I doubt that AIs behaviour was SOP in any airforce ever?

[Roshko]

It's rather frustrating to be a flight leader when  AI:

1) will abandon flight if they see an enemy AI that has nothing to do with the mission
2) Too hear them request for permission to land, whilst you're being done over by a gang of enemy AIs
3) To watch them hover 1 or 2 clicks above your head, whilst you're being brutally engaged by enemy AIs

3a) Have them ignore different calls to action like "engage nearest air" "patrol air" etc ...
4) When they finally do engage, the keep yelling on the comms. They take turns, so the there's a flood of unnecessary info in  your ears all the time. "YES OF COURSE YOU ARE ATTACKING - FINALLY - NOW SHUT UP AND ATTACK" (not to mention the fact that they're aren't always attacking, they are just flooding the channel with the good news that they are)

4a) Yes, I can turn it down (each sortie, you have to do it everytime), yes I can rename files - but that shouldn't be necessary.

Could it be fixed so that the flightleader is actually the supreme commander of the group? It must be possible to code it so, that if a member of a flight group is attacked, the AI will try to intervene. It must also be possible to code it so, that they won't just go home when they think "now's the time" - without saying anything.

I love the game - the flying. But man, these quirks are bothersome. Perhaps an overhaul of AI, UI and the Servercode one day, would be more worth than a new model-aircraft? I can imagine loads of potential players, who has simple been scared away by the ... sorry to say so ... clunky interface and the peculiar ways of AI.

Edited September 17, 2023 by Roshko

[R33GZ]

Couldn't agree with you more... but I have absolutely zero confidence it will ever be 'fixed'

Edited September 17, 2023 by R33GZ

[Roshko]

I just flew an intercept mission.

6 yak1bser127 are chasing 6 ju88s escorted by four MC.202.

I'm in the lead, and the yak seems to be faster than the MC. So slowly I gain distance, but never enough to be out of danger. But in order to gain on the Ju88s - they have a good 6 km headstart - I dive to the ground. So there we are ... me at 500ms - chased by MC.s that can't catch me, and 5 perfectly fine yaks, who hasn't fired a single shot - flying above it all and doing nothing. I press "attack nearest air-target" the voice says "attack nearest airtarget" - nothing. They just fly in a train with me and the MCs. Right on top of us. I press "patrol area for air-targets" - the voice says "attack nearest airtarget" (ahem, shouldn't it say "patrol for nearest"?). Nothing happens, the train keeps moving. I press "cover me" and they do just that: Fly on top of me and pick their noses. I press all this several times. The one time they did something, was when I pressed a "cover me" - all 5 of them started turning for a nearby fighter who was at altitude. I had to go "Follow me" to prevent them from getting off the train. Finally the I've caught up in the horisontal with the Ju88s - they're not slow. I climb - the whole train climbs - and luckily the Ju88s start to turn. Yeah ... now the fight is on ... only ... several of my yaks have flown home. Only two are left. They don't shoot, they just fly around in a furball with me, 6 pissed off Ju88s and a couple of MC.202s. I am so irritated that I have no SA and end up eating a bullit.

Honestly: That's no fun ... that's just irritating. Had the Yaks split up the MC. party. And then rejoined me whilst I was busy splitting up the Ju88s it could've been a hell of a fun mission.

And the whole idea of wingmen under command, that just leaves the flight.

It HAS to be fixed. There is absolutely no realism to it, and it really kills the fun.



 

Edited September 17, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

@Roshko, sometimes this is due to the way a given template was created, but nonetheless, I'll pass it on to the team to see what they might have to say.

[Roshko]

It would be so great if this could become better. Additional info: It was a quick mission of the scenario type ... But the problem seems consistent across various generators, the built in quick-mission, the campaign, The EasyMissionGenerator by Vander and the PWCG by Pat Wilson.

BTW: I own all the WWII BOX-titles and several collector-planes, even though my sig only mentions BON (the others were bought on Steam).

Edited September 17, 2023 by Roshko

[RossMarBow]

4 hours ago, Roshko said:

It's rather frustrating to be a flight leader when  AI:

1) will abandon flight if they see an enemy AI that has nothing to do with the mission
2) Too hear them request for permission to land, whilst you're being done over by a gang of enemy AIs
3) To watch them hover 1 or 2 clicks above your head, whilst you're being brutally engaged by enemy AIs

3a) Have them ignore different calls to action like "engage nearest air" "patrol air" etc ...
4) When they finally do engage, the keep yelling on the comms. They take turns, so the there's a flood of unnecessary info in  your ears all the time. "YES OF COURSE YOU ARE ATTACKING - FINALLY - NOW SHUT UP AND ATTACK" (not to mention the fact that they're aren't always attacking, they are just flooding the channel with the good news that they are)

4a) Yes, I can turn it down (each sortie, you have to do it everytime), yes I can rename files - but that shouldn't be necessary.

Could it be fixed so that the flightleader is actually the supreme commander of the group? It must be possible to code it so, that if a member of a flight group is attacked, the AI will try to intervene. It must also be possible to code it so, that they won't just go home when they think "now's the time" - without saying anything.

I love the game - the flying. But man, these quirks are bothersome. Perhaps an overhaul of AI, UI and the Servercode one day, would be more worth than a new model-aircraft? I can imagine loads of potential players, who has simple been scared away by the ... sorry to say so ... clunky interface and the peculiar ways of AI.

 

Fly online with players and run into the same problems  

[RedeyeStorm]

OP I can only give you the tip not to intervene the AI. Just let it do it’s thing. I only experienced the AI turning for home on three instances, when out of fuel, out of ammo or damaged. When flying escort, wait until the AI engages and not before. They will stay with the bombers and ignore you.

 

Doesn’t mean the AI couldn’t or shouldn’t be improved or when the flight lead the player shouldn’t have more control. This way I just get more satisfaction from the game. I do not expect this to change in this iteration of IL2.

[Roshko]

 

Yeah

1 hour ago, RedeyeStorm said:

OP I can only give you the tip not to intervene the AI. Just let it do it’s thing. I only experienced the AI turning for home on three instances, when out of fuel, out of ammo or damaged. When flying escort, wait until the AI engages and not before. They will stay with the bombers and ignore you.

 

Doesn’t mean the AI couldn’t or shouldn’t be improved or when the flight lead the player shouldn’t have more control. This way I just get more satisfaction from the game. I do not expect this to change in this iteration of IL2.

Thanks - but it shouldn't be like that. AI should behave close to normal human beings. It's totally fair to RTB if you're damaged or out of fuel. But I think that is a long uphold tradition in any fighting force, that you inform your commander. That's another thing: Why don't they consistently go "I'm winchester" - "I'm bingo fuel". You do NOT RTB without informing your commander. Also ... the whole idea: "The commander should not intervene with the soldiers actions", yeah, it's a good tip in this game, but it's not a good thing that you have to do it. Please back me up on this?

 

At Tatyanka "any mission available" means "intercept bombers" - yesterday "any mission available" meant "Take out artillery" (don't remember the airfield).

Attached are four consecutive "Any missions" from Tatyanka ... I didn't fly any of them, because I had just flown "intercept bombers" at Tatyanka.

And while we're at it: Why is the wind-direction the only atmosphere parameter that can be randomized in quick-mission scenarios?. Imagine the clouds, the time of day, the precipitation etc ... imagine all that could be randomized? Each mission would be a totally new experience?

And why do I have to turn down chatter in each sortie? I didn't want it that loud the last time, what's the chance that this time I prefer it blasting in my ears?

And skin selection: If a user has selected a skin, it's probably because he or she likes it. Remember the skin-selection please - even across game restarts?

I'm not gonna lie: I do think that the user experience comes across as somewhat sloppy, and it's too bad. Too many big and small annoyances in what is otherwise an awesome sim.

[Yogiflight]

5 hours ago, Roshko said:

Why don't they consistently go "I'm winchester" - "I'm bingo fuel". You do NOT RTB without informing your commander.

I don't know about the player flight, but AI does inform, when out of ammo or fuel. I hear it from time to time. But there seems to be an issue since one of the last updates, that the AI of the player flight doesn't do any radio chatter at all (except takeoff and landing and when reaching the target). It might be only in ground attack missions (this is what I am flying), but I constantly hear radio chatter of the escort flight (Storch/storck) and the additional fighter flight (Adler/eagle), but never of my ground attack flight. They engage enemy without giving any information.

[Roshko]

5 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

I don't know about the player flight, but AI does inform, when out of ammo or fuel. I hear it from time to time. But there seems to be an issue since one of the last updates, that the AI of the player flight doesn't do any radio chatter at all (except takeoff and landing and when reaching the target). It might be only in ground attack missions (this is what I am flying), but I constantly hear radio chatter of the escort flight (Storch/storck) and the additional fighter flight (Adler/eagle), but never of my ground attack flight. They engage enemy without giving any information.

I've yet to hear it from my own wingmen, I hear it from other flights. I fly fighter all the time, and I can confirm that fighter-AI gossip alot when it's not needed, and seldom when it is I actually recorded a flight today where it happens (as video, and as track). Perhaps I should extract the sound from the point where the action get's really hot as a demonstration of how annoying and unrealistic it is.

Edited September 18, 2023 by Roshko

[kraut1]

On 9/17/2023 at 2:17 AM, Roshko said:

4) When they finally do engage, the keep yelling on the comms. They take turns, so the there's a flood of unnecessary info in  your ears all the time. "YES OF COURSE YOU ARE ATTACKING - FINALLY - NOW SHUT UP AND ATTACK" (not to mention the fact that they're aren't always attacking, they are just flooding the channel with the good news that they are)

 

 

[Roshko]

Thanks @kraut1 - but then I won't get the "attacking fighter 5 km southwest" message either, and that one is actually important. I'm aiming to fly without map and all that - even though I must admit I'm still on icons. That message ought btw. to be "Attention, bandit 5km southwest, high" or similar.

 

[Yogiflight]

2 hours ago, Roshko said:

Thanks @kraut1 - but then I won't get the "attacking fighter 5 km southwest" message either, and that one is actually important. I'm aiming to fly without map and all that - even though I must admit I'm still on icons. That message ought btw. to be "Attention, bandit 5km southwest, high" or similar.

 

What I find absolutely annoying is that it is always my pilot, who calls out, which aircraft I am, in his opinion, attacking. It would be great, if one of my squadmates would warn, there is an enemy fighter around me, but not my pilot. This is the big advantage of flying a twoseater like the Bf 110, here it is my gunner, who calls out enemy fighters.

[kraut1]

3 hours ago, Roshko said:

Thanks @kraut1 - but then I won't get the "attacking fighter 5 km southwest" message either, and that one is actually important. I'm aiming to fly without map and all that - even though I must admit I'm still on icons. That message ought btw. to be "Attention, bandit 5km southwest, high" or similar.

 

 

57 minutes ago, Yogiflight said:

What I find absolutely annoying is that it is always my pilot, who calls out, which aircraft I am, in his opinion, attacking. It would be great, if one of my squadmates would warn, there is an enemy fighter around me, but not my pilot. This is the big advantage of flying a twoseater like the Bf 110, here it is my gunner, who calls out enemy fighters.

 

same for me, I fly only with map, no icons on hud or map.

I am not able to indcate a direction but for grid locations I use a mod with checkzones and subtitles and audio warnings by AI wingmen and radar contacts, both without direction, only range. It' absolutely primitive and selfmade but I like it and I use it since many years for each mission, campaign mission. Required time for installation: 2minutes after mission is loaded in ME. I have yesterday posted a demo video with links (Alarmstart from Amsterdam Schiphol).

Both mods can be used in english for allied missions too.

 

Edited September 18, 2023 by kraut1

[spreckair]

47 minutes ago, Yogiflight said:

What I find absolutely annoying is that it is always my pilot, who calls out, which aircraft I am, in his opinion, attacking.

What I find annoying is that my pilot speaks at all without me, the player, doing so.  Especially when my pilot issues an attack command when I, the player, do not want my flight attacking just yet.  I am left frantically calling my flight to form up again, which they rarely do once they start their attack.  And since they are now attacking from a less than advantageous starting point, they suffer more casualties.

[Roshko]

The AI certainly undermines the idea that the sim is all about realism. They can also be shot upon without taking any evasive action. I just had a flight where a 109 was chasing one of my fellows, and he didn't move at all - just went straight ahead, ignoring that he was being fired upon. I know, coz' I was chasing the shooter, shooting at him, and he didn't react either. Man I put a lot of bullets his way, and managed to get him leaking, no more. That part is probably realistic enough, I'm not that much of a shot, but both of them ... just taking it. My wingman was out on patrol for air with me, so it wasn't his mission that prevented him from doing something, furthermore he was an ace.

@kraut1  If I understand you correctly, you have a mission-group with spotters, and all one has to do to make it work (besides disabling the default voices and installing new ones) - is to add a group to the mission, and object-link it to the players plane? If so, that can be done programmatically. A non-career mission could simply be modified. A career mission, you'd have to generate it first by starting it, then modify it, then reload it. I wouldn't mind programming that up for ya. Right now I am working on something else, but I'll check out your system. Perhaps I'd like it better than default too.

But I really think that 1C should consider doing something about this. It undermines the whole idea that this sim is an attempt at a realistic simulation of WW2 airwar.

Edited September 19, 2023 by Roshko

[kraut1]

7 hours ago, Roshko said:

@kraut1  If I understand you correctly, you have a mission-group with spotters, and all one has to do to make it work (besides disabling the default voices and installing new ones) - is to add a group to the mission, and object-link it to the players plane? If so, that can be done programmatically. A non-career mission could simply be modified. A career mission, you'd have to generate it first by starting it, then modify it, then reload it. I wouldn't mind programming that up for ya. Right now I am working on something else, but I'll check out your system. Perhaps I'd like it better than default too.

But I really think that 1C should consider doing something about this. It undermines the whole idea that this sim is an attempt at a realistic simulation of WW2 airwar.

Thanks for the offer to programm something! I don' have the knwledge.

 

1 Note concerning Video: My commands to my flight during the mission were not played in the Replay for Video creation but you can hear them while playing the mission.

 

-The one mod that reports the grid locations has not to be linked with player's plane. It can be added to a template file e.g. the template file of Easy Mission Generator by Vandor and it works in each mission created with this template.

-the mod with the audio messages (if you prefer subtitles there are old subtitle versions existing):

to simplify the object link of the proximity triggers with player's plane all proximity triggers are in one subgroup at the end of the group.

After loading the group of the mod into the mission I have just to Ungroup the subgroup with the proximities, and to link them with SHIFT O with players plane.

-I don't want to disable all default voices because the quality of my audio messages is not good, just good enough to get the wanted warnings / messages.

-I have only disabled the message that my plane is attacking... that I don'like

 

If you have the knowledge to program automatic object link:

-I could modify for test a EMG template with both mods included.

-I would create a test mission with EMG by Vander

And you could try to program the automatic linking of the proximity MCUs to player's plane.

What do you think?

Updated LATER

I was wrong, implementing both mods into a template creates errors

I have currently not enough time available for further developments.

But if you want you can use my mods for your projects

If you have questions please ask.

 

Edited September 19, 2023 by kraut1
Updated later: idea does not work

[JG27_Steini]

8 hours ago, Roshko said:

The AI certainly undermines the idea that the sim is all about realism. They can also be shot upon without taking any evasive action. I just had a flight where a 109 was chasing one of my fellows, and he didn't move at all - just went straight ahead, ignoring that he was being fired upon. I know, coz' I was chasing the shooter, shooting at him, and he didn't react either. Man I put a lot of bullets his way, and managed to get him leaking, no more. That part is probably realistic enough, I'm not that much of a shot, but both of them ... just taking it. My wingman was out on patrol for air with me, so it wasn't his mission that prevented him from doing something, furthermore he was an ace.

@kraut1  If I understand you correctly, you have a mission-group with spotters, and all one has to do to make it work (besides disabling the default voices and installing new ones) - is to add a group to the mission, and object-link it to the players plane? If so, that can be done programmatically. A non-career mission could simply be modified. A career mission, you'd have to generate it first by starting it, then modify it, then reload it. I wouldn't mind programming that up for ya. Right now I am working on something else, but I'll check out your system. Perhaps I'd like it better than default too.

But I really think that 1C should consider doing something about this. It undermines the whole idea that this sim is an attempt at a realistic simulation of WW2 airwar.

 

Those problems have been discussed/reported over a decade now. The developer never really responded, only that they try to make it better. AI is controlled by mission template and has only a very limited own AI. The mission template always resets the current AI behaiour, so that it is always a strange behaviour between mission parameter or AI responses. This making it very difficult to understand what/why is your flight doing. 

 

I am sorry, but dont expect any progress here. I think the AI is strong connected with the mission template, any changes would too much interfere with it making new problems.

Edited September 19, 2023 by JG27_Steini

[Roshko]

2 hours ago, JG27_Steini said:

 

Those problems have been discussed/reported over a decade now. The developer never really responded, only that they try to make it better. AI is controlled by mission template and has only a very limited own AI. The mission template always resets the current AI behaiour, so that it is always a strange behaviour between mission parameter or AI responses. This making it very difficult to understand what/why is your flight doing. 

 

I am sorry, but dont expect any progress here. I think the AI is strong connected with the mission template, any changes would too much interfere with it making new problems.

A missionbuilder can only do so much. He can task AI with attacking. If the AI does not attack, there's really nothing more he can do about it - it's a developerjob. And if it's been a decade without bettering, well then it's a good job that the topic arises once in a while, until the day something is done about it. It's a question of priorities. AIs behavior and the apps general usability has clearly been under prioritized. Also: A plane that gets shot at will try to evade, unless it's a bomber in formation. If it doesn't, that's not something a missionbuilder has any clear way to fix.



 

5 hours ago, kraut1 said:

Thanks for the offer to programm something! I don' have the knwledge.

 

1 Note concerning Video: My commands to my flight during the mission were not played in the Replay for Video creation but you can hear them while playing the mission.

 

-The one mod that reports the grid locations has not to be linked with player's plane. It can be added to a template file e.g. the template file of Easy Mission Generator by Vandor and it works in each mission created with this template.

-the mod with the audio messages (if you prefer subtitles there are old subtitle versions existing):

to simplify the object link of the proximity triggers with player's plane all proximity triggers are in one subgroup at the end of the group.

After loading the group of the mod into the mission I have just to Ungroup the subgroup with the proximities, and to link them with SHIFT O with players plane.

-I don't want to disable all default voices because the quality of my audio messages is not good, just good enough to get the wanted warnings / messages.

-I have only disabled the message that my plane is attacking... that I don'like

 

Well it should be fairly straight forward to append a group to a mission-file, and if needed, link it to the player plane. I've not much time right now either, but I'll check it out one day!

 

Edited September 19, 2023 by Roshko

[JG27_Steini]

2 hours ago, Roshko said:

A missionbuilder can only do so much. He can task AI with attacking. If the AI does not attack, there's really nothing more he can do about it - it's a developerjob. And if it's been a decade without bettering, well then it's a good job that the topic arises once in a while, until the day something is done about it. It's a question of priorities. AIs behavior and the apps general usability has clearly been under prioritized. Also: A plane that gets shot at will try to evade, unless it's a bomber in formation. If it doesn't, that's not something a missionbuilder has any clear way to fix.



 

Well it should be fairly straight forward to append a group to a mission-file, and if needed, link it to the player plane. I've not much time right now either, but I'll check it out one day!

 

 

If those issues are discussed/reported thousands times (seach the forum e.g. "AI problems")  over nearly ten years now and nothing changed, you can make yourself an opinion what might be the problem. There were times when the forum was full of AI reports, but nothing changed. The AI itself and its connection to the mission should be rebuild completly new. It has so many flaws the developer (in my opinion) simple gave up. It still happens that AI crashes into ground while maneuvering, AI still is not able to do complex maneuver (75% times just turning). Radio operation not existing or not functional. Does not sound that the developer after so many years have a clue to fix it. On the other hand we got many many DM, FM, Graphic overhauls. For me it is clear that the developer are not able to give us an better AI. Reasons? The complex AI flight model is one of them. I think there were many bad decisions developer made that can not easily be undone.

Edited September 19, 2023 by JG27_Steini

[Roshko]

I think fair should be fair - AI does a pretty good job at evading (at least the aces do) when you're on their six - and when they bother to do something. But I think there must be a difference between coding an attack/evade-behavior, that's probably very difficult, and then coding the trigger that triggers that behavior. Just think about it: How do you formulate what a fighter-pilot should do, in order to get the upper hand on an opponent? Difficult right? How do  you formulate when a fighter should go into attack mode? That should be easier - any enemies around? Got the ok from my leader? Any ammo left? and so on.

If the AI would make better general decisions, they would seem a lot stronger, without touching their different fligt-mode patterns at all.

 

[357th_KW]

You can get a pretty wide variety of behaviors out of the AI by tweaking the MCUs you are using to tell it what you want.  For instance, if I have some interceptors that I want to attack enemies, I can give them a simple Attack Area command - they will attack the first enemy they encounter.  
 

But I can also make them focus on just the bombers out of the enemy formation by using an Attack command instead, targeted at the bombers.  I can then adjust the priority of the attack command (high, medium or low) and that will determine how focused the interceptors are - if I set it to low, they will respond if you try to stop them, medium they probably won’t react to you until you’re about to fire on them, and on high they will kamikaze into those bombers.

 

I can also make the interceptors flee the battle if the tide turns against them - I could give them all an onKilled report that runs to a counter, and when the counter is triggered (set to whatever number the mission builder chooses) it then goes to some sort of RTB waypoint - usually I’ll try to set this pretty low and at a high speed, and then they’ll try to dive away from the battle.  
 

You could also do something with an onDamaged report set to an aircraft specific rtb waypoint, and in this way drive them to individually run if they take any damage.

 

The tools exist right now to drive some very complex behaviors - it’s largely a matter of sinking in the time and effort to tune them to do what you want.  I’d bet the various quick mission templates could be remade in such a way to drive more complex behaviors.

[LukeFF]

3 hours ago, JG27_Steini said:

For me it is clear that the developer are not able to give us an better AI. Reasons? The complex AI flight model is one of them. I think there were many bad decisions developer made that can not easily be undone.

 

It's been mentioned before, so I'll bring it up again: it's very difficult for the team to find programmers with the right skill set to improve things like AI. 1CGS is competing with all the other tech developers out there for good AI programmers, who are in very high demand. It's been that way for a decade or more now at this point.

 

15 minutes ago, 357th_KW said:

You can get a pretty wide variety of behaviors out of the AI by tweaking the MCUs you are using to tell it what you want.  For instance, if I have some interceptors that I want to attack enemies, I can give them a simple Attack Area command - they will attack the first enemy they encounter.  
 

But I can also make them focus on just the bombers out of the enemy formation by using an Attack command instead, targeted at the bombers.  I can then adjust the priority of the attack command (high, medium or low) and that will determine how focused the interceptors are - if I set it to low, they will respond if you try to stop them, medium they probably won’t react to you until you’re about to fire on them, and on high they will kamikaze into those bombers.

 

I can also make the interceptors flee the battle if the tide turns against them - I could give them all an onKilled report that runs to a counter, and when the counter is triggered (set to whatever number the mission builder chooses) it then goes to some sort of RTB waypoint - usually I’ll try to set this pretty low and at a high speed, and then they’ll try to dive away from the battle.  
 

You could also do something with an onDamaged report set to an aircraft specific rtb waypoint, and in this way drive them to individually run if they take any damage.

 

The tools exist right now to drive some very complex behaviors - it’s largely a matter of sinking in the time and effort to tune them to do what you want.  I’d bet the various quick mission templates could be remade in such a way to drive more complex behaviors.

 

Yes, a lot of this is down to how the missions and templates are crafted. The team is aware of the need to update some of these old templates and there are more people now working on mission design, so the hope and plan is that some of these older templates will be updated, in due time.

[Roshko]

"I can give them a simple Attack Area command"

Well, I'm more of a pilot than a mission-builder, and I can sometimes give that command all day long, without anything happening. I don't think the fix lies in the missionbuilding, AI should behave fairly rational - and the rationale is "fighting airforce" - and THEN the missionbuilder should be able to tweak from there.

I've flown the quick-mission builder, I've flown built-in campaigns, I've flown EasyMissionGenerator, I've flown PWCG,  - and I've experienced these issues across them all. All of them made by skilled mission-builders.

The hiring problem sounds very real, and hard to overcome, and that's a bad spiral. The flying on realistic settings should be very hard, but it shouldn't be hard to get your wingmen to coorporate, it shouldn't be downright tedious and errorprone to set up your key/joy-input. It would be very easy to put it directly in the first "escape" menu for quick access, and some headings within the different sections wouldn't be impossible to implement. And oh ... an autoscroll to the last keyboard/joy-setting you altered. And you shouldn't have to make the same selections again and again each time you fly (skin, loadout, modifications etc). It shouldn't be hard to set up servers (don't mention ports here please, the rest of the internet can see my wide open 28000 and 28100, my firewall says they're open, and they can be telnetted through) - because all this is a barrier-to-entry for a lot of potential players, and players are buyers.

And then I have to admit, that sometimes it seems that usability is not even on the projects mind. Take for instance custom_photos. Nice that we can have them, but why do they need to be called "custom_photo.dds"? Why can't the game simply list the *.dds files in the plane folder, and let you choose from them? Why can't you have smoke at the same time as guns? A server should be able to decide that "on this server we do not use smoke" - but two friends training or playing together, should be able to signal each other with smoke? I remember back in the Maddox days, my then squad had a lot of fun and atmosphere using smoke when we were just diddling around. And the instrument-panel: I move my head with my mouse - yeah I know, old tech - and it's hell to check your levers, knobs and dials when you're fighting and using the mouse. Why can I choose to have an instrument-panel AND icons, but not panel and NO icons? Why is the instrument panel showing me unrealistic stuff? In a yak, you don't know how much ammo you have left, and you don't know neither true airspeed or your actual height from the ground. It could be optional? An instrument-panel designed to let the experienced pilot have the same information as the true pilot would have, and a more beginner-friendly panel? And track-recording: Why is the size-limit not optional? Some people have huge storage-devices these days? And why does the recording stop silently? Why isn't there a warning, or even better: An option for automatic restart? You had a great mission, and you're so looking forward to seeing that track, and then you come back to a "Flight recording stopped" and can watch all the boring bit's in the beginning, but not the action? I actually coded a script that automates this for me, because that one was simply too hard to live with?

All this should be fixable, without having to shell out for highly-sought for ninja-ai-coders?

It's highly frustrating to have the best sim in the world wrapped up like that, it really is - but of course, I'm gonna play it anyway, I just can't help it. But I think that this is a concoction of unfortunate circumstances AND a lack of focus from company-side. The last thing is actually workable.

Let me stress, that I don't want to come off as negative here, this is meant as constructive criticism.



 

Edited September 19, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

@Roshko, rest assured that the team is aware of these issues, but a lot of these quirks/limitations/annoyances are the result of decisions made well over a decade ago, ergo they are not easy to change on the fly. Without going into too many details, a lot of these things are on the table to be revised/improved for the next title.

[Roshko]

That's soothing words Luke, thanks!

[Roshko]

@LukeFF I have a couple of more suggested items for the list. They're probably already there, but I'd like to mention them to you, and maybe you could check if they are or not?

Head movement:

The pilot heads position in the cockpit should be moved relative to the pilots current line of sight, not relative to the direction of travel. The current system makes checking your six or just your surroundings a very counterintuitive and unnatural affair. Let's say that you have turned your head all the way back, to see if you are followed, or worse: Where your attacker is. As it is, you have to move the head to the right, if  you want to check what's happening on the left side of your line of sight. Of course this can be learned by hours and hours of gameplay, but it will never feel right, and it will trip you up when you're stressed. Or say that your head is in the middle of the cockpit, and you turn it left to see out over your left wing. Now in order to see what is on the leftmost side of your line of sight, you have to push your control backward, and if you want to see what is on the right side of your line of sight, you have to move you control forward. - so you have the natural mapping, a mapping for when you're looking to the side, and a mapping for when you're looking backwards. Two of them are artificial, and must be internalised.

The way it is now, makes it more difficult than it has to be. Of course, players who are used to the current ways might not like it, so it could be made optional: "Move head relative to line of sight? yes/no". But the translation "left is right" or "left is backwards" is unnatural, and even when you have it down, you might fumble it, when an enemy is on your tail, and you hear bullets hammering your wings or fuselage - you might even be bleeding. Btw. that's a cadeau to the game: You really get stressed when you're supposed to be stressed

Also - the head movement is very slow. In a combat-situation, I like to sit high-up and all the way back in the seat. That way I can see most of what is in front of me. It takes me a split second to turn my head backwards with the mouse (like it does in real life), but it takes an unrealistically long time for me to lean forward. And then back again. If I am on the tail of somebody, and I check six, he might very well be gone, by the time I've looked back, and then forward again. I realise that it will get very hard to find an exact position of the head, if ingame head-movement is as fast as in real life, so maybe an option to set head-movement speed from slow to fast? I also realise that I can use snap-views, but to be honest: the setup-procedure is so painful, that when I finally had a workable solution, I turned away from tweaking it further. I might find the time and patience one day.

Tech-chat

When you run out of fuel, the tech chat says "Engine failure", it ought to say "No fuel". The first time it happened to me, I was like "I hardly ever overheated? Can it be the revs?" And I started using a lower propeller-RPM when cruising. Now that's a good thing - one should probably use a lower RPM when cruising (or chasing), but it was still a misunderstanding: My engine was fine - I was just out of fuel.

These are also items that shouldn't require a highly specialised skillset from a developer, and I hope they could be taken into consideration. A game like Il-2, where the actual gameplay itself is rather difficult, would probably do it self a great favor by making the playerexperience as smooth, logical and natural as possible.

Edited September 21, 2023 by Roshko

[Roshko]

Oh - I found out that in order to set speed of my head-movement, I have to go into another menu and set options for a camera ... Not entirely logical from a users point of view in my humble opinion.

I'll be trying to get my views setup as I'd like them again.
 

Edit: I have a much better setup now - thanks to the realisation that my head is a camera, and this video:

 

Edited September 21, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

Yes, many of these things are under review for the new project. More natural head movement was something planned a few years ago, but for one reason or another, it was not changed. 

[Roshko]

Well it helped a lot when the video explained to me that the camera-settings are actually my settings for head-movement. I can now check six in a split second. I am of course not returned to the view I was in when I checked six, but the default position. It would be much better if I was returned to whatever view I came from, but still - it's much better than before.

I hope that company focus on usability will manifest it self stronger in the future.

EDIT: I found out how to get returned to the view I came from. Don't ask me how I found out, there is logic to the procedure, it just escapes me.

Edited September 24, 2023 by Roshko

[Roshko]

Stalingrad career: Hard

6 Yaks on a bombing mission. I fly #3

We get jumped by 6-8 G2. I immediately get hit bad and flee for home. 6-8 G2s abandon their mission to protect a bridge, and generally deny VVS the airspace far behind 6. Armees lines, and starts chasing the scourge of the entire Barbarossa-affair: Yak no. 3 in a bombing mission. They chase me 60-80 kms into red territory ... all of them. It's my luck that they don't know how to shoot a plane that's flying 25ms above ground/tree levels. They are of course faster than me, so I have them above me, behind me, sometimes one will overshoot me, but they can't finish off a target that's flying that low.

It is of course highly unrealistic, that an entire flight of G2s will leave 5  yaks to bomb an important nearby target, in order to get a hold of #3. I think that it is a failure in the career-mode that in order to make missions "hard" - the generator will single out the players plane as a target in itself.

Meanwhile I've been reading about how  you in 1946 - a sim much older than BoX - can order your wingmen to do both this and that, and they'll do it.

Pretty planes will in themselves not give immersion. Gameplay will - and BoX offline is - sad to say, rather disappointing in that regard as it is right now.

You may wonder why I keep harping on -- well I hope to shorten the decade of "won't fix", if even by just a day or two.

 

Edited September 25, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

@Roshko, I will ask about this again and attach this report. Hopefully, with more personnel now working on career missions, these problematic old templates can finally be updated and tuned to run more realistically. 

[Roshko]

Thanks @LukeFF

I attach the mission here, it might help missionbuilders to figure out what is going on:

Missions.zip

[Roshko]

More experienced issues in career-mode

I've downgraded to "medium" difficulty - just to see if that works a little better.

I am now a double lieutenant. Yes, I've been promoted to lt. twice!

Today I had an "intercept attackers mission". I airstart to save time. Despite being one of the most decorated pilots - if not the most decorated - and despite the fact that I'm ranked #1 in the newspapers listing of aces, I start #7. I don't mind that, but is it very realistic? "Our most decorated, highest scoring ace, always start last or next to last in flight". I mean, of course communism is about equality and all that - but still? Well nevermind.

The flight starts at speed around 350 kph. My wingmen immediately slow down to around 300 kph. In real life the flightlead would have announced such a speedchange. I overshoot drastically. I restart the mission. This time I'm aware that they'll do that - I throttle down instantly - to 0%, I can barely avoid the overshoot using flaps. And just when I am about to settle, they speed up again. In real life the flightlead would have announced such a speedchange. #8 overtakes me. Unlike him, I have a human reaction time, and have no way of knowing what the flight will do next. But I throttle up and then they slow down again. This time even more so, than the first time. The speed is all the way down under 300 kph. Taking us into "climb or land" speed settings, only no one is going to land, and no one is climbing. In real life the flightlead ... etc ... and then they speed up to something akin to normal cruise-speed. After some acceleration the enemy is sighted 10 clicks ahead. Flight starts turning gentle left, and just as you got your right wing over the left, they turn semi-hard left. We meet the foe just under their level, no one is really at speed. On the third or fourth restart of the mission I go "screw it" and start climbing on my own accord.

I then have an intercept recon mission. Me and an AI. It's at altitude. 6.500 meters, which for the yak is a bit high. On the first run-trough I didn't check the height properly, so when we spot the target, we're a 1000 meters low, and there's quite a distance to target. It's a ju88 and he's flying fast. So it takes quite a while of climbing, speeding, holding the stick deadsteady and so on to finally catch him. Just before we do, I telegraph my wingman to fall in left column formation. I want to be the shooter. Then i see fiery muzzle flashes from behind the Ju88. "Never thought they had so much reargun" is my first thought, but then I realise that it is my wingman doing the "Stalingrad chainsaw massacre" with his triggerfinger pressed all they through the triggerbutton. So there I am, having climbed, having radiatore'd, having sped, having this and that - watching my AI do the most ugly piece of loadout-emptying shooting you can imagine. The Ju88 catches fire, and that was that mission. I could've shot him on the spot. Actually very nearly did fire at him. Honestly: That's disappointing gameplay. The wingman doesn't follow orders, and he snatches the reward for patient and diligent gameplay right out of the players hand.

Next mission is a free hunt. We are four yaks. We meet a fleet of aircraft. I use outside views to count them: 8 stukas and 11 Bf109s. I also count the russian planes: Four yaks, of which I am one - in the entire stalingrad area, we are four yaks, and that's it for russian airpower that day. They weren't too aggressive, a curious german by the funny sounding name of Max Range in a G2 and a couple of others check us out, and I soon get min range on Max Range. And just as I am petty-pebling him, a brute of a yak forces it's way in between us. He's not quite the chainsaw-artist as the one in the recon mission, but preserving ammo does not seem to be on his mind. I go "f*ck it" and take care not to collide with him, but keep pressing. Finally I take off Max Ranges wingtip, and that was that for his maximum range. The brutish AI is our Major. He is flightlead. He has no decorations and not one single kill to his name. That probably happened in real life too (well, not the bit about a major with not one medal, that certainly never happened). He manages to get him self into trouble, while I've been following Max herunter - and is circling desperately some 1000 meters over my head, with a G2 on his tail. I start to climb and it takes a while. The fight with Max has slowed me down. Being an AI, the major does not for one second think to take the slaughter lower. He's just circling and getting shot - he could learn a thing or two from Max. When finally I'm at level with the fight, he dies. I manage to take down his executioner. I am butchering him, or a third (there were three kills, I don't exactly recall the order) when the entire luftwaffe arrives. I dive and run. Safe in the knowledge that all you have to do to survive a luftwaffe-gangbang is to fly very low and very fast. Just like it never was in real life. They do not give chase for more than a 3-5 kms ... perhaps protecting their flight against all the non-airborne VVS-planes were at priority this time.

I attach the "slow-faster-slower-fast-left-then-right" mission as a gdrive-link, there's also an acmi-file ... no, I'll attach it later, my internet is acting up.

BTW: Apparantly you can only fly offline careermode when your online? Just another little quirk that is rather annoying and makes no sense?

I'm sorry if I come across as a tad irritated, it's not intentional, It's because I am irritated.

PS - I did have a lot of fun along the way too ... that's why I keep playing. I really love the sounds, the sights, the feeling of inertia and mass of the plane etc ... I wish I could see my instruments ... but you eventually get a feel for the plane ❤️

Attachment: The "slow, then faster, the really slow, then fast, then first-left, then right, to shake off any human players"-mission is attached as both mission, flown track and ACMI file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yWt8WdO8i-0Mc0R7PbA09s0fsBM5ATpE/view?usp=drivesdk

It seems to be a reoccurring pattern in the Stalingrad campaign: Many flights will start very very slow, and then pick up speed after a while.

Edited September 27, 2023 by Roshko

[spreckair]

On 9/24/2023 at 8:04 PM, Roshko said:

It is of course highly unrealistic, that an entire flight of G2s will leave 5  yaks to bomb an important nearby target, in order to get a hold of #3.

Which is why, when escorting bombers, the player can fly well ahead of the bombers, get targeted by the enemy AI, and then let the AI chase the player far away from the bombers so that they can bomb the target without being attacked.  It is gaming the system, which can take away from the realism and fun, but it works.

[357th_KW]

1 hour ago, spreckair said:

Which is why, when escorting bombers, the player can fly well ahead of the bombers, get targeted by the enemy AI, and then let the AI chase the player far away from the bombers so that they can bomb the target without being attacked.  It is gaming the system, which can take away from the realism and fun, but it works.

 

This is the result of using an "attack area" command in the mission editor for the interceptors - the AI will attack the first enemy it encounters.

 

You can make them prioritize specific aircraft (bombers or attackers for instance) by using an "attack" command, targeted at those specific aircraft, and varying the priority on the command you can control how focused they are on the designated targets vs escorts that might be trying to stop them.

 

Again, this is simply a question of how the mission has been programmed, not a case where the game can't produce the behavior you want.

[Charon]

2 hours ago, 357th_KW said:

 

This is the result of using an "attack area" command in the mission editor for the interceptors - the AI will attack the first enemy it encounters.

 

You can make them prioritize specific aircraft (bombers or attackers for instance) by using an "attack" command, targeted at those specific aircraft, and varying the priority on the command you can control how focused they are on the designated targets vs escorts that might be trying to stop them.

 

Again, this is simply a question of how the mission has been programmed, not a case where the game can't produce the behavior you want.

Do they concentrate their attacks on the specific selected aircraft, or will they attack the target's whole flight?

 

The Attack Area command has the nice virtue that, when last I tested, AI planes won't engage planes that they're unable to see due to clouds. IIRC the Attack command doesn't respect visibility.

[357th_KW]

1 hour ago, Charon said:

Do they concentrate their attacks on the specific selected aircraft, or will they attack the target's whole flight?

 

The Attack Area command has the nice virtue that, when last I tested, AI planes won't engage planes that they're unable to see due to clouds. IIRC the Attack command doesn't respect visibility.

 

There's an option to allow for just the specific aircraft or its whole flight to be selected.  And you can list a whole series of targets as well.

[AEthelraedUnraed]

On 9/27/2023 at 1:28 AM, Roshko said:

Despite being one of the most decorated pilots - if not the most decorated - and despite the fact that I'm ranked #1 in the newspapers listing of aces, I start #7. I don't mind that, but is it very realistic? "Our most decorated, highest scoring ace, always start last or next to last in flight". I mean, of course communism is about equality and all that - but still? Well nevermind.

Being flight leader (and your rank, for that matter) historically depended more on how experienced you were (e.g. how many flights) than on your kill count. I think @LukeFF published a list with the exact requirements sometime but I cannot find it anymore. Furthermore, the position in a flight is not necessarily from highest ranked to lowest ranked. It depens a lot on the air force and time, but for instance the Germans divided their four-aircraft flights (Schwärme) into two semi-autonomous "Rotten", so basically if ordered by rank it would be 1-3-2-4 where 3 was the wingman of 1 and 4 of 2.

 

Of course, the current promotion system (same goes for medals) has the disadvantage that:

1) it's based on actual in-game flights, so if you play at 3x career speed it means that you get promoted 3 times more slowly than historically would be expected, and

2) you encounter enemy aircraft in almost every flight (certainly in fighter careers) which makes you rack up kills much faster than realistically. Historically, outside of perhaps the very top of high-intensity environments (e.g. Kuban) and depending on mission type (e.g. escort vs interception), pilots encountered aircraft in only a minority of flights.

 

On 9/27/2023 at 1:28 AM, Roshko said:

In real life the flightlead would have announced such a speedchange.

I think you may have a slightly optimistic view of radio usage in WW2 Although this too depended on the time and place, crews often flew with radio silence in order not to give their attack away to the enemy, and even when not, radio was not always used and/or heard. In 1942 RAF ORBs I've seen several instances where pilots apparently returned to base without bothering to inform the rest of the flight, for example. Even after enemy contact was made and radio silence wasn't needed anymore.

 

Of course, the VVS is especially infamous for not even having any properly functional radio system until c. 1943.

 

On 9/27/2023 at 1:28 AM, Roshko said:

BTW: Apparantly you can only fly offline careermode when your online? Just another little quirk that is rather annoying and makes no sense?

That's not entirely true. You can only fly offline career mode if you're logged in to the game, for which you need to be online. As soon as you're in the main menu, you can disconnect your internet and still fly the career mode and/or generate new missions.

 

Needing to be online to boot up a game is not uncommon at all for today's games, and is a form of DRM.

 

There's a lot that could be improved for the career mode, but some of the things you mention may just be more realistic than you think

[Roshko]

I don't think that it was customary to slow down, then speed up, then slow down, then speed up. And I think that this was true even before 1943 - I think it's a mission-bug. And they would communicate, if not by radio, then by hand signals or wing-waggling or other.

"I think you may have a slightly optimistic view of radio usage in WW2" - well, in the game they use radio all the time, so if they model radio, they should use radio.

I don't care about the promotions, just wanted to mention that I actually got promoted twice ... to the same rank. It has nothing to do with careerspeed.

"Needing to be online is not uncommon" - no, it's not uncommon, for games that somehow needs you to be online. An offline career should not require you to be online.

"That's not entirely true. You can only fly offline career mode if you're logged in to the game, for which you need to be online."

You can log into the game offline, so I can't agree with you on this.

Edited September 28, 2023 by Roshko