4.007 DM

[BMA_Hellbender]

 

1 hour ago, US93_Larner said:

But, how are you meant to model your ears popping in a dive? Or being near-sighted or half blind? More importantly, how do you decide who 'suffers' from these conditions? Should it randomly happen that on certain sorties you're near-sighted, or your depth perception is messed up, just because that was the case for some real pilots? Or, should certain profiles just randomly always be near-sighted or half-blind?  

By any means - seeing as the current community focus is the aircraft DM, we can think about that stuff later on! Unless you think that some kind of simulation of these effects would play a significant part in how the DM translates into the MP experience...

 

The DM is affected by human behaviour and human players in this game are for the most part not acting as flesh-and-blood human pilots back in 1918.

 

Right now you are focused on the shedding wings, because it's a very apparent issue when you don't fly as carefully as a real pilot would. You can attempt to give players unfair advantages and disadvantages, both mechanically and physically, which might either force them to fly more carefully, or in some cases even less carefully than the current baseline. For the most part, though, I think we don't need to bother with all of this, and we can treat all pilots as baseline average. And the average pilot, I'm afraid, is not an ace and should not be pulling crazy maneuvers — and if he does he's likely to die. And if he doesn't, he's likely to die, too. Dying was a pretty average affair in WWI air combat.

 

All you need to do is look at the AI: they mostly die very well without ever losing their wings.

 

 

Quote

But, that's not what you were saying. I don't think they lived in constant fear of their planes just, falling apart in the sky, or doing something wildly random and killing them  - as your quote about "being too scared to do anything other than fly coordinated" would suggest you believe.

 

Well, I didn't say that. I said:

 

When people are basically scared to do anything except fly coordinated within gliding distance of a field, even before taking damage (this is how I feel when I fly my Honda Civic), then we'll have a situation that closely mimicks reality, and which pays tribute to the HUGE brass balls which WWI pilots had.

 

I never said they should be TOO scared to do anything. But scared to do anything other than coordinated flight: yes, absolutely. Those machines were not specifically designed for the stresses we routinely subject them too. In my opinion, not even the Fokkers, Pfalz and Bristol. Those are happy construction accidents with unforeseen safety margins. Obviously in multiplayer where everyone flies their plane close to destruction, you're forced to fly your plane to the very edge. And if you don't: you die.

 

Both the flying and the manner in which you die (wingshedding) are completely unhistorical, but shedding wings is realistic if you fly these planes like that.

 

In all likelihood you are up against D.VIIFs quite often and you push your machine to the max without even realising it, because you can. Even so, they will give chase and hunt you down all the way to the deck, because they can. This was not a common occurence at all. So how do you hope to fly "historically" or even die due to "historical causes" if your entire engagement is "not historical" to begin with?

 

 

Quote

If flying over-aggressively to survive an attack was as lethal to airframes as it apparently is in FC, and FC is supposedly now accurate, would that not equate to there being many, many more cases of this appearing in memoirs, both from the scoring pilots' and victims' wingmen's perspectives? 

Here are some possible answers: 

1) Pilots are more aggressive in attacking manoeuvres than they were in reality. 
2) The current DM isn't correctly representing battle damage. 
3) Pilots didn't feel the need to report how their victims / wingmen went down. 
4) Many more planes fell apart than were witnessed and reported on.

 

I'm going to go with:

 

5) Pilots in general are more aggressive in both attacking and defensive maneuver than they were in reality, which leads to wingshedding

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by J5_Hellbender

[Garven]

Should be noted that the Spandau's in game fire at 650 rpm which is the maximum setting for the gun where as they in real life they were normally set to about 450 rpm due to the use of cloth belts.  Allied Vickers mg's used muzzle boosters and disintegrating metallic belts to boost the rate of fire up to 850 rpm (think it is 750 in game not sure).  Theoretically the boosted vickers could be set to 1000rpm.    

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by Danneskjold

[Tycoon]

20 minutes ago, J5_Hellbender said:

 

 

 

 

All you need to do is look at the AI: they mostly die very well without ever losing their wings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is this a joke? 

 

The reason the ai doesn't lose it's wings is because it doesn't turn period.

 

Any noob can curb stomp the ai in any plane on ace setting. Using the ai we have as any example how to fly our planes correctly is beyond stupid.

[Zooropa_Fly]

1 hour ago, US93_Larner said:

But, how are you meant to model your ears popping in a dive? Or being near-sighted or half blind?

 

 

The onus is on us, to upgrade our simpits.

 

[slug_yuugen]

For accuracy shouldn't we also be super hungover?

[Chill31]

You will have to go back to my earlier post about G limits for this to all make sense...

 

Why does the Pfalz have uper G capability?  Because it has a reputation for being a good diver, so they gave it a high G tolerance.  That is all.  No other data played a role in that decision.  Why? There is no other data!  I have one engineer friend who is a Pfalz D3 fanatic, and he calculated the expected G tolerance for it at about 6.5 Gs.  That is ALL you get.

 

I think people here continue to confuse ultimate G limits with dive capability and with damage durability.  These are not all the same.  We have legitimate reports for SPAD G tolerance right around 7 Gs.  We have legitimate reports for Dr.I G limit at 7.7Gs and the D7 at 10.7Gs.  To say that the SPAD, or SE5, or Pfalz is the strongest plane of the war regarding pulling Gs...well, that isn't what the numbers say...

 

How damage is accumulated in the FM/DM is adjusted at a rate based upon where the bullets hit and how many hit.  That is all there is to it.  If your wing could support 7Gs prior to being damaged, then it suffers 30% damage, it is now down to 4.9Gs.  

 

AnP relayed some of the G limits he has programmed for the FMs, and some are higher than I believe they should be based upon my research while some are lower.  

 

I think this discussion needs to focus on a few things for each individual aircraft: ultimate G limit, dive capability, and durability.  Ultimate G limit is difficult to find data to support, but there is SOME out there, likewise with dive capability.  Durability is rather difficult though...

 

[BMA_Hellbender]

33 minutes ago, Tycoon said:

Is this a joke? 

 

The reason the ai doesn't lose it's wings is because it doesn't turn period.

 

Any noob can curb stomp the ai in any plane on ace setting. Using the ai we have as any example how to fly our planes correctly is beyond stupid.

 

NO YOU're the one whose posts are beyond stupid!

 

I apologise, I don't know what's gotten into me. It must be the lockdown and the fact you can't get a decent Belgian beer imported here anymore.

 

 

But before this thread reaches its inevitable conclusion that we're arguing around in circles again and no one's really paying attention anymore, the one point of criticism I will offer is that an open beta for these kind of drastic changes would have offered more insights to the devs and players earlier. Especially since the game is now no longer in beta. Then again: too many cooks etc.

 

Anyway, for 4.008 I expect the front of my Camel to fall off.

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by J5_Hellbender

[JGr2/J5_Klugermann]

 

Quote

 

Anyway, I expect the front of my Camel to fall off.

 

 

 

A shot of Penicillin could prevent that.

Edited June 12, 2020 by J5_Klugermann

[emely]

10 hours ago, unreasonable said:

 

emely perception

Indeed ?

It is a pity that you said too late that you prefer scripting companies and SP mode.  If I knew this, I would not waste so much time talking with you.  Your version of the game has every right to exist, and I do not condemn such a choice.

However, your opinion about the correct and incorrect piloting, about glass wings and other weighting in new new new patches - your opinion does not interest me.  I believe that under such conditions, the value of your opinion regarding the things discussed is, if not zero, then only not much higher.

S!

[JGr2/J5_Klugermann]

6 minutes ago, emely said:

 I believe that under such conditions, the value of your opinion regarding the things discussed is, if not zero, then only not much higher.

S!

 

0.000000000000001 ?

[emely]

1 hour ago, Chill31 said:

 

How damage is accumulated in the FM/DM is adjusted at a rate based upon where the bullets hit and how many hit.  That is all there is to it.  If your wing could support 7Gs prior to being damaged, then it suffers 30% damage, it is now down to 4.9Gs.  

This is the whole problem.  More precisely, the problem is in the methods of calculating damage.

I'm flying on an airplane, its maximum permissible load is 6G.  I perform a turn with a 3G load, this is 50% of the maximum.  During this turn, three bullets with a total damage of 1% get into my plane and the wing falls off.

What are those guys talking about trying to prove to me that I'm flying wrong?  In their opinion, should I never exceed 1G?  But this is nonsense!

[US63_SpadLivesMatter]

1 hour ago, J5_Hellbender said:

open beta

 

You could argue that this thread is a perfect reason why such a thing should not be introduced to this community.

[No.23_Triggers]

2 hours ago, slug_yuugen said:

Presumably they are modeled in a probabilistic manner in the similar manner to the spars. Hits on a hitbox essentially roll against a probability of hitting the elements that are covered by that box then also roll for damage.

Right! That was my interpretation from the Update log. From my initial first impressions, I can't help but think the severing of control wires has been initially (it's a brand new feature, after all!) over-modelled. Although, I have to say that this is only my perception. 

Even if you did hit a control wire - not probable, and in the case of tail surfaces from the six O'Clock, nearly impossible? - I would think that you would have to hit a wire bang-on in the centre to cut it with a rifle-calibre bullet, without it simply ricocheting off! So, even if you did hit a control wire, it could easily just skim off it!
 

 

2 hours ago, J5_Hellbender said:

The DM is affected by human behaviour and human players in this game are for the most part not acting as flesh-and-blood human pilots back in 1918.

 

Right now you are focused on the shedding wings, because it's a very apparent issue when you don't fly as carefully as a real pilot would. You can attempt to give players unfair advantages and disadvantages, both mechanically and physically, which might either force them to fly more carefully, or in some cases even less carefully than the current baseline. For the most part, though, I think we don't need to bother with all of this, and we can treat all pilots as baseline average. And the average pilot, I'm afraid, is not an ace and should not be pulling crazy maneuvers — and if he does he's likely to die. And if he doesn't, he's likely to die, too. Dying was a pretty average affair in WWI air combat.

 

All you need to do is look at the AI: they mostly die very well without ever losing their wings.

I don't really think that players not flying like real 1918 pilots can really be "fixed" (for want of a better word). After all, sitting at a PC is hardly comparable to the real thing. For that reason, there are certain intricate aspects of reality (nausea, ears popping, near-sightedness, etc) that I'm not bothering to apply to FC, because, well, I don't see the point in doing so. 

I appreciate what you're getting at by saying FC pilots don't fly as carefully as the real pilots did - but I don't think that the real pilots did fly carefully, when they had an enemy on their tail and actively trying to kill them. I think they got the hell out of the way of the MGs at their back however they could - because the alternative was to be shot. If I was to analyse my flying in FC - I'd say I'm actually over-careful with the SPAD. I don't like long attacking dives, and I don't like over-aggressive manoeuvres, I cut the throttle in descents when I really don't need to at all. The only time I'll really get moving in a SPAD (and I know that I really am pushing it) is when I have an EA close on my tail that I can't get rid of. And the only reason I'll push the plane hard is because if I don't, then I'm going to get shot in the back of the head. And, yes, I get worried when the wings are  shot-up, and will do everything I can to avoid piling on the Gs - but sometimes you have to push it harder than you are comfortable with, because not doing so is certain death via gunfire.  

Like you say - the AI die very well without losing their wings! They also die easily, because they just don't manoeuvre enough to get clear of your guns. 

Here's a quote from A.G Lee about one dogfight he was involved in. Personally, I think it doesn't sound overly dissimilar from what an FC Camel pilot would do in a tight spot (although, A.G.L was in a Pup in this particular instance). I've stuck it in a spoiler because it's fairly long. I've highlighted parts that I think are relevant in bold: 
 

Spoiler

At first I cannot see how many there are and I don't really care, all I'm thinking about is avoiding being hit. Tracers whizz past me, alongside, to port, to starboard, above, below. I seem to be enveloped in them, but miraculously none hits me. I know it can be fatal to swerve to change direction, for if I bank from one turn to the other I offer an instant's sitting target, so I continue my steep turning to the right, meanwhile out of the corner of my eye trying to get my bearings and spot my attacker. 

Tracers flash by me again, and the crackle of bullets is so close that I cringe into my cockpit. But the D-III can't turn as tightly as I can, can't get his guns on to me. Another D-III speeds at an angle across my front, turning away. I glimpse the curving underside, the pale blue wings, the black cross on the fin. He is about a hundred yards away. Instinctively I turn after him, still in a steep turn, and at once find his tail and fin in the ring sight. 

I press the trigger, tracers jump out towards him, enter his fuselage halfway up, I edge them towards the pilot--then crack-ak-ak behind me, I jerk the stick back into my belly, the Pup suddenly kicks sharply and dips down--I have flown into the blue Hun's slipstream. But my attacker is thrown off and I level out, still on a turn. The blue Hun has gone, but another is firing at me from three-quarters astern, much too accurately, the tracers slip between the wings to port, two yards from me. I kick the rudder and skid clear. I think Christ, I'll never get out of this, I've not had time to draw breath yet.

Dazedly I glimpse other machines banking round me, but I don't have time to count. A mottled Hun comes across my front firing at a Pup. I swing after him, give him a deflection shot, twenty rounds, the tracers seem to go right into the engine, he lifts suddenly and climbs away. I try to follow, the Pup hangs on the prop, but just can't climb any steeper. 

Suddenly the general crackle of guns increases. But the Albatroses are pulling away. I see them now - only four. And I see why they're bolting. A trio of F.E.2bs has spotted the fight and come wading in, their gunners hosing the Hun with long streams of tracer. 

[Fast-forwarding down the page a bit] 

We still have half an hour's patrol to do, and Joske resumes our beat up and down the lines. Within two minutes, Odell gives the distress signal and glides away westwards. His engine has been damaged, as we learn afterwards. We also learn that we have all taken punishment, but one has been hit in a vital spot.





 

 

 

2 hours ago, J5_Hellbender said:

Well, I didn't say that. I said:

 

When people are basically scared to do anything except fly coordinated within gliding distance of a field, even before taking damage (this is how I feel when I fly my Honda Civic), then we'll have a situation that closely mimicks reality, and which pays tribute to the HUGE brass balls which WWI pilots had.

 

I never said they should be TOO scared to do anything. But scared to do anything other than coordinated flight: yes, absolutely. Those machines were not specifically designed for the stresses we routinely subject them too. In my opinion, not even the Fokkers, Pfalz and Bristol. Those are happy construction accidents with unforeseen safety margins. Obviously in multiplayer where everyone flies their plane close to destruction, you're forced to fly your plane to the very edge. And if you don't: you die.

I can't agree with the idea that, in general, pilots were scared to do anything other than coordinated flight. I'm sure some might have been - but I've never had the impression that pilots were nervous of any kind of serious manoeuvring. I can imagine that pilots might have been scared of extreme manoeuvres - which, of course, they wouldn't mess around with until it was life-or-death. But Scout pilots being scared to do any sort of manoeuvring past coordinated turns? I don't think so.

Neither did Charles J. Biddle, apparently:

Spoiler

Am I misinterpreting what you mean? 

 

 

2 hours ago, J5_Hellbender said:

Both the flying and the manner in which you die (wingshedding) are completely unhistorical, but shedding wings is realistic if you fly these planes like that.

In all likelihood you are up against D.VIIFs quite often and you push your machine to the max without even realising it, because you can. Even so, they will give chase and hunt you down all the way to the deck, because they can. This was not a common occurence at all. So how do you hope to fly "historically" or even die due to "historical causes" if your entire engagement is "not historical" to begin with?

What does this have to do with wingshedding? 
 

1 hour ago, Chill31 said:

I think this discussion needs to focus on a few things for each individual aircraft: ultimate G limit, dive capability, and durability.  Ultimate G limit is difficult to find data to support, but there is SOME out there, likewise with dive capability.  Durability is rather difficult though...

 

Going off topic a little - would you or any of your contacts happen to have any sources on the SPAD's diving capability (Max speed, etc)? If so, could you shoot me a PM? I've been trying to find out any info on just how quick the SPAD was in a dive, but it's hard to come by! 

Edited June 12, 2020 by US93_Larner

[Tycoon]

21 minutes ago, emely said:

This is the whole problem.  More precisely, the problem is in the methods of calculating damage.

I'm flying on an airplane, its maximum permissible load is 6G.  I perform a turn with a 3G load, this is 50% of the maximum.  During this turn, three bullets with a total damage of 1% get into my plane and the wing falls off.

What are those guys talking about trying to prove to me that I'm flying wrong?  In their opinion, should I never exceed 1G?  But this is nonsense!

This is a realistic simulator, go play Battlefield if you want arcade.

 

 

[slug_yuugen]

8 minutes ago, US93_Larner said:

Right! That was my interpretation from the Update log. From my initial first impressions, I can't help but think the severing of control wires has been initially (it's a brand new feature, after all!) over-modelled. Although, I have to say that this is only my perception. 

Even if you did hit a control wire - not probable, and in the case of tail surfaces from the six O'Clock, nearly impossible? - I would think that you would have to hit a wire bang-on in the centre to cut it with a rifle-calibre bullet, without it simply ricocheting off! So, even if you did hit a control wire, it could easily just skim off it!

 

It's basically all inscrutable. I'd caution that adding in a new feature you've not had to deal with before is always going to feel over-modeled though. I wish a bit more detail was given about how it works and some examples. Like is it (volume of wire in hitbox)/(hitbox volume) to hit or something else? I feel that this at least is interesting as a thing to deal with versus losing wings but all of these things essentially lead to less predictable outcomes particularly in WW1 aircraft where lucky shots can be quite dominating to engagements.

[No.23_Triggers]

14 minutes ago, slug_yuugen said:

 

It's basically all inscrutable. I'd caution that adding in a new feature you've not had to deal with before is always going to feel over-modeled though. I wish a bit more detail was given about how it works and some examples. Like is it (volume of wire in hitbox)/(hitbox volume) to hit or something else? I feel that this at least is interesting as a thing to deal with versus losing wings but all of these things essentially lead to less predictable outcomes particularly in WW1 aircraft where lucky shots can be quite dominating to engagements.

That's a fair point! And yeah, it would be nice to have a little more info about how the new control surface damage works. 

That being said - one of the No.20 guys reported that he flew five sorties on the last Thursday Fly-In, and suffered control surface jamming / failure on all five, and both Drookasi and Baer reported having their controls shot out in an estimated two hits, with no prior damage. 

Perhaps just an unlucky start? 

Probably best for me to give it some time before making any big conclusions! 

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by US93_Larner

[slug_yuugen]

Any idea of how thick the control cables are? For example a 3mm thick cable passing straight through a 1m cube has a volume of 2.83x10^-5 m^3 volume so an over-modeled chance of control wire hit in that case would be approximately 0.00003% chance. It's over-modeled because the bullet itself will travel along a track through the volume so the actual chance of hitting depends on how the bullet enters the volume and must also be modeled as a cylinder. If for example we simplify and say any bullet hitting is going to go straight as well (we could pick the biggest dimension or calculate the actual straight path) then then volume of a 7mm track is 1.54x10^-4 or occupies 0.0002% of the volume. So the combined probability of them intersecting is 0.000000006‬% which is quite unlikely.

 

NB: I'm doing this whilst drinking a beer and watching a Smurf's movie with my kids so things might be quite wrong and I think they probably are given we're looking for overlap and I'm just comparing volumes.

 

Edit: Whoops made things twice as thick as they should be so this is still an overestimate for the example.

Edited June 12, 2020 by slug_yuugen

[NO.20_W_M_Thomson]

I hope this new DM will be fixed or removed, how does 1 burst take out all 3 of your controls? 

[HagarTheHorrible]

It's interesting how, all of a sudden, it's not just the Allies who are scratching their collective heads over the probability of hitting wires, that aren't actually modelled, when shooting at an area of aircraft in which they may, or may not, be contained. ?  Maybe there is now a more universal understanding of the shock and horror felt by Allied pilots in the previous patch.

[Chill31]

2 hours ago, US93_Larner said:

Going off topic a little - would you or any of your contacts happen to have any sources on the SPAD's diving capability (Max speed, etc)? If so, could you shoot me a PM? I've been trying to find out any info on just how quick the SPAD was in a dive, but it's hard to come by! 

 

I will check.

 

1 hour ago, US93_Larner said:

That being said - one of the No.20 guys reported that he flew five sorties on the last Thursday Fly-In, and suffered control surface jamming / failure on all five, and both Drookasi and Baer reported having their controls shot out in an estimated two hits, with no prior damage. 

Perhaps just an unlucky start?

I flew 3 Camel and 2 SE5 sorties last night.  I had controls jam once, and half of my elevator shot away once. No wing shedding despite dogfighting my SE5 against J30Hangmans D7F.  I watch the G meter like a hawk though, NEVER more than 5 Gs. Damaged? 4Gs or less.  I got away from the D7F by diving out after a vertical head on pass, only then did I find out my elevator (half of it) was jammed. Ill try to find a way to post my track.

 

I think guys are used to diving at 200mph and then pulling off target with 6 or 7 Gs, even when damaged.

 

 

1 hour ago, slug_yuugen said:

Any idea of how thick the control cables are? For example a 3mm thick cable passing straight through a 1m cube has a volume of 2.83x10^-5 m^3 volume so an over-modeled chance of control wire hit in that case would be approximately 0.00003% chance. It's over-modeled because the bullet itself will travel along a track through the volume so the actual chance of hitting depends on how the bullet enters the volume and must also be modeled as a cylinder. If for example we simplify and say any bullet hitting is going to go straight as well (we could pick the biggest dimension or calculate the actual straight path) then then volume of a 7mm track is 1.54x10^-4 or occupies 0.0002% of the volume. So the combined probability of them intersecting is 0.000000006‬% which is quite unlikely. 

The cables on WWI planes will be 3 to 4 mm thick.  I understand that it seems unlikely, but aircraft manufacturers were building airplanes with redundant control cables...the Dr1 and Bristol fighter being examples of that.  If it was a .000000006% chance, why bother making them that way?

[Cynic_Al]

34 minutes ago, NO.20_W_M_Thomson said:

I hope this new DM will be fixed or removed, how does 1 burst take out all 3 of your controls? 

 

The first bullet hits the rudderbar pivot and the second hits the control column gimbal.

[No.23_Starling]

This new DM is comic. The DM feels like the Star Wars films, and now they’ve given it to Disney. First two sorties online, two bursts, two broken controls. Extending in the Spad was hilarious. One puff - no rudder. If those Dviifs used 20mm cannon I’d get it.

 

Also had 2 entente vs 10 central (with one entente person who usually flies central)! Lol

[DakkaDakkaDakka]

2 hours ago, Tycoon said:

This is a realistic simulator, go play Battlefield if you want arcade.

 

Sure, but that begs the question: are these shedding wings and easy-to-disable controls realistic?

 

Also, player enjoyment is an important thing. Right now, after 4.006 and 4.007, it's clearly suffering, and needs to be adjusted. Players need to be willing to adapt, too, but to expect them to just accept whatever is unrealistic and shortsighted.

[BMA_Hellbender]

44 minutes ago, US93_Rummell said:

This new DM is comic. The DM feels like the Star Wars films, and now they’ve given it to Disney. First two sorties online, two bursts, two broken controls. Extending in the Spad was hilarious. One puff - no rudder. If those Dviifs used 20mm cannon I’d get it.

 

Also had 2 entente vs 10 central (with one entente person who usually flies central)! Lol

 

Interesting. I've been thinking of flying online again recently, for Entente if necessary, though I'd like to spend a bit more time with the vanilla D.VII.

 

I'd be curious to know if the balance of power has shifted towards Central if they don't have the F. Something tells me that both the vanilla D.VII and Dr.I are still mostly Camel and SPAD fodder unless they get lucky during the merge.

[Chill31]

6 minutes ago, J5_Hellbender said:

 

Interesting. I've been thinking of flying online again recently, for Entente if necessary, though I'd like to spend a bit more time with the vanilla D.VII.

 

I'd be curious to know if the balance of power has shifted towards Central if they don't have the F. Something tells me that both the vanilla D.VII and Dr.I are still mostly Camel and SPAD fodder unless they get lucky during the merge.

The D7F is the only saving grace for the German side.  The Dr.I is capable, but it requires surprise to be really effective. Otherwise, your enemy just runs away.  I can fight a Dr.I against a Camel, because Camels are only good at one thing: turning. 

 

I will say this, the Camel in FC is far too stable. Pitching up and down has NO gyroscopic effect, and it has almost no adverse yaw.  

 

There should be a new Camel flying here in the US by next year. Hopefully, we will get some wonderful insights to its handling. 

[J2_Bidu]

3 hours ago, slug_yuugen said:

Any idea of how thick the control cables are? For example a 3mm thick cable passing straight through a 1m cube has a volume of 2.83x10^-5 m^3 volume so an over-modeled chance of control wire hit in that case would be approximately 0.00003% chance. It's over-modeled because the bullet itself will travel along a track through the volume so the actual chance of hitting depends on how the bullet enters the volume and must also be modeled as a cylinder. If for example we simplify and say any bullet hitting is going to go straight as well (we could pick the biggest dimension or calculate the actual straight path) then then volume of a 7mm track is 1.54x10^-4 or occupies 0.0002% of the volume. So the combined probability of them intersecting is 0.000000006‬% which is quite unlikely.

 

NB: I'm doing this whilst drinking a beer and watching a Smurf's movie with my kids so things might be quite wrong and I think they probably are given we're looking for overlap and I'm just comparing volumes.

 

Edit: Whoops made things twice as thick as they should be so this is still an overestimate for the example.

 

My math is a bit different. I may have screwed up... please check. Of course this is all approximate.

 

A bullet that is shot from six and passes through the lateral (vertical) zone where you have wires is entering through an area of 2.6m (width) * 1.1 m (height), that's 2,915,000 mm^2.

The diagonal from one corner to the other is SQRT (2.6^2 + 1.1^2) = 2.82m = 2820mm

I'm taking wire thickness as roughly 10mm. This is based on visual observation of the game model, in Gimp. ? Coincidentally, the caliber of a bullet is not much different.

The (flat, visual) area occupied by one diagonal cable as seen from behind is 2820*10 = 28200 mm^2.

The likelihood of a bullet cutting one of the cables is roughly 28200 /  2,915,000 = 0.00967.

You have 4 crossed cables in that area (actually two of them are double, let's forget that). So the probability of it cutting one of the wires is 0.0386 = 0.00967 * 4.

That means the expected number of bullets you need to shoot to cut one of the diagonal wires is about 26, provided it passes between those struts where you have wires.

 

 

29 minutes ago, J5_Hellbender said:

Something tells me that both the vanilla D.VII and Dr.I are still mostly Camel and SPAD fodder unless they get lucky during the merge.

 

I don't fear any Camel in my DR1! ?

 

...

 

...

 

I fear some specific Camels. ?

Edited June 12, 2020 by J2_Bidu

[BMA_Hellbender]

1 minute ago, Chill31 said:

The D7F is the only saving grace for the German side.  The Dr.I is capable, but it requires surprise to be really effective. Otherwise, your enemy just runs away.  I can fight a Dr.I against a Camel, because Camels are only good at one thing: turning. 

 

I will say this, the Camel in FC is far too stable. Pitching up and down has NO gyroscopic effect, and it has almost no adverse yaw.  

 

There should be a new Camel flying here in the US by next year. Hopefully, we will get some wonderful insights to its handling. 

 

 

I agree, though I've stopped playing multiplayer before 4.005 and it's hard to deduce what the effect is of the DM changes and the new 4.007 control cable DM on the planeset from single player alone.

 

Since nothing has changed in terms of handling, it's safe to say that under ideal circumstances the Camel still walks over everything that isn't a Fokker D.VIIF (especially below 1000m), simply because it can avoid getting damaged during the merge and then stay out of harm's way until it turns the enemy to death. The Dr.I it can fly away from. The vanilla D.VII is what interests me most because they have almost the exact same top speed, though the Camel climbs better and obviously turns way better. Still, if the D.VII could get wing hits during a merge... and if the Camel's fuel would be locked to something like 75%... ...and if the D.VII pilot throws his machine around enough... and if the Camel pilot still insists to turn as tight as possible and maybe overstresses...

 

It's a lot of ifs, ands or buts. Hehe, buts.

 

The truth is that you're likely right and that the D.VIIF needs to stay and Entente needs to avoid them. I'd recommend Bristols, lots and lots of Bristols, but since the Fokkers are the least affected by the new DM, they're probably not the best option either. Against Albies it's just murder at this point. Yeah, fun planeset.

 

So how about that Volume 2?

[slug_yuugen]

2 hours ago, Chill31 said:

The cables on WWI planes will be 3 to 4 mm thick.  I understand that it seems unlikely, but aircraft manufacturers were building airplanes with redundant control cables...the Dr1 and Bristol fighter being examples of that.  If it was a .000000006% chance, why bother making them that way?

This is the chance on a 1m cubed volume with a single piece of cable running through it just to illustrate the way volume makes these things end up probabilistically. Which is essentially the chance of a 14mm projectile hitting a 6mm cable in 1 sqm of air is pretty remote when both can be anywhere crossing the 1 sqm. I also accidentally used the diameter of the cables instead of the radius in my volume calculations so this is an over estimate. In essence it is the probability of a 1m run of 6mm crossing a 1m run of 14mm where they both lie on one of the principal axis.

 

Obviously when you consider the wings and the fuselage the number of cables increases and the volume is different depending on the section a bullet hits. Then you have pulleys and other structural elements which if lost make the cable a floppy lost piece of string. A lot of these probably constitute more volume than the cable itself. Although we’re also not modelling secondary elements that might replace them albeit with increased friction and slop. Further the actual likelihood is enhanced by the normal attack positions because the cables are naturally laid out in certain directions. For example shooting from dead six up through the plane increases the chance of hitting elevator cables purely because their length is obviously going to be principally along it.

 

As for redundancy it’s just the law of large numbers. Granting that mine are optimistic but if you are flying a bunch of planes getting shot at regularly where losing experienced crew and aircraft is important resilience is important. And further if the Dr1 and Bristol have such redundancy they should be far and away less susceptible to control loss than other aircraft.

Edited June 12, 2020 by slug_yuugen

[No.23_Triggers]

2 hours ago, Chill31 said:

I flew 3 Camel and 2 SE5 sorties last night.  I had controls jam once, and half of my elevator shot away once. No wing shedding despite dogfighting my SE5 against J30Hangmans D7F.  I watch the G meter like a hawk though, NEVER more than 5 Gs. Damaged? 4Gs or less.  I got away from the D7F by diving out after a vertical head on pass, only then did I find out my elevator (half of it) was jammed. Ill try to find a way to post my track.

 

I think guys are used to diving at 200mph and then pulling off target with 6 or 7 Gs, even when damaged.

It's surprisingly easy to do, actually...found out when the G-counter was implemented that one of my "Aggressive" dives (being more heavy-handed than usual) was easily pulling 6G. Was actually a bit surprised.  My 'typical' recovery from a long power-dive (anywhere between 210-220 mph) is about 4G. These days if the wing's damaged I flinch if it goes above 3G coming out of one of those dives! 

Edited June 12, 2020 by US93_Larner

[slug_yuugen]

36 minutes ago, J2_Bidu said:

 

My math is a bit different. I may have screwed up... please check. Of course this is all approximate.

 

A bullet that is shot from six and passes through the lateral (vertical) zone where you have wires is entering through an area of 2.6m (width) * 1.1 m (height), that's 2,915,000 mm^2.

The diagonal from one corner to the other is SQRT (2.6^2 + 1.1^2) = 2.82m = 2820mm

I'm taking wire thickness as roughly 10mm. This is based on visual observation of the game model, in Gimp. ? Coincidentally, the caliber of a bullet is not much different.

The (flat, visual) area occupied by one diagonal cable as seen from behind is 2820*10 = 28200 mm^2.

The likelihood of a bullet cutting one of the cables is roughly 28200 /  2,915,000 = 0.00967.

You have 4 crossed cables in that area (actually two of them are double, let's forget that). So the probability of it cutting one of the wires is 0.0386 = 0.00967 * 4.

That means the expected number of bullets you need to shoot to cut one of the diagonal wires is about 26, provided it passes between those struts where you have wires.

Sorry I was talking about control cables that move the rudder, elevator and ailerons rather than the wires in the truss. I’d note though that assuming shots from the six (let alone other positions) have no depth and only considering area is going to give overly positive results. The important thing about volume is that there is another multiple of all the space you considered to miss into.

 

The spatial organisation of bits is also why a probabilistic model needs more refinement than you might think. Essentially you want to know the probability for a bullet strike from the specific direction.

Edited June 12, 2020 by slug_yuugen

[Chill31]

28 minutes ago, J2_Bidu said:

 

My math is a bit different. I may have screwed up... please check. Of course this is all approximate.

 

A bullet that is shot from six and passes through the lateral (vertical) zone where you have wires is entering through an area of 2.6m (width) * 1.1 m (height), that's 2,915,000 mm^2.

The diagonal from one corner to the other is SQRT (2.6^2 + 1.1^2) = 2.82m = 2820mm

I'm taking wire thickness as roughly 10mm. This is based on visual observation of the game model, in Gimp. ? Coincidentally, the caliber of a bullet is not much different.

The (flat, visual) area occupied by one diagonal cable as seen from behind is 2820*10 = 28200 mm^2.

The likelihood of a bullet cutting one of the cables is roughly 28200 /  2,915,000 = 0.00967.

You have 4 crossed cables in that area (actually two of them are double, let's forget that). So the probability of it cutting one of the wires is 0.0386 = 0.00967 * 4.

That means the expected number of bullets you need to shoot to cut one of the diagonal wires is about 26, provided it passes between those struts where you have wires.

 

 

 

I don't fear any Camel in my DR1! ?

 

...

 

...

 

I fear some specific Camels. ?

You should use 3 or 4 mm cable for your calculations 

[J2_Bidu]

10 minutes ago, Chill31 said:

You should use 3 or 4 mm cable for your calculations 

 

Wow, that's way less. It seems the in-game depiction is a bit thick...

I'm wondering if it will make much difference given an 8mm bullet.

 

15 minutes ago, slug_yuugen said:

I’d note though that assuming shots from the six (let alone other positions) have no depth and only considering area is going to give overly positive results. The important thing about volume is that there is another multiple of all the space you considered to miss into.

 

I know the full calculations are much more complicated. I just wanted to get the simplified case of shooting from six right. Ignoring the volume in this case is not wrong, because the bullet travels the whole depth. Hitting the 3D cable in the 3D space is just the same as hitting the 2D cable in the 2D space, in this case.

Edited June 12, 2020 by J2_Bidu

[US63_SpadLivesMatter]

Welcome to a game where you share a damage model with planes that expected to get hit by 20 and 30mm.

 

Just flew for quite a while with some friends and the control strikes seem a bit frequent to say the least.  I guess it must be all those "last seen falling out of control" kill claims and such.

Edited June 12, 2020 by US63_SpadLivesMatter

[slug_yuugen]

20 minutes ago, J2_Bidu said:

 

Wow, that's way less. It seems the in-game depiction is a bit thick...

 

I know the full calculations are much more complicated. I just wanted to get the simplified case of shooting from six right. Ignoring the volume in this case is not wrong, because the bullet travels the whole depth. Hitting the 3D cable in the 3D space is just the same as hitting the 2D cable in the 2D space, in this case.

 
It is but the chances of flinging 26 rounds straight down the pipe are vanishingly rare and if you take depth into account for the same random distribution you need a lot more rounds. Let alone accounting for a distribution of fire that is less random (e.g. most people squeezing off a burst aren’t liberally spraying the entire wing section).

 

The diameter question is also a good example in the 2D case diameters relationship to area is linear but in the 3D case it’s squared in relation to volume.

Edited June 12, 2020 by slug_yuugen

[ST_Catchov]

6 hours ago, slug_yuugen said:

For accuracy shouldn't we also be super hungover?

 

Who says we aren't? I have all day to prepare. But I only do it for accuracy. 

[SeaW0lf]

No matter how people are trying to explain or defend the new damage model, it is clear that it is not working. Players are gone. It players are gone, something is wrong with it. There is no two ways about it. Before these updates we could fly on prime time almost every day with a good crowd. Nowadays I check Flugpark by curiosity, since I’m not playing FC anymore, and it is always empty. The crowd is gone except during the events. And it makes sense. People don't want to be flying and having WTF moments all the time.

 

Regarding Gs, any good Camel pilot will go easy on the Gs because of the g-lock, which is prevalent on the Camel. It is not related to how people fly. We were not used to the physiology at first but we gave the benefit of the doubt and we adapted. But not this. We are experienced enough to understand that we can't get any hits anymore. And on top of that the planes shake, and with every update they add another hit failure and the planes became a Christmas three of failures. So what’s new? Nothing. People are flying with glass planes. These WWI planes don’t have cannons, not even 50 cal. So then people start to ask for bullet dispersion, this and that. When people are going to start asking for ambient flak?

 

One thing is for sure. People are stopping to play the game, something that some of us here fought for a couple years, with servers working hard to host missions and players seeding hard every day to have a crowd. I know the MO, the same happened to ROF, so I'm not losing any sleep over this, but it is sad nonetheless.

[NO.20_W_M_Thomson]

1 hour ago, J5_Hellbender said:

I'd recommend Bristols, lots and lots of Bristols, but since the Fokkers are the least affected by the new DM, they're probably not the best option either. Against Albies it's just murder at this point. Yeah, fun planeset.

The new DM has turned the mighty Bristol into a whimpering bundle of sticks. Sorry but shooting out the controls like you can is just way to easy. But sure we can all stay way from the D7F. no one cross the lines and hide away until we see a lonely alb fly over our lines we can snack on, Would be a terrible sight to see for sure, bunch of rabid dogs on bambie. But what do you do when your hungry for some meat. Would be awful to see the 93rd pg fighting the 20's for that alb. we can be snarly when you go for our food,

 

And Hellbender why don't you fly online again? If you do come online come fly the Bristol with us as a guest, If understand right you like the Bristol.

1 hour ago, Chill31 said:

Something tells me that both the vanilla D.VII and Dr.I are still mostly Camel and SPAD fodder unless they get lucky during the merge

  I don't agree with this, maybe if your 1 fokker against a squad but 3 or 4 dr1's will and can take on a good many Spads and would be pretty even with the same amount of camels, we seen on 103 Baer's stream how many Spads it took to take down 1 DR1, he may be a good DR1 pilot but theirs a lot of good DR1 pilots now I'm sure. Try that many D7's as the spad group was against 1 camel, bet it's a much different out come. 

[unreasonable]

7 hours ago, Chill31 said:

You will have to go back to my earlier post about G limits for this to all make sense...

 

Why does the Pfalz have uper G capability?  Because it has a reputation for being a good diver, so they gave it a high G tolerance.  That is all.  No other data played a role in that decision.  Why? There is no other data!  I have one engineer friend who is a Pfalz D3 fanatic, and he calculated the expected G tolerance for it at about 6.5 Gs.  That is ALL you get.

 

I think people here continue to confuse ultimate G limits with dive capability and with damage durability.  These are not all the same.  We have legitimate reports for SPAD G tolerance right around 7 Gs.  We have legitimate reports for Dr.I G limit at 7.7Gs and the D7 at 10.7Gs.  To say that the SPAD, or SE5, or Pfalz is the strongest plane of the war regarding pulling Gs...well, that isn't what the numbers say...

 

How damage is accumulated in the FM/DM is adjusted at a rate based upon where the bullets hit and how many hit.  That is all there is to it.  If your wing could support 7Gs prior to being damaged, then it suffers 30% damage, it is now down to 4.9Gs.  

 

AnP relayed some of the G limits he has programmed for the FMs, and some are higher than I believe they should be based upon my research while some are lower.  

 

I think this discussion needs to focus on a few things for each individual aircraft: ultimate G limit, dive capability, and durability.  Ultimate G limit is difficult to find data to support, but there is SOME out there, likewise with dive capability.  Durability is rather difficult though...

 

 

Agree with that completely except that the part in bold is inconsistent with AnP's description of the DM and his own test design.  The damage is hit box specific, not generic to the whole wing.  The wing breaks in the area you are shooting at, not anywhere at random.  So even if every hit box starts with the same limit,  it matters a great deal whether damage to the whole wing is spread over the whole wing or concentrated in one hitbox. 

 

Edited June 13, 2020 by unreasonable

[emely]

2 hours ago, J5_Hellbender said:

 

Interesting. I've been thinking of flying online again recently, for Entente if necessary, though I'd like to spend a bit more time with the vanilla D.VII.

How sad, it turns out that you also study kung fu only from pictures, and you don’t even visit the gym ?

3 hours ago, US93_Rummell said:

This new DM is comic. The DM feels like the Star Wars films, and now they’ve given it to Disney. First two sorties online, two bursts, two broken controls. Extending in the Spad was hilarious. One puff - no rudder. If those Dviifs used 20mm cannon I’d get it.

There were no players at Flugpark tonight.  I have not seen this for several months.  Obviously, new conditions made the game so real that players are afraid to fly ;-)))

3 hours ago, US93_Rummell said:

 

Also had 2 entente vs 10 central (with one entente person who usually flies central)! Lol

This balance has become a frequent occurrence by the end of prime time.  Beginners go to bed, and among the veterans there are few fools to fly behind the Entente with the central ones.  They should not be blamed, because they want fun, we all come there just for that.  And for the Entente, pleasure can only be obtained with a large number of players and an equal balance.

After these realistic patches, I often get a not quite equal balance in the game.  At the time of the battle in this video, it was 1x3.  I was looking for these guys for quite a while, and I had no desire and no time yet to get clever, to run away from the three, as apparently all the lovers of realism in the game do.  I knew that I would not win, but I did not expect to lose so quickly.

 

 

This is the same case when the aircraft is in a bend and is experiencing a perfectly acceptable load for it.  But a couple of bullets that hit him cause a breakdown of the wing.

Tomorrow we have a FiF session.  I have no desire to take part in it with the new conditions of the game.  But I will try to come, because I promised to do this to those few of our pilots who have not stopped flying to the FC.

 

[ST_Catchov]

8 hours ago, US93_Larner said:

there are plenty of pilots who really enjoy the 'game within the game' of taking a V-Life as far as they can. I'm one of them, and I can tell you - I very much have a regard for my own "Life" when doing so! In fact, if you've got a really good streak that you've been building for weeks, or even months, any combat is nerve-wracking as hell. My current streak is far beyond what I ever expected to be able to achieve - and it's reached the point where I get nervous before I've even ran into any enemies. I get nervous that I'll mess up a take-off or a landing and kill myself, I get nervous that I'll be unlucky with the flak, I get nervous that I haven't seen someone who's getting ready to bounce me, I get nervous I'm being too aggressive with my manoeuvres after taking damage, etc. etc. etc. 

It's not a legitimate fear of actual death - it's not even remotely in the same realm - but I really, really, don't want to be killed and lose my V-Life. Surviving is way more important than scoring victories for me...but, I am actively trying to "add to my score". And a lot of guys who really enjoy the 'v-life game' are the same way. Most of the other 3rd P.G. pilots are, too. 

 

I watched the latest Thursday night shindigs vid from @US103_Baer (well bits of it) and it is very evident that you guys value your v-life a lot. Do not engage unless you have a sizeable advantage, and even then watch out. Or, runaway, go west young man. The tension is palpable. So, DM Wing shedding and cable popping discussions aside (just for a moment), that is exactly how I'd behave if I was a dashing, stiff upper lipped pilot in WW1. In fact, I'd be a happy lad to finish a sortie without seeing, let alone engaging, the enemy and return to base unscathed. Then off to the bordello. Of course, if you had a crazy CO with a death wish that may be hard to accomplish.

 

So to me, what you guys do is realistic, and if that is influenced by the latest DM's, so be it. Also, pilots on the verge of leave, would be loathe to fly at all for fear of something, anything, going wrong. So the nervousness you describe is close to the truth I think.

 

And that guy (was it Baer?) with jammed elevator in a vertical dive with no way out and screaming the f(uck) word a lot even after death was very entertaining. Not to him of course, and I see his point about the apparent fragility of control cables. But that's another story ….