Can these uneven battles get "fixed" in Career mode?

[sevenless]

1 hour ago, RyanR said:

There's some interesting stuff going on. The "density" setting may not be supposed to change anything in the air, but it seems to be doing exactly this. Just for bomber intercepts, I've seeing what others have mentioned elsewhere in these forums:

 

"Dense" density: 12 bombers in four groups of three

"Medium" density: 9 bombers in three groups of three

"Sparse" density: 6 bombers in three groups of three.

 

 

It has been like that for years now and you can easily reproduce it. Dense settings give you the highest amount of enemy bombers in intercepts.

 

 

[Halon]

On 11/25/2022 at 4:14 PM, Avimimus said:

We really need a 'realistic ratio' and 'realistic morale' options for the campaign system.

 

I would really love for this to be an option, that's the kind of thing I want from my sims. So when the when the allied bombing campaign (the first second front) starts sucking Luftwaffe fighters back to Germany I'd like this to be reflected in my VVS or AV-MF campaigns.

 

On 11/25/2022 at 4:14 PM, Avimimus said:

 

 

Edited November 27, 2022 by Halon

[oc2209]

4 hours ago, RyanR said:

Also at "sparse" density, the AI enemy was seemingly less likely to chase us all the way home to our base. They gave chase and broke off much quicker.

 

This is an interesting observation, because I always fly with 'sparse' frontline activity, and I do get followed home a lot less than some people. It happens occasionally with me, but others act like it happens constantly.

 

4 hours ago, RyanR said:

It hit me last night that I should start a VVS career in BoK to see if the historical odds in favor of the Soviets are "baked in" to the sim. I don't recall it being this way, when I flew both sides in the past, but memories get fuzzy.

 

Kuban offers superior planes compared to Stalingrad/Moscow, but as I recall, the 109 AI still has a boom and zoom advantage. I was always rather breathlessly trying to catch up to 109s, even in a Yak-9. It's not a horrible performance gap, but it's noticeable.

 

190s are generally fodder, almost as bad as the AI is with La-5s. La-5FNs are generally more competent because they turn okay and have good energy. But the AI is best in Yaks and 109s. Incidentally, so am I.

 

*Edit: oh, I forgot to mention numbers. No, I don't think the VVS is given a numerical advantage in Kuban when you fly for them.

Edited November 27, 2022 by oc2209

[oc2209]

Okay, either my memory from a couple years back (last time I played VVS Kuban) is faulty, or they've made things easier. Assuming this pattern holds.

 

I did 2 intercepts so far, hard diff, sparse frontline, and there are 8-9 enemy escorts each time. Our VVS flight is set to 8 by default (unlike Germans who're mostly set to 6 for intercepts, at least in the East) and we had help. In the following example, there were 3-4 P-39s and a couple of LaGG-3s (that were quickly shot down) in the vicinity.

 

Spoiler

 

 

Overall, it was a slaughter for our flight. 8 kills at the cost of 1 injured pilot.

 

Both my kills were 109 wing breaks. The first was legitimate enough since I hit the wing hard at point-blank range, but the second is mystifying to me. I couldn't see any hard hits to the wing that broke, even rewatching the replay.

 

Anyway, I remember VVS careers on hard, being, well, harder. Makes me wonder how much better the Yak AI would do if it didn't fly with its radiator 100% open. That eats up like 12 MPH on the deck. I fly with both radiators at 50%, generally.

[oc2209]

Yeah, the trend is continuing. 8 people in our VVS flight, 9 Germans escorting the bombers. Most of the time (not always) the VVS also has at least 2 friendly fighters loitering in the mission area.

 

At any rate, the numbers are much closer to even than when flying German. I don't feel like testing this out at difficulty levels besides hard, as intercept missions come up much less frequently for the VVS (at least for the current phase of the battle I'm in).

 

I tried out a Ground Cover mission (which I normally hate because they take ~30m, and might not even give you enemy contact), and we also had a small number advantage there, too.

 

Interestingly, however, the kills have not been so lopsided as the example I gave above. We're taking heavy losses (2-4 deaths per sortie) on average, and I still have a hard time catching up to 109s (despite the dumb luck on display above). The enemy AI hasn't managed to hit me with more than a single cannon shell to the tail, but it is peppering me with LMG hits from pretty extreme distances and/or angles.

[LukeFF]

16 hours ago, sevenless said:

 

It has been like that for years now and you can easily reproduce it. Dense settings give you the highest amount of enemy bombers in intercepts.

 

 

 

I can (officially) confirm that now, yes. ? Density affects both the density of ground and air objects. Just goes to show how long ago I wrote the updated manual for this game and never realized the setting had been changed. ? 

[jeanba]

Indeed, I have the same problem from the other side.

I gave up my Mosquito pre D-day campaign as lot of missions were suicide.

Typically, 8 mosquitoes were escorted by 4 Spitfires IX.

The interceptors were 8 FW190A6, 4 went for the spits and 4 against the Mosquitoes, shooting all of them down.

 

I remember having played a A20 campaign over Kuban and this never happened to me.

The escort (provided you did not miss it) was usually strong enough to avoid more than 1 or 2 interceptors to attack bombers.

[Lusekofte]

Might be something wrong with me. I like the challange of survival. Getting bounced by ai is deadly. Initial dogfighting can also be a challange. After that conserving ammo is the only challange against ai. This is why I like to fly Il 2 and other underdogs. Some of the careers are repetitive other is quite fun. I find it easier to survive in a Mosquito online than in career because ai spot you no matter what. 

Edited November 28, 2022 by 216th_Lusekofte

[RyanR]

4 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

I can (officially) confirm that now, yes. ? Density affects both the density of ground and air objects. Just goes to show how long ago I wrote the updated manual for this game and never realized the setting had been changed. ? 

 

Do you know when the change was made? I'd love to be able to correlate my observations with the change. It'd at least tell me if I'm crazy.

 

Density settings seem to be very non-linear. At "medium" settings, not much changed from "Dense" setting. There were still 2-3 to 1 odds against us. At "scattered" settings it all suddenly became far too docile. Almost weirdly so. Somehow, at the "scattered" setting the AI enemy fighters also became slow to react.

 

 

3 hours ago, 216th_Lusekofte said:

Might be something wrong with me. I like the challange of survival. Getting bounced by ai is deadly. Initial dogfighting can also be a challange. After that conserving ammo is the only challange against ai. This is why I like to fly Il 2 and other underdogs. Some of the careers are repetitive other is quite fun. I find it easier to survive in a Mosquito online than in career because ai spot you no matter what. 

 

 

Agreed. That challenge is what it's all about. No challenge, no learning, no self-improvement.

 

-Ryan

 

 

[LukeFF]

2 hours ago, RyanR said:

Do you know when the change was made? I'd love to be able to correlate my observations with the change. It'd at least tell me if I'm crazy.

 

I've a feeling it's been at least a year or more, based on the reply I received when I asked one of the career mode developers. Heck, might even be two years or more! ? 

[Avimimus]

1 hour ago, LukeFF said:

I've a feeling it's been at least a year or more, based on the reply I received when I asked one of the career mode developers. Heck, might even be two years or more! ?

 

...and here I was assuming you knew everything about just about everything

[oc2209]

8 hours ago, RyanR said:

 

Do you know when the change was made? I'd love to be able to correlate my observations with the change. It'd at least tell me if I'm crazy.

 

Density settings seem to be very non-linear. At "medium" settings, not much changed from "Dense" setting. There were still 2-3 to 1 odds against us. At "scattered" settings it all suddenly became far too docile. Almost weirdly so. Somehow, at the "scattered" setting the AI enemy fighters also became slow to react.

 

 

Honestly, I think something in your game is just screwed up. I don't know how, but everything points to that. Your opposition numbers are off the charts. Is the Fw-190 career a continuation from Stalingrad? Maybe that has something to do with it. Try a clean Kuban career start to see if your game's capable of following the easy/moderate/hard criteria for typical enemy numbers. 

 

Changing density has zero impact on AI performance, as far as I can tell. It also doesn't change the numbers of escorts during intercepts; in fact, it doesn't even change the number of Sturmoviks. It only seems to affect the number of bombers in 'bomber intercepts' specifically. Perhaps it might also change the number of bombers in a Ground Cover or similar type of mission where bombers can be present.

 

Hard difficulty, dense settings, bomber intercept:

 

Spoiler

 

 

Hard difficulty, dense settings, Sturmovik intercept:

 

Spoiler

 

 

AI behavior, both friendly and enemy, is identical to sparse settings at the same difficulty.

 

I assumed that perhaps density would bring in more friendly or enemy flights from the surrounding area, but in both these cases, it wasn't any different than my usual (sparse) experience.

[Talon_]

On 11/24/2022 at 10:29 AM, LukeFF said:

 

Sparse only affects ground units at the front line.

 

It affects aircraft too. Playing on Dense is basically Ace Combat.

[KevPBur]

I more or less exclusively fly single player career mode.

I think the perception of career mode missions very much depends on the planes flown.

 

I have 2 careers running in parallel at Stalingrad La-5 and 109 F4 & G2.

 

When in the la-5 an initially even meeting gets impossible very quickly when the rest of your flight is shot down in the first 30 seconds. Then it is just you hugely outnumbered and unable to extend enough for the 109's to give up when they invariable have a height advantage and you just can't climb to get up to them. Basically, you are now in the wrong tool for the job at hand.

 

The situation is reversed in the 109. Your flight survive and either get a couple of kills or the VVS planes run out of ammo and one by one head home leaving the odd ace facing multple 109's with a height advantage he (or she) can do nothing about.

 

Multiple enemy LF flights are just impossible to counter where as multiple enemy VVS is often manageble.

VVS in particular could do with the arrival of additional friendly flights to counter the arrival of multiple enemy flights.

Od course, in the early stages of Stalingrad superiority of numbers probably should be with LF but I assume by the last stages should that not be reversed. That might be getting a bit of track for here though.

 

I did very similar testing to @oc2209 last night and found the same conclusions (and reported in the career issues thread). Sparse is too sterile, Medium and Dense appear to be the same without looking at bombers. Difficulty level was similar, less than haqrd and the enemy would rather get back for snaps rather than engage at all

[RyanR]

I guess I could try "Dense" and "Easy" next? Shrug?

 

Since the first kill or two of an engagement usually dictates the battle, one thought that might be good would be to "handicap" the abilities of AI vs. AI battles. In other word, the AI is much better in certain aircraft than it is in others. A four on four engagement of AI Spitfires (even just MkV's) vs AI 190's will end the same way every time. The better turning aircraft almost always win. The 190's will start turning, and the the Spitfires will eat them, the same way that AI 109's will get early-La-5's.  If there was a way to dial up the AI's proficiency in 190's and dial back its proficiency in Spitfires so that the match had different outcomes, that would help.

 

Then just use the preset difficulty level when it's AI vs player.

 

-Ryan

[LukeFF]

5 hours ago, Talon_ said:

 

It affects aircraft too. Playing on Dense is basically Ace Combat.

 

Yes, I know that now - see what I wrote above. ?

[Koziolek]

Hey Luke, could you do a quick summary of what exactly is changed by difficulty and and what by frontline activity, please? Is it only the the number of enemy planes or friendly too?

[oc2209]

3 minutes ago, Koziolek said:

Hey Luke, could you do a quick summary of what exactly is changed by difficulty and and what by frontline activity, please? Is it only the the number of enemy planes or friendly too?

 

I'm not Luke, but I can summarize my findings for you, if that's of any help.

 

In my testing, density only affects bomber numbers. Not attack planes (Stumovik, Stuka, etc), but 2-engine bombers. The least dense setting will generate 6 bombers. The medium density setting will (probably--didn't test this) result in 9. And at maximum density, 12 will appear.

 

Difficulty level will affect the number of escort fighters (for example) a bomber/attack plane group will have. At maximum difficulty, 8-9 appears to be the most common number of enemy fighters in a single group.

 

I'm uncertain whether density/difficulty affects the numbers of 'loitering' friendly or enemy flights that aren't in your personal flight, or the target enemy's flight(s). There is variability of friendlies based on whether you fly Axis or Allied (the latter seemingly more likely to have friendly flights in the area).

 

Also, the number of planes you have in your flight does seem to change the number of enemies you face--above and beyond difficulty settings. Smaller flight = fewer enemies, larger flight = the most enemies.

 

All of this testing is predicated on bomber/attack plane intercept missions, using as a baseline the standard allotment of fighters in your flight, generated by the game.

[LukeFF]

1 hour ago, Koziolek said:

Hey Luke, could you do a quick summary of what exactly is changed by difficulty and and what by frontline activity, please? Is it only the the number of enemy planes or friendly too?

 

Difficulty affects the skill level of the enemy and friendly AI flights you encounter, and it affects the density of AA gun coverage over the target area:

• Easy: friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Veteran, enemy fighters are Rookie
• Moderate:  friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Veteran, enemy fighters are Regular
• Hard: friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Regular, enemy fighters are Veteran

Density of front-line activity affects how many AI planes and ground targets - excluding AA guns - are generated.

[Koziolek]

Thanks guys, you are most helpful

[RyanR]

4 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

Difficulty affects the skill level of the enemy and friendly AI flights you encounter, and it affects the density of AA gun coverage over the target area:

• Easy: friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Veteran, enemy fighters are Rookie
• Moderate:  friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Veteran, enemy fighters are Regular
• Hard: friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Regular, enemy fighters are Veteran

Density of front-line activity affects how many AI planes and ground targets - excluding AA guns - are generated.

 

 

I just set it to "easy".... 3 Rookie Yak 1b's just slaughtered the 7 190A-5's in my flight. I got the three kills. I don't get it....

 

-Ryan

[LukeFF]

1 hour ago, RyanR said:

I just set it to "easy".... 3 Rookie Yak 1b's just slaughtered the 7 190A-5's in my flight. I got the three kills. I don't get it....

 

-Ryan

 

Probably AI issues. That's why it's important to post the mission or a track file here after you see a potential issue. ?

[oc2209]

8 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

• Hard: friendly fighters (excluding your flight) are Regular, enemy fighters are Veteran

 

Interesting. So does this mean we never face ace-level AI in career? If so, that's a little disappointing. Not that veteran-level isn't capable of handing you your arse.

 

3 hours ago, RyanR said:

 

I just set it to "easy".... 3 Rookie Yak 1b's just slaughtered the 7 190A-5's in my flight. I got the three kills. I don't get it....

 

-Ryan

 

If not a bug, it might be plane-related AI flaws. Certain changes to the AI over the years might've benefited some planes, while others still languish due to fundamental gaps in functionality.

 

Yak-1bs are a menace that I don't recall in earlier career runs (1+ years ago). The AI also seems to aim nose guns better than wing guns, beyond using turning planes better than hit and runners like the Fw-190 and La-5.

 

The one big exception to wing gun weakness is when the AI's using a Tempest. Then it doesn't matter if only 1 of 4 guns hits you.

[Eisenfaustus]

1 hour ago, oc2209 said:

So does this mean we never face ace-level AI in career? If so, that's a little disappointing.

I have to somewhat disagree on this - a whole unit of aces doesn’t make sense in most circumstances. I‘m with you that I‘f prefer if there was 1/1000 chance of meeting aces - but if career config doesn’t allow for that I prefer the current solution to pure ace units. 

[RyanR]

I'd actually prefer to run into veterans if the gunnery skills were dialed back. The maneuvering is more "realistic". I set things on "Dense and Easy" as an experiment, and the AI was doing bizarre negative G maneuvers.

 

-Ryan

[PatrickAWlson]

3 hours ago, RyanR said:

I'd actually prefer to run into veterans if the gunnery skills were dialed back. The maneuvering is more "realistic". I set things on "Dense and Easy" as an experiment, and the AI was doing bizarre negative G maneuvers.

 

-Ryan

 

The maneuvering is more challenging but I don't think more realistic.  Looking at gun camera footage the vast majority of the maneuvering that I see is much less extreme than we see the AI doing in game.  I have no explanation for why.  My speculation is that flying a real plane is much more involved than our sim and areal pilots under fire simply could not react the way that we do.  Take that with a large grain of salt.

[oc2209]

13 hours ago, Eisenfaustus said:

I have to somewhat disagree on this - a whole unit of aces doesn’t make sense in most circumstances. I‘m with you that I‘f prefer if there was 1/1000 chance of meeting aces - but if career config doesn’t allow for that I prefer the current solution to pure ace units. 

 

I'm speaking strictly from a video game perspective of min/maxing difficulty potentials. I mean, to have every single enemy you meet a veteran, is also outside the realm of plausibility.

 

1 hour ago, PatrickAWlson said:

The maneuvering is more challenging but I don't think more realistic.  Looking at gun camera footage the vast majority of the maneuvering that I see is much less extreme than we see the AI doing in game.  I have no explanation for why.  My speculation is that flying a real plane is much more involved than our sim and areal pilots under fire simply could not react the way that we do.  Take that with a large grain of salt.

 

Yes, handling a plane is more difficult in reality--certainly.

 

But also, experience and confidence are the greatest limiting factors in getting the most out of a given airplane. I always think of Spitfire pilots vs 109 pilots in the BoB, when the relative strengths of each plane were still a mystery to many who had yet to engage each other. Hearing accounts from other pilots is never quite the same.

 

The funniest bit to me, was how some 109 pilots thought it could turn inside a Spitfire. We sim jockeys know, of course, that the physics are 100% in the Spit's favor. But novice RAF pilots were often too afraid of pushing a plane to its limits in order to reach the same physics limits that we frequently meet and exceed in a sim. Hence, a more experienced 109 pilot could turn inside a poorly-flown Spit.

 

Fast forward to 1944 and '45, when most 109 pilots were largely useless novices, not only lacking real combat experience, but also severely lacking basic flight training. Take a plane that's already got a nasty reputation among novices (I'm sure it did, by then, with its weight gain and commensurate loss of handling quality), and put those same exceptionally poorly-trained novices in situations where fear is already overwhelming (and they all know--subconsciously at least--Germany has lost the war; thus fear mixed with despair), as they've heard of many of the greatest experten who've already been killed--add all of that up, and you've got the perfect recipe for mass turkey shoots for the Allies.***

 

The probability of Allied gun cam footage capturing the moves of an ace/experten, versus the untold thousands of hapless fodder, is quite minimal.

 

Yet another complicating factor is that any pilot of any nation, regardless of training quality, is likely to freeze up while getting shot at for the first (or second, or third) time. Air combat is ruthlessly unforgiving, in that even if your body remains unscathed in the hail of fire aimed at your plane, getting safely back to earth after said plane's been crippled, is another matter entirely. I mean, in a tank or any other ground vehicle, if it gets knocked out and you don't die instantly, you just hop out before it burns/blows up. The mathematics of survival are simpler. Hopping out of a plane is never simple.

 

Point being: a lot of pilots don't have a chance to become inured to that initial paralyzing fear. They're just dead. It's quite possible that in many cases of gun cam footage, you're seeing an unseasoned pilot being shot down. Not necessarily a poorly trained one.

 

 

***Edit: though I consider it self-evident, to be clear, the same conditions for German pilots post '44 largely apply to VVS pilots pre-'43.

Edited November 30, 2022 by oc2209

[PatrickAWlson]

@oc2209 Agree on all points.  In the game I prefer a nice mix of novice and expert, with probably more good pilots than was historically accurate but still plenty of novices.  For historical accuracy I set the level of replacement pilots based on the service and the date.  The VVs gets almost all novice replacements early and later it is a mix of novice and average.  Western allies get a mix of novice and average throughout the war.  Germans start off getting mostly average and eventually degrade to all novice.  

 

Because every pilot in PWCG is tracked, as the war goes on what happens is anybody's guess.  Each AI pilot has his own career so it is entirely possible that their virtual fate will not align with history.  Still, the statistical odds used are aligned with history so, on balance, the results should be something like historical levels of pilot competence for any given service at any given time.

[oc2209]

1 hour ago, PatrickAWlson said:

Because every pilot in PWCG is tracked, as the war goes on what happens is anybody's guess.  Each AI pilot has his own career so it is entirely possible that their virtual fate will not align with history.  Still, the statistical odds used are aligned with history so, on balance, the results should be something like historical levels of pilot competence for any given service at any given time.

 

Sturmovik's career mode would definitely benefit by incorporating your pilot system.

 

Perhaps have the current 'easy-moderate-hard' difficulty settings, but with the ratio of novices to aces adjusted per difficulty level.

 

Also, 'easy' has a pejorative connotation (if you're a gamer, anyway) that likely prevents a lot of people from using it. Hence it might be better to reclassify 'easy' as the baseline, most realistic game mode. Simply call it 'realistic' like career speed.

 

The ratio would be, say, 65% novices, 20% average, 10% veteran, and 5% aces, at the default setting.

 

Then the next difficulty level would be 50% novices, 25% average, 15% veteran, 10% aces.

 

Then the final difficulty level could be 30% novices, 30% average, 20% veteran, 20% aces.

[RyanR]

Quick update:

 

Things are better now. I dialed the difficulty settings to "easy" and "scattered" for a few "days" of missions. I then turned both settings back to medium..... and things are as one would expect. It's almost as if something needed to get worked out of the system. Search me. Maybe I stumbled though a person rusty period, but the odds do seem more even.

 

There's still some AI stuff that would be nice to "fix".

 

Gotta say, after several careers through BoK in "stock form", I'm really enjoying the "Extended Career Mod" by Sevenless in Kuban. The 190A-6 gets a chance to shine. It quickly gets marginalized by the A-8 in BoN and BoBP. Not sure I'm looking forward to the La-5FN showing up, though!

 

-Ryan