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

[LukeFF]

8 hours ago, Roshko said:

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.

 

It's a bug with messages repeating in general. I've passed it along to the team.

[spreckair]

14 hours ago, Charon said:

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

So, my example above was flying in career mode.  In every instance that I have experienced in career mode, the enemy AI fixates on me, the first aircraft they see.  I can drag them directly through my flight of bombers and escort fighters, and they totally ignore everyone but me.  Kind of kills the immersion.

[Yogiflight]

12 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

Furthermore, the position in a flight is not necessarily from highest ranked to lowest ranked.

Which, for me is an issue in career mode, as the way it currently goes means, when your flightleader is out of the flight a low ranked pilot is the new leader of the flight. This is absolutely unrealistic. As you wrote in your example about the German flights, pilot number 3 would be the new flightleader, not number 2. With the way the system of the game works, the pilots should be flying according to their ranks, like PWCG does it.

 

12 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

so if you play at 3x career speed it means that you get promoted 3 times more slowly than historically would be expected,

I am not sure on that, because currently you get promoted by far too fast. When I was playing a Moscow career with the Bf 110 E2 last time, I was promoted to Leutnat after four weeks and one day later I became Squadron commander. Marseille would have been Emperor of the German Luftwaffe with that speed of advancement.

 

12 hours ago, Roshko said:

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

You can log into the game offline, but what he means is, you need to log in online, if you want to play career mode. But after having you logged in, you can cut off your internet connection and still play career mode, you only need internet connection for the Login.

[Roshko]

16 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You can log into the game offline, but what he means is, you need to log in online, if you want to play career mode. But after having you logged in, you can cut off your internet connection and still play career mode, you only need internet connection for the Login.

Yes, I know. What I mean is that it is counterproductive to demand an internet connection before  you get the option to play your offline career. I just had a lot of trouble with my internet connection, and that meant that I often couldn't play my career, because I had to be logged in online in order to play it.  Imagine there's an internet blackout in  your area? Well, shucks, now you can't play your offline career. Luckily my connection problems seems to be solved now.

Edited September 29, 2023 by Roshko

[Yogiflight]

22 minutes ago, Roshko said:

and that meant that I often couldn't play my career, because I had to be logged in online in order to play it. 

I have to say, that I am playing through Steam, so it might not work if you launch your game with the IL-2 launcher, but I can even with just a 2G connection log into the game. And after logging in, it doesn't matter anyway.

But yes, it shouldn't be neccessary to log in for playing the career mode. You can use PWCG without internet connection, so if you have trouble with internet, you might try that opportunity for playing a career. The missions work through the Missions menu, so you don't need to log in online.

[Roshko]

2 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

I have to say, that I am playing through Steam, so it might not work if you launch your game with the IL-2 launcher, but I can even with just a 2G connection log into the game. And after logging in, it doesn't matter anyway.

But yes, it shouldn't be neccessary to log in for playing the career mode. You can use PWCG without internet connection, so if you have trouble with internet, you might try that opportunity for playing a career. The missions work through the Missions menu, so you don't need to log in online.

I play through Steam too. Of course ones internet connection has nothing to do with gamespecifics. I do fly PWCG and EasyMissionGenerator too ...  But I had invested several hours in my career before my internet-problems. It was quite a disappointment, when I discovered that my offline career wasn't available with the offline login. Furthermore, it serves no reasonable purpose that can't be achieved by other means. If  you wan't an online verification, that you are flying the sim in "macho" mode, a check-box entitled "I'd like to fly in online-verified macho-mode" would be much better ... just like you have an option to fly in "iron-man" mode - and btw. people can easily cheat the system and resurrect dead pilots, by simply manipulating the game-database (called cp.db in the "data/career" folder). When people go through the hassle of hacking the system like that, and when an entire thread on this forum is dedicated to it ... it shows that something is not aligned with what a lot of players want.

When you buy the game it boasts that it has a dynamic campaign-generator running in career-mode. It never boasts about "and it is only available if you are online when you login". It's just a poor design choice, forcing arbitrary limitations on the players gaming-experience. Too many of that kind of choices, and by highlighting them, one could hope that some of them would be removed.

 

Edited September 29, 2023 by Roshko

[Yogiflight]

22 hours ago, Roshko said:

just like you have an option to fly in "iron-man" mode - and btw. people can easily cheat the system and resurrect dead pilots, by simply manipulating the game-database (called cp.db in the "data/career" folder).

You can also leave the game before the mission ends by pressing RAlt+RCtrl+Delete, then outlog from Windows and go back into the game after logging in in Windows again and starting the game. That way the game doesn't write a result of your mission and doesn't know, you were flying it already.

[Ghost666]

5 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You can also leave the game before the mission ends by pressing RAlt+RCtrl+Delete, then outlog from Windows and go back into the game after logging in in Windows again and starting the game. That way the game doesn't write a result of your mission and doesn't know, you were flying it already.

LAlt+F4 does the same.

[Roshko]

@LukeFF - here's a bugreport.

I started a new career in the Kuban.

1. mission is a "cover river crossing" type mission. I've made myself commander from the get go.

In the planning room the mission looks like this:

 

However when you start the mission, the waypoints look like this:
 

I flew the mission anyhow, thinking that as flightlead, I could just fly to 0822 - covering the bridge. Nothing happens, no spotters are reporting. I use outside views to check flights. The only flight airborne is my own. No friendlies whatsoever, no enemies whatsoever. I fly home with my gang. Spotters still silent. A last check after landing reveals that we are still the only planes in existence in the entire Kuban map. Of course the mission is deemed "Failed".

 

Next day:

Two missions are pending. An intercept, that I am not assigned to, and yet another "cover river crossing".  I decide to give my flight rednosed skins - in case we bump into other yaks, and just for the hell of it.

There is no way to assign one skin to all planes in a flight. You have to click 8 times and laboriously assign the skin to each individual plane.

 

I click proceed, and the intercept is processed. I know click "start mission" and my own mission starts. The first thing I see is that even though this is a different rivercrossing we have to cover, the target WP is way out in the sea, just like the first one. I click fly and we're airborne. Not one of the planes has the rednosed skin that I had to assign individually. All are wearing defaults. Apparently the skin-selection was forgotten during the processing of the recon-mission. I check outsideviews, and yup - we're the only planes flying in Kuban that day. I quit the mission ... I'm not going to fly around hoping that some trigger somehow will populate the map with something to do. I have no faith in the generator anymore.

I attach these screenshots, the _gen mission files for the first botched rivercrossing and my cp.db file in a zipfile, if someone on the team would like to dissect them.

Status: I have a mate who also kinda recently got into the game. Both of us are computerprofessionals. None of us can host a server, even though we know how to open ports and check if they really are open and offline flying is a mess. It really ruins my fun, and it's too bad. I bought all the games, and I really like flying the sim.

Here's the zipfile with missions, database and screenshots (note - this is only for the first failed mission, not the second):



kuban-misplaced-waypoint-no-other-flights.zip

Edited October 1, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

7 minutes ago, Roshko said:

@LukeFF - here's a bugreport.

I started a new career in the Kuban.

1. mission is a "cover river crossing" type mission. I've made myself commander from the get go.

In the planning room the mission looks like this:

 

However when you start the mission, the waypoints look like this:
 

I flew the mission anyhow, thinking that as flightlead, I could just fly to 0822 - covering the bridge. Nothing happens, no spotters are reporting. I use outside views to check flights. The only flight airborne is my own. No friendlies whatsoever, no enemies whatsoever. I fly home with my gang. Spotters still silent. A last check after landing reveals that we are still the only planes in existence in the entire Kuban map. Of course the mission is deemed "Failed".

 

Next day:

Two missions are pending. An intercept, that I am not assigned to, and yet another "cover river crossing".  I decide to give my flight rednosed skins - in case we bump into other yaks, and just for the hell of it.

There is no way to assign one skin to all planes in a flight. You have to click 8 times and laboriously assign the skin to each individual plane.

 

I click proceed, and the intercept is processed. I know click "start mission" and my own mission starts. The first thing I see is that even though this is a different rivercrossing we have to cover, the target WP is way out in the sea, just like the first one. I click fly and we're airborne. Not one of the planes has the rednosed skin that I had to assign individually. All are wearing defaults. Apparently the skin-selection was forgotten during the processing of the recon-mission. I check outsideviews, and yup - we're the only planes flying in Kuban that day. I quit the mission ... I'm not going to fly around hoping that some trigger somehow will populate the map with something to do. I have no faith in the generator anymore.

I attach these screenshots, the _gen mission files for the first botched rivercrossing and my cp.db file in a zipfile, if someone on the team would like to dissect them.

Status: I have a mate who also kinda recently got into the game. Both of us are computerprofessionals. None of us can host a server, even though we know how to open ports and check if they really are open and offline flying is a mess. It really ruins my fun, and it's too bad. I bought all the games, and I really like flying the sim.

Here's the zipfile with missions, database and screenshots (note - this is only for the first failed mission, not the second):
kuban-misplaced-waypoint-no-other-flights.zip

 

Okay, thanks! I'll pass along this report to our QA team. 

[Roshko]

12 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You can also leave the game before the mission ends by pressing RAlt+RCtrl+Delete, then outlog from Windows and go back into the game after logging in in Windows again and starting the game. That way the game doesn't write a result of your mission and doesn't know, you were flying it already.

Yeah, I know, and I've done that before, but it's a workaround to a silly problem. When I lost my career it was because I wanted to see the track of me hitting a 109 with the prop. I had no thought for "oh yeah, you can't finish a mission like this, if you don't immediately restart, then abort it, OR kill the game and restart it"

It's just silly.

[Roshko]

What is the callsign of your flight? "Find out for youself"
What is the callsign of the flight you're escorting? "It's blowing in the wind, but you can find out for your self"
How many of them survived? "You can review the mission text-logs or go to debrief and count them"
Why are they bombing that place? "Because it needs bombing"
What's their flight plan? "Somewhat similar to yours"
How fast are they going? "The answer is blowing in the wind - go have a breath of it"
What are the operational parameters of my plane? "Buried in a load of text you don't need when operating. Placed furthest down"

I noticed that a guy called "Han" is the game-producer, and you are doing a whole new interface. I really hope that immersion is highly prioritized.

If I didn't love flying this much, I wouldn't bother - I'd be somewhere else.

[LukeFF]

5 hours ago, Roshko said:

I noticed that a guy called "Han" is the game-producer, and you are doing a whole new interface. I really hope that immersion is highly prioritized.

 

I've seen prototypes for the new interface - it looks really, really good. ?

[Roshko]

Yeah - my only fear is if the toolkit used is able to run under wine on linux. With my luck it's probably not ...

BTW - had a third rivercrossing mission in the Kuban-career, and the waypoints did exactly the same. That probably narrows the problem down to one or two specific Kuban-templates, and perhaps an easy fix. Just thought I'd mention it. Everything else in that mission worked as expected.

Had a marvellous escort mission. Bright sunny day, puffy clouds, and the most satisfying kill ever (that sounds weird, but ... that's combatpiloting isn't it? ) - When things get together, this sim is really capable of giving you remarkable experiences!

Edited October 2, 2023 by Roshko

[Yogiflight]

20 hours ago, Roshko said:

How fast are they going? "The answer is blowing in the wind - go have a breath of it"

You can find the speed of the aircrafts you escort by clicking on the end point of your mission in the Headquarters map. The waypoints of your mission will appear and as speed is the speed of the bombers/ ground attack aircrafts you escort noted, plus the time they will need with that speed to the next waypoint. Unfortunately the briefing map and the mission map show the travelling speed of your aircraft and the time you would need with that speed.

 

The issue with the callsigns is something I also reported some time ago. You shouldn't have to find out through the radio callouts. It should be in the briefing. Fortunately they changed the callsigns lately, so it doesn't happen anymore, that your flight as ground attacker has the same callsign as your fighter escort.

[LukeFF]

3 hours ago, Roshko said:

BTW - had a third rivercrossing mission in the Kuban-career, and the waypoints did exactly the same. That probably narrows the problem down to one or two specific Kuban-templates, and perhaps an easy fix. Just thought I'd mention it. Everything else in that mission worked as expected.

 

Yes, I've passed along that mission report you posted above, and it looks like it will be fixed in the next update.

[Roshko]

4 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You can find the speed of the aircrafts you escort by clicking on the end point of your mission in the Headquarters map. The waypoints of your mission will appear and as speed is the speed of the bombers/ ground attack aircrafts you escort noted, plus the time they will need with that speed to the next waypoint. Unfortunately the briefing map and the mission map show the travelling speed of your aircraft and the time you would need with that speed.

 

The issue with the callsigns is something I also reported some time ago. You shouldn't have to find out through the radio callouts. It should be in the briefing. Fortunately they changed the callsigns lately, so it doesn't happen anymore, that your flight as ground attacker has the same callsign as your fighter escort.

Are you sure about that? Il-2s marching at 450 kph? I'm pretty sure that's my own flight's waypoints? Not least because they have takeoff and landing at my airbase?

 

4 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

Yes, I've passed along that mission report you posted above, and it looks like it will be fixed in the next update.

Great!

I just flew a mission, where we were 8 yaks supposed to deal with at least 4 or 6 Ju88s (probably 8...) and at my time of counting: 18 1098-G2s (or was it G4s?). At my time of counting we were down to 4 yaks, and a guy in a parachute. 2 of the yak's were on landing-approach having been shot up. So me, another guy, and 18 G2s. Well only ½ me to be honest - I was shot to pieces and had to bail. Last thing I saw of the other guy, he was being pummeled by the 8 or 9 G2s the Luftwaffe could spare from the important task of pummeling me.

It was kinda' ironic for there'd just been a video telling us that the luftwaffe was losing it's superiority in the Kuban air.

The mission took place well inside red territory, with quite a few manned russian airbases in the area (I think ... )

I can't say if such a scenario is realistic: A massive fleet of german A/Cs - in a well-covered red area Kuban 1943 - and only 8 yaks to deal with the situation, but it's a massive gamekiller. You might as well just simulate pointing the personal sidearm to ones own forehead and be done with it.

I attach the mission, perhaps this can be looked into also?

Kuban-overweight-of-LW-ACs.zip


UPDATE:

I went into the missionbuilder, to see that mission. Here's the Soviet planes (14 by my count, I only ever saw the 7 others from my own flight):



And here's the german planes (34 or perhaps only 33 - more than double the amount (btw: note how many has exactly the same name btw ... that's a strange random-generation at play right there. It's not impossible, after all it is random, but ....)

Edited October 2, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

@Roshko, sure, I'll pass that along too. Thanks!

[Yogiflight]

14 hours ago, Roshko said:

Are you sure about that? Il-2s marching at 450 kph? I'm pretty sure that's my own flight's waypoints? Not least because they have takeoff and landing at my airbase?

You had the speed of 450 kph on the Headquarters map? I had two Ju 88 escort missions yesterday and for both missions the Headquarters map showed a cruising speed of 330 kph, while the briefing map and the mission map showed the cruising speed of my flight.

The waypoints are of course the same, as you meet your flight when it reaches your airfield and your RTB goes over the airfield, the bombers will land, before you turn to your base. I didn't look for that last part from the airfield, the bombers land to your base. For that last leg, the speed on the Headquarters map should be the cruising speed of your flight.

 

Here is an example of a He 111 escort mission, flying a Bf 109 F4

The Headquarters map (the last leg still is with the bombers cruising speed)

 

and the Mission map

Edited October 3, 2023 by Yogiflight

[LukeFF]

17 hours ago, Roshko said:

Are you sure about that? Il-2s marching at 450 kph? I'm pretty sure that's my own flight's waypoints? Not least because they have takeoff and landing at my airbase?

 

Great!

I just flew a mission, where we were 8 yaks supposed to deal with at least 4 or 6 Ju88s (probably 8...) and at my time of counting: 18 1098-G2s (or was it G4s?). At my time of counting we were down to 4 yaks, and a guy in a parachute. 2 of the yak's were on landing-approach having been shot up. So me, another guy, and 18 G2s. Well only ½ me to be honest - I was shot to pieces and had to bail. Last thing I saw of the other guy, he was being pummeled by the 8 or 9 G2s the Luftwaffe could spare from the important task of pummeling me.

It was kinda' ironic for there'd just been a video telling us that the luftwaffe was losing it's superiority in the Kuban air.

The mission took place well inside red territory, with quite a few manned russian airbases in the area (I think ... )

I can't say if such a scenario is realistic: A massive fleet of german A/Cs - in a well-covered red area Kuban 1943 - and only 8 yaks to deal with the situation, but it's a massive gamekiller. You might as well just simulate pointing the personal sidearm to ones own forehead and be done with it.

I attach the mission, perhaps this can be looked into also?

Kuban-overweight-of-LW-ACs.zip


UPDATE:

I went into the missionbuilder, to see that mission. Here's the Soviet planes (14 by my count, I only ever saw the 7 others from my own flight):



And here's the german planes (34 or perhaps only 33 - more than double the amount (btw: note how many has exactly the same name btw ... that's a strange random-generation at play right there. It's not impossible, after all it is random, but ....)

 

For this mission, what difficulty settings were you using? If you're playing on maxed-out career settings, unfortunately this can sometimes happen (according to the developers).

[Roshko]

5 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You had the speed of 450 kph on the Headquarters map?

 

 

Yes I did. We were escorting Il-2s. I am trying to upload a screenshot from the headquarters, however the server seems to have problems right now. But yes, escort Il-2s at 450kph. None of the modelled Il-2s can go that fast, unless it's downhill, and they certainly don't march at that speed. Oh, the upload worked now. Here's the pic

 

It's not just a single mission:



What I miss is their actual flightplan. I also miss knowing WHY they're bombing, what is happening in that area besides "our troops are hauling supplys"? And I'd like to see their missionreport as well as my own. We may fail in protecting them (we often do, and that's probably all too realistic), but did they destroy what they set out to destroy, and what is the impact on the tactical/strategic situation of our mission?

All in all, the way the AI behaves in general and the way the campaign-system is set up, it's very hard to feel like you're part of something. You feel more like an ignored guest, who are free to shoot at the enemies if he so pleases. I think the maps are gorgeous, the plane-models are awesome, I love listening to my engine for the best fuel-mixture, the clouds are simply fantastic, and every once in a while, you get a really great mission-experience.

I think that the sim bears the hallmark of really awesome developers and engineers, but it is sorely lacking the fingerprints of usability- and user-experience experts, and that is hurting the whole experience. When I see new announcements from the team, it's always about new aircraft-models, and nobody can dislike new models, but perhaps the Arado, the Li-2 and some WWI-kites isn't what the sim is lacking most at this time? Don't get me wrong here. I'm not talking against new planes, I am talking about priorities. In short: Immersion!

2 hours ago, LukeFF said:

 

For this mission, what difficulty settings were you using? If you're playing on maxed-out career settings, unfortunately this can sometimes happen (according to the developers).

I think I had difficulty "hard" and frontline-activity "dense", so that might very well be true. But there must be a tradeoff between immersion and realism. If the sim were to be strictly realistic ... well the russian loss-rates, especially early on, were horrific. You wouldn't have a game if that was to be modelled realistically. I have no doubt that many russian flights never came home at all, but as a player, you're fighting G2s and G4s in a yak. You can't keep up, and you can't climb to them. You see your wingies get slaughtered, even when odds are more fair. There's a tradeoff between immersion, excitement and brutal realism, and "hard" should not mean "Massive inferiority in numbers" or "Player is target for all enemy AIs" - at least I think so.

I realise that what I am hoping for is quite a stretch relative to the games current status quo, but then again, a direction should be taken in the development. What goals do the project have? And I hope that I can influence this towards a more keen focus on the actual gaming/UI experience going forward.

Edited October 3, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

2 minutes ago, Roshko said:

Yes I did. We were escorting Il-2s. I am trying to upload a screenshot from the headquarters, however the server seems to have problems right now. But yes, escort Il-2s at 450kph. None of the modelled Il-2s can go that fast, unless it's downhill, and they certainly don't march at that speed. Oh, the upload worked now. Here's the pic

 

What I miss is their actual flightplan. I also miss knowing WHY they're bombing, what is happening in that area besides "our troops are hauling supplys"? And I'd like to see their missionreport as well as my own. We may fail in protecting them (we often do, and that's probably all too realistic), but did they destroy what they set out to destroy, and what is the impact on the tactical/strategic situation of our mission?

All in all, the way the AI behaves in general and the way the campaign-system is set up, it's very hard to feel like you're part of something. You feel more like an ignored guest, who are free to shoot at the enemies if he so pleases. I think the maps are gorgeous, the plane-models are awesome, I love listening to my engine for the best fuel-mixture, the clouds are simply fantastic, and every once in a while, you get a really great mission-experience.

I think that the sim bears the hallmark of really awesome developers and engineers, but it is sorely lacking the fingerprints of usability- and user-experience experts, and that is hurting the whole experience. When I see new announcements from the team, it's always about new aircraft-models, and nobody can dislike new models, but perhaps the Arado, the Li-2 and some WWI-kites isn't what the sim is lacking most at this time? Don't get me wrong here. I'm not talking against new planes, I am talking about priorities. In short: Immersion!
 

I think I had difficulty "hard" and frontline-activity "dense", so that might very well be true. But there must be a tradeoff between immersion and realism. If the sim were to be strictly realistic ... well the russian loss-rates, especially early on, were horrific. You wouldn't have a game if that was to be modelled realistically. I have no doubt that many russian flights never came home at all, but as a player, you're fighting G2s and G4s in a yak. You can't keep up, and you can't climb to them. You see your wingies get slaughtered, even when odds are more fair. There's a tradeoff between immersion, excitement and brutal realism, and "hard" should not mean "Massive inferiority in numbers" or "Player is target for all enemy AIs" - at least I think so.

I realise that what I am hoping for is quite a stretch relative to the games current status quo, but then again, a direction should be taken in the development. What goals do the project have? And I hope that I can influence this towards a more keen focus on the actual gaming/UI experience going forward.

 

Got it. ?? Yes, I have experienced similar scenarios on this map, so I'll pass along another message and see what they say. The guys did say this morning that some numbers will be cut for the Normandy map, BTW, so that's good (again, based on historical data).

[Yogiflight]

1 hour ago, Roshko said:

What I miss is their actual flightplan. I also miss knowing WHY they're bombing, what is happening in that area besides "our troops are hauling supplys"? And I'd like to see their missionreport as well as my own. We may fail in protecting them (we often do, and that's probably all too realistic), but did they destroy what they set out to destroy, and what is the impact on the tactical/strategic situation of our mission?

All in all, the way the AI behaves in general and the way the campaign-system is set up, it's very hard to feel like you're part of something. You feel more like an ignored guest, who are free to shoot at the enemies if he so pleases. I think the maps are gorgeous, the plane-models are awesome, I love listening to my engine for the best fuel-mixture, the clouds are simply fantastic, and every once in a while, you get a really great mission-experience.

I think that the sim bears the hallmark of really awesome developers and engineers, but it is sorely lacking the fingerprints of usability- and user-experience experts, and that is hurting the whole experience. When I see new announcements from the team, it's always about new aircraft-models, and nobody can dislike new models, but perhaps the Arado, the Li-2 and some WWI-kites isn't what the sim is lacking most at this time? Don't get me wrong here. I'm not talking against new planes, I am talking about priorities. In short: Immersion!

Couldn't agree more. And when you are escorting bombers or ground attack aircrafts and they get slaughtered, your mission shouldn't be successful, because you were flying all the waypoints and didn't return to your base before you were told so. if they get slaughtered, your mission wasn't a success.

About the success of the flight, you escorted. You can see their success on the AAR map. German ground attack aircrafts in escort mission always attack artillery positions, I guess it is the same for Russians, too. But I am with you, it would be nice to have a written debriefing, which gives you information about the success of the mission.

[Roshko]

53 minutes ago, Yogiflight said:

Couldn't agree more. And when you are escorting bombers or ground attack aircrafts and they get slaughtered, your mission shouldn't be successful, because you were flying all the waypoints and didn't return to your base before you were told so. if they get slaughtered, your mission wasn't a success.

About the success of the flight, you escorted. You can see their success on the AAR map. German ground attack aircrafts in escort mission always attack artillery positions, I guess it is the same for Russians, too. But I am with you, it would be nice to have a written debriefing, which gives you information about the success of the mission.

We often bomb convoys, but also artillery - dunno, I'd say 50/50. Guess the germans were moving more stuff around

The AAR map, which one is that?

BTW. @LukeFF - had another slowdown start.

If you see my speedgauge, you can see that we're flying just above 250, this was after a dramatic speed-down just after gaining post-takeoff speed. I flew the mission again, and we were at 380 when the speed-down occurs. Immediately after this screenie was taken, they sped up again. We had to bomb a convoy (as fighterbombers, not escorts), and they did the same on egress from target. First a solid speedup, then a solid speeddown. We got jumped by G2s, luckily there was an La-5 flight escorting us - after a short tangle, my flight left the already decimated La-5s and went homewardbound. I restarted the mission and took over as flightlead.

 

On this screenshot you can see that the WP is set to 450kph

I know I've mentioned this, but just wanted to provide another example, to show that this happens often.

Edited October 3, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

Yes, the AI has issues with keeping speed right now that are still being ironed out.

[Yogiflight]

22 hours ago, Roshko said:

We often bomb convoys, but also artillery - dunno, I'd say 50/50. Guess the germans were moving more stuff around

I was talking about ground attack aircrafts, when you are flying an escort mission. When you fly a ground attack aircraft like the IL-2, it depends on what kind of missions they were (likely) flying back then.

 

23 hours ago, Roshko said:

The AAR map, which one is that?

The map you see after finishing the mission when clicking on Events Log.

[Roshko]

Yeah, I confused my escorting of attack-a/c with doing groundattacks myself 

And you're right, you can see what groundunits was destroyed by the attackers in the debriefing-map, but you won't know what impact it had on the tactical situation. It's not a full substitute for a regular debrief.

Edited October 4, 2023 by Roshko

[Yogiflight]

22 hours ago, Roshko said:

but you won't know what impact it had on the tactical situation. It's not a full substitute for a regular debrief.

Well, unfortunately there is no real tactical situation in career mode. You just get missions by chance. I don't know about Russian careers, but in German careers you usually get ground attack missions, which don't fit the tactical situation of that phase of the war at all. For example, you play a ground attack career on the Kuban map, the first phase is the attempt of the Wehrmacht to throw the Russians out of the bridgehead south of Noworosiysk. German ground attacks should concentrate on supporting that attack. But you usually don't get a single mission there, but mainly somwhere at the northeastern part of the front.

You shouldn't expect too much from the career mode. Unfortunately it is just flying missions for entertainement with a minimal story around it. And there are logical mistakes in the career mode as well, like having a Leutnant as Squadron Commander, a Oberleutnant as his Co Commander and the Hauptmann, after having recovered from an injury, being just a pilot in the Squadron Rooster. Or after death or injury of the Commander not the Co Commander getting the new Commander, but another pilot of the squadron.

[Roshko]

6 hours ago, Yogiflight said:

You shouldn't expect too much from the career mode. Unfortunately it is just flying missions for entertainement with a minimal story around it.

 

I have come to see that you are right. During the Stalingrad airbridge, where 100s of Ju-52s tried delivering supplies to Paulus' doomed 6. army, my Yaks and I were out throwing bombs at vehicle convoys. Today I flew with my online-buddy. He had just hosted a completely different game for a bunch of friends the other day. That game utilised a D-server like setup. A separate program does the actual hosting (although it's started from within the game). That went without a hitch. He still can't host Il-2. Neither can I.

I have a bunch of screenshots documenting that my path to the internet is clearly open. I even have screenshots of a netmonitor, showing that 28000 and 28100 are activated when I start ingame hosting service. But the game spits out "activator: connection refused" (I started it from a terminal to see the output) none the less. My buddy and I could have tonnes of fun if only we could host. I'm on Linux, and that's not supported (there's nothing wrong with the networking part of Linux windows-compatibility - I've only ever had problems with network and windows programs with Il-2), but he's on Windows, and everything is certifiably supported by Il-2, except ... it just does not work.

I want to mention some good things too: I've been flying Yak almost exclusively. My squad in the Kuban-career was disbanded, so I had to switch. I switched to a squad flying La-5 to try something "new". I can really feel why the Soviet pilots where happy when the La-5 arrived (and I looove flying the Yak, it's a great plane). The La-5 is more powerful, has a higher roll rate and better armament. Things actually break when you shoot them. And I've become much much better at shooting.

It's a bittersweet love this game is ❤️

Edited October 6, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

13 hours ago, Roshko said:

I have come to see that you are right. During the Stalingrad airbridge, where 100s of Ju-52s tried delivering supplies to Paulus' doomed 6. army, my Yaks and I were out throwing bombs at vehicle convoys.

 

"Well, actually" moment incoming. ? 

The missions for the VVS from late November 1942 to the end of the Stalingrad campaign are based on the official mission summary lists for the Air Armies in the Stalingrad sector. Yes, I agree there should be missions intercepting transports, but as of right now there is nothing more I can do.

[Roshko]

@LukeFF  - this is a medium diff. mission from the same career. I've switched to La5 and the Germans all appear to have upgraded to G4s.

24 G4s against 8 La5s and 3 P-39s

We have to shoot more than two of them down, each time they murder one of us. Of course we can't manage that, so the numbers grow more and more horrific as the battle progresses.



On this map I count 7 of us and 14 of them, but one can't be sure that all planes are shown.

We got wooped good, and as I try to flee, I count 4 of us and 12 of them. I notice in these forums, that others have the same complaint, and of course, this is not complaining that I get shot, this is complaining that you fly out to intercept attackers, and  you are greeted by an overwhelming amount of G4s ... faster and better climbers than you, and of course, with great skills at high deflection shots.

Note that this is on medium, not hard, settings.

24_LW_vs_11_VVS.zip

29 minutes ago, LukeFF said:

 

"Well, actually" moment incoming. ? 

The missions for the VVS from late November 1942 to the end of the Stalingrad campaign are based on the official mission summary lists for the Air Armies in the Stalingrad sector. Yes, I agree there should be missions intercepting transports, but as of right now there is nothing more I can do.

?

Well, the video for that part says that more than 200 Ju52s were shot down. Can it be true that the VVS didn't shoot one single of them? I'm not denying it, it just sounds odd.

Edited October 6, 2023 by Roshko

[LukeFF]

6 minutes ago, Roshko said:

?

Well, the video for that part says that more than 200 Ju52s were shot down. Can it be true that the VVS didn't shoot one single of them? I'm not denying it, it just sounds odd.

 

No, they were definitely there shooting them down, but the thing was that when I combed through that data for the information on air intercept sorties, obviously we don't have an option for intercepting transports right now. But the good news is that the lead career mode designer just told me that mission type is still on the to-do list; it's just that others have a higher priority right now, as intercepting of transports will mainly only apply to Stalingrad.

 

Quote

this is a medium diff. mission from the same career. I've switched to La5 and the Germans all appear to have upgraded to G4s.

24 G4s against 8 La5s and 3 P-39s

We have to shoot more than two of them down, each time they murder one of us. Of course we can't manage that, so the numbers grow more and more horrific as the battle progresses.

 

Alright, I'll let them know again. Thanks!

[Yogiflight]

On 10/3/2023 at 7:50 PM, Yogiflight said:

And when you are escorting bombers or ground attack aircrafts and they get slaughtered, your mission shouldn't be successful, because you were flying all the waypoints and didn't return to your base before you were told so.

I stand corrected here. Last night I was flying a ground attack aircraft escort mission and we lost four out of six Hs 129s and the mission was counted by the game as failed.

[LukeFF]

The way it should work for escort missions is the mission will fail if you allow too many planes to be shot down by enemy fighters. However, if too many planes are lost due to ground fire, then there should be a message about the mission being aborted due to circumstances beyond your control, and thus it won't count as a failure.

 

It's been a while since I've seen the last scenario occur, but it still should be the case.