Get PWCG Here ...

[czech693]

Since this thread is about PWCG, I'll be talking about PWCG and not the sim's career.  I fly PWCG exclusively.  What is nice about PWCG is that you can modify things.  For instance, if you think the missions are too long you can go into Configuration/Advanced Configuration and change "Max dist in km mission center from base".  Default in PWCGFC was 35 km.  I changed it to 20 km because I was spending a long time just traveling to the start of the patrol area.  Don't like escorts, you can also changed the number for chance of escort (presumably a %).  I really like that I can change the skins (the Nieuport17gbr restricted tactical codes situation is a bummer though).

 

The Advanced Configuration gives you a lot of options to modify your career.  I have my default "config" folder saved and apply it to every new campaign I start so I using the same criteria.

 

Time acceleration in the sim goes up to x8.

[KodiakJac]

On 3/29/2025 at 10:40 AM, Aurosa said:

1.Too long flights, if I wanted to sleep, waste time and do nothing, I would be flying bomber escorts*. Why I am always being sent far away to the edge of the map**?

2.Too many waypoints that serve no point, other than prolong time-wasting. Get to the point, no worthless waypoints and circling around, just the bare minimum, to get back and from, as soon as possible.

 

 

I enjoy the longer, more realistic missions.  I have my "Max dist in km mission center from base" in PWCG set to 75 km (plus a few other parameters that make for longer missions).  Sounds like you are looking more for an arcade experience, so you might try War Thunder instead of IL-2 Great Battles.

 

[Nickkyboy99]

Is the Stug and Churchill added?

[PatrickAWlson]

6 hours ago, Nickkyboy99 said:

Is the Stug and Churchill added?

 

I have stopped development of PWCG for TC.  Just can't make it what I want it to be.

[FodderMonkey]

On 3/30/2025 at 1:46 PM, czech693 said:

Time acceleration in the sim goes up to x8.

Time acceleration goes as high as your system will allow, which for most people (myself included) is somewhere between x2 and x4.  It depends on how many resources the game is requesting, and it can even force you to stay at x1 or slower if too many sim elements are generated.  The game never stops simulating objects during compression, so most rigs can't handle it.  It was a critical misstep leaving out the option to "skip to contact" that had been available in IL2:1946.  I've heard they're bringing it back for Korea, though, and I hope they do.  Us folks with full time jobs don't quite have the time for a fully-immersive experience, unfortunately; gotta skip to the action and be done with it!

[PatrickAWlson]

On 4/11/2025 at 5:42 AM, FodderMonkey said:

Time acceleration goes as high as your system will allow, which for most people (myself included) is somewhere between x2 and x4.  It depends on how many resources the game is requesting, and it can even force you to stay at x1 or slower if too many sim elements are generated.  The game never stops simulating objects during compression, so most rigs can't handle it.  It was a critical misstep leaving out the option to "skip to contact" that had been available in IL2:1946.  I've heard they're bringing it back for Korea, though, and I hope they do.  Us folks with full time jobs don't quite have the time for a fully-immersive experience, unfortunately; gotta skip to the action and be done with it!

 

I very recently got a brand new, top of the line gaming computer.  I thought "this is going to make IL2 run so much better".  This computer makes every game except IL2 run smooth as can be.  IL2 time compression is barely any better than my old computer.

 

If IL2 optimization was improved such that my computer could actually achieve 8x then jump to action would be unnecessary.

Edited April 12 by PatrickAWlson

[zsolo007]

On 4/11/2025 at 3:58 AM, PatrickAWlson said:

 

I have stopped development of PWCG for TC.  Just can't make it what I want it to be.

Hi!

 

Is it possible to access the source code for it? Since there is no dynamic campaign, your approach would be real nice. I'd like to try it if there is a way.

 

Thanks!

[Aapje]

@zsolo007

 

https://github.com/PWCGDeveloper/PWCGCampaignTC

[Raynebow]

Just want to report that the site is being considered 'unsafe' and my browsers are giving me a real hard time of trying to download PWCG again. Certificates expired?

 

Edit: Yeah, cert expired on May 17th

Edited June 3 by Raynebow

[[806th]_RipGZW]

What is thef ix for this issue? i downloaded Java

[AndreiTomescu]

On 3/30/2025 at 8:08 PM, Aurosa said:

I read many comments, and reviews about the AI, but If I really knew it was that bad, I would have never gotten the game, never! I found out too late about it, with no chances to get a refund, unfortunately. 4 careers, 2 planes, that's it. Scrap Korea, scrap everything else, focus on the AI, and career, then this game would be enjoyable and playable, otherwise, adding more of anything, while the overall feeling of the game is that you just fly the same generic, repetitive missions in a world that is totally empty, and nothing you do matters, since the campaign is set in fixed timeframe... 

I hear you, mate. But sometimes the AI does really impressive things, in a good way. imho.

the campaign is a reenactment of the past, so, yeah, everything it's somehow fixed, and your actions won't change anything, it's not Back to the Future movie :))))

I am a great fan of this historic simulator, and i think that, despite it clearly has lot of rooms for improvment concerning AI behavior, it does the job done in immersing us into those times and happenings.

You could try some scripted campaigns, most of them are really awesome , with huge effort put into them to be accurate and thrilling even sometimes.

Just my 2 cents, sorry to bother.

[Gobnik20]

On 9/7/2025 at 9:25 PM, AndreiTomescu said:

I hear you, mate. But sometimes the AI does really impressive things, in a good way. imho.

the campaign is a reenactment of the past, so, yeah, everything it's somehow fixed, and your actions won't change anything, it's not Back to the Future movie :))))

I am a great fan of this historic simulator, and i think that, despite it clearly has lot of rooms for improvment concerning AI behavior, it does the job done in immersing us into those times and happenings.

You could try some scripted campaigns, most of them are really awesome , with huge effort put into them to be accurate and thrilling even sometimes.

Just my 2 cents, sorry to bother.

I would disagree. It does a terrible job at immersing you. At most it feels like a technical simulation rather than trying to immerse you in WW2.

 

The world is barren, there is no dynamic campaign. The career mode is just an eyecandy UI with no depth to it whatsoever. Just a generic mission generator. The single missions are cool and in fact immersive but that's about it. Just a linear set of missions with a few objects and planes placed for you to mess around with. 

 

There is no depth at all. The AI is horrendeus. The performance is the worst in the series, for some odd reason 1C decided to give the AI same flight model as the player with no real benefit as stated above the AI has no behavioural trees at all. Its all just weird and strange designs and a destroyed potential.

 

In my opinion (You may disagree) IL2 - 1946 is one of the most immersive and well designed aeroplane combat games ever made. The AI is astonishingly in depth. There is a vanilla dynamic campaign, but it shines with a mod developed by Lowengrin called DCG. Which is the closest thing to Falcon 4.0 campaign.

 

1000s of planes thanks to modpacks. 

 

Sure Il-2 has great visuals and nice looking models. But I don't really understand the psychology here. We're paying full price for planes that have detailed interiors but no ability to interact with? It's all very strange and if you asked me shady. 

 

The only reason why I even played this game is probably thanks top Patrick and his great mod. Even that can't really save this title for me as the AI and the limitation of the engine are just too much.

[AndreiTomescu]

2 hours ago, Gobnik20 said:

You may disagree) IL2 - 1946 is one of the most immersive and well designed aeroplane combat games ever made

I DO agree.

But things have to move on. I've played 1946 since before my 15 yrs older was born. It had consistent romanian faction. But age is showing. that's the problem. 

The new one I find very good, however. Sometimes surprisingly good. sometimes not. You know when it's gonna be awesome? after the newest one will come out, and the old one will be left on the hands of modders. Modders like Patrick, and others guy who did awesome things. then, like the old 1946, it's gonna reach its full potential, because a passionate comunity of many guys can do more than a limited number of programmers limited also by numerous constrains: management, financial and so on. 

Look how incredibily good are many of the scripted campaigns.

Just my opinion.

2 hours ago, Gobnik20 said:

behavioural trees at all.

what does this mean? like choises? like Detroit became human game ?

2 hours ago, Gobnik20 said:

AI same flight model as the player

i thought that is a good thing. why not? 

Edited 3 hours ago by AndreiTomescu

[Gobnik20]

 

  

2 hours ago, AndreiTomescu said:

I DO agree.

But things have to move on. I've played 1946 since before my 15 yrs older was born. It had consistent romanian faction. But age is showing. that's the problem. 

The new one I find very good, however. Sometimes surprisingly good. sometimes not. You know when it's gonna be awesome? after the newest one will come out, and the old one will be left on the hands of modders. Modders like Patrick, and others guy who did awesome things. then, like the old 1946, it's gonna reach its full potential, because a passionate comunity of many guys can do more than a limited number of programmers limited also by numerous constrains: management, financial and so on. 

Look how incredibily good are many of the scripted campaigns.

Just my opinion.

 

Well truth is that the game is very hardcoded and hardlocked. The business model used here is inherently against modding. This game will NEVER be moddable to the extent IL2 - 1946 was. We can't even program basic AI functions, the best mod for AI we have is the "AI gunnery mod" which in itself isn't really doing much.  What Patrick has done is incredible but it uses a a 3rd party program, it's essentially just stats and algorithms.

 

That's what annoys me about this product. It's a combination of greed and ignorance. Devs gotta earn of course. But this is not a sustainable model longer term wise. There's a reason why a lot of players including me go back to IL2 1946 or even Cliffs of dover. Because they have depth and replay value, this game doesn't and it could if the devs weren't this greedy. "we can't find an AI dev". Well then let us as a communtity fix what you cannot? Well I guess not, money matters.

 

2 hours ago, AndreiTomescu said:

what does this mean? like choises? like Detroit became human game ?

Its basically a modular series of tasks AI dynamically adopts in certain situations. It's not finite state or linear but adaptive. For example:

 

Selector:
  - Condition: EnemyAbove?
    - Sequence:
        - Condition: EnemyIsFast?
        - Action: DiveDownAndBreakLeft

 

It gives AI a brain and makes it reactive. 

 

Not sure if you noticed but a LOT of the times AI just either flies straight, or just keeps doing turning fights until it dies. It doesn't take into account what plane you fly, how fast you are, how slow etc. Its just baffles me  how bad it is,  It's just linear and stupid. For a flight game not to have complex behavioural trees in 2025 is INSANE. IL - 1946 had all of these basic and advanced functions and its 7 years older than IL 2 GB. IL - 2 GB is still updated till this day. How is this not sorted yet? I can't explain this differently than just ignorance and incompetence.

 

2 hours ago, AndreiTomescu said:

AI same flight model as the player

i thought that is a good thing. why not? 

 

It's not good because the AI is fully simulated wether its 500000000KM away from you or 1km away . It takes A HUGE toll on performance, placing more than 4 bombers will bootleneck your game. It will run in slow motion but your frame rate stays high. It's because there's WAY too much unnecessary calculation going on . It's just a dumb decision choice with 0 benefit. Sure its nice knowing the AI doesn't "cheat" but at the same time it limits the scale of battle where you can only have like max 10 planes in a flight.

 

I'll use IL 2 1946 as a comparison again. You can have more than 50 planes and the game runs fine. The AI doesnt fly the "Same" flight model but it's cleaverly programmed where it it isn't cheating but it also isn't performance heavy. The AI there stalls, it isn't faster than you, it doesn't turn faster than you, It's all smart programming. This game here is lackluster.

Sorry if I sound negative and I don't mean to destroy your enjoyment. Just wanted to highlight vital points why this game is not all that good.

 

To be fair the IL2 GB has some incredible flight and damage physics, it's very satysfying to shoot and fly. It's also very cinematic and graphically really good. What overshadows all of that is what I described above. Without depth, there's no longevity. 

 

Look at it this way: IL2 GB is a shallow but very pretty girl. Treat IL2 1946 as an unattractive yet incredibly intriguing girl.

Edited 1 hour ago by Gobnik20

[giftgruen]

So true. Since I like pretty girls I still somehow like IL2 GB. Visuals and good VR somehow make a match.

Nevertheless - yes - user experience is overshadowed by the things you mentioned.

 

34 minutes ago, Gobnik20 said:

It's a combination of greed and ignorance. Devs gotta earn of course. But this is not a sustainable model longer term wise

 

Second that.

The day there is another 'Retro' FlightSim which offers VR - I will be up and away.

Will maybe never be the case however, since this pre1945 sim community maybe rather dies.