Belly landings with fighters and bombers are acceptable but must be improved!

[oc2209]

As far as I'm concerned, this is where the logic goes out the window:

 

Spoiler

 

 

I can land a P-38, roughly comparable in size and weight to the Pe-2, almost 50 MPH faster than the Pe-2, and survive unscathed.

 

In a Pe-2, landing using the exact same technique on the exact same stretch of sim terrain, kills the entire crew at 110 MPH:

 

Spoiler

 

 

There's a severe logical disconnect between those two results. That disconnect is, I believe, where the bug resides.

Edited April 9, 2022 by oc2209
Posted Pe-2 clip on this new page for ease of comparison.

[II/JG17_HerrMurf]

I'd actually like them to revert to the old code and revisit this whole issue at a later date to find a happy medium. It is far less desirable and fun to fly now and that should be the overriding factor in something as subjective as this. I know for sure there is no time to review and revamp it again, at the moment, as they ready Normandy.

Edited April 10, 2022 by II/JG17_HerrMurf
clarity

[oc2209]

Serious question for everyone watching this discussion:

 

What is the difference between the following two recordings? Besides the obvious. You'll know what I mean by that when it happens.

 

Clip 1:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Clip 2:

 

Spoiler

 

 

I can't tell any significant differences that should result in such wildly divergent endings. I mean, this is like Schrödinger's cat* levels of mutual exclusion.

 

*Just so everyone gets the joke, I'll over-explain it via Wikipedia:

 

"In the thought experiment, a hypothetical cat may be considered simultaneously both alive and dead as a result of its fate being linked to a random subatomic event that may or may not occur."

[IckyATLAS]

6 hours ago, oc2209 said:

 

I can't watch that file. Or I don't know how. There's no TRK file in it.

 

 

Sorry my fault, I missed the track file in the zipped folder.

 

Here it is now complete:

Pe2_Deadstick_Belly_Landing.zip

 

First Unzip this file.

You will get the Pe2_Deadstick_Belly_Landing folder.

In this folder you have two items:

 

- One is a folder named Pe2_Deadstick_Belly_Landing 

- The other is a file named Pe2_Deadstick_Belly_Landing.trk 

 

Copy these two items into the ....\data\Tracks\   folder   and there you go.

The Map is Kuban and the Pe2 version that is in this track is the Pe2ser87 that comes in the BoS pack.

 

I edited my previous post to have the correct zip file.

 

[Asgar]

two pages of discussion and even though multiple people have mentioned some incredible hints, you people still havn't figured it out ? ? ? 

hint: It has nothing to do with DM, G forces or the crews.

[IckyATLAS]

39 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

Serious question for everyone watching this discussion:

 

What is the difference between the following two recordings? Besides the obvious. You'll know what I mean by that when it happens.

 

I can't tell any significant differences that should result in such wildly divergent endings. I mean, this is like Schrödinger's cat* levels of mutual exclusion.

 

*Just so everyone gets the joke, I'll over-explain it via Wikipedia:

 

"In the thought experiment, a hypothetical cat may be considered simultaneously both alive and dead as a result of its fate being linked to a random subatomic event that may or may not occur."

 

I agree that between the two it is unclear, but if you allow me I will rule out here any quantum entanglement ? phenomenon taking place.

 

I will not contest the fact that to belly land the Pe2 is not easy. The A20 by the way is much easier. I know for some of you they both will be very difficult but train train. Can you please tell us what were your landing flaps settings in the two cases. I understand that you do not use flaps or very little angle. To me that is not a good approach. With my approach I always succeed. Over many trials with my technique very rarely I or one of my crew members gets just injured. So it is pretty consistent. Again there is some randomness in the success of a crash landing and this is totally normal. Too many parameters are in play and they are sensitive, like the plane attitude in respect to the ground, maybe a slight angle relative to ground has a major impact. So maybe in the model there is also a random factor and I can accept that because that's life. There is no expert in crash landing in true life. I know that in WWII some fighter pilots did crash land a few times and walked away and sometimes with some severe injuries but that is a very very rare fact. It is no secret that globally there were more pilots that died in various accidents that under the enemy bullets in action.

 

One good thing is to kill the engine before touch down which I often do for planes where the engine is low like the Pe2. This will normally reduce damage. A running engine will have the propeller hit much harder and generally destroy the engine propeller axis and crankshaft. It is better to land with a killed engine to reduce damage and increase the chances to have the plane airworthy again.

I have no idea how things are modelled in the sim, but it could be that flaps in landing position at minimum and a killed engine besides the vertical and horizontal speed are considered in the model to decide how much damage and if it is lethal or injury or just no effect on the people in the plane.

 

There was a comment regarding the A20 that was also difficult to crash land. So I made two tracks for it and in which I belly land with engines on and off. It is the Kuban map and I land on the grass of Agoy airfield near Tuapse. Either you miss and you are for a swim or you end up against terrain or the village. Better than large flatland where there is no challenge. The Track file is below:

 

A20 Belly Landings.zip

 

Enjoy.

39 minutes ago, Asgar said:

two pages of discussion and even though multiple people have mentioned some incredible hints, you people still havn't figured it out ? ? ? 

hint: It has nothing to do with DM, G forces or the crews.

You are absolutely right. It has to do with training, morale, cold bloodedness, vodka, singing Kalinka, flying with a balalaika etc. ?

[Asgar]

12 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

You are absolutely right. It has to do with training, morale, cold bloodedness, vodka, singing Kalinka, flying with a balalaika etc. ?

no it's either netcode, or simply the servers you people play on. we heard from one persone: CB and Berlog... well Berloga has always been a shit show with server overload message every other second and CB is jam packed with scripts and modifications to get all their cool mission stuff running. super cool, but probably not great for performance since the server handles all the extra stuff. just my 2 cents

[firdimigdi]

1 hour ago, Asgar said:

two pages of discussion and even though multiple people have mentioned some incredible hints, you people still havn't figured it out ? ? ? 

hint: It has nothing to do with DM, G forces or the crews.

 

Since the vast majority of tests were done so far in QMB I'd rephrase that to: two pages of discussion and you didn't read any of it. ?

2 hours ago, oc2209 said:

Serious question for everyone watching this discussion:

 

What is the difference between the following two recordings? Besides the obvious. You'll know what I mean by that when it happens.

 

Clip 1:

 

  Hide contents

 

 

Clip 2:

 

  Hide contents

 

 

I can't tell any significant differences that should result in such wildly divergent endings. I mean, this is like Schrödinger's cat* levels of mutual exclusion.

 

*Just so everyone gets the joke, I'll over-explain it via Wikipedia:

 

"In the thought experiment, a hypothetical cat may be considered simultaneously both alive and dead as a result of its fate being linked to a random subatomic event that may or may not occur."

 

Only thing I can see from this angle is that it seems that in the second clip the plane pitches down more than in the first clip. At the moment of death the gunsight is "under" the horizon.

[Asgar]

27 minutes ago, Firdimigdi said:

Since the vast majority of tests were done so far in QMB I'd rephrase that to: two pages of discussion and you didn't read any of it. ?

maybe you should work on your reading comprehension.

multiple people stated they have zero issues, people you know how to fly, testing in QMB. some of them stated they had some occurances in MP.

most people complaining said they can't enjoy coop or MP since "the change" 

the people dying in SP... need to learn now to belly land

so how about you DON'T rephrase what I'm saying with the bullshit that comes to your mind and instead mind your own business

Edited April 10, 2022 by Asgar

[oc2209]

48 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

I will not contest the fact that to belly land the Pe2 is not easy. The A20 by the way is much easier. I know for some of you they both will be very difficult but train train. Can you please tell us what were your landing flaps settings in the two cases. I understand that you do not use flaps or very little angle. To me that is not a good approach. With my approach I always succeed. Over many trials with my technique very rarely I or one of my crew members gets just injured. So it is pretty consistent. Again there is some randomness in the success of a crash landing and this is totally normal. Too many parameters are in play and they are sensitive, like the plane attitude in respect to the ground, maybe a slight angle relative to ground has a major impact. So maybe in the model there is also a random factor and I can accept that because that's life. There is no expert in crash landing in true life.

 

With the Ju-88 side-by-side clips, I had full landing flap. I don't mind using flaps in the Ju-88 because it's not as stall-happy as the Pe-2.

 

The Pe-2 with full flap feels extremely jittery; I can't stand it. That's why I stopped using flaps on it. I can see you're on the very edge of stalling when you pull up before touchdown.

 

I disagree about the randomness, on the basis of there being significantly less apparent randomness (in offline mode) with single-seater planes. Multicrew planes seem to be far, far too variable in their responses to belly landing. If both types of planes were equally random, I could accept it (though I still wouldn't be too happy with it). But in my eyes, there's a massive difference in landing difficulty and excessive punishment for multi-crew planes (specifically bombers, as opposed to, say, the Bf-110 which I have not tested yet, and therefore can't express an opinion on it).

 

Here's a comprehensive comparison study, beginning with your recording that I took the liberty of re-recording for everyone's convenience:

 

Interior view:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Exterior view:

 

Spoiler

 

 

For anyone curious, no, @IckyATLAS doesn't have the same cockpit photo as I do. My settings evidently override his track. Anyway, the following clips are my attempts at copying IckyAtlas' technique.

 

Successful attempt:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Failed attempt:

 

Spoiler

 

 

I will leave judgment of my technique execution to the reader.

 

It is my opinion that the mathematical variances (sink rate, speed, etc) between IckyAtlas and myself are so minimal as to not constitute a valid reason for having substantially differing outcomes.

[firdimigdi]

44 minutes ago, Asgar said:

maybe you should work on your reading comprehension.

multiple people stated they have zero issues, people you know how to fly, testing in QMB. some of them stated they had some occurances in MP.

most people complaining said they can't enjoy coop or MP since "the change" 

the people dying in SP... need to learn now to belly land

so how about you DON'T rephrase what I'm saying with the bullshit that comes to your mind and instead mind your own business

 

Yikes, it was clearly said in jest my dear fellow hence the addition of the smiley face and all that, as the vast majority of the discussion and analysis done both here and in the other thread is done by @IckyATLAS and @oc2209 in QMB. I guess this thread brings out the ad hominems quite fast.

[CountZero]

2 hours ago, Asgar said:

two pages of discussion and even though multiple people have mentioned some incredible hints, you people still havn't figured it out ? ? ? 

hint: It has nothing to do with DM, G forces or the crews.

Tere was also expert players who were trying to convince noobs that there was nothing wrong with 0.50 guns and they need to train and problem is betwen chair and monitor. And devs decided to fix 0.50 and are planig to do DM fixes in future because of this no problem with 0.50. Im sure this landing skill gap will also in the end be fixed by devs. 

[Asgar]

1 minute ago, CountZero said:

Tere was also expert players who were trying to convince noobs that there was nothing wrong with 0.50 guns and they need to train and problem is betwen chair and monitor. And devs decided to fix 0.50 and are planig to do DM fixes in future because of this no problem with 0.50. Im sure this landing skill gap will also in the end be fixed by devs. 

if you say so. I have done dozens of belly landings cause of this discussion on the forums. not a single issue. with almost all planes in the sim. 

[IckyATLAS]

1 minute ago, CountZero said:

Tere was also expert players who were trying to convince noobs that there was nothing wrong with 0.50 guns and they need to train and problem is betwen chair and monitor. And devs decided to fix 0.50 and are planig to do DM fixes in future because of this no problem with 0.50. Im sure this landing skill gap will also in the end be fixed by devs. 

 

Let me try to summarize a little what came up up to now. I could not have imagined that this topic would become such a "controversial" issue.

I think like good pilots we have to remain cold blooded, rational and have to be a little objective and put for a few moments our bruised ego on the side.

Do not forget there are no good pilots, there are only old pilots.

So what can we say:

 

1) First and most important: The QMB tests made above does not rule out that in Multiplayer Servers things behave differently. I may be tempted to do a try on a multiplayer server later, but I have no idea where to start. 

 

2) Know by hart your plane flying characteristics and before attempting crash landing do stall training and recovery, slow speed low flying and maneuvering so that you see how the plane and how fast it reacts to changes in attitude, so that you perfectly know what is the behavior of the plane in those moments before touching ground phases. You need to know the flying envelope. Do aerobatics so that you can see how to recover from weird attitudes of the plane, and get used to bizarre or contradictory visual cues.

 

3) Train also on precision landings. In the sim you can record a track of the landing, replay it and change camera viewpoint to see how precise you landed according to where you intended to touch down. I participated to some precision landing competitions that my flying club organized, and it is a very good training. You must have the wheels touch down the shortest distance after the beginning of the landing line width. But if you touch before it is a landing fail. Then the lateral distance at touch down with the center line of the runway is considered. You do ten landings and all this make up for a mark that is given by the judges on the runway. The plane attitude before touch down will also count. You can win only if you feel your airplane and the air around it the slipstream. Every sensory input counts here. Never fight against your plane, but listen to what it says to you and use its natural behavior for your goal.

 

4) If you keep engine/s running then use it properly in combination to the landing flaps. If you do a deadstick then you have various possibilities depending how far you are from a safe place to land. For that first properly use your landing flaps by gradually using them (you know their behavior and impact on speed and attitude because of your training right?) to reach the maximum finesse (that is with 10-15° of flaps depends on the aircraft) and so to have the maximum distance covered in gliding flight.  If on the contrary you are near and need to kill speed then use either lateral skidding (aileron opposite to rudder) to slow down, or full flaps nose down up and a combination of all. It is not possible again to explain everything in words just train and feel it (in a sim only visually, instruments external view and sound). I repeat never fight against your plane, but listen to what it says to you and use its natural behavior for your goal.

 

5) Training makes perfect and all planes (fully functioning and not badly damaged) can be successfully belly landed most of the time.  If you have heavy combat damage then it become a lottery depending on what is still functional. You can save the day but slight errors here become deadly. But you can also train on a twin engine bomber with one engine dead. You can try to land with no flaps, etc. In this sim you can simulate all sorts of damage scenarios.

 

6) Do you need to be lucky? No. First you train and only after if luck helps, that's good to have, but never never count on it. 

 

 

[AtomicP]

I have to agree with @IckyATLAS, I don't think there's an obvious problem. Maybe in some situations there's an errant bit of terrain that clips the plane or something, but in my experience my pilot rarely dies with a forced landing (i.e. engine out, belly landing). In these cases I use aerobraking as much as possible since careening along the ground at high speed will further damage the aircraft and risks crashing into a tree or something.

[IckyATLAS]

Let's add an additional point that does come out from all the comments on this topic.

 

I can very well understand the frustration when after having succeeded on your mission you have to crash land get killed and so finally you fail your mission.

 

A serious combat flight sim should be as near as possible to something realistic, otherwise it is not a sim it is an arcade game. This is not an arcade game in case you were wondering ? and I hope will never be.

Improvements on the flight model, on the physics,  plane models, damage model, atmospheric models, AI over time tend towards more realism visual or physical. 

 

Devs must stick to the "reality", the laws of physics and the mathematical formulas that describe ballistics, motion, energy etc. with some compromise sure but not according to the wishes of some of us. It is a simulated reality for combat, which is not easy per definition and even if not perfect this is the reality we like.

 

 

Edited April 10, 2022 by IckyATLAS

[SCG_motoadve]

2 hours ago, IckyATLAS said:

Let's add an additional point that does come out from all the comments on this topic.

 

I can very well understand the frustration when after having succeeded on your mission you have to crash land get killed and so finally you fail your mission.

 

A serious combat flight sim should be as near as possible to something realistic, otherwise it is not a sim it is an arcade game. This is not an arcade game in case you were wondering ? and I hope will never be.

Improvements on the flight model, on the physics,  plane models, damage model, atmospheric models, AI over time tend towards more realism visual or physical. 

 

Devs must stick to the "reality", the laws of physics and the mathematical formulas that describe ballistics, motion, energy etc. with some compromise sure but not according to the wishes of some of us. It is a simulated reality for combat, which is not easy per definition and even if not perfect this is the reality we like.

 

 

To the developers, I would say mission accomplished, ditching is now scary, as it is in real life, and you have to do it very carefully or else you pay for it, there will always be whinners, no matter what.

This is way better and more rewarding than it was before, and arcade ditching where you always survived no matter what.

 

 

[Charon]

There seems to be a certain impulse among simulator pilots, to suppose that "challenging" and "unforgiving" is the same thing as "realistic". Sometimes that may be true, but simply cranking the "unforgiving" dial to 11 does not, in general, lead to realism.

 

So I opened up my books and reviewed what mentions of crashes I could find (apologies for the typos)

 

Quote

One of the 61st Squadron's pilots, Robill Roberts, came in low on such a day in P-47 No 26. By the time he realized he might not clear the house facing him at the end of Runway Three, it was too late.
Almost on the point of stalling as he tried to pick up the fighter's nose, the left wheel and gear strut of the Thunderbolt smashed into the house, and like a giant bludgeon sheared through wood, plaster, and plumbing.
[...]
The thunderbolt, if it faltered at all, paused only momentarily, then burst onwards, leaving behind it a jumbled mass of debris that spewed forth in a torrent from the side of the house. [...] Roberts brought the fighter in for a perfect landing.

[...]

One pilot failed to clear the surrounding terrain on taking off, and at 105 miles per hour crashed directly into a hill. He smashed his propeller, literally ripped the engine from its mounts, and tore the whole underbelly of the fighter to shreds--to say nothing of ripping up the local real estate. He walked away with nothing more than a few bruises.

No pilot was more blessed with a combination of Thunderbolt durability and sheer good luck than Milton Anderson. Just as his fighter cleared the runway his engine lost power as several cylinders blew out. Immediately Anderson shoved forward on the stick to lower the fighter's nose, the only possible procedure to maintain enough flying speed to clear the rolling ground. In this he was successful, except that at nearly 150 miles per hour, gear still down, the Thunderbolt smashed into Long Island Sound. We watched in horror as a mountain of spray leaped upward and the sound of the crash reached us. At once the stricken fighter cartwheeled, hurtling wingtip over tail, literally wadding itself like crumpled paper. The thunderbolt was still tumbling helplessly as we raced to the shore. By now the P-47 was a crumpled mass, and our concern was to find Anderson's body before it sank or drifted away with the current.
Anderson wasn't dead! Strapped tightly into his seat he had survived the tremendous buffeting of the crash, suffering only a bump on his head and shoulder bruises. The moment the wreckage came to a stop, he wriggled out of his straps and half waded and swam to shore. He was waiting patiently for us, and wanted to know what took us so long to get there!

Thunderbolt! Johnson and Caidin, Chapter 8.

 

Quote

The planes got into a heavy storm [while moving airfields] and twenty of them made forced landings in different places. The command spent much time looking for them later. A Shturmovik with its fuselage broken in two parts was found near Seshi. Its pilot Alexandr Bulavin bumped his head against the collimator sight and died in the cockpit. This innocent-looking instrument was situated opposite the pilot's head and was the reason for so many deaths! Pilots nicknamed it 'the instrument that knocks out a pilot once and for all'. It took a long time before they were removed from the cockpit and the sighting grid was marked directly on the windshield. One more plane was found in the forest. The commander of the fourth squadron, Captain Lesnikov, got into a heavy rain, tried to land in the sudden darkness with lights on and took the tops of the trees for a field. The branches cushioned the blow and the pilot got off with bruises, but the aircraft was a total loss.

Red Star Against the Swastika, Emelianenko, p60.

 

Quote

The altitude was two or three meters; speed was critical; the aircraft was responding poorly. The engine stalled. Should I land on the fuselage or on the landing gear. My and had already grasped the stick releasing the landing gear. I felt the two usual jerks -- the wheels came out -- and the plane drove down on to the rocky soil at a speed of more than 100kph. And then a crack -- the plane crashed down on the fuselage and crawled...
[...]
Now I understood that I had landed close to the enemy, and the wheels of the aircraft had got stuck in the first German trench.

ibid, p85

 

Quote

Suddenly the aircraft fell off into a steep left turn. It would not respond to the controls and in an instant I realized that only by putting the nose down and opening the throttle all the way could I get myself out of this dangerous situation. A house seemed to rush toward me at tremendous speed. While fully aware that certain death was racing toward me I felt not a moment of fear, there was simply no time.
Instinctively I placed my left arm in front of my head and hauled back on the stick with my right. I saw the aircraft was coming out of its dive, then the house was there and I closed my eyes. There was a terrible crash and I thought: so this is death!
There were several more crashes and then all was still. I hadn't lost consiousness even for a second. I felt a light breeze and risked opening my eyes. I couldn't believe that I could still think and was therefor still alive. Seconds later i climbed from my smoking cockpit -- all that was left of the 109 -- like a phoenix rising from the ashes. I felt myself all over and then begain to laugh loudly. The infantrymen who rushed to the scene must have thought I'd gone mad.
[...]
I had crashed into the cottage without being strapped in. The Me had made a three point landing on the roof of the cottage, during which the tail and wings must have broken off. The heavy engine, together with the fuselage to a point just behind the cockpit, had smashed through the roof and floor of the house. The engine itself remained stuck in one of the walls, and only the cockpit section, with me inside, continued into the open, where it ended up in a garden near some apple trees.
[...]
I escaped with two bruises on my left forearm and a huge lump on my head. Luck had been with me again; without luck it would have been all over.

The War Diary of Hauptmann Helmut Lipfert, Helmut Lipfert, p26

 

Quote

I lay in the cockpit with my legs bent as much as the narrow fuselage allowed. In spite of this my upper body still projected some way into the actual cockpit and Van de Kamp had to lean forward so that I could at least rest my head on his shoulder.
...
On the third try, I realized that we were much too high, but the Leutenant couldn't or didn't want to make another approach and force the machine towards the ground still going quite fast. We touched down far beyond the landing cross and raced over the ground. Braking was useless and we hurtled toward a pile of fuel drumps which had been placed on the landin gfield. Van de Lamp did the only correct thing. He stepped so hard on the left rudder pedal and brake that the Bf 109 abruptly swerved to the left and sheard off the right landing gear leg. We slid along the ground and the machine came to a stop just short of the fuel drums.
Although we were in the last machine to come from the Crimea to Mamaia, some other pilots did not get off so easily as we. Proof of this lay in the many crashed and overturned aircraft on the field. Luckly the hasty flight had not cost any lives from among the pilots. There were no injuries apart from scrapes and bumps.

ibid, p111

 

Quote

The engine was no longer running. I swept toward the first race course, where I wanted to put my aircraft down. As I approached I thought of Liebmann, but immediately put such thoughts out of my mind. But then I saw that the first race course was far too short for a landing, and when I reached the center of the field at 200 kph in spite of side slipping and lowering the flaps, I switched on the ignition again. When the engine started I pulled up briefly to clear the poplars which were racing towards me. Then I switched off the ignition again and forced the crate down hard. It was hanging in the air like a fat plum.
Its forward speed almost zero, the aircraft dropped to towards the second race course at an angle of 60 degrees. It struck the ground short of the center of the place, whereby both cannon gondolas and the engine literally plowed up the ground. At that instant I felt a heavy blow in the back. But I remained wide awake and in no time had loosed my straps and jumped out of the crate. Even though my back hurt terribly, I'd been spared once again.

ibid, p151

 

Quote

It had become darker and I was determined to land somewhere. I swept in toward the extreme right side of the airfield and touched down smoothly. I rolled about 100 meters after the landing and then noticed the tail of my Me was rising slowly. Cutting the throttle and pulling back on the stick had no effect. I quickly switched off the ignition and pulled my straps tight. Then came the expected crash and I was hanging upside down in my crate. As I had flipped over quite near the dispersal, the technical personnell were on the scene quickly and raised the Me.
[...]
We watched the other aircraft land and commented on the crashes: there had now been seven. Saschenberg and Ewald agreed that my somersault had been the prettiest crash on the airfield.

ibid, p171

 

In summary, lots of crashes; many of them hard crashes (far harder than what is presently survivable in the sim), with cartwheels or trenches or houses or trees, and two of them without even being strapped in. Yet these were survivable, with a bit of luck.

 

The only account I can find that resembles what we presently see in sim is that of Bulavin, who landed in the storm, and hard enough to break the fuselage in two. And even this is attributed to the gunsight used in those planes. There were no fatalities among the rest of the squadron who made forced, off field landings, not even the one who crashed into a forest.

 

Edit: Two more, one without a harness and with obstacles, and one into a forest:

 

Quote

It would have been fine on an aerodrome, but God knows where else. For some reason, I didn't trust this rye field. "Have I done everything in order to last? Oh yes, I'm not strapped in!" The alarming thought struck me. I caught hold of the harness, which had fallen behind the seat, but I couldn't fasten it with my free hand. My altitude was only 60 meters. Ahead were the houses of a village. I flung away the harness and, with difficulty, pulled the plane [n.b. an I-16] over the roofs of the houses and steered the aircraft away from a haystack that stood in my path. The wings of the fighter cut the ears of the ripe rye, then flattened it. The aircraft made a belly landing. It slid 10 meters and struck an invisible obstacle. I had the impression that a stone wall had blocked the plane's path. It stood on its nose, slewed round, dropped on one wing and then crashed  with all its weight into the rye. Lumps of earth, mixed with ears of rye, flew into the cockpit. My fling goggles struck the gunsight and fragments of glass cut my right temple and cheek.

Swastika in the Gunsight, Kaberov, p41

Quote

While I thought about this, the aircraft [n.b. a LaGG-3] lost height. The altitude was already 200 meters. There was a village and the forest on the right. I slackened speed. At a height of 100 meters, the aircraft plunged into a mist as white as snow. For a moment or two I broke through the shroud of mist. Beneath me was the dense forest with the tops of its sharply bristling spruce trees. I turned the aircraft towards the left towards the edge of the woods, but I hadn't enough height. The wings were already brushing the tops of the trees. Twigs began to fly. I could see nothing in front of me, but felt a sudden jerk. It felt as though someone had grabbed the aircraft by the tail. It immediately stopped in mid-flight and slid down. I managed to throw my hands forward to avoid hitting my head. Then came a slight thrust and I was throw half out of the plane, suspended by my harness and hanging by the cockpit cover. A cloud of snowflakes settled. It became quiet. I felt myself. It seemed that I was in one piece.

Ibid, 121

Edited April 10, 2022 by Charon

[oc2209]

12 hours ago, Firdimigdi said:

Only thing I can see from this angle is that it seems that in the second clip the plane pitches down more than in the first clip. At the moment of death the gunsight is "under" the horizon.

 

I used to believe the pitching motion caused the problems, but I don't feel that way anymore.

 

You'll notice that the sight pitched below the horizon on both my own clean Pe-2 landing and during IckyAtlas' clean landing.

 

It's almost impossible to control the pitch forward, even on the best landing.

 

9 hours ago, IckyATLAS said:

 

Let me try to summarize a little what came up up to now. I could not have imagined that this topic would become such a "controversial" issue.

I think like good pilots we have to remain cold blooded, rational and have to be a little objective and put for a few moments our bruised ego on the side.

 

 

It's pretty obvious that people get pissed quickly because, in effect, you're telling them that they're not experiencing what they feel they're experiencing. And, not only that, but you're making them out to feel incompetent in the process.

 

I'm not saying that's your intention, but it's an inevitable result of these kinds of debates. Furthermore, you do invite a more violent backlash by claiming landings are 'perfect' rather than simply saying they're 'acceptable.'

 

I consider myself exceptionally cold-blooded (unless someone tries to bait me--then I will indulge them) and I also was skeptical when people complained about the landing deaths. I also went around posting recordings of myself belly landing 109s and P-51s and other easily landed planes, attempting to tell people that there wasn't an offline problem.

 

And then I began to fly the Pe-2, the Ju-88, and the He-111 in belly tests. Then my opinion changed.

 

I don't believe for one second that my landing technique is poor in any of these planes. I challenge anyone to call my technique poor in these examples:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Spoiler

 

 

Nobody should be defending that Ju-88 outcome in particular.

 

Nobody can rationally claim that in a landing like that, the entire crew should die. I won't budge an inch on that assessment. There is no way that's a rational outcome. Especially when you see me land the exact same way and have no one die or even suffer an injury in another recording.

 

The variability is what feels wrong. There's no logic to it at all.

[firdimigdi]

So far I have to say that of your videos these two stand out the most to me:

 

P47 pilot death by malnutrition:

 

vs

 

P47 YOLO mode survival:

 

[oc2209]

1 hour ago, Firdimigdi said:

So far I have to say that of your videos these two stand out the most to me:

 

P47 pilot death by malnutrition:

 

vs

 

P47 YOLO mode survival:

 

The irony is that surviving a ~200 MPH belly landing is what we used to be able to do before the pilot physiology changes.

 

What I'd like to figure out, is what causes the deaths and injuries during a long slide. It seems like bombers are more susceptible to deaths/injuries while sliding. Even at much lower speeds. Which at face value, makes no sense to me.

 

Here's a Sturmovik test I just did:

 

Instant death on ground contact:

 

Spoiler

 

 

And here's a survival with no injury:

 

Spoiler

 

 

If you look closely, you'll see that my sink rate is a little higher in the fatal result. So at extreme touchdown speeds, any kind of sink rate beyond the bare minimum is fatal.

 

I'm okay with this.

 

What I can't understand, is why a Sturmovik can skid on the ground at ~185 MPH, a P-47 can skid at closer to 200 MPH, while a Ju-88 and a Pe-2 can kill every occupant aboard with a touchdown speed of ~110 MPH or less.

 

If I were to take the Sturm and P-47 down to 110 MPH, I am quite confident that I would survive, at worst with an injury, every single belly landing at those speeds.

 

If there was some consistency here, I would not suspect a bug.

[IckyATLAS]

I wanted to try if on a MP server it was more difficult.

So here I tried Bellylanding the Pe2 in MP Server (Official EU 1C dogfight) Stalingrad map it seems.

I did a few tries and on the dirt runway no problem, here is the track:

 

Pe2 MP Server Bellyanding.zip

 

However on the desert the terrain was very bumpy and irregular and I had often the radioman injured.

I can still consider these are successful landings in view of the circumstances.

[CountZero]

http://72ag-ded.su:8080/en/sorties/35103/IckyATLAS/?tour=30

 

14 landings 4 KIA, ~70% succes rate landing perfectly good airplane for expert and thats acceptable ? good luck atracting players

[[CPT]Crunch]

Even the normal landings are canned actions, remember the last time you landed a plane with one wing shot all to hell and had to wrestle the plane all the way to the very end until full stop.  In the real world only wind would pull you like that, and it would have to be awful strong, and it would do exactly the same when undamaged.  Soon as you make full weight on gear and stop flying damage would have zip to do with ground handling, only engines out, braking, and gear damages would, but not so in this simulated world.  Not a complaint, just observation to think about whats going on likewise for a wheels up/ditching.

 

Its a sim and not real, many parts are still imperfect smoke and mirrors.  Yeah it probably can be adjusted some in our favor, its not always about realism, in this case a game play issue.  Those are important in the scheme too, it is a game, our fun and entertainment, the over all health and sales of it are dependent on our having fun.  I would think there are other more important 'realism' priorities for most of us than ground taxi and crash modeling.  Small gaming tweak make the groaning cease and move on.  

[oc2209]

I just want to briefly reiterate here that I don't believe landing technique matters in the case of increasing survivability. This being a sim and not reality, everything is, in my view at least, a function of mathematics.

 

Not that math doesn't apply to reality; I'm saying that there are fewer variables at play in a sim than in reality. It's a simplified version of reality. Those variables are thus easier to isolate and study. The only pertinent variables with landing in a sim, are sink rate and airspeed. I have greatly mitigated the former by making an almost totally parallel landing approach in most cases. If speed is low enough, sink rate can be higher. If speed is high, sink rate must be lower. It is quite a simple and reliable formula when landing most planes.

 

To illustrate this point, I landed a Sturmovik at 2x time acceleration (to reduce the smoothness and precision of my handling), well over the recommended landing speed, yet well under the speed that I have determined to be dangerous (~150 MPH). This was at the end of 5 landings between 110-120 MPH to prove my earlier claim that I was certain I could land planes other than the Pe-2 and Ju-88 around 110 MPH with a much higher probability of success. I had no injuries.

 

Spoiler

 

 

I have never been able to land a Ju-88, Pe-2, etc, 5 times in a row without incident.

 

In other words: there is clearly a 'safe speed' threshold in the sim. One that is arrived at by presumably some basic physics calculations. If you exceed a certain speed or sink rate, bad things are exponentially more likely to happen.

 

The big question here is: why do these bad things happen at times when you're operating within the normal safety limits? That's where the bug speculation comes into play.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

43 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

The big question here is: why do these bad things happen at times when you're operating within the normal safety limits? That's where the bug speculation comes into play.

With all due respect; that isn't the big question at all. The big question is why some people (me, IckyATLAS, etc.) have no problems whatsoever with the current system and haven't had any pilot deaths that we consider unrealistic, while other people die if they sneeze too hard. I agree that at this stage, evidence points to a bug of some sorts, but I don't think this bug has anything to do with the flight/damage/pilot physiology model since those are identical for different persons.

 

(I also just survived a crash uninjured when on final the wing of my 110E2 collided with a building and I spun into the ground at 180kph or so.)

[Charon]

Miscellaneous thoughts:

 

• Raw ground-speed seems to be by far the largest factor in the survivability of crashes.
• As an amusing consequence of this, it's possible to land the U2-VS inverted (on its upper wing) without injury. It's just too slow to be fatal.
• It appears to be impossible to survive landing in trees at any speed, even in the U2, even though that is possible in real life (with enough luck).
• BoX doesn't, AFAIK, model ground effect, meaning we all habitually touch down a little bit faster than is realistic.
• I've long suspected, without proof, that BoX substantially over-models the loss of lift associated with battle damage, and as a consequence I think we wind up landing damaged planes faster than is realistic, on top of the extra speed from the previous bullet point.
• Real world pilots make mistakes. They spin in on final, or they try to perform impossible turns. They fly into IMC they're not qualified or equipped for. They forget about density altitude and fly their planes into the ground, as the above video. And these are all logged in databases. If belly landings are as dangerous as we see in game, someone ought to be able to find such fatalities in the ASN database: fatalities where a ham-fisted pilot belly-landed a plane in a field too fast and died (and didn't just stall it in, or crash into some obstacle).

----

 

I also managed to find one account of belly landing a Ju 88, with no fatalities despite the pilot being unfastened and the plane being heavily loaded (which necessarily implies high landing speed).

 

Quote

"We have two good engines in our new aircraft," he remarked. No sooner had he said this, than a shudder went through the aircraft. The right hand engine came to a standstill, and we could see that a part of the camshaft protruded from the top of the engine. I feathered the propeller and ordered the jettison of the wing pods [n.b. carrying luggage and mail]. I was busy trying to trim the heavily loaded aircraft, as Kratzert reported that because of the valuable contents, he had wire-locked the transport pods, which meant that they could not be jettisoned. In spite of full power to the left engine, the aircraft was dropping in height at some fifteen ft per second. We were busy looking for a suitable place to make an emergency landing, now that we were under the clouds. [...] I put the aircraft into a dive to gain speed and shot over the railway track and the trees. A few yard from the end of the plateau our nice new Ju hit the ground on the fuselage underside and came to rest in the field. Bubi had released the cabin canopy just before the "landing". "That was a close shave," remarked Heinz. Heinrich had noticed that I was not strapped in my seat, which was a bit thoughtless in the circumstances. He had positioned himself behind me and held the headset cable tightly in his hand so that I would not be thrown forward during the crash. He had helped me, but suffered injury to his knee, which made it difficult for him to move.

A Luftwaffe Bomber Pilot Remembers, Häberlen, p89

[oc2209]

49 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

With all due respect; that isn't the big question at all. The big question is why some people (me, IckyATLAS, etc.) have no problems whatsoever with the current system and haven't had any pilot deaths that we consider unrealistic, while other people die if they sneeze too hard. I agree that at this stage, evidence points to a bug of some sorts, but I don't think this bug has anything to do with the flight/damage/pilot physiology model since those are identical for different persons.

 

(I also just survived a crash uninjured when on final the wing of my 110E2 collided with a building and I spun into the ground at 180kph or so.)

 

I beg to differ, in the cases where I'm landing planes under almost identical conditions and have vastly different outcomes. I'm the same person, with the same handling behaviors, the same stick, the same computer, on the same map, etc, etc, everything else being equal. I should not be able to demonstrate the disparities that I have, in a logical system.

 

I can land a Sturmovik or a P-47 or a P-38 sloppily at ~135 MPH and know with a good deal of certainty that I'll be okay. Land a Pe-2/Ju-88 slower by at least 25 MPH, and there's no guarantee of safety.

 

It's the aggregate safety probability that we're examining here.

 

I can pretty much guarantee there will be inexplicable injuries and deaths landing beside Lapino airfield, offline, between 100-110 MPH in a Pe-2, Ju-88 or He-111. It might take you 3 times, 5 times, whatever. But it will happen. And when it does, it makes no sense.

 

Belly landing at safe speeds should not be a coin toss. Yet in some planes, it seems to be. Why should the plane type matter? 

 

I think there's a connection between the following phenomena: very light mid-air collisions causing pilot/crew deaths; as-safe-as-can-be-reasonably-expected belly landings causing deaths; and the variety of online deaths we hear about even when people are landing safely with gear down.

 

The same underlying issue is likely responsible for all of the above. As I've said elsewhere, my guess is that it's related to the sim registering a plane as being stopped for a fraction of a second. Stopped dead. It's an error of some kind, and the act of suddenly stopping (invisible to the naked eye) is what's capable of instantly killing an entire bomber crew in what should be a simple belly landing at optimal speed and sink rate.

 

And this stoppage happens more often online than offline because of network issues; and it happens more often to bombers, offline, because of some kind of variable mass, or surface area contacting the ground, or multi-crew calculation.

Edited April 11, 2022 by oc2209

[oc2209]

Science... has prevailed!

 

Well, okay, my pseudo-scientific methodology has prevailed.

 

It dawned on me that the Me-262 has the least ground contact during a long belly slide. It rests upon its engines, which are not only indestructible (in the context of controlled belly landings), but very smooth and present little that can be 'snagged' on terrain bumps. Assuming terrain bumps have anything to do with the odd behavior I've witnessed.

 

The point is to eliminate variables. I have now pushed successful belly landing speeds up to 242 MPH.

 

First attempt:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Simple explanation why I flipped. I pulled back on the stick too hard after contacting the ground. I've done it in a Sturmovik before, where I actually take off again.

 

Anyway, the second attempt was much smoother:

 

Spoiler

 

 

By comparison, I tried landing the Ju-88 and Pe-2 at speeds ranging from 170-200 MPH in the same conditions, and had crew fatalities every time.

 

The lesson here:

 

Speed by itself doesn't kill, so long as the plane does not 'catch' anything on the ground. This is something I've suspected, but I feel this latest example is proof enough. Bombers for some reason 'catch' much more of the ground, which explains why they suffer from crew casualties at a much higher rate than fighters, even at lower speeds.

 

The sim must either be basing its physics calculations on the surface area of a given plane that's contacting the ground at any given moment + speed; or it's related to the shape of the plane that's making contact with the ground + speed.

 

Either way, there is undeniably a connection between survivability and plane structure, either in shape or size.

 

This could be a twofold problem in terms of how to fix it. Terrain bumps might be causing issues; maybe some are too large or having some kind of bad interaction with planes. The other possible problem is in how the physics calculations are interpreting collision forces.

[Noisemaker]

22 hours ago, Charon said:

The aircraft made a belly landing. It slid 10 meters and struck an invisible obstacle. I had the impression that a stone wall had blocked the plane's path. It stood on its nose, slewed round, dropped on one wing and then crashed  with all its weight into the rye.

So anecdotally, the devs even got the invisible objects right!

[AEthelraedUnraed]

15 hours ago, oc2209 said:

I beg to differ, in the cases where I'm landing planes under almost identical conditions and have vastly different outcomes.

Then explain to me why IckyATLAS, myself and some others don't have these "vastly different outcomes" you speak of.

[[CPT]Crunch]

Maybe because they're not actually ditching, but doing wheels up landings on airport turf in most of these clips.  The online crowd generally don't get that 'luxury' of making it back to a properly programmed and prepared turf.

[oc2209]

3 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Then explain to me why IckyATLAS, myself and some others don't have these "vastly different outcomes" you speak of.

 

Any number of reasons. It's obviously very hard for me to make a solid guess when I can't see any of your landing recordings but a few of Icky's (the Pe-2 was the only pertinent one so far--I don't need to see him land P-51s safely, as I can do that myself; and I haven't tried with the A-20 enough to establish whether it's as troublesome as the other bombers).

 

I also can't see your failure rate in the planes I consider most problematic: the Pe-2, Ju-88. What you consider 'acceptable' for deaths and injuries incurred during a landing might vary widely from what others consider acceptable.

If what @CountZero said is true regarding Icky's 4 deaths in 14 attempts on the MP server--if Icky's KIAs weren't from being shot down or something else--then that's a terrible failure rate for, as Count said, an expert pilot ditching under ideal conditions.

 

Further, we don't know how extensive yours and others' testing is in the Pe-2 and Ju-88. For all we know, you might fly one of them, say, six times in a row, and when you get two successes in a row, you consider it safe.

 

Beyond all of the above, there is yet another factor. Maybe your particular landing style somehow manages to bypass the root cause of the problems that so many other people are having.

 

It's not that your technique is better. I don't mean this in a petty competitive way. I'm saying I clearly established that I could mimic Icky's approach well enough, and I also showed how my approach is valid--the chief consideration is to eliminate sink rate and reduce speed. All other considerations are irrelevant.

 

But maybe, maybe Icky's approach of pulling back almost to the point of stalling while making contact with the ground--maybe that saves him. I think it feels extremely dangerous myself, which is why I come in perfectly flat instead; I have more control, the plane never shakes that way. The landing speed is increased maybe 10 MPH by not lowering flaps in the Pe-2. 10 MPH shouldn't make that much difference.

 

Beyond that, I had the 'everybody dies' scenario in the Ju-88 with full landing flaps.

 

Point being: I have established that I can land planes at ridiculously high speeds. Up to 240 MPH. I have therefore learned how to 'game' the simulation. When I cannot learn how to land the Pe-2/Ju-88 without incident to the same extent that I can safely land other planes, I don't see this as any kind of issue with me.

 

If I had a hardware problem, say faulty stick inputs, I should kill my pilot landing at 240 MPH. The slightest twitch or personal hardware flaw should do it at that speed, if the Me-262 was subject to the same forces that routinely kill my crew at 110 MPH in a bomber. That logic is inescapable.

 

The fact that I can safely land any plane far, far above what is safe, while other planes kill my crew at speeds that are totally safe--that disparity is the giant, gaping logic hole I consider irrefutable evidence of something being wrong. It means the 262 is not subject to the same forces as the Ju-88, etc.

 

Therein is the problem. If one plane, one magic plane, can plow terrain at any speed with impunity, while another one kills crew from the slightest invisible bump at much lower speeds... that is the problem in a nutshell. Plain as day.

[IckyATLAS]

14 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

Point being: I have established that I can land planes at ridiculously high speeds. Up to 240 MPH. I have therefore learned how to 'game' the simulation. When I cannot learn how to land the Pe-2/Ju-88 without incident to the same extent that I can safely land other planes, I don't see this as any kind of issue with me.

 

If I had a hardware problem, say faulty stick inputs, I should kill my pilot landing at 240 MPH. The slightest twitch or personal hardware flaw should do it at that speed, if the Me-262 was subject to the same forces that routinely kill my crew at 110 MPH in a bomber. That logic is inescapable.

 

The fact that I can safely land any plane far, far above what is safe, while other planes kill my crew at speeds that are totally safe--that disparity is the giant, gaping logic hole I consider irrefutable evidence of something being wrong. It means the 262 is not subject to the same forces as the Ju-88, etc.

 

Therein is the problem. If one plane, one magic plane, can plow terrain at any speed with impunity, while another one kills crew from the slightest invisible bump at much lower speeds... that is the problem in a nutshell. Plain as day.

 

Here you made a big point. Your high speed attempts show that indeed the sim model is what it is and is far from perfect. It also shows that you need to find the right combination of "parameters" that makes the sim accept it as a belly landing without consequence. 

 

In the sim the ground is always hard, except maybe for the water surfaces. You never plough through the ground. Probably there is a hardness parameter to make a difference between a  corn field, a concrete or grass runway or a stone paved or a gravel road. But in ditching it makes an enormous difference what type of soil, the material, and if it is dry, humid or full of water, sticky, compact, loose etc. The energy dissipation vertically and horizontally can change enormously. And if you have some vegetation like thick bushes, branches (not oak trees ?) that can help cushion the frontal impact forces. A P47 that has an immense and large wall of steel in front of the pilot also protects much better the pilot. This is why we can have incredible crash landings and pilots walking away. All these things probably can't be simulated with simple physical models.

 

Regarding my tests with the Pe2 on the MP server I was not shot down by anybody. In fact I tried to be out of the combat zone. The problem I had is that the "mission" that was active was on a winter map and with the sun very low on the horizon. So it was not night yet but pretty dark. I did all my landings on a large frozen lake that was not illuminated and so the surface was dark pretty featureless with no contrast. I ditched more or less in the middle of it. And the problem I had in the first trials where I got killed was related to the ability to see through the windshield at what exact altitude I was from the frozen surface. It was very dark so not easy and I had no real reference as the trees from forest where very far so very small and did not give a good cue. 

 

As I mentioned I do not use the HUD but only the instruments in the cockpit, which were also in low light. I kept the cockpit without light to avoid destroy my vison capability to see outside. Once you are low near the ground there is an error margin (and I did not compensate my altimeter for the barometric pressure that I do not know as I have not made that mission) that is easily in a few meters and that in a Pe2 is fatal. But after being killed 4 times and then injured two times it went well for me. I had my radioman only injured a few times. I do not understand why radiomen are so fragile ? 

 

I would say that the problems in evaluating the height in low light on featureless surface is very realistic and experimenting it in the sim was nice. Pilots know this very well at night on the sea, or at noon on a clean snow surface. To land on fresh snow (without a trace) on a glacier slope if the sun is above you in a bright sunny blue sky day and there is no shadow visible because it is right under you it is extremely tricky to estimate your height, only training will help you avoid that you get caught in one of the many traps that nature can have for us. If the sun is more on the side then you can also use your shadow as a cue, as it will come towards you as you go down and both will meet at contact.

[oc2209]

1 hour ago, IckyATLAS said:

As I mentioned I do not use the HUD but only the instruments in the cockpit, which were also in low light. I kept the cockpit without light to avoid destroy my vison capability to see outside. Once you are low near the ground there is an error margin (and I did not compensate my altimeter for the barometric pressure that I do not know as I have not made that mission) that is easily in a few meters and that in a Pe2 is fatal. But after being killed 4 times and then injured two times it went well for me. I had my radioman only injured a few times. I do not understand why radiomen are so fragile ?

 

So 6 failed attempts of 14, and then the radioman injuries mixed in those. Thanks for explaining.

 

I find the radioman very frustrating. Landing the Pe-2 between 170-200 MPH, the pilot and navigator frequently died, while the radioman lived, uninjured. Conversely, landing at lower (normal) speeds, the people in the cockpit were okay and the radioman died or was injured.

 

There's not a lot of sense to it. The funny thing is when I have a better statistical chance of keeping a Sturmovik gunner alive at almost 200 MPH:

 

Spoiler

 

 

I had a successful landing at these speeds 4 of 6 times. One of the failures was injuries to both pilot and gunner; another was the pilot dying while the gunner lived.

[CUJO_1970]

Cool thread.

 

On the one hand, we have people providing actual photos and pilots accounts in abundance, providing actual proof of what actually happened on a regular basis during WW2.

 

On the other hand, we have people showing no proof whatsoever that running over a dandelion with a pinhole in your wing should result in instant death, yet they are happy about it and call it "realistic", even "perfect" lol.

 

Bless this flat earth ? 

[Luftschiff]

Just made an emergency belly landing in a 110 on an airfield, came in too fast because I couldn't use flaps - but landed perfectly at below 120 km/h, slid to a halt, without injury, and once the plane had almost stopped moving, I suddenly died. There is absolutely something very inconsistent with the variables that decide whether you live or die. 

[oc2209]

2 hours ago, IckyATLAS said:

Here you made a big point. Your high speed attempts show that indeed the sim model is what it is and is far from perfect. It also shows that you need to find the right combination of "parameters" that makes the sim accept it as a belly landing without consequence. 

 

 

I did all my landings on a large frozen lake that was not illuminated and so the surface was dark pretty featureless with no contrast. I ditched more or less in the middle of it.

 

Thanks for mentioning the frozen lake. It inspired me to try a frozen landing myself.

 

4/4 attempts with no injuries. This was the fastest:

 

Spoiler

 

 

So, yeah. This really makes it look like a terrain bump issue.

 

An Me-262 can land fast on (relatively) uneven ground because it has a completely smooth underside; while a Pe-2, which is a deathtrap for me on the normal ground, can land fast on a smooth surface like ice with no issues.

[oc2209]

3 hours ago, Luftschiff said:

Just made an emergency belly landing in a 110 on an airfield, came in too fast because I couldn't use flaps - but landed perfectly at below 120 km/h, slid to a halt, without injury, and once the plane had almost stopped moving, I suddenly died. There is absolutely something very inconsistent with the variables that decide whether you live or die. 

 

My Spidey-Sense tells me this was online?

[oc2209]

3 hours ago, CUJO_1970 said:

On the other hand, we have people showing no proof whatsoever that running over a dandelion with a pinhole in your wing should result in instant death, yet they are happy about it and call it "realistic", even "perfect" lol.

 

I think we can get Icky on our side.

 

As someone who underwent my own Saul to Paul conversion on the matter, I'm not going to get hostile with him. I was originally in the 'git gud' camp who thought people just needed to land better-er. Then I saw the light. Hallelujah, I saw the light.