AI Constantly Turning

[Taxman]

4 hours ago, dburne said:

What in the world does the menu background sound and inability to turn it off have to do with a thread about the AI constantly turning?

To lazy to start another thread?  Back on subject, if down low I just disengage gain altitude and try to reacquire the target, if still turning I now have advantage, works very well most of the time, unless the target has friends around getting interested in me,  if so I get of the combat area and live to fight another day.

[JG27*Kornezov]

On 8/20/2018 at 6:06 PM, Scottvdken said:

I recently picked up IL2 again after having not played in over a year. I've played a couple German campaigns now, and the same weird behavior seems to persist. I'm not very good, but I prefer engine management on, so to help myself out I put the AI in my career to "easy" or "Medium", but as soon as i'm on their six the enemy AI banks into a tight turn and just stays there. They'll happily keep turning indefinitely if I let them. The stalemate is only broken either by me getting lucky with a blind leading shot, or breaking off myself and coming back around (essentially tricking them into doing something other than maintaining their turn). 

 

If I increase the difficulty level in SP, will that alleviate any of this behavior? I'm getting tired of repeating the same process constantly in every dogfight. There is no excitement whatsoever.

 

Another thing that bothers me is the AI has no fear. Was flying a soft column attack mission in a 109E and one lone Mig appears. Guess what he does? Makes a beeline for all six of us and gets shot down immediately. They do not give up in fights either. AI could have an engine bellowing out black smoke and fuel, but it's as if the pilot is oblivious. No attempt whatsoever to disengage and flee. Same result if I attempt to flee, they refuse to give up chasing me. We could be five miles into friendly territory, the AI looks like swiss cheese from the AA but still refuses to quit. All I have do is keep circling a friendly airfield until the AA takes care of him.

 

Are there any (even small) fixes for some of these issues? Or are we forced to wait for the fabled AI rework?

 

 

 

I am sorry to quote the first post of a very long discussion. But it appears to me (as a guy with 10 years of flight sim experience), you are doing something wrong in your fight with AIs. I remember when I was completely new in the flight sim in my first squad squad they gave me a game track, how to deal with AIs. Written posts are not good enough to get it. That video completely explained things to me, for the whole of my flight sim career, the pattern remains unchanged. Actually, AIs are very good training partners.

I find those things pretty basic and self explanatory that everybody should know that but apparently not. So do you think that such a video would be useful?

 

PS Definitely the AI can be improved, but BoX is state of the art. And by the way historically,  on the Eastern front there were pilots who flew with less than 20 h of flight training.

 

BoX series is not really a game, it is a sim that allows to connect with the world of aviation, that is completely foreign but awesome.
 

 

Edited August 29, 2018 by JG27_Kornezov

[Blutaar]

21 hours ago, Dakpilot said:

Why repost this 

 

"And how can you still support the game when there are no AI changes planned like forever? The devs made it clear at some point that there will be no AI overhaul because they are not willing to pay for a dedicated AI guy. It seems they think it is not worth the money and that they should focus on new content to keep the money flow"

 

Clearly BS and breaking forum rules

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

 

Is it really BS? I mean i shouldnt have posted the first qouted sentence i give you that. My apologies to the devs, sorry guys. But what is the problem with the rest of it? Didnt the devs said at some point that there will be no AI overhaul due to the fact they need a dedicated "AI guy" and that there is no money for it? Correct me if im wrong or when they changed their mind on that please. The rest is just my assumption that they think focusing on new content is better then focusin on AI. And thats not a out of the blue assumption, isnt it? Also i said directly after the last sentence that i kind of understand this decision from a dev PoV. I cant really see much BS here but maybe its just my stupidity you know?

 

I hope a moderater will delete my filthy post if it is against the forum rules. And on top of that a warning. I absolutely deserve my first one here!

 

 

On the topic of AI: 

 

Im really curious about the fact some people here seem to think there are only minor problems with AI and that they perform good enough for them. I wanna be more clear this time. My experience comes from a Luftwaffe PoV in the campaign mode. I played from moscow till the end of kuban as a german. And i tested every campaign difficulty but the problems are allways the same. Formation flying dosent work. My wingmates allways fall behind even when i fly very slowly. I mean a very unhealthy speed for non escorted fighterplanes. My question is, if this is not the same experience for everyone? No matter which side they fly?

 

Another example is Ground attacking. It only works for the initial attack with bombs but when it comes to followup attacks, which are necessary if you have to attack for example artillery because you cant choose the targets for the AI (another big point of critique for me). They will attack AAA everytime so only one artillery gets destoryed if i dosent miss. So it becomes time for guns and that is the point were the AI fucked up everytime. They just follow my number two and if he destroys a target, everyone calls it out as destroyed and start their reattack logic. Which is a wide circle with a shallow dive to the target. And in the end only my number two managed to get artillery kills while all the others have only one AAA destroyed in the initial attack with bombs. It gets more problematic in mission goal terms when you do a ferry attack or how its called. Where you have to destroy a ponton bridge. After the first initial bombs on AAA there are tanks next which get picked up by the AI with guns instead of all the trucks standing around. They will make pass after pass on the same tank until the ammo is out. What are your experiences? Does it differ?

 

And what about fighter vs. fighter? In my experience, 109s and 190s are nearly useless even at ace AI. They just cant hit when they need to. Sure they sometimes are lucky but most of the time they miss and end up in front of an enemy Lagg3 or something. If the campaing difficulty is low, the Laag3 has a better hitchance then my ace AI wingmates it seems. This could be due to the fact that the AI dont know that they fly the faster plane and so they start to turnfight which makes them an easy target even for low rank AIs. That is of course not how to fight in a german fighter. Most if not all of my missions end up with me downing lots of enemy planes while my wingamtes get one or two kills when they are lucky. They also often just dive into the ground for no reason. Often enough they get zero kills and just die. This makes levelling them up at lower ranks very difficult and you have to send them on generated missions to get any chance to kill an enemy plane in a real mission with them. I mean an increase from unable to hit anything to a slightly better chance to hit something. Thats it from lowest to highest rank in my experience. I only talk about air gunnery of course, not ground gunnery skills. On the ground it seems even the lowest ranks are able to hit a groundtarget but they need a much longer burst then higher AIs. What is your experience as a russian? I guess its not that bad as it is for the germans? I really have to start a russian campaign next time i play IL2.

 

There are more issues for me with the AI but these are the most annoying ones. By the way, how is the AI in Tank Crew? I imagine they can see through buildings and vegetation and have super SA and gunnery accuracy? I would like to test it myself but i didnt own it, same goes for Flying Circus. Anyway, i am not the enemy here. I wish as much as everyone else that IL2 continues to succeed. But sometimes you have to make prioritys just like the devs have to. And my priority at the moment is AI. Its not the only issue for me of course but it is the only issue i cant accept anymore. Because it affects my experience with the game in a negative way more then destruction timers or short render distances. Sorry!

[InProgress]

Funniest things I had was 8x ju87 dropping 500kg bombs on exactly same spot. And task was to bomb airfield, so basically everyone dropped bomb on one parked plane, 4t on one target lol. I think even command gives you idea how AI works "attack nearest ground target" so they all do.

 

Another was being chased back to my af by bunch of enemy fighters and flying 10-15min low (no ammo) for my aaa to kill them, they couldn't hit them even when you fly like 10m from the ground right in front of your aaa. But when you are on 3k, you will get one shot snipe and dead 

 

Today, new moscow career, E7, first mission. Bomb crossing, 6 of us with 250kg bomb, of course AI left me behind and got some uber boost while I was flying at max combat power (1% more and it was emergency power), I have no idea how AI fly but they have some ultra speed. Anyway we saw enemy bombers so everyone decided that destroying a bridge is not important and they went to hunt for IL2s, since target was quite close I went there, dropped my bomb and missed of course that huge bridge and instead I directly hit a tank behind it xD, still no one cared anymore about our mission so went back to base, landed, finished mission. Mission failed, everyone missing in action 

 

I really hope we can get great ai one day, so it will be a blast to play career (and less combat mission because so far it's filled with action and every sortie (or like most of them) is just bunch of enemy planes all over the place. Wish for an option [ x ] realistic missions, or something like This when you just do "boring" missions like patrols, escorts, ground attacks and there wont be magically enemy fighters all over.

[Blutaar]

39 minutes ago, InProgress said:

still no one cared anymore about our mission so went back to base, landed, finished mission.

 

A rearm and repair option in an actual campaing mission would be nice.

[InProgress]

6 minutes ago, Ishtaru said:

 

A rearm and repair option in an actual campaing mission would be nice.

Yeah, even it it would take 20min or so (I think it would take like 3 to add new bomb) but would be cool to be able to fly again at some mission. If it's fairy close and hq would agree that it's important to destroy target then yea. Like that bridge, it wont drive away like convoy or train and it's important to destroy it today. So you could get back there and try to bomb it again (then enemy could actually get few fighters there since they expect attack again)

 

 

[Semor76]

LooL.. are you guys aware of the fact that this sweet thread is already moved to the complaints section? Or in other words: Lost in space....

 

Waste of time here to discuss futher

[BraveSirRobin]

Lol. It was a waste of time at page 1...

[Cybermat47]

44 minutes ago, BraveSirRobin said:

Lol. It was a waste of time at page 1...

 

How much singleplayer have you played recently? The AI leaves a lot to be desired.

[BraveSirRobin]

31 minutes ago, PB_Cybermat47 said:

 

How much singleplayer have you played recently? The AI leaves a lot to be desired.

 

I unlocked all the mods and skins for BoS, and a bunch of stuff for BoM before ridiculous unlock feature was disabled.  The AI sucks.  The AI in every flight sim I have ever played sucks.  It's probably impossible to program AI that does not suck for a flight sim.  But the devs will probably throw more money at it eventually.  And the same people who are currently complaining about ambient background sounds in the menu screens will continue to complain about the AI.

[Cybermat47]

7 minutes ago, BraveSirRobin said:

The AI sucks.  The AI in every flight sim I have ever played sucks.  

 

So we both agree that an improvement in the AI would be great for the game. 

[BraveSirRobin]

2 minutes ago, PB_Cybermat47 said:

 

So we both agree that an improvement in the AI would be great for the game. 

 

No.  It's a waste of money.  But they'll eventually do it anyways.  

[Enceladus828]

10 minutes ago, BraveSirRobin said:

No.  It's a waste of money. 

It's money that they'll look forward into spending as the users will be benefited by the fixes.

[BraveSirRobin]

22 minutes ago, Novice-Flyer said:

It's money that they'll look forward into spending as the users will be benefited by the fixes.

 

No, they probably won't care as soon as they realize that the AI still sucks.

[Thad]

I created a SP practice mission today with four AI controlled Ju-87s routed to area attack Yantar airfield to eliminate as many ground units as they could.

 

They each carried a 500 kg and two 250kg bombs.

 

It was a sight to behold as the four of them dove down to obliterate all of the ground units and then head for home. It can be done but requires some experimentation in mission logic through frustrating trial and error. ?

Edited August 30, 2018 by Thad
Corrections

[unreasonable]

How do you stop them all targeting the same ground unit?  

[sniperton]

No direct answer to that, but still an interesting read:

It's important to note IMO that we almost never meet a 'pure AI'. We encounter the AI in the framework of a mission, where the acting of the AI is influenced by how the mission was set up. Designated targets, areas, waypoints, timeouts, triggers, and a lot of customizable settings all have an impact on how the AI finally performs in the mission. The AI is like a lion in a circus show, where the performance you see is the result of the interaction of the lion (the AI) and its trainer (the mission designer). What we (rightfully) complain about is sometimes not a 'pure AI' defect, but rather inadequate mission design. Quick missions and career missions are a case in point, those were made/generated in batch, mission settings were not individually customized and tested for best AI experience. I don't say the AI is good, I only say we have to distinguish between proper AI shortcomings and mission design shortcomings, where mission design suffers from the AI being a black box, it's a try and error process to find out how ME settings interact with it.

[unreasonable]

Since people have been having a go at the AI I thought it might provide some balance to tell the tale of a career mission I have just finished.

 

6 109 F-2s take off on a bridge attack mission. As number 3, I manage one of the rare take-offs when "my" pilot reports "taken off" before the pane behind me.  A prompt start and take off at 2600rpm gets me airborne, then onto climb and combat at 2400rpm.  I am able to keep up easily because I have not fallen behind at the start. The outbound legs take about 25 minutes: at rated power of 2300rpm I am maybe 5 kph slower than the AI, so occasional brief periods of combat power are needed: no problem I have half an hour.  The AI take about 5 minutes to form up fully but have no trouble keeping up with the leader or with the formation.

 

The target area is a pontoon bridge, with a few tanks, AA vehicles. The leader gives an attack command and bombs one of the vehicles.  I bomb the pontoon.  The other four F-2s circle round so I watch them thinking "aha, now they will all attack the same target!"  Not so: the bombs are well spread out and leave a couple of burning vehicles.  We all circle and the group of four start a strafing run. "Surely this time they will all attack the same target just as the critics say!" I think to myself.  Wrong again:  only two of them fire, virtually simultaneously, at different targets.

 

I am not good at strafing so I am waiting for the Ivan's fighters to show up. As usual "my pilot" sees them before I do, but I turn towards the threat. Unfortunately I have not spotted them all and a MiG hits me on his first pass.  Now I only have one functioning aileron but the good news is my cockpit ventilation is much improved. I manage to get behind one who starts constantly turning to the left. "Aha, you stupid AI" I think, just before the tracers from his wingman start passing over my head. 

 

I manage to get out of that too, thanking the developers for making deflection shooting difficult for the AI, as it is for me. Fortunately by this time the other F-2s are all announcing that they are attacking fighters "It's close!" and so I just try to stay out of trouble and watch my flight shoot down a couple of MiGs. Then I head for home as nothing is attacking me and I need to get my damaged plane over friendly territory.

 

Returning to base is uncomfortable but I make it and finish a rather exciting landing, taxi to an empty emplacement: then my brakes fail and I run slowly into the crates at the back of the emplacement.

 

Overall results: I got the bridge, the flight got 4 MiGs, 6 vehicles and 4 artillery pieces. We lost one F-2, pilot KIA.  I do not think there was a single thing that happened in that particular mission where I could say that the AI did anything silly.

[Thad]

7 hours ago, unreasonable said:

How do you stop them all targeting the same ground unit?  

I didn't have to. They just selected their own targets. It seemed that if the same selected target was taken out the second craft would not attack it and attack another target or go around and come back for another attack.

 

I did see same target attack when I had 'Attack Ground Targets' selected in the Advanced settings. Therefore, I didn't use it.

3 hours ago, sniperton said:

No direct answer to that, but still an interesting read:

It's important to note IMO that we almost never meet a 'pure AI'. We encounter the AI in the framework of a mission, where the acting of the AI is influenced by how the mission was set up. Designated targets, areas, waypoints, timeouts, triggers, and a lot of customizable settings all have an impact on how the AI finally performs in the mission. The AI is like a lion in a circus show, where the performance you see is the result of the interaction of the lion (the AI) and its trainer (the mission designer). What we (rightfully) complain about is sometimes not a 'pure AI' defect, but rather inadequate mission design. Quick missions and career missions are a case in point, those were made/generated in batch, mission settings were not individually customized and tested for best AI experience. I don't say the AI is good, I only say we have to distinguish between proper AI shortcomings and mission design shortcomings, where mission design suffers from the AI being a black box, it's a try and error process to find out how ME settings interact with it.

Absolutely, especially concerning the missions created or made in batch. They simply don't have the detailed AI programing a personal mission creator can give a mission.

[Adger]

1 hour ago, unreasonable said:

Since people have been having a go at the AI I thought it might provide some balance to tell the tale of a career mission I have just finished.

 

6 109 F-2s take off on a bridge attack mission. As number 3, I manage one of the rare take-offs when "my" pilot reports "taken off" before the pane behind me.  A prompt start and take off at 2600rpm gets me airborne, then onto climb and combat at 2400rpm.  I am able to keep up easily because I have not fallen behind at the start. The outbound legs take about 25 minutes: at rated power of 2300rpm I am maybe 5 kph slower than the AI, so occasional brief periods of combat power are needed: no problem I have half an hour.  The AI take about 5 minutes to form up fully but have no trouble keeping up with the leader or with the formation.

 

The target area is a pontoon bridge, with a few tanks, AA vehicles. The leader gives an attack command and bombs one of the vehicles.  I bomb the pontoon.  The other four F-2s circle round so I watch them thinking "aha, now they will all attack the same target!"  Not so: the bombs are well spread out and leave a couple of burning vehicles.  We all circle and the group of four start a strafing run. "Surely this time they will all attack the same target just as the critics say!" I think to myself.  Wrong again:  only two of them fire, virtually simultaneously, at different targets.

 

I am not good at strafing so I am waiting for the Ivan's fighters to show up. As usual "my pilot" sees them before I do, but I turn towards the threat. Unfortunately I have not spotted them all and a MiG hits me on his first pass.  Now I only have one functioning aileron but the good news is my cockpit ventilation is much improved. I manage to get behind one who starts constantly turning to the left. "Aha, you stupid AI" I think, just before the tracers from his wingman start passing over my head. 

 

I manage to get out of that too, thanking the developers for making deflection shooting difficult for the AI, as it is for me. Fortunately by this time the other F-2s are all announcing that they are attacking fighters "It's close!" and so I just try to stay out of trouble and watch my flight shoot down a couple of MiGs. Then I head for home as nothing is attacking me and I need to get my damaged plane over friendly territory.

 

Returning to base is uncomfortable but I make it and finish a rather exciting landing, taxi to an empty emplacement: then my brakes fail and I run slowly into the crates at the back of the emplacement.

 

Overall results: I got the bridge, the flight got 4 MiGs, 6 vehicles and 4 artillery pieces. We lost one F-2, pilot KIA.  I do not think there was a single thing that happened in that particular mission where I could say that the AI did anything silly.

 

An excellent post IMO unreasonable. I really enjoyed reading it pal.

I Personnally wouldn't say we're "having a go" at the AI were commenting on our experiences same as you,I've also had campaign missions similar to yours and when everything " works" like we expect it to it's a brilliant time to fly. Unfortunitely for me I've also had campaign missions that just defy belief.

 

Ai  lawn darting, Bombers not even dropping Any ordnance ..Enemy fighters spewing smoke/oil following you all the way over your own lines/airfield to shoot you down,AI turning circles constantly amongst other things. Please don't get me wrong I love this series I certainly would prefer myself not to have at least some of the issues I've mentioned but they DO happen.

 

Its a mystery because some missions are "perfect" and others I see instances I've mentioned above..Anyway FWIW I sincerely hope the Devs can in time have a look and hopefully make some adjustments to the AI ..if they feel it's needed.

 

Regards:Adger

 

Edited August 30, 2018 by Adger

[sniperton]

47 minutes ago, Adger said:

Ai  lawn darting, Bombers not even dropping Any ordnance ..Enemy fighters spewing smoke/oil following you all the way over your own lines/airfield to shoot you down,AI turning circles constantly amongst other things. Please don't get me wrong I love this series I certainly would prefer myself not to have at least some of the issues I've mentioned but they DO happen.

 

Its a mystery because some missions are "perfect" and others I see instances I've mentioned above.

Sure, all this sh.t happens from time to time, my only point being that some of these issues sometimes are not to be blamed on the AI, since we positively know (ask Thad for confirmation) that such issues may result from inappropriate mission design solutions as well. Which are, in turn, hard to avoid in missions generated in batch.

[Blutaar]

@unreasonable That is strange. So you had no formation problems, the AI did attack different targets after the initial attack and was able to shoot down enemy planes? And i guess you did it without any ace AI (Major)? Did anything changed in the last 2 months which i missed? Im temped to plug in my simrig and test it myself. Because especially the ferry attack missions (bombing a ponton bridge) is the mission where it is so obvious to me that the AI attacks the same groundtarget every time. Because on my end, they target just one of the many tanks standing there after they took out the AAA in the initial attack and make one gun pass after another on the tanks until ammo is empty. The primary target is the bridge so if i dont hit the bridge, no one hits it.

 

I understand that AAA is a primary object for AI target selection but that dosent make sense anytime. When you just want to make one attackrun, it should be possible to determine what the main targets are. Bombing AAA makes no sense for me on just one attackrun. I usually take four planes, sometimes 6 but never more. To much babysitting!

 

Someone mentioned airfield attacks where the AI bombs the same target. In my experience the AI attacks AAA emplacements like they allways do in this mission type. So it seems experiences differ but i dont understand why. In my campaigns i am allways lead so keep that in mind. I do all the loadout and flighplanning also. Maybe it is only a problem when the player takes the lead i dont know. You could test the same mission on different positions and see if your experience changes.

[unreasonable]

@Adger Thanks: I get annoyed with the AI too - watching three AI all try to land simultaneously after being given the RTB command is funny and also infuriating.  My very first fix would be to reduce the damage they tolerate before trying to head home.  

 

 

@Ishtaru This mission was with the AI leading: relatively new career after my first attempt got killed near the end of the Moscow campaign.  I sometimes think the missions work better with an AI leader. Trying to stick with one AI plane and cover it's tail is interesting, as long as you can stave off the greed for kills. 

I have never had a great problem with seeing AI shoot down enemy fighters: they may miss quite a lot, but so do I.  The MiGs seem to have no problem hitting me!  I agree that AI vs bombers is more of a problem, especially chasing the Pe-2s, as they get stuck behind and get hit and break off and get too far behind. On intercept bombers missions I am happy to see the AI tackle escorts which I know they can do, while I can usually get one or two Peshkas without getting hit.

 

As for ground attack - I generally go for the bridge too - it is the only thing I can hit reliably.   

 

  

 

 

[LizLemon]

The big problem with the AI in dogfights is that it almost never goes inverted. I've only seen it happen a few times and messing around with the AI files doesnt seem to help.

[Feathered_IV]

8 hours ago, LizLemon said:

The big problem with the AI in dogfights is that it almost never goes inverted. I've only seen it happen a few times and messing around with the AI files doesnt seem to help.

 

I’ve seen quite a few occasions in both RoF and this game where the AI does a half roll and seems to get “stuck”, then flys around upside down until I can help it out with a few bullets.  Albatrosses and 109s tend to be the ones that do it the most.  

[InProgress]

3 hours ago, Feathered_IV said:

 

I’ve seen quite a few occasions in both RoF and this game where the AI does a half roll and seems to get “stuck”, then flys around upside down until I can help it out with a few bullets.  Albatrosses and 109s tend to be the ones that do it the most.  

Happens quite often ? I was always so confused and had no idea what they are doing, if it's some uber pro move or something, but it only gives you very easy shot so i guess it was just another pro AI move

[Blutaar]

7 hours ago, Karamazov said:

Some missions do ' work '; in my experience 109 fighter missions more so than others because you are more able to cope with being alone if you use the aircraft well.

 

Sure they might work for the player but what about your AI comrades? How many sorties do they survive? If i just do my 109 flying and dont care for my AI wingmates, they will get shot down and after a few sorties they get replaced by rookie AI comrades if im unlucky. Just take one AI squadmate and make him your buddy who needs to survive and do everything so he survives. Then you will see how bad 109s are in the campaign against enemy AIs. Not sure how it is on the russian side but knowing the AI. I guess they perform a little bit better when it comes to hitting and downing enemy planes (speculation).

 

Edit: Im talking from a flightleaders point of view i might add.

Edited August 31, 2018 by Ishtaru

[HeavyCavalrySgt]

On a bomber escort mission P-40s attacked.  Those guys love their airplanes!  It can be burning, missing pieces, engine dead, or pointed at the ground with no apparent effort scheduled for a recovery attempt and they will just ride it in.  Maybe they are thumbing through the flight manual for the section on "Unusual Attitudes", or maybe they don't want to risk becoming a POW, or maybe the mindset is, "I'm a pilot and I want to die in my cockpit!"

 

I did watch one P-40 trying to get away.  Two of my wing men were following him and when the closer one got in range and started firing, the P-40 executed the first half of a split S from about 100 meters.  My wing man followed him.  I admire his enthusiasm if not his planning ability.

 

Another wing man was engaging a different P-40.  By the time I noticed the fight, the P-40 was already dinged up and my squadron mate was hosing at him with long bursts. Do they carry more ammo than the planes we control?  After about a half circle he had the P-40 on fire.  I expected him to break off and let the P-40 crash. It was obviously doomed.  Nope!  Maybe the P-40 pilot had made a rude gesture or said something unkind, or maybe my wing man had a kill claim credited as a "probable" or "damaged" or something but he was going to be sure of this one.  The P-40 driver patiently waited in his burning aircraft as my wing man continued to throw long streams of lead at him and the scenery (we really need to work on gunnery in my squadron!) until he finally bellied the plane in and died in the burning wreck.

[BraveSirRobin]

35 minutes ago, HeavyCavalrySgt said:

 

Another wing man was engaging a different P-40.  By the time I noticed the fight, the P-40 was already dinged up and my squadron mate was hosing at him with long bursts. Do they carry more ammo than the planes we control?  After about a half circle he had the P-40 on fire.  I expected him to break off and let the P-40 crash. It was obviously doomed.  Nope!  Maybe the P-40 pilot had made a rude gesture or said something unkind, or maybe my wing man had a kill claim credited as a "probable" or "damaged" or something but he was going to be sure of this one.  The P-40 driver patiently waited in his burning aircraft as my wing man continued to throw long streams of lead at him and the scenery (we really need to work on gunnery in my squadron!) until he finally bellied the plane in and died in the burning wreck.

 

In RoF burning aircraft were instantly treated as shot down, so the AI no longer attacked them.  That is not the case in BoX.  A burning aircraft is not considered shot down, so they are still treated as viable targets by the AI until they are “shot down”.

[HeavyCavalrySgt]

1 hour ago, BraveSirRobin said:

 

In RoF burning aircraft were instantly treated as shot down, so the AI no longer attacked them.  That is not the case in BoX.  A burning aircraft is not considered shot down, so they are still treated as viable targets by the AI until they are “shot down”.

 

 

I know - I was kind of kidding - and it makes sense: a burning plane could still attack or perhaps ram a bomber, or a burning bomber could still get to its release point.

 

I suppose a solution could be target prioritization, where the badly shot up, burning fighter at low altitude is de-prioritized compared to a plane lining up for an attack run on a bomber formation.

[InProgress]

13 hours ago, HeavyCavalrySgt said:

it makes sense: a burning plane could still attack or perhaps ram a bomber, or a burning bomber could still get to its release point.

I don't think so. Your plane is burning, probably you inside as well. Fire will blind you and ramming is not as easy as it sounds, especially when you are on fire + you kind of lose a control over your plane. Also we should remember that 99.99% of pilots were not a psychos who would rather ram 1 plane and die instead of save himself.  So it's would  be pointless to make AI attack every plane that is on fire because MAYBE he is insane and could ram someone.

[HeavyCavalrySgt]

9 hours ago, InProgress said:

 So it's would  be pointless to make AI attack every plane that is on fire because MAYBE he is insane and could ram someone.

 

The AI already does that. I was posting in favor of them doing it less.