Spotting

[4thFG_Cap_D_Gentile]

Is a pain in the WW2 part of the game, makes it unrealistic but in the WW1 part of it. Why do I see WW1 planes further away than the WW2 ones? The 47 is actually bigger than the Dreidecker!  Why do WW1 planes appear bigger than WW2 planes on my screen?

 

Cheers

[JonRedcorn]

It's a known fact that ww1 airmen ate a lot of carrots.

[JG1_Schulte]

2 wings....Double smudges

[[CPT]Crunch]

Slower rates of closure speeds, easier to spot with more successful outcomes when you have lots more time on your side. 

[RossMarBow]

Yea theirs a massive difference between two planes closing at 600 kph plus

And two planes closing at walking speed

[4thFG_Cpt_Godfrey]

Elaborate here a bit. We were noticing how far away they were and the fact that we could see them at a very long distance. We could tell they were in a fight, manuevering. Could not tell what planes they were until closer of course, but the fact that we could see dots/planes made us wonder why its not like that on the WW2 side of this sim? At the risk of naming names, Combat Box is the main one here. Nice server, but hard to see German planes until they open fire. We were once flying side by side with a distance of perhaps a 1/4 mile. I was looking at him at the very moment he was hit very hard and shot down. I could see behind him for a great distance and after I saw the tracers, I saw the 190 that did it. Tracers first, plane second. Conversely, in The Unprofessional server this doesn't seem to be an issue and to a lesser extent, Wings of Liberty. Any constructive help would be appreciated. Both our computers are quite capable of running this sim at max settings. Thanks

[Feldgrun]

1 hour ago, 4thFG_Cpt_J_Godfrey said:

 Could not tell what planes they were until closer of course, but the fact that we could see dots/planes made us wonder why its not like that on the WW2 side of this sim? At the risk of naming names, Combat Box is the main one here...

Conversely, in The Unprofessional server this doesn't seem to be an issue and to a lesser extent, Wings of Liberty.

 

Could this be related to shading mods some servers allow?

[CountZero]

2 hours ago, 4thFG_Cpt_J_Godfrey said:

Elaborate here a bit. We were noticing how far away they were and the fact that we could see them at a very long distance. We could tell they were in a fight, manuevering. Could not tell what planes they were until closer of course, but the fact that we could see dots/planes made us wonder why its not like that on the WW2 side of this sim? At the risk of naming names, Combat Box is the main one here. Nice server, but hard to see German planes until they open fire. We were once flying side by side with a distance of perhaps a 1/4 mile. I was looking at him at the very moment he was hit very hard and shot down. I could see behind him for a great distance and after I saw the tracers, I saw the 190 that did it. Tracers first, plane second. Conversely, in The Unprofessional server this doesn't seem to be an issue and to a lesser extent, Wings of Liberty. Any constructive help would be appreciated. Both our computers are quite capable of running this sim at max settings. Thanks

So if this is online thing is it posible that places where you have good visability use enhanced visability settings in realisam and ones with poor visability dont use it ? did you check that ? maybe you have this on in SP and when you try MP servers dont have this on.

Or it could be some bug you discovered that makes ww2 airplanes less visable then ww1, i just check in QM in SP and didnt notice big differances on my game with them spawning 10km away, enhanced vis off in settings.

Edited July 16, 2022 by CountZero

[4thFG_Cpt_Godfrey]

Count Zero.

I’m not aware of their setting’s honestly and as far as SP, neither of us do that. Go to QM when a new plane comes out is about it for offline.

 

It seems to us it is just German planes since occasionally we lose sight of each other in clouds, ground clutter, etc. but once we know the approximate position and altitude, it’s usually not too hard to regroup since we are able to pick each other up from a distance. 
 

We have inquired through the chat if anyone else is experiencing this and it seems about half and half. 
 

Appreciate the response and will check into it. 

[4thFG_Cap_D_Gentile]

On 7/16/2022 at 6:16 PM, Feldgrun said:

 

Could this be related to shading mods some servers allow?

There is a shading mod? Just the word "mod" gives me bad feelings. Do you know what servers?

 

Cheers

[JonRedcorn]

4 hours ago, 4thFG_Cap_D_Gentile said:

There is a shading mod? Just the word "mod" gives me bad feelings. Do you know what servers?

 

Cheers

Why does the word mod give you bad feelings? Mod gives me the opposite feelings in fact. Usually means making something better than originally intended.

[357th_KW]

CB doesn’t allow reshade to be used.  Running the sim with everything set to max isn’t a good formula for spotting.  There’s a ton of threads on this topic, but running lower resolutions on as big a screen as you can will make the contacts larger to your eye and vastly improve your spotting ability.  Game settings like mirrors and terrain filters can have a big impact as well.
 

CB has a training server where you can turn on icons for practice.  If you go into the dogfight arenas there, you can cycle your icons on and off and get an idea of how far away you’re actually spotting things.  Players with good spotting can generally pick up a single engined fighter at 10km+ if conditions are ideal (some relative motion, contact is against a high contrast background - silhouetted against the sky etc).  Keep in mind that the aircraft’s orientation to you matters a lot - a plane turning in circles will be very visible and then appear to shrink up or vanish momentarily as it turns head on to you etc.  Likewise, shadows, low light (dusk or dawn), haze, rain, clouds etc can all have a big impact on visibility.  Mixed cloud over the broken farm fields of Western Europe can make for some very difficult spotting underneath the cloud layer.  Getting below a target and silhouetting them against the sky or clouds can make it much easier to see them, at the price of sacrificing the altitude advantage.

[JimTM]

On 7/16/2022 at 5:26 PM, 4thFG_Cpt_J_Godfrey said:

Count Zero.

I’m not aware of their setting’s honestly and as far as SP, neither of us do that. Go to QM when a new plane comes out is about it for offline.

...

 

To view the settings for each server, mouse over the icon to the left of the server. 

 

You won't be able to see servers that allow mods unless you have enabled them for your game (Settings > Game > Enable mods). Then, you will see only those servers that allow mods.

[4thFG_Cpt_Godfrey]

On 7/19/2022 at 12:40 PM, 357th_KW said:

CB doesn’t allow reshade to be used.  Running the sim with everything set to max isn’t a good formula for spotting.  There’s a ton of threads on this topic, but running lower resolutions on as big a screen as you can will make the contacts larger to your eye and vastly improve your spotting ability.  Game settings like mirrors and terrain filters can have a big impact as well.
 

CB has a training server where you can turn on icons for practice.  If you go into the dogfight arenas there, you can cycle your icons on and off and get an idea of how far away you’re actually spotting things.  Players with good spotting can generally pick up a single engined fighter at 10km+ if conditions are ideal (some relative motion, contact is against a high contrast background - silhouetted against the sky etc).  Keep in mind that the aircraft’s orientation to you matters a lot - a plane turning in circles will be very visible and then appear to shrink up or vanish momentarily as it turns head on to you etc.  Likewise, shadows, low light (dusk or dawn), haze, rain, clouds etc can all have a big impact on visibility.  Mixed cloud over the broken farm fields of Western Europe can make for some very difficult spotting underneath the cloud layer.  Getting below a target and silhouetting them against the sky or clouds can make it much easier to see them, at the price of sacrificing the altitude advantage.

 

Well sir, first of all, as I stated we only seem to have this problem in very limited servers. I mentioned CB because we like the maps, (Western Front) plane sets, and so many targets to choose from. 

We have been playing these sims since CFS1 so I won't go into tactics/weather conditions/lighting etc. on spotting as you have mentioned and on how we are to fly. We know how to do this. These are not the issues we are having and as I said above we are not the only ones. You mentioned, " There’s a ton of threads on this topic". So by your own admission, there is an issue here that is not being resolved to make this sim more enjoyable/playable. Rather frustrating to be bounced by unseen German planes practically all the time. My friend was jumped by a 262 once and all I saw was a small dot and tracers. Unfortunately I to have been on the receiving end all too often. As for the resolution, we have tried different ones and it absolutely makes no difference. You will lose planes in background from time to time after spotting, but when you are looking at a clear blue sky, this should not happen. The developers' have made a wonderful sim, no question, but this is almost a deal killer. Thanks for your feedback. 

Edited July 21, 2022 by 4thFG_Cpt_J_Godfrey

[357th_KW]

I used to have that same experience, where I'd know an enemy was nearby due to a callouts or flak etc.  And I'd be staring at my 6 o'clock, frantically trying to see the guy before I got bounced, only to watch tracers appear out of no where and destroy me.

 

This is a fixable problem - it takes some time and effort tweaking graphics settings, and possibly some hardware changes (you're never going to be competitive with a 15" monitor for instance).  I'm at a point now where on the rare occasions I get bounced, its because I was distracted, not because the contact was invisible.