AP Fix

June 28, 2021

52 minutes ago, Denum said:

DVD system is not a reliable indication of damage as per Jason. You can circle damage on aircraft all you want. It doesn't prove anything. Because it is a DECAL system intermixed with the old damage system. Also. Due to how the game is designed. I can clearly see the elevator and rudder took the brunt of that. Sorry your favorite 109 didn't delete the aircraft but that's clearly going to be crashing very soon. Seems like a ridiculous complaint.

HE is absolutely not effective at "any range"

Early Hispanos were plagued with failing to penetrate deeply enough to do significant damage. At 300m 151/20 AP is only penetrating 10-12mm of armor and yet HE is still capable of completely disabling your aircraft from any range, regardless of penetration.

Okay, first of all, I only show the holes from the DVD to show where the shell impacted. I corroborate this with recordings that show the flash of impact is always near where the hole is left. I'm not sure how much more accurate I can get, visually. The point in showing the DVD holes is to show how closely grouped 30mm strikes were. The tail should not exist at that point.

Secondly, not sure why you call the 109 my favorite, when my avatar here is a Yak-9's sight picture. I do like the 109 for scoring kills in single player, chiefly because it carries more ammo than Russian planes. That's where my bias begins and ends.

As for early Hispanos... do you have any examples of German HE failing to penetrate? Because that's what's on trial most of the time; German HE performance.

1 hour ago, Denum said:

HE is over powered.

Well, I see this claim, and raise you this recording I just took today. I haven't been sitting on it for months waiting to show it off. I can capture laughable HE moments quite often and easily. But this one takes the cake.

Spoiler

I used to think German 30mm was more destructive than Russian 37mm, but after extensive testing, I concluded that both HE shells display extreme oddities on occasion.

For the record, I do agree that 13mm-20mm HE is very likely too destructive to aerodynamics. I don't agree that HE, in general, is overpowered.

No Typhoon-sized plane can take 5x37mm HE hits (only the sixth was fatal, and not to the plane itself) according to all historical documentation.

AP bullets are not the only ones getting screwed by the damage model. They just get screwed a lot more often because probability is intrinsically not in their favor; and because people notice it and study it. They don't bother to study all the things I've seen.

In the end, we'll just have to agree to disagree. I'll leave it at that for once and for all.

June 28, 2021

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/68888-comparing-hmg-damage-and-issues-with-50-cals/?do=findComment&comment=1050698

Those photos are where its at for ME from my OWN experience.

The level of damage to the german fighter is not an issue from my own experience. I have flown my A5 and A8 with WORSE damage then shown as level 3, and nothing EVER fell off. My performance was never impacted in any way. What is labelled as level 1 damage is what i call FOREPLAY with the rear gunner. Meaning i know what direction the enemy b25 or A 20 is facing in relationship to me on a height/direction basis.

Ive had a single burst form an A 20 give me level 3 damage and i just laughed it off, did a loop, come around and blown his ass out of the sky.

Yet i have had the "magic yeet bullet of death" hit my engine compartment with one thunk of impact, and its instant engine fire, fuel injection loss, fuell leak, oil leak.... dead engine. Ive flown between two B 25s and only had the first burst from both give level 2 and 3 damage to BOTH wings, and yet NO ISSUES to flying and killing them.

June 28, 2021

13 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

Okay, first of all, I only show the holes from the DVD to show where the shell impacted. I corroborate this with recordings that show the flash of impact is always near where the hole is left. I'm not sure how much more accurate I can get, visually. The point in showing the DVD holes is to show how closely grouped 30mm strikes were. The tail should not exist at that point.

That's a limitation of the DM, the tail mostly didn't exist at that point. The amount damage there even if the control surfaces were intact, there was no way you'd get that home without extreme effort. Also, 30mm doesn't always= blown apart aircraft. Its not a instant "I win" button.

14 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

As for early Hispanos... do you have any examples of German HE failing to penetrate? Because that's what's on trial most of the time; German HE performance.

I know the MG-FF tended to perform at less then ideal expectations. I can't find anything out of anecdotal examples like the P47 that survived everything a 190 poured into it.

14 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

Well, I see this claim, and raise you this recording I just took today. I haven't been sitting on it for months waiting to show it off. I can capture laughable HE moments quite often and easily. But this one takes the cake.

Happens once in a blue moon. That doesn't bother me.

I can definitely find more examples of HE detonating planes then you can of them taking more then they should though.

14 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

AP bullets are not the only ones getting screwed by the damage model. They just get screwed a lot more often because probability is intrinsically not in their favor; and because people notice it and study it. They don't bother to study all the things I've seen.

HE is not getting screwed by the DM in any capacity. At all. Period.

The blast radius is comically huge on some shells and the only two in the game that can consistently show any weirdness is the Allied 37mms.

We are focused on AP because it affects half the aircraft in the game. The proposed mod is conservative at best and simply just makes the situation a little more bearable.

June 28, 2021

As per @Yak_Panther's discovery, we don't actually have an AP round, we have a ball round modelled. So it appears the devs have modelled the excess training ammo that would have been sent over with the P40s and then just copied it over for the 1945 planes.

@oc2209

Kind of get your point now. The problem always boils down to the fact we have a best case HE round every time and a worse case AP/Ball round everything (in terms of structure/skin damage).

There is a balancing issue here though. Not in the weird MMO way, but in a purely historical sense. Yes, API should help that and bring non-HE guns closer in comparison to HE as per period testing we can review, but you can't argue that 70 rounds into a single section of wing before having an effect isn't underperforming.

June 28, 2021

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

Yes what a way to cherry pick information that makes HE look like the magic yeet juice of destruction and make 50 bmg AP look like crap.

[...]
If you start a test and then throw out things that dont conform to, or confirm your observational bias, your tests are nothing more then what some are calling oc2209's videos that show 50 AP works.... as pure internet bullshit.

I referenced engine fires because they are so random. Even under a very controlled test such as shooting at a parked plane on the ground at a precise spot, the number of hits to induce an engine fire or explosion is incredibly random. We did these tests more than 20 times, but the number of hits varied from 5 to 75. There was no way to draw any meaningful conclusion about this behavior using our test methodology. The tests we threw out had nothing to do with the comparison of AP to HE HMG as you are suggesting.

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

Just had A20-B that could shrug off wing hits iwth the magic mk 108. That was impressive as can be as i was thinking, based on these destructions, that the HE round should knock a plane out with a single wing hit.

I managed to fly a 190 that had a hole as big as the A20 B landing gear wheel in the middle of the wing, and it didnt rip off until i HIT the a20 in question.

I am having difficulty following this.

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

NO FUCKING SHIT it wont. It wont in REAL LIFE and it doesnt in the game. Its why the english and soviets and germans invented HE rounds. MORE FUN...

Calm yourself, and please stop misrepresenting what Shallot and I wrote. At no point did we complain that "50 AP doesnt do the same amount of damage to an airplane as HE ammunition does" - of course we do not expect for one damage type to do the same amount as another damage type. What we said is that the disparity between the two should not be so great.

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

oh my oc2209 used the same range and was bitch slapped for using a cherry picked range UNDER the standard reccomendation of 300 yards.... but was actually the SAME as used in those tests. Oddly enough YOUR tests were recreated and were found to DISPUTE your cherry picked results.

He was suggesting that AP had a greater effect at closer range, I was simply pointing out that range does not have an appreciable effect on the damage for AP HMG. I don't understand what you mean by your second statement here regarding disputed results, can you elaborate?

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

Strangely the ammo loadout for the soviet and german belts is disregarded in the result listings... no one accounted for the 50% mix of HE and AP for them..... and there have been comments on the soviet AP being worthless in game,, yet no one wants to fix it by name.

It was not disregarded; it is known that there is a mix for these belts. What makes you think it was disregarded in our tests? We want to see a fix for AP and HE across all weapon platforms, regardless of the coalition it affects.

7 hours ago, oc2209 said:

AP bullets are not the only ones getting screwed by the damage model. They just get screwed a lot more often because probability is intrinsically not in their favor; and because people notice it and study it. They don't bother to study all the things I've seen.

HE rounds never fail to detonate on impact. That is the epitome of "never being screwed". How can you say that HE is not being studied/noticed when all of the complaints regarding AP are being compared to the performance of HE?

June 28, 2021

Its easy, in all the results from that cherry picked "testing" you used a range of 100 to 200 yards. Yet when oc2209 used the SAME ranges to do HIS video shooting tests, tests that disputed YOUR RESULTS, disproved them actually in many ways, you formed a lynch mob to go after him because he did not use the "period correct range settings of 300 yards in manual, or the 200-250 yards many pilots switched to in order to IMPROVE PERFORMANCE"

Since you were cherry picking information to disregard standard targets,, like engine fires. I wonder how many times bullets killed the engine, fuel system, pilot... and those tests got tossed out.

And from reading the test results, you WERE disregarding the AP load out. Its the only way you are able to prove a major variation between exploding bullets and solid bullets in damage to skin/aerodynamic.

And your tests are flawed as your OWN tests proved that the HE is more powerful as a single HE shell hit from 13-14mm MG can damage two damage panel zones with a single hit. SHRAPNEL impact. AP only impacts the panel it lands on duh.

I have had holes blown through my wing as large as my 190s PROPELLER hub and i had NO issues with flying, fighting, and no wing ever detached. The only time i have wings come off is when i HIT something like an enemy plane. Thats the only fault of flying close up like Udet did with the MK 108.

TO get an accurate result you need to do some actual testing and include the Breda HE load out. And compare with 20mm HE rounds.

And in general when you realize that your testing results and conclusions when overlayed with reality and the 50/50 mix of AP and HE, 12 rounds of HE backed with 12 rounds of "usless" AP as an average compared to 30-33 rounds of 50 caliber is NOT at all UNREALISTIC as in this "result" AP is apparently performing with more power then it should

June 28, 2021

If I remember correctly, Shallot and Creep were specifically testing the HE damage effects in that test in relation to the German HE, and the effects of HE overall, the tests follow what is essentially scientific principle without modding the game in any way (using the 20mm nose cannon for the he-111 and disregarding the AP rounds as they were an eliminated variable)

As mentioned before though, which you still miss the point of, the actual ammunition that's being used specifically by the late war allied aircraft seems to be modelled of the earlier Ball/practice ammunition implemented for the P-40 release and likely the A-20 release.

And as Yak Panther pointed out with his wizardry it is underperforming, which calls into question the effectiveness of all pure AP rounds in game. This isn't saying that the round isn't usable or even totally ineffective at securing a kill with, but it makes sense to provide data to improve the quality of the simulation as a whole.

I've watched this wonderful flailing of points for what, 3 days now? and each time someone points this out it seems to get lost in translation. We're using the .50 AP as the example here due to the resources available to compare it to, which you can then create a comparison to the other rounds in game to see if they match up mathematically.

So if you can provide any documentation similar to how Yak Panther did, I'm sure we'd be keen to see it, so we can compare it to the game files e.g. penetration at 100m for a German 13 AP/API round.

June 28, 2021

1 hour ago, pocketshaver said:

And your tests are flawed as your OWN tests proved that the HE is more powerful as a single HE shell hit from 13-14mm MG can damage two damage panel zones with a single hit. SHRAPNEL impact. AP only impacts the panel it lands on duh.

Shrapnel has very little effect of aero damage in game. Yeah think of it as just tiny AP rounds. Shockwave damage is having a bigger impact on aero damage. And in my opinion the blast radius of it is to big. Or the damage it’s doing is to much

June 28, 2021

34 minutes ago, =RS=Haart said:

I've watched this wonderful flailing of points for what, 3 days now? and each time someone points this out it seems to get lost in translation.

You're being excessively generous.

It's not being lost in translation, it's intentionally being ignored and buried by FUD. The simple reality is that even by switching the .50 cals from the hilariously incorrect ball ammo to AP, they'd see their lethality increase (the exact amount however is unknown) and therefore for players of a particular technical and ideological leaning must not let that happen to preserve their superiority

June 28, 2021

6 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

Its easy, in all the results from that cherry picked "testing" you used a range of 100 to 200 yards. Yet when oc2209 used the SAME ranges to do HIS video shooting tests, tests that disputed YOUR RESULTS, disproved them actually in many ways, you formed a lynch mob to go after him because he did not use the "period correct range settings of 300 yards in manual, or the 200-250 yards many pilots switched to in order to IMPROVE PERFORMANCE"

Since you were cherry picking information to disregard standard targets,, like engine fires. I wonder how many times bullets killed the engine, fuel system, pilot... and those tests got tossed out.

And from reading the test results, you WERE disregarding the AP load out. Its the only way you are able to prove a major variation between exploding bullets and solid bullets in damage to skin/aerodynamic.

And your tests are flawed as your OWN tests proved that the HE is more powerful as a single HE shell hit from 13-14mm MG can damage two damage panel zones with a single hit. SHRAPNEL impact. AP only impacts the panel it lands on duh.

I have had holes blown through my wing as large as my 190s PROPELLER hub and i had NO issues with flying, fighting, and no wing ever detached. The only time i have wings come off is when i HIT something like an enemy plane. Thats the only fault of flying close up like Udet did with the MK 108.

TO get an accurate result you need to do some actual testing and include the Breda HE load out. And compare with 20mm HE rounds.

And in general when you realize that your testing results and conclusions when overlayed with reality and the 50/50 mix of AP and HE, 12 rounds of HE backed with 12 rounds of "usless" AP as an average compared to 30-33 rounds of 50 caliber is NOT at all UNREALISTIC as in this "result" AP is apparently performing with more power then it should

Dude, you can't even shoot down the AI by your own admission in another thread:

"Is there any reason that the single player missions where I use the multi plane versus multi plane format and choose to fly a fighter versus any fighter or ground attack plane

that this set up makes MY fighter plane a sluggish piece of crap and the fighter or ground attack plane turns into a super powered manouverable machine from hell?

I mean if i fly any 109 or 190 or 110 in the multi plane set up, MY plane behaves sluggishly, sort of like i had a damaged engine or jammed aileron rods. BUT anything i fly against has the speed and manuevering of a me 262.

SO FAR the only thing i can survive more then 3 minutes in are russian fighters, and those seem to be the only ones i can move around and have any chance of getting on target with. It ridiculous. But when i fly a campaign or try career, i can actually get HITS on an enemy fighter, and can actually kill them.

In some ways its like the single player fighter versus fighter puts the game into a "sluggish running on a system without enough ram" and career and campaigns put the game into "hey, im playing CLOD Blitz on a system with twice the ideal system resources".

I dont quiet understand the physics of what is happening other then what i am seeing, and from what i can tell career and campaign is more demanding on the system then single player is.."

Stop trolling this thread with your nonsense and I'm sorry the AI planes with .50s keep knocking you from the sky.

Edited June 28, 2021 by =AW=drewm3i-VR

June 28, 2021

15 hours ago, ACG_Cass said:

@oc2209

Kind of get your point now. The problem always boils down to the fact we have a best case HE round every time and a worse case AP/Ball round everything (in terms of structure/skin damage).

There is a balancing issue here though. Not in the weird MMO way, but in a purely historical sense. Yes, API should help that and bring non-HE guns closer in comparison to HE as per period testing we can review, but you can't argue that 70 rounds into a single section of wing before having an effect isn't underperforming.

Thanks for giving me some credence, at least.

One other thing I'd like to add: I think the damage model is possibly deflecting belly shots (the only explanation I can think of), which would greatly contribute to ineffectual firing from dead-six positions. There is definitely something odd going on that is not strictly ammo related. Observe:

Spoiler

Above, I rake the whole width of the plane from almost directly behind, and only the wing breaks. Now, watch this:

Spoiler

Despite the fact that I'm firing from fairly long range (320-350m), the 109's tank catches on fire pretty easily. Because, I believe, the bullets are entering from above, and not the typical dead-six belly position.

17 hours ago, Denum said:

That's a limitation of the DM, the tail mostly didn't exist at that point. The amount damage there even if the control surfaces were intact, there was no way you'd get that home without extreme effort. Also, 30mm doesn't always= blown apart aircraft. Its not a instant "I win" button.

Look, I know you're 100% opposed to everything I say, but can you give me a break here?

3x37mm hits to the tail alone? 3x30mm strikes would down a B-17 in most cases. Anywhere on the B-17. 3 shots concentrated in one place would mean that place no longer exists. "Mostly didn't exist" means nothing. The plane was still clearly flyable had I not killed the pilot. A plane without a tail doesn't keep flying.

And yeah, 3x37mm hits on a single-engine plane is instant "I win". And 6x37mm hits is simply absurd. Every bit as absurd as ~100 AP .50s being survivable.

June 29, 2021

6 hours ago, =AW=drewm3i-VR said:

Dude, you can't even shoot down the AI by your own admission in another thread:

"Is there any reason that the single player missions where I use the multi plane versus multi plane format and choose to fly a fighter versus any fighter or ground attack plane

that this set up makes MY fighter plane a sluggish piece of crap and the fighter or ground attack plane turns into a super powered manouverable machine from hell?

I mean if i fly any 109 or 190 or 110 in the multi plane set up, MY plane behaves sluggishly, sort of like i had a damaged engine or jammed aileron rods. BUT anything i fly against has the speed and manuevering of a me 262.

SO FAR the only thing i can survive more then 3 minutes in are russian fighters, and those seem to be the only ones i can move around and have any chance of getting on target with. It ridiculous. But when i fly a campaign or try career, i can actually get HITS on an enemy fighter, and can actually kill them.

In some ways its like the single player fighter versus fighter puts the game into a "sluggish running on a system without enough ram" and career and campaigns put the game into "hey, im playing CLOD Blitz on a system with twice the ideal system resources".

I dont quiet understand the physics of what is happening other then what i am seeing, and from what i can tell career and campaign is more demanding on the system then single player is.."

Stop trolling this thread with your nonsense and I'm sorry the AI planes with .50s keep knocking you from the sky.

they only do me in in the quick match setup. campaign i can hold my own just fine for some reason. Still best to obliterate them the first second i can. But i have NO problem whatever doing a ballet dance with them, doing nothing but endless loops, rolls, etc and never getting hit by them,,,, or hitting them.. in the quick match system.

June 29, 2021

I swear I did this in one attempt just now.

7x30mm hits on a Mustang. Pilot lived. Plane didn't break up.

1st hit was on the underside of the belly intake. 2nd and 3rd hit were in the left wing root. 4th hit was near the radio behind the pilot, in the cockpit. 5th, 6th, and 7th hits were across the right fuselage.

Recording:

Spoiler

Some screens to make it clearer where the multiple hits were:

There are two hits to the wing in the following screen, one obscured by smoke, one visible on the yellow stripe:

The 3 on the right fuselage are hard to spot in the recording, so here's a still (one shot behind the exhaust, two by the fuselage star):

The forward fuselage, as we are aware, is unbreakable. Only the tail can break off, and that only happens with mid-air collisions, fuel explosions, or crashes. In other words, the tail generally cannot be blown off even by multiple cannon strikes or extreme ballistic damage.

It is my belief that this 'adamantium' fuselage behavior is what's absorbing .50 AP, contributing to .50 AP's uneven performance. In a tiny target like the 109, the invincibility effect is compounded when attacking from dead-six. It's not a concrete tail you're hitting; it's a concrete entire rear fuselage. Bullets that pass through it from directly behind are apparently robbed of the majority of their destructive power, which then makes attacking from larger-than-zero deflection much more productive. Which is not realistic. Point-blank attacks also seem to bypass the issue somewhat.

The complete solution to .50 under-performance is somewhere in the damage model. Adding extra hitting power to .50 rounds will only be a partial solution. Even AP-I won't solve everything as long as we have fuselages that can take this much damage.

June 29, 2021

5 hours ago, oc2209 said:

Thanks for giving me some credence, at least.

One other thing I'd like to add: I think the damage model is possibly deflecting belly shots (the only explanation I can think of), which would greatly contribute to ineffectual firing from dead-six positions.

Look, I know you're 100% opposed to everything I say, but can you give me a break here?

3x37mm hits to the tail alone? 3x30mm strikes would down a B-17 in most cases. Anywhere on the B-17. 3 shots concentrated in one place would mean that place no longer exists. "Mostly didn't exist" means nothing. The plane was still clearly flyable had I not killed the pilot. A plane without a tail doesn't keep flying.

And yeah, 3x37mm hits on a single-engine plane is instant "I win". And 6x37mm hits is simply absurd. Every bit as absurd as ~100 AP .50s being survivable.

I agree that the lack of sufficient detail in the DM is part of the problem (referring to one of your earlier comments.) An AP round should be able to penetrate far into a plane and find something to smash or even multiple things to smash, but if the DM doesn't have all the smashable important parts a real plane has then it simply can't be as effective as it should be as much of it will pass through and not hit anything. This greatly favors the HE ammo because aero damage is easily and fully modeled in game. For a hit, you increase drag based on how big a hole it makes on the part that got hit. Easy. Unfortunately, it also makes for a poor comparative weapons simulation and that in turn unbalances the fighting to greatly favor all HE armed planes in the game. I have no problem with the fact that cannon with HE rounds were considered better than MGs, but that doesn't mean that AP loaded MGs were as worthless as this sim makes them currently. The US made up for weaker weapons by just putting a bunch of them on their planes. However, in the sim the HE cannons are far better comparatively than they should be. Adding more aero damage and a more detailed DM would probably fix AP rounds.

I also agree that more than one 30mm or 37mm hit on a fighter should be fairly fatal. Two should be fatal. 37mm guns were used as medium flak guns! Just a near miss would shower a plane with lots and lots of holes (we're talking AAA not air-air.) Direct hits in air-air should nearly always be fatal. They make holes 3-5 feet across and that doesn't even consider all the fragments flying everywhere. The Soviets considered them good enough to shoot down B-29's and B-52's, so a fighter would be mince meat.

"3 shots concentrated in one place would mean that place no longer exists." - True, but aerial gunnery is seldom accurate enough for that to happen. At least while you have angry gunners shooting back at you and a target that is trying to dodge. You're pretty lucky if you get more than one hit on the same pass (excluding the ME-262 of course.)

June 29, 2021

3 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

they only do me in in the quick match setup. campaign i can hold my own just fine for some reason. Still best to obliterate them the first second i can. But i have NO problem whatever doing a ballet dance with them, doing nothing but endless loops, rolls, etc and never getting hit by them,,,, or hitting them.. in the quick match system.

We are happy you have picked up il-2, but unless you are a competent pilot with 1000s of hours in the sim in all planes, you really don't have a clue about what is right and what is wrong in the sim, no offense intended. All you are doing here is muddying the waters. While I believe the dm is far from accurate and the .50s are not working as they should, I too refrain from posting one way or the other (besides some testing videos) because there are people in this thread way smarter than I with tons of data and historical reference information having this discussion.

Edited June 29, 2021 by =AW=drewm3i-VR

June 29, 2021

It's not the damage model that's the issue here on the aircraft themselves I think.

The new gun truck is especially nasty to get hit by, and any 37mm ground fire is quite often a one hit kill.

You can't really make the aircraft softer because of how much damage a single 20mm will do.

It would make the 13mm extremely deadly.

You can often fight on after taking one 20mm in single player because the AI isn't good enough to be a credible threat but that level of damage is a fight ender on a human player. The P38 and P47 both just about explode from single hits.

They aren't likely to completely rework the damage model again. I don't even see this being an option.

The proposed mod is the still the quickest. Easiest way to provide a fix that isn't years down the road.

The inconsistencies occur far more often with AP then they do with HE. Personally I'm focusing on the bigger issue.

June 29, 2021

6 hours ago, Denum said:

It's not the damage model that's the issue here on the aircraft themselves I think.

The new gun truck is especially nasty to get hit by, and any 37mm ground fire is quite often a one hit kill.

I know that 30-37mm hits on the wing (outside of the root, which very rarely breaks without an explosion) will generally destroy the wing in one hit; with the caveat of Hurricane, Typhoon, and Sturmovik wings (not mentioning twin-engined planes).

6 hours ago, Denum said:

You can't really make the aircraft softer because of how much damage a single 20mm will do.

It would make the 13mm extremely deadly.

I did think about this.

In terms of rebalancing damage effects for historical accuracy, I would reduce the HE power of 13mm rounds significantly. I've done my own testing in this regard, and it's very easy to shoot down AI-controlled planes with 1-2 13mm HE hits to the wing (outboard of the root). Evidently this holds true even in multiplayer.

I think the problem with HE isn't so much the damage radius (the P-51 pilot in my above recording had 6x30mm explode within 6 feet of the cockpit, and was only injured instead of being turned into a fine slurry), but the effect it has on wing aerodynamics.

A pure reduction in all HE damage output/radius would make HE more laughably weak against unbreakable parts of the plane, like the fuselage and wing roots. Which then puts us right back to the AP problem, wherein dozens of HE rounds could hit certain parts of the plane to no effect.

So a more equitable/realistic solution would be to somehow reduce HE effects on aerodynamics, without reducing its overall damage potential to vital systems such as the pilot, engine, and fuel tanks. How that would actually work is beyond me. A crude solution would be to simply drastically reduce the size of the impact hole made by 13mm-20mm HE, while keeping the same shrapnel radius.

6 hours ago, Denum said:

The P38 and P47 both just about explode from single hits.

I've noticed the P-38 in particular is exceedingly flammable. This is probably related to the massive fuel tanks and the fact that the fuel system isn't completely modelled yet; as such it's always a greater problem for Allied planes that carry a lot of fuel. Can we ascertain if the DM considers all fuel tanks full even when you only give a plane a 50% load, for instance?

6 hours ago, Denum said:

They aren't likely to completely rework the damage model again. I don't even see this being an option.

Agreed.

Provided the devs don't go for the AP-enhancement mod, I think another possible imperfect solution would be to make tail control surfaces detach more easily with damage. Since the tail itself cannot be blown off, at least make the elevators/rudder break off when hit multiple times by anything larger than a .30 cal (which deserves a performance boost, but less than larger rounds). Ailerons could probably afford to be more easily shot off as well.

This would have the effect of making AP perform better when striking controls. If HE's effects on aerodynamics were reduced at the same time, there would be a net gain to damage realism.

Edited June 29, 2021 by oc2209

June 29, 2021

Just to quickly highlight the failure of control surfaces to detach easily:

Spoiler

I typically don't experiment with rocket air-to-air attacks, but was inspired to by an odd DVD occurrence today (that I posted in the general topic area in my Typhoon target drone thread).

June 29, 2021

3 hours ago, oc2209 said:

So a more equitable/realistic solution would be to somehow reduce HE effects on aerodynamics, without reducing its overall damage potential to vital systems such as the pilot, engine, and fuel tanks. How that would actually work is beyond me. A crude solution would be to simply drastically reduce the size of the impact hole made by 13mm-20mm HE, while keeping the same shrapnel radius.

I agree with this to a large extent. The 13mm is grossly OP and I think the 20mm is OP as well. The amount of drag a single 13mm hit adds is insane. Also, worth noting the number of fragments from a 13m HE would small as well.

I agree that a more complex DM may be beyond what is possible or affordable for the current engine or 1C's resources, so those that say an increase in the ability of AP to knock parts off or disable the systems that are currently modeled is probably the best short term solution along with the reduction of HE skin damage. This should not be a big programming challenge as the parameters are nearly contained in the config files for the weapons, so it's basically just a quick text file update to change them.

43 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

Just to quickly highlight the failure of control surfaces to detach easily:

I typically don't experiment with rocket air-to-air attacks, but was inspired to by an odd DVD occurrence today (that I posted in the general topic area in my Typhoon target drone thread).

That plane should have been blown into confetti.

Edited June 29, 2021 by BCI-Nazgul

June 30, 2021

Well if only people who have thousands of hours flying every plane in the game are worthy of commentary in this thread.... well up yers dude.

ANY one who plays the game has an input in what happens to it. Just because some small bunch of people who want to increase their kill ratio in multiplayer want to make changes to weapon damage or even the damage model need to grow up. And they need to fly OTHER planes for once.

If you think the 50 AP is underwhelming, try using the machine guns in the E4.... they kind of suck..... and the mg 151/15mm sucks... actually makes 50 AP look good. Then again even the 20mm fired through the E4s propeller hub seems to suck in comparison to what comes out of the 20mm wing guns in later models of 109.

June 30, 2021

6 hours ago, BCI-Nazgul said:

I agree with this to a large extent. The 13mm is grossly OP and I think the 20mm is OP as well. The amount of drag a single 13mm hit adds is insane. Also, worth noting the number of fragments from a 13m HE would small as well.

All true, but rebalancing the 20mm is a difficult task because (not to sound like a broken record here) the fuselage can absorb so many more HE hits than a wing can.

It would be quite possible to utterly cripple 20mm HE performance, given that things like this are already happening:

Spoiler

Despite all those big HE flashes, it was ironically only an AP 20mm that finally killed the pilot.

I've been doing a lot of testing with the La-5 lately, as I just bought it on sale. The fact that it lacks the La-5FN's armored glass windscreen makes the view clearer, and I think I aim better with it. Point being:

This tight grouping of HE shots should effectively leave one large hole. Not enough to rip the tail off, but definitely enough to make some air flow disturbances. In theory. In reality, hits like these don't seem to affect the plane much.

Here's a different test:

That's at least 12 Russian 20mm HE hits to the underside of the fuselage alone. For all that, I knocked the tailwheel off!

Right now, HE is essentially ineffective against the majority of the fuselage structure behind the engine; while it is over-effective against wing structure.

AP is somewhat effective against the fuselage (depending primarily on the angle the bullets strike), and mostly ineffective against the wing structure.

Because of the presumed inflexibility of the DM, this will be a difficult balancing act.

6 hours ago, BCI-Nazgul said:

That plane should have been blown into confetti.

Most likely. It appears as though the rockets had no explosive effect at all (or else the rudder at least should have been blown off), but a huge shrapnel effect.

Which means that it should be possible to tweak HE shells' explosive damage separately from their shrapnel damage.

If I had a choice in the matter, I would propose the following changes:

Reduce 13mm HE in both explosive radius and shrapnel density.

Reduce 20mm HE (German) explosive and shrapnel radius, but increase shrapnel density. Reduce Allied explosive radius by a smaller factor, increase shrapnel density by a smaller factor than the German.

Increase 30-37mm explosive radius, decrease shrapnel radius, increase shrapnel density.

All of the above would translate into less aerodynamic penalty for sub-30mm ammo, with an increase to the lethality of 20mm+ shells that hit near vital areas. 30mm+ would see an increase to aerodynamic penalties and lethality within the shrapnel radius.

*Edit:

I realize what I described above sounds like the MMO balancing I criticized earlier. What I now acknowledge is that you can't be slavishly devoted to ballistic realism while the damage model has significant unrealistic elements. The question then becomes where and how to make the compromises in order to achieve a result that broadly corresponds with historical realism.

Edited June 30, 2021 by oc2209

June 30, 2021

43 minutes ago, pocketshaver said:

Then again even the 20mm fired through the E4s propeller hub seems to suck ...

Which is acurrate. All historical records agree that this particular 20mm gun was indeed underwhelming. In British tests of captured E4 it failed to penetrate the fabric-covered fuselage of a Hurricane, in fact it didn't even scratch the paint.

June 30, 2021

12 hours ago, oc2209 said:

Reduce 20mm HE (German) explosive and shrapnel radius, but increase shrapnel density. Reduce Allied explosive radius by a smaller factor, increase shrapnel density by a smaller factor than the German.

Regarding the 20mm HE-Ammunition i think it is a bit more complex since all 3 sides used different philosophies:

British/US:

5.44g Tetryl R.E. factor 1.25 (and 2.27g incendiary though a 1960 airforce research paper found that is the explosive and incendiary effect vs fuel tanks is dissatisfying: )

131g in weight -> good frag damage potential

no delay charge

Soviet:

5.6g A-IX-2 (73% RDX, 23% aluminum powder, phlegmatized with 4% wax; R.E. factor 1.54 -> very good blast effect and good fire potential)

96g in weight

no delay charge

German:

18g HA41 (75% RDX, 20% aluminum powder, phlegmatized with 5% wax; R.E. factor ~1.54 -> very good blast effect and good fire potential)

92g in weight (thin walled except for the fuze not much frag material)

delay charge to have the round explode inside the planes structure to further increase blast damage and damage to fuel tanks and increased potential to ignite fuel.

A 1960 US research paper for incendiary ammuniton vs fuel tanks supports the german way of a delayed detonation for best results. Tested was a 20mm M97 HE-I round, the very same I described above:

Regarding the 13mm/12.7mm HE rounds the case seems much easier to resolve:

1g PETN for the Germans

2g for the Soviets.

The Germans quickly sorted out the HE in favour of the pure incendiary tracer round.

as for the Soviets, their API and API-T are pretty much similar to their US counterpart (both not yet implemented in the game).

I have not yet seen a primary source for the belting of soviet machine guns in their aircrafts, so if someone can provide these, that would be fantastic

I have so far only stumbled accross a german document for soviet aircraft ammunition and it does not mention 12.7 HE rounds only API and API-T.

As a stopgap and in light of the exaggerated damage these rounds do, I would propose that all sides are limited to AP rounds only, until the API and API-T for the 12.7mm (soviet and US/Brit. alike) and the German 13mm Incendiary-T can be correctly implemented in the game.

Cheers ?

Edited June 30, 2021 by the_emperor

June 30, 2021

1 hour ago, the_emperor said:

Regarding the 20mm HE-Ammunition i think it is a bit more complex since all 3 sides used different philosophies:

British/US:

5.44g Tetryl R.E. factor 1.25 (and 2.27g incendiary)

131g in weight -> good frag damage potential

no delay charge

Soviet:

5.6g A-IX-2 (73% RDX, 23% aluminum powder, phlegmatized with 4% wax; R.E. factor 1.54 -> very good blast effect and good fire potential)

96g in weight

no delay charge

German:

18g HA41 (75% RDX, 20% aluminum powder, phlegmatized with 5% wax; R.E. factor ~1.54 -> very good blast effect and good fire potential)

92g in weight (thin walled except for the fuze not much frag material)

delay charge to have the round explode inside the planes structure to further increase blast damage and damage to fuel tanks and increased potential to ignite fuel.

Regarding the 13mm/12.7mm HE rounds the case seems much easier to resolve:

1g PETN for the Germans

2g for the Soviets.

The Germans quickly sorted out the HE in favour of the pure incendiary tracer round.

as for the Soviets, their API and API-T are pretty much similar to their US counterpart (both not yet implemented in the game).

I have not yet seen a primary source for the belting of soviet machine guns in their aircrafts, so if someone can provide these, that would be fantastic

I have so far only stumbled accross a german document for soviet aircraft ammunition and it does not mention 12.7 HE rounds only API and API-T.

As a stopgap and in light of the exaggerated damage these rounds do, I would propose that all sides are limited to AP rounds only, until the API and API-T for the 12.7mm (soviet and US/Brit. alike) and the German 13mm Incendiary-T can be correctly implemented in the game.

Cheers ?

yep proud member of the 50 caliber m2 airline association

June 30, 2021

@pocketshaver

Try.

The.

Mod.

It helps the MG17 as well.

You've added nothing constructive so far in any of your posts.

June 30, 2021

1 hour ago, pocketshaver said:

yep proud member of the 50 caliber m2 airline association

June 30, 2021

@pocketshaverHey just so we're all on the same page here, what game do you think we're all playing?

June 30, 2021

1 hour ago, =RS=Haart said:

It should be right if he got any kind of coherence in his "argument".... but even the example of the E-4 is out of this game. Dude you're still in CloD.... You should compare "anything" with the ingame E-7 but even that I CAN'T see your point comparing early 40's tech with late 44-45. There's no worst Blind than who doesn't want to see....

June 30, 2021

5 hours ago, the_emperor said:

...

Regarding the 13mm/12.7mm HE rounds the case seems much easier to resolve:

1g PETN for the Germans

2g for the Soviets.

The Germans quickly sorted out the HE in favour of the pure incendiary tracer round.

as for the Soviets, their API and API-T are pretty much similar to their US counterpart (both not yet implemented in the game).

I have not yet seen a primary source for the belting of soviet machine guns in their aircrafts, so if someone can provide these, that would be fantastic

I have so far only stumbled accross a german document for soviet aircraft ammunition and it does not mention 12.7 HE rounds only API and API-T.

As a stopgap and in light of the exaggerated damage these rounds do, I would propose that all sides are limited to AP rounds only, until the API and API-T for the 12.7mm (soviet and US/Brit. alike) and the German 13mm Incendiary-T can be correctly implemented in the game.

Cheers ?

How ignorant were thouse german and russian munition generals, replace HE with incendiary when we can see in this sim how nuclear HMG HE is, they were working ugenst their pilots when they removed god like HE in favor of incendiary, or maybe HMG incendiary will be even better then HE in this game when we get proper ammo types modeled lol

Edited June 30, 2021 by CountZero

June 30, 2021

9 hours ago, oc2209 said:

I realize what I described above sounds like the MMO balancing I criticized earlier. What I now acknowledge is that you can't be slavishly devoted to ballistic realism while the damage model has significant unrealistic elements. The question then becomes where and how to make the compromises in order to achieve a result that broadly corresponds with historical realism.

Exactly.

We aren't chasing unreasonable expectation, nor do we want to make the AP ammo excessively over powered.

We are just seeking "kinda effective".

You've spent alot of time trying to show your views, made some fair points.

Have you tried the mod?

I suspect you'll be quite pleased with it also.

June 30, 2021

7 hours ago, pocketshaver said:

yep proud member of the 50 caliber m2 airline association

You do realize you responded with a reasoned, well researched and developed post with some glib dismissive remark about the .50 cals?

That's tough words from someone who can't play without autothrottle and can't beat an AI.

June 30, 2021

14 minutes ago, Denum said:

Have you tried the mod?

I suspect you'll be quite pleased with it also.

I did and I got to say that even is not an "insta golden shot solution" (nobody is expecting it,... at least me). I've been positively surprised with the amount of damage you inflict in the first and/or second pass (basically when you need the bullets do their magic). From the first pass you can feel confident that that A/C has been dissabled as a flying threat: objective acomplished!!!! and I'm not talking about those unreal ripping off parts situations, etc, etc.,...

So at this point the mod is a non OP better option than the default AP, so in a near future (too much time crossing fingers) API-APIT implementation will be more than an ideal, so we could compare with what we have today, also with any mod. present or future.

June 30, 2021

Should it always be a first pass guarantee to knock out an a/c from the fight?

(not including the "OP" HE)

Cheers, Dakpilot

June 30, 2021

9 minutes ago, Dakpilot said:

Should it always be a first pass guarantee to knock out an a/c from the fight?

(not including the "OP" HE)

Cheers, Dakpilot

I don't think so, that wasn't the case IRL either.

With the mod it's not a consistent one pass and go either though.

Unless you get a really solid amount of hits in but thats to be expected imo

June 30, 2021

Basically what I've said but a few can only interpret the darkness with stupidness. Never nobody has any warranty. Read again my previous post cause I'm not going to quote it, neither yours, cause your contributions here are at the same level as shaver but with the difference that he's a member and you a founder, but I can't see any difference in any post from any of both of you.

June 30, 2021

14 hours ago, the_emperor said:

Regarding the 20mm HE-Ammunition i think it is a bit more complex since all 3 sides used different philosophies:

German:

18g HA41 (75% RDX, 20% aluminum powder, phlegmatized with 5% wax; R.E. factor ~1.54 -> very good blast effect and good fire potential)

92g in weight (thin walled except for the fuze not much frag material)

delay charge to have the round explode inside the planes structure to further increase blast damage and damage to fuel tanks and increased potential to ignite fuel.

Right, it was my understanding that the German 20mm was big on explosive power and low on shrapnel; and to model it in the sim essentially the opposite of those characteristics would be patently unrealistic on paper.

However, that's the only solution I can see to the problem of having 1-2 20mm wing hits destroy a plane's ability to maneuver. Or the phenomenon I've witnessed myself where a single 20mm (or 13mm) HE hit to the tail of a Spitfire sends it wildly into an unrecoverable spin.

If we want to reduce the ostensibly excessive explosive force of the 20mm HE (ignoring the 13mm for now), without robbing it of adequate kill potential, the only way to compensate is to allow it to deliver damage in some other way; non-aerodynamic damage, i.e, shrapnel.

Currently, the fuselage DM situation allows things like this to occur with 30mm hits:

The hole in the '7' of 'B7' is where the 30mm hit. How it failed to do significant damage there, I don't know. Then there's the following example:

This one really surprised me. No engine damage, no fire, no pilot wound/kill.

So if 30mm is already questionable at times, then a reduced-power 20mm would be even less reliable. Which is why I think the shrapnel density should be increased; for all 20mm rounds, but more so for German, to reflect its greater damage potential.

Like the .50 mod, it is not an ideally realistic solution to the HE issue; but it is one that could potentially result in more realistic outcomes. Instead of 1-2 20mm hits to a wing crippling a plane, it'd take 3-4. I'm not advocating large adjustments. Greater shrapnel damage would mean that HE fuselage hits would do more component damage, since they clearly do no structural damage in a fuselage that can't be blown apart.

7 hours ago, Denum said:

Have you tried the mod?

I suspect you'll be quite pleased with it also.

No, not yet. But that's no slight to the mod; I don't use any mods at the moment.

My mentality is to adapt to the base game, regardless of any annoyances it throws at me. Which, as I've noted, is easier to do in single player than multiplayer.

June 30, 2021

Really should try the mod, super easy to install, and easy to go back to vanilla if you'd like.

The HE situation is a bit upsetting but requires some pretty drastic changes to work. I liked the idea of the mod and simply locking API planes to AP as the G4 doesn't feel ridiculous when hitting people, and I'm assuming that's due to the MGs being just wee!

It's not a perfect fix, but it's enough of a temporary fix that it would honestly fix alot of the most frustrating issues in MP and potentially single player also.

Here's my G4 kill from last night's quick sortie.

I didn't delete this fellow, but in two passes I definitely did some damage.

As you can see I hit him ALOT of times with my MGs, and the cannon was the only reason it went down.

Edited June 30, 2021 by Denum

July 1, 2021

2 hours ago, Denum said:

Really should try the mod, super easy to install, and easy to go back to vanilla if you'd like.

The HE situation is a bit upsetting but requires some pretty drastic changes to work.

As you can see I hit him ALOT of times with my MGs, and the cannon was the only reason it went down.

Six HE hits to get a kill sounds about right. Depending greatly on the target plane and the hit locations, naturally.

What I'd really like now is an HE mod just to see how much better (if at all) my proposed changes would feel.

I realize my recordings are very repetitive by now, but... one more for the road. I'm using this one to show the disparity between fuselage and wing hits, all conveniently in the same clip:

Spoiler

By my count, in slow motion, the fuselage takes a minimum of 17x20mm HE strikes. Granted these are Russian 20mm and not German, but... anything over 10 should be... fatal, you would think.

The AI just shrugs it off, goes into a turn, continues the turn.

Want to guess how many wing strikes it takes to down him after that?

It's important to note that wing strikes seem to make little-to-no difference in flight mechanics inside the Typhoon's inboard 20mm. Outside of that, from the mid-wing to the tip, any hits seem catastrophic. I understand there are physics at work, as to why the outer wing is inherently going to affect stability more than the wing root; but not to this extreme degree.

So this might well be an aerodynamic issue and not even an HE damage issue. As in, damage to certain parts of the wing is being exaggerated in the flight model somehow; instead of the damage delivered being unrealistically excessive.

Because, as I've said so many times before: HE damage really doesn't appear at all excessive when it hits the wing roots and fuselage.

July 1, 2021

I think using the AI as an metric can be a bit dangerous, you may be better off seeing how it feels for you to fly after taking hits.

I'm not saying iL2 did anything different with the AI then a human player, but there's definitely that possibility.

Using WarThunder as an example (Bad I know)

But the AI instructor mode can often fly the plane better then a player with damage.

So it's very possible it's the same in iL2.

By balancing for the NPCs ability to fly a damaged aircraft that might get us in trouble if you know what I'm saying.

Using the p47 as an example a single hit is often enough that it requires full aileron and trim to remain level.

Fuselage hits more often than not will take your turbo out.

Edited July 1, 2021 by Denum

July 1, 2021

I agree with the post that says one hit of HE is often enough to destroy the tail section of the spit...has happened to me a bunch of times online in the spit, but seemingly never in any other plane including the tempest or any of the German fighters (that also get hit by Hispano and Russian HE 20mm). I have also witnessed more than once multiple direct hits with Hispano 20mm HE to the 109 and 190 tail with zero damage and then the opponent keeps fighting as if nothing happened.

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