Career mode wingmen incompetent?

[Rogue-9]

Hi,

 

I played a little bit of the career mode over Moscow and everything seemed normal.

 

I am now working on a Kuban career and I am having the issue that any friendly AI planes, that are part of my flight, are always completely useless. They almost always get 0 air victories between them and frequently end up killed or captured. Other friendly planes that are not part of my squadron will behave normally: sometimes they shoot down the enemy and sometimes they get shot down. So it's only my flight that is not behaving as expected.

 

This is on medium difficulty.

 

So my question to more experienced players is: Is this normal and working as intended? Or has something gone wrong somehow?

 

[dburne]

I am playing the Career in a Spit over Kuban, on medium as well.

I have gone through one full career and am progressing through a second. Love the Spit and love Kuban.

 

I have seen really a mixture of friendly AI, some are pretty decent and get some kills and other times they can't manage to hit the broad side of a barn LOL.

 

[dkoor]

That is pretty much what I experienced in my SP too. My flight being constantly wiped on higher than easy settings.

That's why I turned to Pat Wilson Campaign Generator (PWCG) and will see how that one goes...

[Finkeren]

The sad truth is, that when it comes to fighters, it really depends a lot on which type you’re flying. In AI vs. AI match-ups there are some fighters that are just massively favored. What makes it worse is the fact, that if your casualty rate is too high, your squad mates are wiped out before they get a chance to become veteran or ace AI which means that they will be at a further disadvantage against the average AI opponent. Once your numbers fall below 6 available aircraft your risk of being outnumbered in combat also goes up dramatically.

 

The best thing to do, is to try and nurse your squad mates - really look out for them, protect their backs, let them have the easy kills etc. The more of them survive the better your squad will be. Sometimes it can make a big difference. Veteran/ace AI in a 109 is a potent force, novice/average AI is dead meat.

 

Based on my personal experience with the career, I have tried to compile a ranked list of the best fighters to survive in as a squad in career:

 

BoM:

 

I-16

Bf 109F4

MiG-3

Bf 109E7

Bf 109F2

MC.202

P-40E

Bf 110E1

 

BoS:

 

Yak-1

I-16

Bf 109F4

Bf 109G2

MiG-3

Fw 190A3

LaGG-3

Bf 109E7

MC. 202

La-5

P-40E

Bf 110E1

 

BoK

 

Yak-7b

Yak-1b

Yak-1

Spit Mk. Vb*

La-5FN

Bf 109G2

Bf 109G4

Bf 109G6

P-39L

LaGG-3

La-5

Fw 190A5**

Bf 110G2

P-40E

 

*: The Spitfire is arguably the best fighter in the hands of AI, but their low ammo count means they are constantly getting themselves into situations they can’t get out of.

 

**: The Fw 190A5 is ranked so low mainly due to the types of missions it faces in BoK.

Edited July 1, 2018 by Finkeren

[Finkeren]

As you can see, there seems to be a pretty consistent pattern here: The better sustained turn rate, the better the AI does - at least in my experience.

[Fritz_X]

1 hour ago, Finkeren said:

As you can see, there seems to be a pretty consistent pattern here: The better sustained turn rate, the better the AI does - at least in my experience.

 

The big problem, and this has been mentioned before by many people, is that the AI handles every fighter the same way. They don't care about energy retention and go for turn fighting instead, which of course works fairly well with nimble planes like the I16 and the Spitfire Vb, but fails with types like the whole Bf 109 series.

 

Unfortunately this kind of ruins the experience in the single player campaign no matter what side you are flying for:

 

If you fly for the Soviets, battles with German fighters are too easy to win. The enemy tries to turnfight, it fails due to the type of plane they are flying, you shoot them down with relative ease.

 

If you fly for the Luftwaffe, the fights become tougher for the player, since the enemy AI can now make a good use of its' turnfight tactic. What ruins the experience in this case though, is that your German AI wingmen are now failing to make an effective use of their fighters, which A) makes them often suffer from heavy losses (sometimes your whole squad gets killed on a mission, there is no way to get attached to your wingmen this way) and B) leads to an artificially high kill count for the player on the German side, making you feel like the only competent pilot of the Luftwaffe.

 

I really hope that the team will be able to have a look into the AI at some point. I know this is quite something to ask for, but I feel like this could improve the SP experience alot.

Edited July 1, 2018 by Fritz_X

[Finkeren]

It’s too simplistic to make it a LW vs. VVS issue. The Yaks and the I-16 are favored in the hands of the AI, yes, but the La-5 on the other hand is royally screwed.

[Yogiflight]

Another aspect, that plays a big role is the issue of friendly fighters to hit enemy aircrafts. I see again and again my squadmates sitting on the six of a straight on flying enemy, shooting long bursts and all of the tracers pass below the enemy aircraft. It seems as if they were progeammed to hit nonmoving targets only, as they are pretty deadly when shooting on ground targets, but when shooting at fast moving targets, the target has moved on, when their projectiles reach the point the AI had aimed at.

And even when they damage an aircraft, which seems to be more by coincidence, they turn away instead of finishing it.

[Rogue-9]

Thanks for all the responses and insights!

 

Here's something I have noticed as well.

 

On some missions, there will be both my 109 group and another group of 109s cooperating and the funny thing is that the 109s that are not my wingmen, behave normally; they get some decent kills. It's only my group that appears to be made up of complete novices.

 

For this reason, I would say that it's not simply a case of some aircraft types being disadvantaged when piloted by AI. It might be a factor, but it's probably also a case of replacement pilots in my group coming in at a low AI level and never getting the chance to rank up.

 

Edit: I may try to leave the squadron and either stay with a new one or switch back. Maybe that will reset the AI so that there are at least some competent pilots in my flight.

Edited July 1, 2018 by Rogue-9
Additional thought

[Rogue-9]

Well, I don't know...

 

I switched flights and for maybe one mission, it almost seemed as if the AI would be ok. I saw them at least shooting at the enemy and most of them got home, although only one kill was achieved by one of them.

 

But that was about it. I have advanced in the campaign to the second stage of the Battle of Kuban now and the enemy has become far more dangerous. Every sortie sees me going up against 12 enemy fighters, usually Yak-7s. In my last mission, I noticed two Yaks behind me and climbed away to get some distance. This worked and I was eventually ably to turn on them but then I noticed that I had dragged more planes with me. I had ten... TEN Yak-7s chasing me into my own territory. I will give you three guesses as to how that fight played out...

 

At this stage, I would almost say that this particular career playthrough has become unplayable. Every mission, I end up having to fight at least half a dozen Yaks or more with no support whatsoever. The best I can do is take out one or two planes and then run for it. Sometimes I can land before they catch up. Sometimes a forced landing under fire. Sometimes a bail out or crash in friendly territory. And that's only if I don't have to restart that mission 4 times because of a career ending outcome.

 

Not a lot of fun ☹️

[BB5000]

Going up as lone wolf in Bomber Intercept and Ground Attack Intercept (possible if you're StaffelKapitän) will almost always make the Soviet escorts stay at home. Battle of Kuban, Medium difficulty. Going up with 1 or 2 Schwarms will see the corresponding flights of Soviet escorts, so trying to outnumber the opponent seems not possible.

[Bremspropeller]

Rogue, I'm having similar concers - I'm currently flying the Schlachtflieger campaign on the Fw 190A-5/U17 and my whole squadron is obliterated every two or three days.

 

Yesterday I was taking off for an airfield air-raid (I was#3 in a 8-airplane formation), I was smug thinking about how that poor old airfield has some hard time coming...

Little did I know that #2 would lose control on take-off, ground-loop at high speed, break the landing-gear and have the following three airplanes crash into it at full steam.

 

Now, this seems like a nice feature (immersive), but if on the following mission the rest of the formation is shot to pieces regularly, the whole affair gets a bit repetitive.

 

The above suggestions do Sound pretty nice. On a historical setting, there should be lots of dweebs, a lower number of experienced and a very low number of aces around.

Also, the AI should not be able to spot you when sneaking up from the low 6 sector (I know, an old issue with AI in general).

Edited July 15, 2018 by Bremspropeller