the first flight, which could lead to bombers on patrol and other odd things.  I have a fix in place for that.  

[Columbar]

19 hours ago, Nadelbaum said:

- I also had a bombing mission of "Attack transport and road facilities". The target was on top of a bridge so I thought that the bridge is the target (= transport and road facility) even if there were some "random" units around it. I hit the bridge spot on and could verify that it went into a million pieces (or at least in five pieces), but I wasn't credited for it in any way after the mission. Maybe this is expected?

 

Same here. Or even better: the target bridge is already destroyed ?

19 hours ago, Nadelbaum said:

- Is there a description somewhere that would go into a bit more details on the mission types with regards to what is expected to be accomplished?

 

also have weather information and flight members names in briefing text would be great.

Edited April 17, 2020 by Columbar

[PatrickAWlson]

PWCG does not currently credit objects like bridges, hangars or static planes.  

 

Something for the to-do list.  I wanted to get out of big changes but - not yet.  One in progress and one more in the queue.  At some point it would be nice to get down to a couple of small changes in a weekly release.  This would qualify.

[Nadelbaum]

27 minutes ago, Columbar said:

 

Same here. Or even better: the target bridge is already destroyed ?

 

also have weather information and flight members names in briefing text would be great.

 

I think I got it now on another mission. there's in fact a column of vehicles close to the bridge. I believe that's the real target as on the airfields you also have a column of vehicles. I believe this follows the same idea as the official Career .

 

@PatrickAWlson Please note, this just in:

 

 

-DED-Rapidus has released a few minutes ago new recommended values for the durabilities!

Edited April 17, 2020 by Nadelbaum

[Murleen]

2 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

PWCG does not currently credit objects like bridges, hangars or static planes.  

 

Something for the to-do list.  I wanted to get out of big changes but - not yet.  One in progress and one more in the queue.  At some point it would be nice to get down to a couple of small changes in a weekly release.  This would qualify.

 

I have some bits of code in this direction - it needs some more log parsing work, as you get some very odd things in the log files for buildings...

[PatrickAWlson]

38 minutes ago, Murleen said:

 

I have some bits of code in this direction - it needs some more log parsing work, as you get some very odd things in the log files for buildings...

 

There's a bit more than that.  Things that we want to track like bridges, hangars, and static planes have to have a country assigned to tell the AI that it is the enemy.  PWCG has the ability to determine what country an item belongs to based on placement of front lines, but it does not write that into the mission file.

 

Then there is the translation from an item code to display text, so users see something that makes sense and not something like static_spitfire_mkb.   

 

If that is done the hope is that everything else falls out of the logs, but I'm not sure.  The logic around what got destroyed by whom is tied to planes and vehicles.  It may or may not need a tweak for objects.

 

Finally, there is "how will the AI react?"  The AI will suddenly have objects designated as "enemy".  We want airplanes to bomb a bridge or static plane.  We don't want AI tanks shooting at a bridge.  There is a risk that we do more harm to the overall experience than good.  A test mission in the ME would resolve those questions.

[Murleen]

Yeah, basically what I have so far sets the country for the generated blocks, so you see the events in the logs. The weird thing in the logs is that if you don't make the blocks linked entities, then they all get logged with the same ID. I think enough information is present to pull the right data together, but it is different to current vehicles/planes. As you say, name mapping also needs to be done - I found the file which the game uses to generate human names for the in-game report, so it shouldn't be too hard to import that.

 

So far I haven't noticed the AI specifically targeting buildings, I've only seen collateral damage - bombers taking out the buildings around vehicles they're targeting, and on several occasions airfield AI taking out friendly hangars. I don't know if the behaviour is different if the blocks are linked entities. 

 

The other thing we might want to look at is restricting the set of valid targets - would you actually want to record ground kills against houses or churches?

[PatrickAWlson]

@Murleen Targets should definitely be restricted ... didn't see to many church steeple silhouettes painted on the sides of planes  .  Bridges, hangars, and static planes are IMHO a good start.

[Yogiflight]

Especially for bombers, industry buildings would be a nice target, too.

[aust3298]

Pat, Got a Combat report error when making my claims.  I don't know what may have happened, mission was fine (excellent as a matter of fact).  Anyhoo, the error said to post this file so I hope it helps.

Thanks for your excellent work and a really impressive product.

Fokker D seven202004171404296.zip

[PatrickAWlson]

PWCG 8.6.0
Add ability to view and modify player flights on the same side
- Change waypoints for all friendly player flights
- Change fuel for all friendly player flights
- Change pilots/equipment for all friendly player flights
Add ability to view friendly Ai flights on briefing map
Improved mission location to shorten flights
Bugs:
Fixed issue in coop flights where subsequent flights could be assigned an incorrect flight type

 

I really like the way the briefing changes turned out.  For coop players you can now edit friendly flights just like your own. For single players you can get a look at friendly flights in the mission.  The change in mission location should help to shorten missions. 

[dburne]

 

Thanks Pat, looking very nice!

[Varibraun]

On 4/15/2020 at 9:11 PM, PatrickAWlson said:

Added East Front 1944 Map

 

Just realized this means that we can switch fronts within the same campaign either by transferring LW pilot or adding a new pilot to an East Front map.  I just added my first Normandie - Niemen pilot into what I originally intended as a new BoBp test campaign (and the log was up to date).  That is just awesome - Thank you!!

Now on to see what 8.6 offers...

[Taxman]

Thanks for again for a your hard work Pat.  Now on to issue that I am not sure has been explained:

When assigning a ground attack mission on the allied side on the BP map using air start I am 30,000 plus ft. I have checked the mission start altitude which shows 2,000 meters which should be approx. 6,000 ft even I change the starting altitude to a lower one the flight still starts at 30,000 plus ft.  Is there something I can do or just live with it?

 

Thanks

[ZCavalry]

2 hours ago, Taxman said:

Thanks for again for a your hard work Pat.  Now on to issue that I am not sure has been explained:

When assigning a ground attack mission on the allied side on the BP map using air start I am 30,000 plus ft. I have checked the mission start altitude which shows 2,000 meters which should be approx. 6,000 ft even I change the starting altitude to a lower one the flight still starts at 30,000 plus ft.  Is there something I can do or just live with it?

 

Thanks

 

Have had this issue since 8.3.0 . Since then I always just scrub ground attack missions and now I am just waiting for a possible fix or patch.

[blue_max]

On 4/16/2020 at 6:39 PM, [808_BOB]Dafak-man said:

 YES! YES! YES! I have tried making missions with friends where you have some in a fighter squadron and some in bombers. And I've always wanted something like this

+1 for this request! We're also interested in doing this.

 

14 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

PWCG 8.6.0

Improved mission location to shorten flights

 Thanks a load for this! Exactly what we needed.

 

Keep up the amazing work

[HR_Tofolo]

14 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

PWCG 8.6.0
Add ability to view and modify player flights on the same side
- Change waypoints for all friendly player flights
- Change fuel for all friendly player flights
- Change pilots/equipment for all friendly player flights
Add ability to view friendly Ai flights on briefing map
Improved mission location to shorten flights
Bugs:
Fixed issue in coop flights where subsequent flights could be assigned an incorrect flight type

 

I really like the way the briefing changes turned out.  For coop players you can now edit friendly flights just like your own. For single players you can get a look at friendly flights in the mission.  The change in mission location should help to shorten missions. 

 

Well thank you so very very much, we'll give it a try tonight.

[Almenas]

Great. Thank you!

[Taxman]

23 hours ago, Taxman said:

Thanks for again for a your hard work Pat.  Now on to issue that I am not sure has been explained:

When assigning a ground attack mission on the allied side on the BP map using air start I am 30,000 plus ft. I have checked the mission start altitude which shows 2,000 meters which should be approx. 6,000 ft even I change the starting altitude to a lower one the flight still starts at 30,000 plus ft.  Is there something I can do or just live with it?

 

Thanks

 

21 hours ago, ZCavalry said:

 

Have had this issue since 8.3.0 . Since then I always just scrub ground attack missions and now I am just waiting for a possible fix or patch.

Well for now the way I have solved this issue is to take off, no air start.  

[Almenas]

Hi Pat,

a question for understanding: Does the mission location box also apply to enemy flights?

[PatrickAWlson]

38 minutes ago, Almenas said:

Hi Pat,

a question for understanding: Does the mission location box also apply to enemy flights?

 

Yes.  The idea is top funnel activity into an area small enough to generate contact and also big enough to make contact highly variable and sometimes not happen.

 

IMHO besides being good for game play this is not as unrealistic as it may seem.  Ground activity would generally be concentrated.  Ground activity is what attracts air activity, so this would also be concentrated. 

 

Even in WWI this was true as telephones were used to advise squadrons of activity.  Obviously no contact once airborne but by 1917 they did not just take off and hope to find something.

[Nadelbaum]

Here's an example of Low Alt bombing mission that got generated just now. I assume the air start is supposed to be around 1000m (as the bombing is supposed to be around 1050m), but it is around 10000m.

 

This bug is rather annoying...

HeinkelBomber 1941-11-08.zip

[Almenas]

4 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

 

Yes.  The idea is top funnel activity into an area small enough to generate contact and also big enough to make contact highly variable and sometimes not happen.

 

IMHO besides being good for game play this is not as unrealistic as it may seem.  Ground activity would generally be concentrated.  Ground activity is what attracts air activity, so this would also be concentrated. 

 

Even in WWI this was true as telephones were used to advise squadrons of activity.  Obviously no contact once airborne but by 1917 they did not just take off and hope to find something.

 

Perfect (even if an open world would be even more perfect). But the box is big enough to be surprised.

[PatrickAWlson]

52 minutes ago, Almenas said:

 

Perfect (even if an open world would be even more perfect). But the box is big enough to be surprised.

 

IMHO one of the biggest differentiators of PWCG is virtual waypoints.  VWPs allow flights to move without being rendered and consuming valuable CPU.  They spawn when they are close enough, not otherwise.  What this means is that enemy flights come to you as well as you going to them.

 

I posted a write up of a mission in a different thread that provides an example.  Saw 3 IL2s below so I attacked them.  Finished dealing with one when suddenly an escorted flight of PE2s appeared well above me.  Things like this can't happen if enemy flights are sitting at a static location waiting for you to come to them.