Why does no one care about the AI??????

[oc2209]

22 hours ago, PatrickAWlson said:

 

 Lead or not I always let my AI flight mates engage first.  That is my solution to "everybody is attacking me".  People have stated with firm belief that the AI is programmed to attack the player.  I can guarantee this is not the case.  They are programmed to attack nearby threats and, once they engage, they tend to be pretty target fixated.  If you dive into the fray first then, yes, they will fixate on you.

 

 

To be clear, when I said:

 

22 hours ago, oc2209 said:

I believe that my position at the head of the flight resulted in my drawing a lot of enemy aggro

 

I meant that literally. My physical placement at the front of the formation, resulted in my being attacked. I wasn't arguing that simply being the flight leader made the enemy attack me.

 

What I'm wondering now, is when the enemy AI targeting behavior kicks in. Like, from the moment they spot you from ~10 km out (or whenever you first declare via radio that you've spotted them), or the moment they break formation and begin to attack?

 

Whatever the case, it's very clear that having friendly AI flying well ahead of you, will generally (yes, I know there are exceptions) prevent enemy AI from piling on you. Throughout the course of a fight, you'll likely get 1-2 enemies shooting at you, but as soon as you evade (significantly evade, i.e, by diving a few thousand feet), they ignore you again.

[PatrickAWlson]

24 minutes ago, oc2209 said:

 

To be clear, when I said:

 

 

I meant that literally. My physical placement at the front of the formation, resulted in my being attacked. I wasn't arguing that simply being the flight leader made the enemy attack me.

 

What I'm wondering now, is when the enemy AI targeting behavior kicks in. Like, from the moment they spot you from ~10 km out (or whenever you first declare via radio that you've spotted them), or the moment they break formation and begin to attack?

 

Whatever the case, it's very clear that having friendly AI flying well ahead of you, will generally (yes, I know there are exceptions) prevent enemy AI from piling on you. Throughout the course of a fight, you'll likely get 1-2 enemies shooting at you, but as soon as you evade (significantly evade, i.e, by diving a few thousand feet), they ignore you again.

 

When the AI transitions is a mystery to me.  At what point will they give up and acquire a new target?  That definitely can happen, but the urge to fixate and kill seems generally stronger than the urge to pay attention and live.

[spreckair]

I use the AI target fixation to my advantage.  I often fly well ahead of the aircraft that I am escorting, at about 3000 meters altitude, to spot the enemy early.  I then get them to chase me, leading them away from the bombers/attack planes.  Eventually, they lose interest and turn away, and I make my way back to the main mission.  On my most recent flight, I led two separate groups of enemy fighters away from the Henschels so that they could attack unmolested.  I know that it is unrealistically gaming the mission, but it works.

[oc2209]

25 minutes ago, PatrickAWlson said:

 

When the AI transitions is a mystery to me.  At what point will they give up and acquire a new target?  That definitely can happen, but the urge to fixate and kill seems generally stronger than the urge to pay attention and live.

 

In my example scenario, I hit the deck and was only chased briefly thereafter. I hit a pursuing P-40 in the nose/engine with a 20mm, which caused it to hemorrhage a thick oil trail instantly, whereupon it disengaged. I assumed it would crash shortly, but I saw after I landed back at my base that it, too, was landing at its base.

 

Anyway, I was allowed to leave the area at just above treetop level, using only half throttle, after that.

 

If I hadn't done my idiotic stall-turn initially, and had simply dived to the deck immediately, I'm betting that would've shaken most of my aggro. It usually works; at least when there's other friendlies in the area for the enemy to chase. I'm thinking that altitude is a target priority for enemy AI, i.e, higher altitude = higher attack priority. 

[PatrickAWlson]

40 minutes ago, spreckair said:

I use the AI target fixation to my advantage.  I often fly well ahead of the aircraft that I am escorting, at about 3000 meters altitude, to spot the enemy early.  I then get them to chase me, leading them away from the bombers/attack planes.  Eventually, they lose interest and turn away, and I make my way back to the main mission.  On my most recent flight, I led two separate groups of enemy fighters away from the Henschels so that they could attack unmolested.  I know that it is unrealistically gaming the mission, but it works.

 

'I have heard of real life pilots doing the same, so I think it's fair.  Good thinking.

[Gambit21]

41 minutes ago, spreckair said:

I use the AI target fixation to my advantage.  I often fly well ahead of the aircraft that I am escorting, at about 3000 meters altitude, to spot the enemy early.  I then get them to chase me, leading them away from the bombers/attack planes.  Eventually, they lose interest and turn away, and I make my way back to the main mission.  On my most recent flight, I led two separate groups of enemy fighters away from the Henschels so that they could attack unmolested.  I know that it is unrealistically gaming the mission, but it works.

That this works, tells me that the enemy AI are not properly linked to what should be their actual targets (the bombers) So again - mission design. 

[KevPBur]

1 hour ago, Gambit21 said:

That this works, tells me that the enemy AI are not properly linked to what should be their actual targets (the bombers) So again - mission design. 

Just wondering, as I know nothing about mission design, would they ai be changing their target to him as he was so far ahead of the bombers they could only "see" him?

[Gambit21]

12 minutes ago, KevPBur said:

Just wondering, as I know nothing about mission design, would they ai be changing their target to him as he was so far ahead of the bombers they could only "see" him?

 

Good point...that is entirely possible.

 

 

[BraveSirRobin]

On 1/25/2023 at 10:45 AM, [CPT]Crunch said:

AI?  What are those?  I spawn alone, yeah, with nobody else, cause when I fly alone..

 

To me they're gunnery targets, not AI, true solo play.  Else it's multiply all the way, if I had to do AI and single play this would all go dodo and wiped off the drive.

I  fly alone, yeah

With nobody else

I fly alone, yeah

With nobody else

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

 

Now every morning just before breakfast

I don't want no coffee or tea

Just me and my friend Wildcat

That's all I ever need

 

'Cause I fly alone, yeah

With nobody else

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

 

Yeah, the other night I laid sleeping

And I woke from a terrible dream

So I caught up my pal Hawker

And his partner Super Marine

And we flew alone, yeah

With nobody else

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

 

Yeah, the other day I got invited to a party

But I stayed home instead

Just me and my pal Tony Fokker

And his brothers Black 6 and Red 4

And we flew alone, yeah

With nobody else

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

 

Yeah my whole family done give up on me

And it makes me feel oh so bad

The only one who will hang out with me

Is my dear old Gloster Glad

 

And we fly alone, yeah

With nobody else

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

Yeah, you know when I fly alone

I prefer to be by myself

I fly alone

[spreckair]

@KevPBur  @Gambit21

In one instance, I dragged a flight of four Yaks directly over a flight of Henschels; the Henschels were at about 1000 meters and we were at about 4500 meters.  The Yaks still ignored the Henschels and kept after me until I did a split s and the Yaks seemed to lose me and fly on.

[Guest deleted@83466]

Some people won’t play online because you have 5000 hour flight sim experts that shoot like Rene Fonck would have dreamed of, and kick your ass every time.  But then they are playing against AI that makes novice mistakes like the poorly trained German guys in 1945, and…

[Gambit21]

28 minutes ago, spreckair said:

@KevPBur  @Gambit21

In one instance, I dragged a flight of four Yaks directly over a flight of Henschels; the Henschels were at about 1000 meters and we were at about 4500 meters.  The Yaks still ignored the Henschels and kept after me until I did a split s and the Yaks seemed to lose me and fly on.

 

That seems to indicate that the flight of Yaks was directly target linked to you in the editor...which is not good.

 

 

 

[KevPBur]

10 hours ago, spreckair said:

@KevPBur  @Gambit21

In one instance, I dragged a flight of four Yaks directly over a flight of Henschels; the Henschels were at about 1000 meters and we were at about 4500 meters.  The Yaks still ignored the Henschels and kept after me until I did a split s and the Yaks seemed to lose me and fly on.

 

I have noticed and I think others have commented here that once an AI, friendly or otherwise, ans locked onto a target they will be somewhat singleminded untill that target is destroyed. This does appear to be something that could be improved as it it prevents them switching to a higher value target, in case the bombers. I wonder if that also stops them zooming and booming in things like P47's as they don't want to turn away from the target to extend.

I'm sure we have all target fixated at times but the AI do seem to be experts at it.

 

@Gambit21 could very well also be correct

On 1/26/2023 at 12:34 AM, RyanR said:

 

For reasons I can't explain, this isn't working for me anymore. I was flying hard and dense for ages and it was great. Then the odds spiraled out of control. Too many bandits wound up in too small a place, and they don't miss when they shoot. I kept dialing back the difficult settings, and nothing was changing. It was so strange that I actually uninstalled IL-2 completely and reinstalled. No joy. 

 

Tweaking the career DB sounds like a great idea. If you fly P-47's or FW-190A's, you'll wind up with a squad of rookies pretty quick. Cranking the replacement skill level sounds like a good idea.

 

I gave up with the native career missions about a month ago. It just got comical. Without fail, another flight of bandits would fly into the area. Rinse and repeat until 15-20 planes were in the area.

 

-Ryan

 

Interesting. THere was definitely a recent change that made hard, well, harder and my La5 career over Stanlingrad become impossible being hugely outnumbered and my entire flight wipped out in 30 seconds.

I'm now flying that career on Medium Difficulty and Density. I now don't see enemy every flight and when I do they come in 2's or 4's and are pretty easy pickings and we have a good record as a unit.

 

I'm assuming that as I am at the later stages with the Germans in the pocket that they would be unable to field such large numbers of fighters so this may be more realistic at this stage?

 

However, the gap between medium and hard now seems to be too big as I'd like slightly fewer planes but still each one putting up a better fight.

Edited January 27, 2023 by KevPBur

[LukeFF]

5 hours ago, KevPBur said:

I'm assuming that as I am at the later stages with the Germans in the pocket that they would be unable to field such large numbers of fighters so this may be more realistic at this stage?

 

Generally so, yes. Aside from combat losses, trying to keep aircraft flyable in such austere conditions meant the Luftwaffe was stretched beyond its limits.

[RyanR]

Have we even gotten into the AI in ground attack missions? JU-88-C6 should be fun.... but isn't. Like at all. Why would the AI wing men attack the assigned ground targets when I beg and plead, when instead, they could fly straight and level over very accurate AAA. 

 

The big thing is the advert 1C had done for BoN has nothing to do with the game you buy:

 

 

It's really bait and switch. In reality, you get bare beaches, static targets. I sure would love to get the game being advertised.

 

-Ryan

[LukeFF]

15 minutes ago, RyanR said:

It's really bait and switch. In reality, you get bare beaches, static targets. I sure would love to get the game being advertised

 

The beaches are as populated as they can be for D-Day missions with the C-6. 

[RyanR]

53 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

 

The beaches are as populated as they can be for D-Day missions with the C-6. 

 

 

Nothing if you're in a fighter. Just another day....

 

-Ryan

[LukeFF]

9 minutes ago, RyanR said:

Nothing if you're in a fighter. Just another day....

 

-Ryan

 

Not so - on both sides. ? There are missions specifically set up for both covering and intercepting the landings. 

[Ghost666]

15 hours ago, RyanR said:

 

 

Nothing if you're in a fighter. Just another day....

 

-Ryan

Can't say that for myself. The last 1090G6/G6late Career I just died in, the fist 4 missions where "Bomb beachhead". Had lots of targets and AAA. Landing crafts/ships on  the beach and moving off the beach. Supply ships filled the mulberry harbor. The AAA was plentiful and deadly. No, it didn't have as much going on as a picture from 1944. But it was a great representation.

[KevPBur]

On 1/26/2023 at 12:34 AM, RyanR said:

 

For reasons I can't explain, this isn't working for me anymore. I was flying hard and dense for ages and it was great. Then the odds spiraled out of control. Too many bandits wound up in too small a place, and they don't miss when they shoot. I kept dialing back the difficult settings, and nothing was changing. It was so strange that I actually uninstalled IL-2 completely and reinstalled. No joy. 

 

Tweaking the career DB sounds like a great idea. If you fly P-47's or FW-190A's, you'll wind up with a squad of rookies pretty quick. Cranking the replacement skill level sounds like a good idea.

 

I gave up with the native career missions about a month ago. It just got comical. Without fail, another flight of bandits would fly into the area. Rinse and repeat until 15-20 planes were in the area.

 

-Ryan

 

I did remind myself of anything thing that may be related here and could explain why you are not seeing the same results as me.

Changing the difficuklty and density only seem to effect future days missions not the day you are currently on so flying a mission, discovering the odds are impossible, altering the options and flying the mission again will have no effect.

I always make myself commander so I can take myself out of any missions I've failed a few times due to impossible odds. The ai appear to do alright without me around ?

Move to the next day with lower settings and all is good.

Alternatively, start the mission and then immediatley finish it. You fail but you are all still alive!

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

There really is a problem with the AI when the main objective is completed and its on its way back home.  

 

I was flying an IL2 yesterday and on my way back after destroying the train station, many 109s followed us for at least 40 km's (I thought that was fixed?).

 

Our escort was there....behind us at alt 1500m or 2000m. They completely let us being torn apart, until I was the only one left with a badly damaged left wing. I would order the other IL2s to engage, they would just follow me. And the Yaks were busy gorging on popcorn instead OF DEFENDING US.

 

So, basically, a 3 in 1 AI failure package.

 

-Enemy AI still following your deep into your territory.

-Ordering you wingmen to engage but they wont.

-Tourists escort not engaging the enemies tearing the attack aircrafts apart.

 

Sad, seriously.

[KevPBur]

9 minutes ago, I./JG52_Woutwocampe said:

There really is a problem with the AI when the main objective is completed and its on its way back home.  

 

I was flying an IL2 yesterday and on my way back after destroying the train station, many 109s followed us for at least 40 km's (I thought that was fixed?).

 

Our escort was there....behind us at alt 1500m or 2000m. They completely let us being torn apart, until I was the only one left with a badly damaged left wing. I would order the other IL2s to engage, they would just follow me. And the Yaks were busy gorging on popcorn instead OF DEFENDING US.

 

So, basically, a 3 in 1 AI failure package.

 

-Enemy AI still following your deep into your territory.

-Ordering you wingmen to engage but they wont.

-Tourists escort not engaging the enemies tearing the attack aircrafts apart.

 

Sad, seriously.

 

seems like a perfect case to raise in the Issues formum > Quick mission, campaign and single missions  thread along with the requested mission log files requested in that thread.

 

Obviously, your escorts should have engaged but how would you have wanted the IL2's to engage the 109's. I would have thought the correct action would be to run as best they can and hope the rear gunner is still alive (if you have one)?

 

I have noticed that reducing the difficulty level to medium, the enemy are less determined to follow you forever

 

Edited January 30, 2023 by KevPBur

[LukeFF]

4 hours ago, KevPBur said:

Changing the difficuklty and density only seem to effect future days missions not the day you are currently on so flying a mission, discovering the odds are impossible, altering the options and flying the mission again will have no effect.

 

Not so. It affects whatever is the next mission you generate.

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

4 hours ago, KevPBur said:

 

seems like a perfect case to raise in the Issues formum > Quick mission, campaign and single missions  thread along with the requested mission log files requested in that thread.

 

Obviously, your escorts should have engaged but how would you have wanted the IL2's to engage the 109's. I would have thought the correct action would be to run as best they can and hope the rear gunner is still alive (if you have one)?

 

I have noticed that reducing the difficulty level to medium, the enemy are less determined to follow you forever

 

 

No turret. And I ordered the Il2 of my flight to engage when I realised the Yaks were asleep at the switch. It was either engage, or do nothing and wait for certain death. 

 

They chose....poorly.

 

And the difficulty is already at medium.

Edited January 30, 2023 by I./JG52_Woutwocampe

[FTC_Zero]

Another question about AI behavour. Not sure if if is an issue with mission design or AI in general. What bogs me quite a lot is when I fly as non leader in a flight. It seems AI tries always fly from waypoint A to B with a given "airspeed". "Of course dummy! It does what it should do."

BUT, flying with my squadron, we fly by RPM or given manifold pressure and barely care about airspeed (unless of extremes of course). The thing is AI seems to fly like my car using a speed limiter. And exactly like my car,where RPM and manifold pressure regulates automatically, trying to keep the speed. Thats how it feels all the time and it feels super weird. Just played a mission where AI descended (in combat) and I always overtake them without increasing my engine settings. At the same time AI turn up gas in low speed. Speed up, speed down, speed up, speed down, repeat.

Is it a mission logic thingy issue again, or just plainly how the AI works?

 

[BlitzPig_EL]

When you build a mission you set the AIs speed in the waypoint properties.  That's how it works.

[KevPBur]

2 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

Not so. It affects whatever is the next mission you generate.

I think that is what I was trying to say. It is just that restarting a mission, returning to the menu and changing those settings doesn't appear to regenerate the mission. Maybe of you change the settings then exit and re-enter the career it might regenerate but I think not as I get the same planes appearing at the same points along the route. I think it used to work that the mission would regenerate with the same target but otherwise completely different encounters along the way.

[Ram399]

On 1/17/2023 at 11:42 AM, Olt_Kloetenburg said:

I get the impression that the ai is less capable than ever and most of the time to stupid to be worth the time playing a mission. 

While it might seem that way, I would argue that the AI in the current build of the game is actually at the best its been since release.
This isn't to say that it doesn't do dumb things literally all the time, but when functioning within the framework of a properly designed mission I have seen it consistently respond to threats and score kills effectively.  The key to that statement is that the AI has to operate within the confines of the mission, and a lot of the frustration much of us experience, myself included, has to do with incidents that occur outside of what the mission expects you and your wingmen to be doing, and also with misconceptions about what the player-issued commands actually do.

Over the past thousand or so hours of career mode I've picked up more than a few tricks to keep my wingmen from buzzing around like mindless drones, its something akin to herding cats and I could probably write a short book on the matter, but I'll try to condense it here.
 

Spoiler

The first thing to do is always act as the flight leader.  If you aren't capable of making yourself the flight lead then surviving for around a month is usually sufficient to attain commander status in a unit, alternatively you could just start as the CO and save yourself the trouble.  As the flight lead your number one priority should be to stick to the mission goal and flight path.  If the mission is to cover ground troops then stay in the circle and never pursue fleeing aircraft, if the mission is to escort friendlies then stay near them at all costs, and, rather counterintuitively, if the mission is to intercept a hostile flight always deal with the enemy escort first.

To assist you in these matters you have to issue the right commands at the correct times, but there is quite a lot of confusion over what exactly each command does, the important ones break down as follows.

Follow Me: The AI will mindlessly try to rejoin formation with you and copy your actions, they will generally never respond to external threats, only use this when forcefully dragging your flight from Point A to Point B.  This command overwrites whatever the current mission goal is but can be useful in missions such as intercepts and ground covers as you can maneuver the flight into an advantageous position before the action starts.

Rejoin Formation:  Does not mean rejoin formation.  If you actually want to rejoin formation then use the Follow Me command as stated above.  What this command actually does is return your AI wingmen to their pre-set mission goal.  For example, if you were intercepting bombers and used the follow me command to position your flight at the high 6 o'clock of the enemy formation, giving the Rejoin order would result in your wingmen breaking off to attack the bombers en masse. (Note that this will only work as long as the mission goals have not yet been satisfied, meaning none of the bombers have been touched yet.  If you've already downed some of them the AI won't attack, this is why its better to deal with the escort first so you can get the most out of a potential turkey shoot.)

Cover Me:  The AI will try to rejoin formation with you unless a hostile aircraft approaches your 6 o'clock.  This would be a very useful furball command if you could break your flight up into sub-units, but unfortunately you can't.  However, if you're willing to risk it, I've had great success using myself as bait in conjunction with this command.  Basically what you do is you order your flight to hold position and wait, which is a command that actually does what it says it does, and then go find a flight of hostile fighters.  Once you've successfully provoked them to attack you, run for the deck underneath your own flight before issuing Cover Me.  If all works as intended your flight will then bounce the pursuing hostiles, though it should go without saying that it helps to have a faster aircraft for this.  Furthermore, if you encounter a flight of unescorted bombers but your wingmen turn pacifistic for no reason, this command can be used to force them to engage by weaving in front of the enemy bombers and hoping their nose gunners are lousy shots.

Attack Nearest Air Target/Ground Target:  Don't use this.  As near as I can tell this command gets overwritten either after a short period of time or after you move any meaningful distance away from where the command was issued, causing your wingmen to either do nothing or break off any attack and rejoin you.

Patrol this Area for Air Targets/Ground Targets:  Use this.  This will set a designated area for your flight to engage hostiles in, and as long as you're near the mission flight path should result in a successful engagement.  I recommend issuing this command manually for engagements such as a ground troops cover, river crossing, or dealing with hostile escort fighters.

Return to Base:  Does roughly what it says it does, but is actually an emergency bugout command.  Issuing this order will completely dissolve your flight, making each aircraft an independent actor who will then dive for the deck and book it for home.  Only use this when you've found yourself in a very hairy situation, and be prepared to act as a rearguard for any hostiles which pursue you or your wingmen as they will no longer defend themselves.  It also helps to have a faster aircraft here, otherwise you're better off fighting to the end.

 

Finally, and I've said this a lot in other posts, your number one priority should always be to keep your wingmen alive.  In the career mode the skill of your AI pilots corresponds directly to their experience level and rank.  By following these rules and farming experienced pilots the effectiveness of your unit will increase dramatically, see my two most recently flown career missions and unit roster below:

Spoiler

 

[KevPBur]

7 hours ago, Ram399 said:

While it might seem that way, I would argue that the AI in the current build of the game is actually at the best its been since release.
This isn't to say that it doesn't do dumb things literally all the time, but when functioning within the framework of a properly designed mission I have seen it consistently respond to threats and score kills effectively.  The key to that statement is that the AI has to operate within the confines of the mission, and a lot of the frustration much of us experience, myself included, has to do with incidents that occur outside of what the mission expects you and your wingmen to be doing, and also with misconceptions about what the player-issued commands actually do.

Over the past thousand or so hours of career mode I've picked up more than a few tricks to keep my wingmen from buzzing around like mindless drones, its something akin to herding cats and I could probably write a short book on the matter, but I'll try to condense it here.
 

  Hide contents

The first thing to do is always act as the flight leader.  If you aren't capable of making yourself the flight lead then surviving for around a month is usually sufficient to attain commander status in a unit, alternatively you could just start as the CO and save yourself the trouble.  As the flight lead your number one priority should be to stick to the mission goal and flight path.  If the mission is to cover ground troops then stay in the circle and never pursue fleeing aircraft, if the mission is to escort friendlies then stay near them at all costs, and, rather counterintuitively, if the mission is to intercept a hostile flight always deal with the enemy escort first.

To assist you in these matters you have to issue the right commands at the correct times, but there is quite a lot of confusion over what exactly each command does, the important ones break down as follows.

Follow Me: The AI will mindlessly try to rejoin formation with you and copy your actions, they will generally never respond to external threats, only use this when forcefully dragging your flight from Point A to Point B.  This command overwrites whatever the current mission goal is but can be useful in missions such as intercepts and ground covers as you can maneuver the flight into an advantageous position before the action starts.

Rejoin Formation:  Does not mean rejoin formation.  If you actually want to rejoin formation then use the Follow Me command as stated above.  What this command actually does is return your AI wingmen to their pre-set mission goal.  For example, if you were intercepting bombers and used the follow me command to position your flight at the high 6 o'clock of the enemy formation, giving the Rejoin order would result in your wingmen breaking off to attack the bombers en masse. (Note that this will only work as long as the mission goals have not yet been satisfied, meaning none of the bombers have been touched yet.  If you've already downed some of them the AI won't attack, this is why its better to deal with the escort first so you can get the most out of a potential turkey shoot.)

Cover Me:  The AI will try to rejoin formation with you unless a hostile aircraft approaches your 6 o'clock.  This would be a very useful furball command if you could break your flight up into sub-units, but unfortunately you can't.  However, if you're willing to risk it, I've had great success using myself as bait in conjunction with this command.  Basically what you do is you order your flight to hold position and wait, which is a command that actually does what it says it does, and then go find a flight of hostile fighters.  Once you've successfully provoked them to attack you, run for the deck underneath your own flight before issuing Cover Me.  If all works as intended your flight will then bounce the pursuing hostiles, though it should go without saying that it helps to have a faster aircraft for this.  Furthermore, if you encounter a flight of unescorted bombers but your wingmen turn pacifistic for no reason, this command can be used to force them to engage by weaving in front of the enemy bombers and hoping their nose gunners are lousy shots.

Attack Nearest Air Target/Ground Target:  Don't use this.  As near as I can tell this command gets overwritten either after a short period of time or after you move any meaningful distance away from where the command was issued, causing your wingmen to either do nothing or break off any attack and rejoin you.

Patrol this Area for Air Targets/Ground Targets:  Use this.  This will set a designated area for your flight to engage hostiles in, and as long as you're near the mission flight path should result in a successful engagement.  I recommend issuing this command manually for engagements such as a ground troops cover, river crossing, or dealing with hostile escort fighters.

Return to Base:  Does roughly what it says it does, but is actually an emergency bugout command.  Issuing this order will completely dissolve your flight, making each aircraft an independent actor who will then dive for the deck and book it for home.  Only use this when you've found yourself in a very hairy situation, and be prepared to act as a rearguard for any hostiles which pursue you or your wingmen as they will no longer defend themselves.  It also helps to have a faster aircraft here, otherwise you're better off fighting to the end.

 

Finally, and I've said this a lot in other posts, your number one priority should always be to keep your wingmen alive.  In the career mode the skill of your AI pilots corresponds directly to their experience level and rank.  By following these rules and farming experienced pilots the effectiveness of your unit will increase dramatically, see my two most recently flown career missions and unit roster below:

  Hide contents

 

 

Agree with your experience completely, although I'm not so good at keeping my ai colleagues alive as well as you.

I'll try to use the follow me command to manoeuvre us into a more advantageous position before entering the fray

[Deicide]

Since my comment replying to Sheriff, appears to have been deleted. My only guess is someone got to the soggy cracker before he did, shame. He won't be happy you didn't share it with him.

[Wardog5711]

I deleted it because it added nothing to the conversation.

And you don't seem to be able to take a hint.

[Lusekofte]

AI friends in the same airplane as you should be able to warn you, shoot at the target in a way so fighter at least feel they getting shot at. Your navigator/ observer should assist getting IP and target recognition and observer in Mosquito should be interacted with and actually help you. Right now the only helper you got is your mate in the 410. He is deadly. But you still do not interact with him. When flying in a squad single seaters. You should be able to interact and get warned by your mates. No matter if you are a flight leader or not. It is this dead environment of not communicate that make me fly coop only in this game. 

Edited February 1, 2023 by Lusekofte

[BlitzPig_EL]

That 410 rear gunner has X-ray eyesight, or radar controlled gun aiming, or both.  It will shoot with amazing accuracy no matter what high G maneuver the aircraft is making, or the angular speed difference the attacking fighter is using to not get hit.  It also makes it impossible to sneak up on the 410's low six.  It's so bad that I am removing them as AIs from all missions I have made that include them.  If they were this good in real life the Luftwaffe could have totally replaced it's single seater fighter units with them.

Edited February 1, 2023 by BlitzPig_EL

[I./JG52_Woutwocampe]

Order : Cover me

 

AI : lets all try to steal the leader's kill! Go for friendly fire and if you dont land any hit, ram him! 

 

God I'm so salty. Only 3 different orders and they are heckin broken. It was a 6 kills mission in my Mustang and again the AI sent it down the gutter.

 

COVER ME

CO

VER

ME

 

 

[KevPBur]

5 hours ago, I./JG52_Woutwocampe said:

Order : Cover me

 

AI : lets all try to steal the leader's kill! Go for friendly fire and if you dont land any hit, ram him! 

 

God I'm so salty. Only 3 different orders and they are heckin broken. It was a 6 kills mission in my Mustang and again the AI sent it down the gutter.

 

COVER ME

CO

VER

ME

 

 

Hi, firstly, I am posting this only to try and understand why you have an issue and to try to maybe improve your experience, definitely not to criticize.

 

I can count on one hand the times I have had the ai shoulder shoot, collide with me on steal a kill I was still "on". We are playing the same game so I assume it is down to how we play it.

Is this in career or AQMB?

The missions in career 8 think tend to behave better.

Are you staying on you target for a prolonged period rather than get in shoot, move out reassess and try again?

Perhaps getting well within your gun convergence range is confusing the ai who think you should pull away as they are in a better position than you at convergent range?

This is a guess, but if you are setting your gun convergence to very close, inside the range the aivwill property engage, is this confusing them. I do see that the so always get the same convergence as you. 

 

It sounds a little like you called the so to cover you when there were no targets on you. The ai had nothing behind you to attack so you effectively called them to fly in a line behind you.

I am finding "patrol for enemy aircraft" can sometimes be more effective.

 

Lastly, and possibly the main difference in my game is that I use the ai gunnery mod. This sets the range at which the so fire to be much better, it stops the sniping from 1km and I guess is stopping friendly ai from firing from a long way behind you. Generally feels far more realistic.

 

Edited February 1, 2023 by KevPBur

[Willy__]

On 2/1/2023 at 11:50 AM, BlitzPig_EL said:

That 410 rear gunner has X-ray eyesight, or radar controlled gun aiming, or both.  It will shoot with amazing accuracy no matter what high G maneuver the aircraft is making, or the angular speed difference the attacking fighter is using to not get hit.  It also makes it impossible to sneak up on the 410's low six.  It's so bad that I am removing them as AIs from all missions I have made that include them.  If they were this good in real life the Luftwaffe could have totally replaced it's single seater fighter units with them.

 

Sounds awfully like the Pe2 gunners, since like... ever ? Funny how the turn-table have turned... no, wait... 

[Lusekofte]

4 hours ago, Willy__ said:

 

Sounds awfully like the Pe2 gunners, since like... ever ? Funny how the turn-table have turned... no, wait... 

PE 2 gunners is as rubbish as the rest. ME 410 is like they was on steroids. 
Historical speaking it was quite opposite, the ME system had its fault and back down was a big blind area. While PE 2 had much better field of fire. German pilots had great respect for gunners in both IL 2 and PE 2 

they simply tried not to be in their field of fire

[354thFG_Drewm3i-VR]

My AI wingman killed me from dead 6 today in FC while I was pursuing a bogey dead 6 for like 2 minutes straight. As soon as he caught up to me, he fired and I was dead. If I knew this was coming, I could've gotten a track lol.

[CountZero]

4 hours ago, Lusekofte said:

PE 2 gunners is as rubbish as the rest. ME 410 is like they was on steroids. 
Historical speaking it was quite opposite, the ME system had its fault and back down was a big blind area. While PE 2 had much better field of fire. German pilots had great respect for gunners in both IL 2 and PE 2 

they simply tried not to be in their field of fire

Hes talking about Pe-2 before gunners were nerfed to state they are in now.

And nothing was wrong with Pe-2 gunner back then , its airplane that was fast and had big gun at back that could one shot any axis lazzy fighter attacking it... same like nothing is wrong with 410 now, its airplane with TWO big guns that can 1 shot any allied lazzy fighter.

Gunners were best back then, you could set them to ace and they could fight of few fighter airplanes before you got shot down in MP, but atleast they had to think twice before atacking you, you could servive sometimes if you got lucky and avoided geting gangbanged by 5 fighters all camping targets, but now they are good only for fighter players, you as bomber player are there to be target for them and say thanks for shooting me down do you wont more sir. 

[Lusekofte]

7 hours ago, CountZero said:

And nothing was wrong with Pe-2 gunner back then

The only problem back then was gunner radar. They knew where the plane would show up. And probably still do. And that is the main problem. It is either all or nothing. Nothing is what we get now. And that is why I do not bother flying. I reinstalled because of a coop campaign just started