Defaults in Campaign...WHY?

[Sheriff88]

Why do planes fly in blank default skins in campaign mode? For example. If you select to fly in a particular squadron in BoP shouldn't the planes in your flight have the appropriate squadron skins and not the default? is there a way to select skins for flight mates ?

[AstroCat]

Yeah I wondered this as well, even a way to select the skins and save them would be nice.

[Falcon41]

I agree with you both.  Given the team has gone to great lengths to provide squadron locations, history,  etc., in campaign mode it would seem logical for the aircraft in the squadron you've chosen to have appropriate markings.  Perhaps in the future, given the number of skins being developed for all sides, the team will provide such a means.  After all they've done that for the new scripted campaign for the Spitfire. 

[DD_Fenrir]

Sheer numbers I would suggest.

 

Even if you had just a "XXX squadron generic" skin for each squadron, that's still a huge number to do.

 

Look at USAAF alone, and just those in (or loaned) to the 9th AF:

 

P-38: 3x squadrons per Group, 3x Groups in 9th TAF = 9x skins

P-47: 3x squadrons per Group, 16x Groups in 9th TAF = 48x skins

P-51: 3x squadrons per Group, 4x Groups in 9th TAF = 12 skins

 

That's 69 skins!

 

Now extrapolate for the Luftwaffe and RAF.... !

 

And I guess you want those 4K yeah?

 

Furthermore, you want to be able to ID your squadron amongst others, why stop there? Why not individuals in your flight?

 

However, without a the function of dynamic numbering/lettering, allowing a generic skin to be overlaid with an individual a/c ID letter or number, you'd have to have a single skin for every operational airframe within every squadron in that campaign! Using actual squadron strengths of  the USAAF at the time that'd be ~20 a/c per squadron. To do the 9th alone would require, wait for it...  1380 skins!!!!

 

If you went that far, how do you administrate the application of those skins to individual pilots - is that something you expect the career to do automatically? Or are you going to ask users to do it as part of their campaign admin?

 

Note that I don't disagree with you - in  a perfect world I'd like to see squadron generic schemes with a dynamic numbering/lettering system that could be applied consistently across squadrons and individual AI pilots within the career system. However, I think I've laid out why that might take a lot of time and perhaps more resources than 777 can afford to devote.

 

Note that when you get to squadron commander level you can edit your wingmen's skins as part of their loadout options; if you can find a suitable generic for the squadron you're flying with then you can at least get your flights looking more like what you're after. In the interim you just have to lump the factory defaults. Also remember that any other AI flights you encounter will always remain in the factory defaults.

Edited November 25, 2019 by DD_Fenrir

[Cybermat47]

55 minutes ago, DD_Fenrir said:

That's 69 skins!

Nice.

[BB5000]

If I'm not mistaken, in IL-2 1946 (and older), one default skin was used and numbers / letters were imposed on the skin. There was a "MAT manager" utility to select weathering etc of markings.

[Trooper117]

Yep, used that Mat Manager for years!

[MarcoPegase44]

Hello ,
You can predict a skin by winger of your squadron if you do it yourself.
No need in this case to be the squadron commander.
see my post below

Spoiler

 

 

Edited November 27, 2019 by MarcoPegase44

[DD_Fenrir]

39 minutes ago, BB5000 said:

If I'm not mistaken, in IL-2 1946 (and older), one default skin was used and numbers / letters were imposed on the skin. There was a "MAT manager" utility to select weathering etc of markings.

 

Yeah, I used that too. There were a lot of errors in Maddox Games Squadron codes for the Allied units, however it was a good feature. It's a shame something similar is not included in GBS.

[BB5000]

5 minutes ago, DD_Fenrir said:

 

Yeah, I used that too. There were a lot of errors in Maddox Games Squadron codes for the Allied units, however it was a good feature. It's a shame something similar is not included in GBS.

Somehow I think this would speed up mission loading compared to assigning unique skin files to each aircraft, just load the default skin (like vanilla GBS) and then apply the markings. In PWCG you can assign individual skins , but the mission loads much slower than a vanilla GBS career mission, maybe the skin assignment/loadind part has something to do with that..

[Sheriff88]

Looks like I started quite a conversation!

I  have not flown in older legacy IL-2 Sturmovik  series for a while but as I recall in the latest patches  or in SAS Mod you could select skins for up to 4 flights of aircraft. if that was possible in BOX you could create your own skins for selected squadron then assign individual skins to aircraft.