No victories for my squad members?

[shamino]

Hello I think the campaign generator is really great but I find it strange that most of my squadron members do not report any victories even after dozens of missions and that only a couple of them have 1/2 victories. I also tried to adjust the fighter AI to a +1 with no sensibile results. I'm not just talking about my wingmen but also the other members whose results, I think, are fully simulated. Is it a settings problem or maybe just a coincidence? This obviously is not a real problem per se but it makes me look like a top ace (and really this isn't the case!). 

[PatrickAWlson]

Not really odd at all.  Depends on a lot of things.

 

The quality of the pilot.  Different services at different times will produce pilots of varying quality.  If you are in a Russian unit at the beginning of the war it would be quite normal that they have no victories.  It is also quite normal that they will rarely score and die often.  If you enter as a Russian pilot your highly experienced sim self will almost certainly rise to the top quite rapidly.  That is mostly because your German opponents will still be AI, therefore they will suck in ways that real German pilots in 1941 did not suck.

 

Over time Russian initial quality improves while German initial quality degrades.

 

In reality it was an accomplishment for any pilot to shoot down anything.  The fact is that most victories were scored by very few pilots.  For the vast majority of fighter pilots, their role was effectively to act as targets. 

 

Now think of an American ace.  We're talking ace here, a very, very good pilot.  He has 5 victories after his tour.  Quite an accomplishment.  Five victories over a one year tour is less than one victory every two months.  So over the course of Bodenplatte (9 months), your top AI wing mates would be expected to score three or four victories.

 

Your AI mates absolutely can become aces.  On the German side I have had AI pilots get to thirty or forty.  That is much more difficult on the Russian side.  

 

Final note: your AI squadron mates improve as they survive.  The transition from novice to average requires only survival.  From average to veteran requires a couple of victories.  Ace begins with 5 victories.  The more they improve the more likely they are to score more.  Another reason why Germans have the upper hand.  Many German pilots will start at Veteran AI level and some will even be aces.  That is rare on the Russian side early in the war.  So, take care of your AI mates.  You can even give away a victory on occasion by not claiming it.  It will be awarded to an AI flight mate and will help in their progression.

 

 

 

 

[co199]

5 minutes ago, PatrickAWlson said:

You can even give away a victory on occasion by not claiming it.  It will be awarded to an AI flight mate and will help in their progression.

 

I do this a lot - unless I see a plane I killed go down (or catastrophically fail - wing off, etc), I won't claim it. Sometimes you'll shoot up a plane so it bugs out to go home and then crash-lands 15 minutes later. The game will allocate the kill to you in the post mission screen, but I don't mark the claim in PWCG and it usually allocates it to a wingman (or whoever else got hits in).

[shamino]

Thank you very much for the thorough answer!