First Eagles Patch is Out

[+whiteknight06604 931]

I noticed it listed in the command section as "Bail Out" - was thinking whether any WW1 pilots had this option - I suspect not

 

Guess you can put it to be unassigned - then you wont get the urge to cheat :)

 

germans had chutes on a limited basis towards the end of the war also balloon observers did too.British thought they would stunt the "agressiveness" of pilots if they knew they could bail out.Also it was unfortunatly kinda common to jump without a chute rather than burn slowly inside the cockpit.

[Gr.Viper 131]

That sure wasn't a usual sight before.

That's AI. Still flying and even maneuvering.

[+peter01 2]

arrgggg, not again....

Edited April 12, 2008 by peter01

[ONETINSOLDIER 2]

lol, thats one angry bot! :angry2:

[Gr.Viper 131]

Oh, yeah... 65-73 hits to shoot down a balloon. Love it.

 

BTW did you notice, there's a "broken prop" model there? I had a rough landing (with at least 10 Albs shooting at me) and nerly touched the ground with the nose. The prop was replaced by a broken off stub.

[Firecage 1]

From Peter01 .....arrgggg, not again...

 

I guessing this is how peter is looking these days after yet another patch.... but which one is the real hairstyle ?

 

[

Edited April 12, 2008 by Firecage

[+peter01 2]

lol lol.....good one Firecage

 

But happy to report none of the above...do you have a picture of a young Errol Flynn? My wife said to write that , bless her.

 

If TK makes another major change to the FM, its likely to be the third! Bug-eyed and bald. As it is, not jogging or playing squash so much the past year, certainly looking a bit paler.

 

Cheers mate

[+peter01 2]

Been flying the patch now a couple of days, must say I'm impressed with the changes TK has done with the AI in dogfighting.

 

Its subtle, but quite an improvement - I spend so much time dogfighting when doing FMs, pretty attuned to the AI and their capability....actually spend a lot of time modifying it too

 

They climb better, in that in a dogfight they will now try to get more of a height advantage for attacking then before. It makes beating good climbers harder. They will also zoom up vertically in an emergency, never saw that in the past 6 mths. Unfortunately did also see one get into that 0 speed situation (that we used to see in the past), and then just died?! But that was only once, and since they use climb/height more aggressively, really pushing it actually, its a minor quibble. Overall, big improvement.

 

The AI also seem to "react" better - either quicker or smarter or both. Its not that are more capable in turn, roll etc, more in how quick they decide to do something, or what they do seems better, more interesting. Hard to describe.

 

They also nose nicely down to effectively pick up speed, and do diving attacks better.

 

Overall, all AI are better, at least a level up in toughness, with most improvements to the ZnB plane AI.

 

Great stuff, nice refinements to already excellent AI. Well done TK.

Edited April 13, 2008 by peter01

[sockboy 0]

Hi guys...

 

Been playing Campaign Mode all yesterday and today and have been having a lot of fun, shot at an Albatros DV for what seemed like ages, registering hits but it took many many attack runs to finally shoot down!!! lol.. cool..then in another dogfight a Fokker D7 lost part of a wing and half of his prop then (like Peter has observed) he seemed to slow down so I went in for the kill and....he zoomed right up in the air very fast vertically, done some form of Immelmann Turn then shot my wing off!!! lol.. wow...Im impressed..they never did that before!! also noticed huge furballs over the trenches with my Fellow Wingmen getting very involved in the action whilst below a major German Tank Offensive was going on and I swooped down in my 'Red Devil' SE5 to Investigate and took out a couple of Jerry tanks to help the chaps on the ground..great stuff..another thing that i found aided my immersion in the new patched game was I was attacking an Albatros D3 and..bizarrely, after id shot him many many times, he was training light smoke and was riddled with Bullets with half his Prop missing he was flying about 50 feet from the ground and I closed in from the Kill when I went to see him go down with F8 and (this really scared and spooked me!!)..the Pilot was looking at me with his head turned! lol lol.. and he had a Black Tache!(Moustache!)..again, never seen that before..this spooked me so much that I did the Chivalrous thing and Wing Commander Rab 'Haggis' Watson let him go and did a Barrel Roll over him to salute his courage!!! Amazing stuff...Loved the game before and now loving it even more!!!! A Great Job TK, also loving being able to view all my Medals anytime..nice!!!

 

Back to the next Campaign, have a few to go since I lost all my progress after the patch!!!

 

Best wishes to all...

 

Rab ;0)

 

Sockboy

 

Fife

Scotland

Edited April 13, 2008 by sockboy

[Firecage 1]

Peter are you playing TKs FM set or yours?

[+peter01 2]

Peter are you playing TKs FM set or yours?

 

My FMs, and modded AircraftObject.ini - newly extracted, with same skill levels changes I posted previously, pasted over default skill levels.

 

So the only difference to my game is the patch itself.

 

Its pretty tough. I'd say comparing what I'd been playing before, a "Regular" now is nearly as good as an "Ace" previously. Its the underlying AI routines that have changed, and its in how they fly (smarter, use climb better), not their capability to turn roll etc.

 

It was a shock - for example I can hardly beat my FokkerD7F (with Ace AI) in ANY allied plane. Lost nearly every 1:1. And I've been playing this game for over a year, flight sims 10 years, online il2 for 2 years.

 

This is a very good development, cos you can keep Aces very tough (so you really have a challenge now and then), and tone down the rest. AFAIC, you couldn't do this before... I basically played with all AI either Vets or Aces, so that I would always have a decent challenge. But in my mind/imagination, I considered these to be really Regulars and Vets, couldn't bear to think of any AI as "real" Aces (nor in any game I've played), to be truthful :). Not so now.......

 

Rambled a bit, was there a specific reason you asked?

Edited April 13, 2008 by peter01

[Barkhorn1x 9]

Pete: I am paranoid about screwing things up - so do you mind posting your new modded AircraftObject.ini ?

[+peter01 2]

Pete: I am paranoid about screwing things up - so do you mind posting your new modded AircraftObject.ini ?

 

Good idea, it is easy to screw up your game making changes here. I'll post it to this thread here tonight.

[Barkhorn1x 9]

Thanks much.

[+peter01 2]

Some spare time, so a 101 on some key skill level parameters in the Aircraftobject.ini, if you are inclined to change/try out things to suit yourself.

 

WARNINGS: The skill level stuff doesn't work independently of ai data in the FMs, so you can't completely change the ai behavior of the plane unless you mod that too - I don't recommend you do that unless you test extensively. Do not mod the {aidata] section in the Aircraftobject.ini under ANY circumstances - Big Problems. This is overrridden by whats in the FMs themselves, and where these are not present, its for good reason, the generic ones work well, eg most of TKs. Finally, if you try out changes like below, and at some time in the future, some planes (not all necessairly), the AI are funny/out of control either in dogfighting or in formation, delete your changes. The changes you have made are probably the cause of AI problems - most of the AI are fine now. Don't blame the game, don't blame me.

 

All the parameters will effect the AI, but some of the major ones are (from Ace skill level in the default Aircraftobject.ini that came with the game), and remember that capability and aggressiveness are different:

 

DefensiveAngle=120

MaxRollForGunAttack=180

MaxPitchInput=1.0

MaxRudderForGunAttack=1.0

MaxRudderForManeuver=1.0

 

Most important from a capability perspective is MaxPitchInput=, max value is 1.0. Its how much the pitch values in the FM and aidata section of the FMs are used by the AI. If you find AI planes turn too tightly, too manoeuvrable, too capable - ie, too difficult - then reduce for all skill levels. Values higher than 1.0 do not work, its reduced to 1.0.

 

Secondary from a capability perspective are the MaxRudderForGunAttack= and MaxRudderForManeuver= parameters. I use 3.0 for MaxRudderForGunAttack= and it works, but it would be limited to some value, TK always does this, its good programming practise. The first is how much rudder the AI will use WHEN it starts a gun attack (ie, lines you up and decides to attack, or is shooting at you), the second is rudder generally for both defensive actions (sideslipping), and offensive how quickly it comes around (eg, using rudder together with roll will mean it turns quicker). The AI uses rudder very effectively now since EP, so these are important, but not as important still as MaxPitchInput=. If you were making AI harder or easier, I'd vary these a bit, but not much.

 

Lastly, are MaxRollForGunAttack=, and DefensiveAngle=. They sort of work together, and are the MOST important from an aggressiveness perspective.

 

MaxRollForGunAttack= measured from the front of plane basically "says", if an enemy is within this arc, undertake aggressive actions. Now, if you make this 360, as I do, it means, that say in 1:1 (1:1s are a good way to see how an AI performs, in a pure form, and its how they will be in furballs too), the AI will continually be trying to attack you, rather than being defensive. If you set it at 90, it will be mainly defensive.

 

DefensiveAngle= works somewhat with MaxRollForGunAttack=. It tells the AI if an EA is within that arc (measured from rear), then take defensive action. It seems to mostly take precedence over MaxRollForGunAttack=, ie, if you are say at rear of AI, it will do defensive maeouvers like sideslip turn dive climb, until it has you in the MaxRollForGunAttack defined arc, then it attacks. The AI is far better if it attacks more.

 

I have tried reducing DefensiveAngle= to 30, but thats a problem. You can be on its tail, and it does nothing, even tho MaxRollForGunAttack= is 360, it should be attacking. Optimal seems 60, they are pretty tough then. What happens is they jig about when you are on their tail, until you are out of their 60 degree angle (which is easily done), and then turn around because of the MaxRollForGunAttack=360 angle and attack.

 

My conclusion is that MaxRollForGunAttack=360 isn't actually 360, maybe less, or more logically, there is a range of around 60 where the defensive action takes precedence over aggressive. All guessing of course. Increasing MaxRollForGunAttack= over 360 doesn't make any difference ...its probably the limit defined by TK.

 

Cheers

Edited April 15, 2008 by peter01

[+peter01 2]

Pete: I am paranoid about screwing things up - so do you mind posting your new modded AircraftObject.ini ?

 

There you go...place in your "objects" directory, for both April patches of FE (pre-EP and EP).

 

AIRCRAFTOBJECT.zip

[Barkhorn1x 9]

You da man!!

[+sinbad 27]

A thousand thanks. -- Now if I can only get the rest of the mods to run properly . . .

 

sinbad

[+peter01 2]

A thousand thanks. -- Now if I can only get the rest of the mods to run properly . . .

 

sinbad

 

Your welcome.

 

How do you mean? Is there something wrong?

[Tooner 0]

Hello Peter01,

 

I'm looking for your hardest, toughest, let's do the popcorn AircraftObject.ini. Is that the AircraftObject_Hard you presented with the 1917-18 FM's Update ( March 2008)? Thanks for your time and trouble.

 

Regards,

Tooner

[+peter01 2]

Hello Peter01,

 

I'm looking for your hardest, toughest, let's do the popcorn AircraftObject.ini. Is that the AircraftObject_Hard you presented with the 1917-18 FM's Update ( March 2008)? Thanks for your time and trouble.

 

Regards,

Tooner

 

LOL....thought this one was too tough! The one posted here is the same as AircraftObject_Hard in 1917-18 Upload.

 

If you want to make it even tougher, copy the Regular skill level stuff to the Novice and Green. Furballs are extremely tough then. To improve say Aces and Veterans, change parameter DefensiveAngle= from 120 I think, to say 60 for Aces, maybe 90 for Vets.

 

If you just want it hard, but without much variety in skill level, make Vets Aces,and make Regulars/Novices/Green Vets by copying and pasting.

 

The rest of it is in the FMs themselves.

 

Cheers

Edited April 16, 2008 by peter01