A few revs back, the AI did not have the current 140m minimum alt they now have. I could actually trick B-25s (AI) to skip bomb, for example.
Way back, you used to be able to set 2 waypoints for some planes ON THE GROUND, then reset the speeds to 0 and they would actually remain parked where you placed them in game. This allowed you to place planes (AI) on the tarmac, and when strafed, they were damaged like other "real" planes. FAR more interesting than strafing the static planes.
Could some features like this be brought back from the dead?
in early AEP days I used to make BoB style takeoffs by first setting waypoints and first one as take-off....then dragged it from the strip to where I wanted it...then reset the waypoint to normalfly and speed 0 height 0....and the planes would be born heading for the next WP with their engines running.....
but all that got spoiled by PF which had to change some things to allow for carrier ops..... so my old missions...the planes would be born just above the ground and drop and explode :roll:
Spuds,
I made a couple of missions using 1946 4.09beta last week and was able to do that. 0 height, 0 fuel, 0 speed (which defaults to that plane's slowest speed), with two WPs about one plane length apart, and it worked fine, but only with certain planes. The A20 and Beaufighter worked fine. Fun to watch too--the planes slide on their bellies a bit, props bend (which I don't notice when I'm doing the strafing), then the gear lowers and it rolls to a stop. When they're shot up enough, the crew jump out and run for cover--more targets! Fixed gear craft bounce about 100 feet in the air before crashing, which has it's own usefulness, and other planes end up on their noses more than half the time.
I'm still waiting for the DVD, so I haven't been able to install any mods. Could thati n some way be causing the problem?
There is a screenshot in the original il2-manual on which you can see the qmb with the option to attack ships
In old versions they didn't slide on the belly, the gear were down. They were parked. I can still do this with planes, you just drop them from low alt to bend the props. It;s not the same though.
Also, with one of the recent patches, damaged real planes on the ground bounce and blow themse;lves up.
For example, a few versions ago, you could have say 6 planes land at a base while the player was flying to the target. The landed planes would park, and stay there on the tarmac. When you strafed, you'd then have a mixture of static and "real" planes. Cool. You leave some static plane wrecks, and some leaking, smoking "real" planes. Far more immersive.
Now, if you do this, they stay and park, but hit any with a couple 30 cals even, and they start to rotate and or bounce. I hit a B-17 with a couple rounds from an oscar, and it bounced a little... after a minute it was bouncing such that flipped all the way on its back, lol. Never used to happen.
Currently, the "change formation" command is extremely likely to have 2 of your flight immediately crash straight into each other. The AI has been getting progressively worse during the series as "sledgehammer to crack a walnut" type fixes have been implemented in the various patches. It's still good but there are a lot of annoying "features" that have crept in and a lot of cool stuff that has crept out.
As the poster states, AI planes now have a minimum flight altitude that they didn't have many versions ago. Fleeing home in a damaged Yak9 being relentlessly pursued by 4 Fw-190s, I discovered that by flying in a straight line at 300km/h at 50m the AI 190s were unable to get a firing angle on me because of the minimum altitude "feature". All their ammo passed straight over my head and when they inevitably overflew me it was just a simple matter of lifting my nose to pop a cap in them and then wait for the next one to have a go.
Hardly realistic. Yes, I would be very much in favour of returning to the original FB AI behaviour. I guess this would completely screw up all carrier based missions and a heap of other stuff though.
I asked oleg about the low alt stuff (along with previous version tracks of me making the AI skip bomb, etc) and he said that due to complaints about planes hitting mountains they did that.
It is 140m.
Unbreaking the game by fixing that would be nice.
I also PMed him regarding the change in formations. At default spacing, I tested every possible formation change with small, medium, and large wingspan planes (all flyables at the time) and sent him a list of what changes cause crashes for what sized planes. The answer: don't change from formation A to B then, not worth the trouble to fix.
One other AI related issue: default formations for attack.
The B-25 and A-20 form into line astern to attack, which is absurd. Thet should either stay default, or they should be line ABREAST. You set them up to parafrag, and they blow the same line up, silly.
tater
Spud,
Are those types of things (alt, formations) considerd FM/DM mods? I assume not, and if so, can they be modded by one of the artiste's here? I'd love to be able to put B24s and many other planes into V's, like the B17 does (or did--I haven't checked in 4.09b).
Oh, and default formations, too.
I'm the one that lobbied for the japanese planes to default to vics, but I think they might have changed in some revision.
