flying the p-38

[1111mark*norma*]

Here i am coming back from a mission, almost back home when  i see enemy fighters behind us in formation. i'm getting shot  down. No one in my formation does anything. What gives here ?? 

[SharpeXB]

Sometimes your own wingmen don’t spot the enemy. 

[40plus]

AI needs work...It's been a long discussed topic and there is a lot of effort going into it....still a long way to go.

[Y-29.Silky]

This is why I don't play single player, the AI are worthless. You're either getting 10 kills a mission because you have to do everything, or you're getting gang banged because the AI don't do anything.

 

This is aside from their constant turns with perfect trim that make them impossible to hit.

Edited September 13, 2020 by Y-29.Silky

[Zeev]

3 hours ago, Y-29.Silky said:

This is why I don't play single player, the AI are worthless. You're either getting 10 kills a mission because you have to do everything, or you're getting gang banged because the AI don't do anything.

 

This is aside from their constant turns with perfect trim that make them impossible to hit.

I disagree. There are a lot of community made free scripted campaigns and missions that are excellent. When a mission designer tests his missions and knows exactly how to adjust the AI the result is great.
I rarely see the situations you mentioned in either free or paid campaigns or mission packs.
I do agree that there are issues with AI, there are always bugs (in any software), especially the ground attack missions, but overall the single player is enjoyable.
And last thing, this game is great mostly to the awesome work the community does in single player area.

22 hours ago, 1111mark*norma* said:

Here i am coming back from a mission, almost back home when  i see enemy fighters behind us in formation. i'm getting shot  down. No one in my formation does anything. What gives here ?? 

Were the navigation lights turned on of the wingmen? Usually this is the problem, when AI is going to land, he does not care about the enemy on his tail.

Edited September 13, 2020 by Zeev

[JG27_Steini]

10 hours ago, Zeev said:

I disagree. There are a lot of community made free scripted campaigns and missions that are excellent. When a mission designer tests his missions and knows exactly how to adjust the AI the result is great.
I rarely see the situations you mentioned in either free or paid campaigns or mission packs.
I do agree that there are issues with AI, there are always bugs (in any software), especially the ground attack missions, but overall the single player is enjoyable.
And last thing, this game is great mostly to the awesome work the community does in single player area.

Were the navigation lights turned on of the wingmen? Usually this is the problem, when AI is going to land, he does not care about the enemy on his tail.

 

You maybe right in well designed mission. Most common are the normal careers and the AI is just useless in it. It does not attack, it does not warn you, it is only usefull as a shooting dummy.

[Jaegermeister]

On 9/12/2020 at 4:23 PM, 1111mark*norma* said:

Here i am coming back from a mission, almost back home when  i see enemy fighters behind us in formation. i'm getting shot  down. No one in my formation does anything. What gives here ?? 

 

I had that happen before. In one of the later missions in Lightning Strikes at the end of a dogfight, there was an issue where the Player Flight had a high priority home waypoint and the EAC had a medium priority waypoint, so they decided to follow the Player flight all the way back to home base and creep up through the flight that was ignoring them.

 

The AI singling out the Player and ignoring the wingmen is a different problem that still comes up sometimes.

 

If different waypoint priorities gets mixed with AI psychic behavior, the results can be odd.

[grcurmudgeon]

2 hours ago, Jaegermeister said:

The AI singling out the Player and ignoring the wingmen is a different problem that still comes up sometimes.

To be specific, the AI singling out single enemy aircraft is an issue. It's not just the player, I've seen an entire enemy flight fixate on my AI flight leader.

[Taxman]

4 hours ago, grcurmudgeon said:

To be specific, the AI singling out single enemy aircraft is an issue. It's not just the player, I've seen an entire enemy flight fixate on my AI flight leader.

Now that's when you become the hero.  If you can try and get there to help your flight leader, I have been able to score a few victories that way and if damaged enough they will break off and try to get away.  And yea I've had at times 3 or 4 after me, then that's when I try to locate a friendly or 2 and head for them hoping they will engage the enemy.  Another way to get help if they are ganging up on you is to find a friendly air field and hope the AA & AAA will engage them, but that only works if you are over friendly territory. 

 

Yes the AI needs work, but it's a combat flight sim and we must learn to adjust to the situation given us to operate in.

[grcurmudgeon]

Oh definitely, I had great fun in a flight when our 4 MiG-3s were headed back to base and 3 109s jumped us. I peeled off and blew the merge while my 3 buddies blissfully kept flying. They peeled off 1 at a time as the 109s dove into the flight and all of them latched on to the leader, with the 3 of us trailing behind, and the leader blissfully continuing to head for home. I damaged one who got finished off by one of my flight mates, then shot down the second. As we're getting close to base the lead 109 finally gets close enough to fire at the leader, who breaks off and maybe starts to scissor, which leads to a collision with the 109 and they both go in.

[twilson37]

I think a lot of good points have been stated here:

1.) The Career Mode needs work, as stated above the enjoyment level of scripted campaigns and PWCG are far greater than the career mode for several reasons

   a.)   The mission generation of the career mode appears to be way too basic, you would fly to spot X where you may or may not be met by a set number of enemy fighters, these aircraft rarely have a severe height advantage or disadvantage and always meet you when you have gotten to your climbing altitude.

   b.)  At least for me the missions invariably become me flying to an objective away from my squadmates who fly a nice tight formation but do little to mutually support one another.

2.) The AI needs improvement, in my opinion less in the individual flying of the aircraft and more in the group tactics, I would like to see them attempt do a better job of offering mutual support to one another

 

I think these issues are known but are a relatively low priority given they are working on a new game, a new collector plane, bug fixes, and setting a very high bar on airplane flight dynamics.

 

In the meantime, I still find the career mode enjoyable for what it is, I mainly do ground attack campaigns in it where the issues above are less pronounced and use PWCG for fighter career.

 

[RedKestrel]

52 minutes ago, twilson37 said:

 

 

I think these issues are known but are a relatively low priority given they are working on a new game, a new collector plane, bug fixes, and setting a very high bar on airplane flight dynamics.

 

 

They do have a dedicated AI programmer now who is working on improvements to the AI. Working their way up from basics, individual flying, and now if I remember correctly from a recent DD, some more group tactics work. There are AI tweaks and improvements in nearly every patch, some more significant than others.

[smink1701]

The AI is the worst part of this game. I enjoy the eye candy, sightseeing, and updates. I enjoy the community. But I only play SP and after five minutes I am out. Why?  Total boredom. No fun fighting NASCAR, sharp shooting, bots!

[[CPT]Crunch]

Post patch, if you take any guns damage, try dropping flap to full and see what happens to you.  Keep it within limits under 200 indicated so they don't jam.  Enjoy the ride.

[EAF19_Marsh]

It’s hit and miss (pun!). The last time I started a standard game campaign was in a Tempest. The first mission we ran into some D-9s and a nice mixup occurred with my wingman offering some erratic and at times somewhat dangerous help.

 

Second mission, the same thing but we ran into 8 262s. Now, I am pretty sure finding 8 262s together over the Rhein was highly unlikely but...OK. The sad part was what happened next and I will give you only one guess as to which of 2TAF or Luftwaffe had some celebratory pints in the bar that night.

Edited September 24, 2020 by EAF19_Marsh