Adding dynamism to the dynamic campaigns

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

2 things in the careers that are lacking but I think could be implemented by devs.

 

 

- enemy skills level based on the current historical state of the war.

 

Right now, depending on the difficulty level you chose in the options of the career, all AI aicrafts will always have the same AI level. Like, you always fight veterans if difficulty is at moderate. In the battle of Moscow for instance, if I'm flying german, I'd expect russian opponents to be rookies most of the times, unexperienced, with low morale while the Lutwaffe is pretty strong with many experienced pilots. The opposite in BoBP, a defeated Luftwaffe, mostly rookies vs experienced RAF and USAAF. The historical state of the war should increase/decrease the chances of meeting rookies, average, vets or aces. 

 

 

-amount of AI aircrafts/flights based on the current historical state of the war.

 

Again, the game wont consider this factor, the airforces are always as strong no matter the state of the war. The Luftwaffe still puts insane numbers of 109s in the air even by the end of the battle of Stalingrad or while in full retreat near the end of Kuban. I would expect russians to be more scattered in the early stage of BOM but no, they are just as numerous as they'll be by the end of BOM and BOS for instance. 

 

 

So, I propose a new campaign option, the 'historical war state' option that would affect the two things I mentionned to add dynamism to the campaigns according to real history and airforces strength. The player could also leave the setting at 'default' so the campaigns would remain as they are now with all airforces being balanced throughout all campaigns.

 

Thoughts? 

Edited August 16, 2022 by I./JG52_Woutwocampe

[LukeFF]

2 hours ago, I./JG52_Woutwocampe said:

Thoughts? 

 

Yes to all that. ??

[=LD=Nephrill]

First.. the devs have to fix the issue with the stutterering game in single player. See this thread:

 

@Firdimigdi

[firdimigdi]

15 minutes ago, =LD=Nephrill said:

First.. the devs have to fix the issue with the stutterering game in single player. See this thread:

 

@Firdimigdi

 

BTW, in a thread in the bug report forum I've added some findings which I believe point to the culprit starting from this post downwards:

 

[AEthelraedUnraed]

1 hour ago, =LD=Nephrill said:

First.. the devs have to fix the issue with the stutterering game in single player. See this thread:

And what exactly does this have to do with any of the suggestions posted by the OP??

[=LD=Nephrill]

5 minutes ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

And what exactly does this have to do with any of the suggestions posted by the OP??

 

In hindsight, my comment could have been a little more elaborate.

 

The suggestions that are made are very good and welcome. My remark is about the suggestion "amount of AI aircrafts/flights based on the current historical state of the war." I expect performance issues for many players due to more AI planes in the air.

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

59 minutes ago, =LD=Nephrill said:

 

In hindsight, my comment could have been a little more elaborate.

 

The suggestions that are made are very good and welcome. My remark is about the suggestion "amount of AI aircrafts/flights based on the current historical state of the war." I expect performance issues for many players due to more AI planes in the air.

 

If you are referring to the game slowing down when there are too many AI objects in a mission due to the cpu dilation, my suggestion might in fact actually help often as a crippled airforce would put less AI planes in the sky.

 

In fact, I rarely tell myself 'oh this airforce should be more numerous in that phase of the campaign.' Its actually the opposite, my suggestion would lower the amount of AI aircrafts in many situations.

[Avimimus]

Would be a great option to have! I'm pretty sure I'd fly more campaign missions if this was the case.

Edited August 23, 2022 by Avimimus

[migmadmarine]

Yea, I'd love a "historical" setting for difficulty even if it meant not seeing an enemy aircraft for several missions in a row, if that is what is accurate to the experience (late war western allies for example)

[LukeFF]

1 hour ago, migmadmarine said:

Yea, I'd love a "historical" setting for difficulty even if it meant not seeing an enemy aircraft for several missions in a row, if that is what is accurate to the experience (late war western allies for example)

 

Same here, and for me at least that would be part of the suspense - will this mission be relatively easy and no will show up to counter us? Or will the enemy come out in force? And if so, how good are they?

To add to the initial suggestion: mixed aircraft flights for the AI are needed. Right now, for instance, you'll never encounter a mixed flight of P-47D-22s and D-28s - it's always one or the other.

[tattywelshie]

It’s things that PWCG provides, mixed flights, missions where you don’t encounter enemy. I’ve always thought the most simple solution would be an amalgamation between the vanila career mode and PWCG

[GenMarkof007]

Hi all,

 

I do agree with this...

- amount of AI aircrafts/flights based on the current historical state of the war.

But I do see something more and more in online MP mission dynamism, that we were seeing a lot before and that we don't see anymore in long running campaigns... where are the trains moving on the map and the truck and tank convoys (and not just static items on the ground) ? I do wish that we could have those back when playing on MP servers, those could be targets of opportunity when flying and doing recons or bombing runs!

 

Cheers,
GenMarkof

 

[Airborne506]

50 minutes ago, tattywelshie said:

It’s things that PWCG provides, mixed flights, missions where you don’t encounter enemy. I’ve always thought the most simple solution would be an amalgamation between the vanila career mode and PWCG

Ideally yeah that’d be awesome - I like the squadron aspects of PWCG (more time off the line if wounded, more time before resupply of planes if you lose a few in one flight) but it’s honestly having to alt-tab out of the game that literally and figuratively takes me out of the experience. The missions I have flown have been pretty cool but even still out of maybe 10 I’ve flown in PWCG, in 2 of them my flight lead just decides to dump ordnance in a random friendly field and circle around the sky until I decided to end the mission. I know just flying as flight lead solves that but that’s not the point of working your way up in the squadron. The vanilla career is more fluid (to me at least) and that’s usually what I end up playing. I will say since starting to play the game ~2 years ago career mode has made some great upgrades especially widening the radius of what planes can fly in a given mission - no more flight of P47s escorted by only P47s - with lightnings or mustangs you actually stand a chance to get to the target. I’m hoping Normandy update will further improve career mode and I have a feeling it will.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

I also fully agree with the expressed sentiment that there should be an option for the amount of enemy aircraft to be historical. I think it's already supported by the current scripting system; you should be able to run the delete_object action based on the output of random_integer (see actions.cfg for both) to delete enemy flights based on a pre-defined chance. If I've got some spare time in the coming weeks I might try it out, but I'm afraid I won't

 

1 hour ago, GenMarkof007 said:

But I do see something more and more in online MP mission dynamism, that we were seeing a lot before and that we don't see anymore in long running campaigns... where are the trains moving on the map and the truck and tank convoys (and not just static items on the ground) ? I do wish that we could have those back when playing on MP servers, those could be targets of opportunity when flying and doing recons or bombing runs!

I think most servers are running custom-made missions made by the server admins, so this is something you'll have to discuss with the admins of your favourite servers. You might be able to reach them in the multiplayer forum

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/forum/83-multiplayer-servers-and-hosting/

Edited August 24, 2022 by AEthelraedUnraed

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

Im also totally IN for AI flights with mixed aircrafts.

 

Yak 1's/1b's/9's

P-47 D22's/D28's

G6 late's/G14's/K4's

 

Etc etc.

 

Its applied to the player's squadron so it should be the same for AI squadrons too.

Edited August 24, 2022 by I./JG52_Woutwocampe

[DBFlyguy]

4 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

To add to the initial suggestion: mixed aircraft flights for the AI are needed. Right now, for instance, you'll never encounter a mixed flight of P-47D-22s and D-28s - it's always one or the other.

YES PLEASE!  This is a must for when both Thunderbolt and Mustang units were transitioning to bubble tops during the Normandy campaign, "mixed" formations were the norm during this period, not the exception.

 

 

 

[migmadmarine]

Tying aircraft to particular pilots would probably be good, especially once the applicable lettering is available for all aircraft, it can feel strange to be bouncing back and forth between types in a mixed squadron. 

 

MiG-3 and I-16 mixed flights are odd, were those done historically? Or would squadrons with both send out flights of each types. 

[LukeFF]

2 hours ago, migmadmarine said:

MiG-3 and I-16 mixed flights are odd, were those done historically? Or would squadrons with both send out flights of each types. 

 

It was probably a case where one squadron in each regiment was equipped with one type of plane. 

[Charon]

5 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

It was probably a case where one squadron in each regiment was equipped with one type of plane. 

I think this is right. Kaberov refers to "the second squadron in our regiment which was equipped with MiG-3 fighters." (p70). I can't find any reference to mixed flights in the early chapters either. When they re-equip with LaGG-3s, they do so all at once.

 

You might see situations like this during scrambles: "In the evening [one day in late June 1941], two MiG-3s and two I-153s took off following a flare signal toward an approaching twin engine aerial target. Upon return, one of the pilots reported than an enemy He 111 had been downed. General Kutsevalov immediately went to inspect the site, only to find that it was their own DB-3F bomber returning from a reconnaissance mission." (Von Hardesty and Grinberg, p37) But this is really better thought of as two flights scrambling independently.