DR1 vs SE5A

[BigJim 0]

Flew into a bunch of manuvering DR1's, planned to use my superior speed to stay out of harms way?? The DR1's not only caught up with me but did so in a climb LOL.

 

I guess I should not have been surprised since while flying formation with my flight, they all of a sudden jumped 1000 yards ahead of me?

 

While the secenery is not CFS3 the AI and gamesmanship still are, its this kind of unrealistic AI that drove folks away from CFS3. AI planes need to suffer the same physics as the player and when they do not it makes the sim bogus.

[Hauksbee 103]

The DR1's not only caught up with me but did so in a climb LOL.

Lift, and climbing, were the strengths of the Dr.1

[Rickitycrate 10]

Very strange doings there BigJim. Makes me wonder if you are patched up to the latest version 1.30c I think it is and then the new mini patch.

[Hellshade 110]

No game is perfect and no AI is as good as a real pilot at the stick. That said, the AI in Over Flanders Fields is the best I have seen in any flight sim. RB3D was a GREAT flight sim, but it relied on multiplayer combat to make the dogfights exciting. I've never seen a reviewer rave about "realistic" AI from it. It's true the OFF AI aren't currently affected by all the same forces the players plane is but it still manages to produce the most varied and effective combat AI most people have ever seen. But more importantly to the point, the Dr 1 had 3 wings which produced an incredible amount of lift. It wasn't fast, but it could climb out of a dogfight against SE5as almost at will. I seem to recall in Season 2 of Dogfights on the History channel where the battle of Voss in a Dr 1 against 6 SE5as made that very point. Voss chose to stay in the fight despite the fact that he could have climbed above it at any time. Have you tried flying a Dr1 against some SE5as to see if you can out climb them? Just curious.

 

Hellshade

Edited July 10, 2009 by Hellshade

[BigJim 0]

Very strange doings there BigJim. Makes me wonder if you are patched up to the latest version 1.30c I think it is and then the new mini patch.

 

 

LOL yeah I got all the patchs on including the last one that messed up MP in fact I spent all of last night loading and reloading cfs3 and off ,I upgraded my mb to a q6700 from an e6600 and added 2 more gigs of ram and all of a sudden things that were working fine like cfs3 and off were not (cfs3 will give a no disk error and then run??) finally got them going and then they fritzed again while try to use alacrity to boot.

 

None that has anything to do with planes in formation and suddenly 3 of the AI wingmen pick up speed and fly away LOL. As for the previous post I know what the strengths of the DR1 are and SPEED is not one of them and they lose energy like a rube at the fair. The SE5A was one of the fastest planes in the war and I attacked from above them and never manurvered except to climb and STILL they caught me and lazer gunned me down LOL

[BigJim 0]

No game is perfect and no AI is as good as a real pilot at the stick. That said, the AI in Over Flanders Fields is the best I have seen in any flight sim. RB3D was a GREAT flight sim, but it relied on multiplayer combat to make the dogfights exciting. I've never seen a reviewer rave about "realistic" AI from it. It's true the OFF AI aren't currently affected by all the same forces the players plane is but it still manages to produce the most varied and effective combat AI most people have ever seen. But more importantly to the point, the Dr 1 had 3 wings which produced an incredible amount of lift. It wasn't fast, but it could climb out of a dogfight against SE5as almost at will. I seem to recall in Season 2 of Dogfights on the History channel where the battle of Voss in a Dr 1 against 6 SE5as made that very point. Voss chose to stay in the fight despite the fact that he could have climbed above it at any time. Have you tried flying a Dr1 against some SE5as to see if you can out climb them? Just curious.

 

Hellshade

 

Heh I have been flying these things since RB on the sierra network (circa 1984?) and have flown almost every flight sim that has come out both off and on line and currently fly AH2, RoF, and this one plus CFS3 (if I can get it running right again) the DR's manuverabilty IS superior to the SE5A but any good SE5A pilot will dive and out run the DR because it is so slow and VERY poor in a sustained dive (like wings start departing soon). In my case I had so much smash over the targets I chose to shallow climb to repeat the B and Z but the DR's simply tight turned onto my and six and over took me, sorry but that is just not right. I can live with lazer like mg fire from the AI but to overcome physics in flight are hard to take and still stay emmersed in the game.

[Hellshade 110]

LOL yeah I got all the patchs on including the last one that messed up MP in fact I spent all of last night loading and reloading cfs3 and off ,I upgraded my mb to a q6700 from an e6600 and added 2 more gigs of ram and all of a sudden things that were working fine like cfs3 and off were not (cfs3 will give a no disk error and then run??) finally got them going and then they fritzed again while try to use alacrity to boot.

 

None that has anything to do with planes in formation and suddenly 3 of the AI wingmen pick up speed and fly away LOL. As for the previous post I know what the strengths of the DR1 are and SPEED is not one of them and they lose energy like a rube at the fair. The SE5A was one of the fastest planes in the war and I attacked from above them and never manurvered except to climb and STILL they caught me and lazer gunned me down LOL

 

1. If everything was working fine and you installed a new motherboard and ram and then things got messed up, I'd say to check that memory to make sure it's good. Also, if you are over 4 GBs RAM total (including video memory) in a 32 bit operating system, that can actually cause problems. You need a 64 bit OS to address more than 4 GB total.

 

2. If you weren't Flight Leader in the formation, they might have just been following orders. Did you have Always Lead Flights checked in the Workshop settings?

 

3. Nobody said speed was the DR 1s strength. LIFT, Climbing and manuverability are. With more lift, the Dr 1 doesn't need to be as fast as the SE5a to climb quicker.

 

4. If the enemy flight contained some Ace pilots and they climbed to meet you, I imagine they would have taken some shots at you as they nosed up and you got closer. They generally don't open fire unless they are quite close to a target. The AI can't perform 1000 yard sniper shots like in some games. One of the Devs could tell you the actual range but it's quite close indeed.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your technical troubles with the game. Perhaps you could check other games to see if they are still playing properly since your hardware upgrade.

 

Hellshade

[Hellshade 110]

In my case I had so much smash over the targets I chose to shallow climb to repeat the B and Z but the DR's simply tight turned onto my and six and over took me, sorry but that is just not right. I can live with lazer like mg fire from the AI but to overcome physics in flight are hard to take and still stay emmersed in the game.

 

Perhaps if I read this right I see what happened. If you only did a shallow climb, I could definately see the quicker turning Dr 1s getting on your 6 and climbing fast enough to get within gun range.

 

Hellshade

[Cameljockey 3]

BH&H doesn't run on XP 64 bit does it? IIRC that is what was said.

[Hellshade 110]

BH&H doesn't run on XP 64 bit does it? IIRC that is what was said.

 

I'm running it on Vista 64 great, but I couldn't say about XP 64.

 

Hellshade

[Pips 5]

Climbing isn't as straightforward as it would appear. Depending on the aircraft you are flying, different aproaches are called for.

 

For example, nothing will outclimb either the Sopwith Triplane or the Fokker DR.1. They're effectively venetian blinds and climb vertically like the clappers! But aircraft such as the SPAD and the SE 5 do have other strengths. Speed. You can out distance them in fast 'shallow' climbs. So extend away once you've made your pass in a fast shallow climb that'll leave the Tripes wallowing in your slipstream. Then return for another go once you have gained height. And come in steeply to keep your speed up.

 

A point on breaking away, which is crucial to survival. Done incorrectly the Dr.1 will get on your tail and fill you full of holes. After all the speed variation is only around 20 - 25 mph, unless you have droped on them from a great height. So at that speed difference it will take time to gain safe seperation. When you break from your firing pass you have to be watching which way the Dr.1 turns to avoid your pass. If it 'turns' left, you then 'curve' left yourself (gentle stick movements to maintain speed). The Dr.1 will end up having to fly a 360 degree turn to gain a lead on you. Same for the right. And if it break up you go down, It if breaks down you go up.

 

It ain't foolproof, but most times it'll work. Of course if there are other nasties in the vicinity then your problems have multiplied!

 

By the by Rowans MiG Alley has the best (IMHO) AI ever created for any combatsim. The team here have done wonderful things with the AI - but they are still limited to the vagaries of CFS3. Which show up every now and then. MiG Alley really is in a class of it's own.

Edited July 11, 2009 by Pips

[BigJim 0]

1. If everything was working fine and you installed a new motherboard and ram and then things got messed up, I'd say to check that memory to make sure it's good. Also, if you are over 4 GBs RAM total (including video memory) in a 32 bit operating system, that can actually cause problems. You need a 64 bit OS to address more than 4 GB total.

 

2. If you weren't Flight Leader in the formation, they might have just been following orders. Did you have Always Lead Flights checked in the Workshop settings?

 

3. Nobody said speed was the DR 1s strength. LIFT, Climbing and manuverability are. With more lift, the Dr 1 doesn't need to be as fast as the SE5a to climb quicker.

 

4. If the enemy flight contained some Ace pilots and they climbed to meet you, I imagine they would have taken some shots at you as they nosed up and you got closer. They generally don't open fire unless they are quite close to a target. The AI can't perform 1000 yard sniper shots like in some games. One of the Devs could tell you the actual range but it's quite close indeed.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your technical troubles with the game. Perhaps you could check other games to see if they are still playing properly since your hardware upgrade.

 

Hellshade

 

Hmmm I have 4 gb ram and 895 mg on the 260 vid card, thanks for that tip I do have all working well but was wondering about the 64 bit OS I may go that routel.

 

Now as for speed vs lift, if I am 1000 yrds ahead of you no amount of LIFT will make that up, only speed to catch me will do it, now if they were above me and dove they might pick up enough smash to catch me but a DR1 doesn't like diving much (if its modeled right) oh well not a game breaker just an observation

 

I actually LOVE off for the way it does the "campaign mode", much better than RoF at the moment but then they are new and are working on it.

 

Oh btw as far as know all the others are fine but not as much improved as I suspected they might be, the OS may be the choke point???

 

Since I was upgradeing an old Dell 700 xps I put as much in as the "law would allow" and still keep the original MB because I didn't change that, PLUS I got trackir5 otw soooo I hope I can run it all.

[Hellshade 110]

Hmmm I have 4 gb ram and 895 mg on the 260 vid card, thanks for that tip I do have all working well but was wondering about the 64 bit OS I may go that routel.

 

Try pulling at least 1 GB of RAM out (temporarily) and see if that actually speeds up performance. It did for me when I was running 4GB RAM and a 1GB GTX280 video card until I re-built my machine and used Vista 64 bit. Now I'm running 6GB RAM, same video card and it runs smooth as glass. 32 bit OS have a 4GB total memory address limit. That includes RAM, video RAM and registers.

 

Congratz on TrackIR 5. I'm still using 4 pro but it is a blast. Definately adds realism to the game.

 

I couldn't answer you on how they got you from 1000 yards away. That's very odd because I know the Devs got rid of that type of sharp shooting when they released phase 3 (Between Heaven and Hell) of OFF. If you make a Test Pilot, change him to invulnerable in the workshop and setup a QC with you against any enemy planes you want, put yourself on autopilot and watch how close the AI needs to get before it opens fire. I believe it's only around 100 yards. Can even set the TAC to 1 mile so you get a better idea of the range they are at when they start shooting.

 

Hellshade

[Duce Lewis 3]

Welcome to OFF BigJim

 

Strange happenings as I've never seen AI exibit super performance

 

Did you have your Fuel Mixture set correctly?

Any battle damage that could have reduced performance?

What was your actual speed during the dive and when you were hit?

 

That fact that you have AI wingmen jumping 1000 feet ahaead of you may mean you have an install issue

Did you follow the install procedure?

[sitting_duck 3]

BH&H doesn't run on XP 64 bit does it? IIRC that is what was said.

 

 

xp64 here,,,runs fine...

 

now,,the joystick software wont,,,,but the game does

[sitting_duck 3]

LOL yeah I got all the patchs on including the last one that messed up MP

 

It didnt mess up mp....just a little bump,,thats all....

[Cameljockey 3]

Thanks Sitting Duck. I may install it so I can use all 4 gigs of memory.

[BigJim 0]

Thanks Sitting Duck. I may install it so I can use all 4 gigs of memory.

 

Ok thanks guys maybe I missed a DR1 that was on top of me from above??? there were alot of em there about 10 - 12.

 

As for the computer I upgraded from a core2 dual core to a core2 quad core for more pipes for RoF, and I got the Geforce 260 GTX, so I thought what the heck may as well max the ram and went from 2 gb to 4 gb (but forgot the almost 1gb on the vid card). I also mildly OCed this thing since one the things the new bios flash allowed was OC.

 

I have got CFS3 up and running correctly now (which should help OFF run right), all my other flight sims and games seemed to run ok it was just CFS3 that gave me fits after the upgrade, which of course made OFF unplayable since the two dance together. I was also fooling around alacrity and ch control manager and may have goofed something up there.

 

The result was one of those "all nighter's" getting debugged and reset, then I flew this mission with DR1's (hmmmm maybe that wasn't such a good idea). As for fuel mix I had it set to auto as I don't like to micro manage (its bad enough in a real plane LOL)

Edited July 11, 2009 by BigJim

[Test Pilot 0]

Flew into a bunch of manuvering DR1's, planned to use my superior speed to stay out of harms way?? The DR1's not only caught up with me but did so in a climb LOL.

 

I guess I should not have been surprised since while flying formation with my flight, they all of a sudden jumped 1000 yards ahead of me?

 

While the secenery is not CFS3 the AI and gamesmanship still are, its this kind of unrealistic AI that drove folks away from CFS3. AI planes need to suffer the same physics as the player and when they do not it makes the sim bogus.

 

 

Perhaps you had wind on. Supposedly while wind affects your plane, it doesnt to the AI. Try disabling it and see if it helps. It is possibly the last major quirk with CFS3 that hasnt been addressed yet. (But after the last mini update with the cloud fix, it seems anything is possible! And there is the no wind option anyways so not too bad!)

Edited July 11, 2009 by Test Pilot

[Duce Lewis 3]

I have got CFS3 up and running correctly now (which should help OFF run right), all my other flight sims and games seemed to run ok it was just CFS3 that gave me fits after the upgrade, which of course made OFF unplayable since the two dance together.

Fixing a problem with your cfs3 install will not correct the same problem with OFF

 

When installing OFF, a copy is made of cfs3 and this completely separate cfs3 is modified to create OFF

Your original install of cfs3 is not used by OFF in anyway

You can delete the cfs3 install and OFF will run fine

 

If you have only corrected cfs3, then OFF will still be created based on the original corrupted version

Suggest ou consider re-installing OFF from the corrected cfs3

 

HTH,

[BigJim 0]

Fixing a problem with your cfs3 install will not correct the same problem with OFF

 

When installing OFF, a copy is made of cfs3 and this completely separate cfs3 is modified to create OFF

Your original install of cfs3 is not used by OFF in anyway

You can delete the cfs3 install and OFF will run fine

 

If you have only corrected cfs3, then OFF will still be created based on the original corrupted version

Suggest ou consider re-installing OFF from the corrected cfs3

 

HTH,

 

Ok thanks I will do that, as I suspected probably most of my problems are "operator error" or "pilot error" in this case

Edited July 11, 2009 by BigJim

[+Polovski 460]

Flew into a bunch of manuvering DR1's, planned to use my superior speed to stay out of harms way?? The DR1's not only caught up with me but did so in a climb LOL.

 

I guess I should not have been surprised since while flying formation with my flight, they all of a sudden jumped 1000 yards ahead of me?

 

While the secenery is not CFS3 the AI and gamesmanship still are, its this kind of unrealistic AI that drove folks away from CFS3. AI planes need to suffer the same physics as the player and when they do not it makes the sim bogus.

 

AI pilots don't jump 1000 yards never seen anything like that ever BigJim, suggests something is really screwy going on there. If anyone else can reproduce it then let us know.

DR1 can climb better than your Se5 and faster, as they guys say a dive at top speed. Make sure you leaned the engine, used your straight or diving speed to leave them.

[BigJim 0]

AI pilots don't jump 1000 yards never seen anything like that ever BigJim, suggests something is really screwy going on there. If anyone else can reproduce it then let us know.

DR1 can climb better than your Se5 and faster, as they guys say a dive at top speed. Make sure you leaned the engine, used your straight or diving speed to leave them.

 

Heh well I am making an assumsion here that the distance numbers are in yards and not feet, and jump was not a good term more like pull away (like their engines were faster than mine) but I use auto mix on the fuel so that should not have been the problem?

 

Prehaps it was due to my planes flight attitude not being completely flat?

Edited July 12, 2009 by BigJim

[+Polovski 460]

OK yes pull away is a bit different lol. If you mean at the start yes AI can do full throttle wind does not effect them so you can often be struggling.. however you will catch them up when they settle.

The AI waypoint stuff is tricky, we have done lots of work to get it good enough, and at the moment it's the best it will get until we can redo many things.

[BigJim 0]

OK yes pull away is a bit different lol. If you mean at the start yes AI can do full throttle wind does not effect them so you can often be struggling.. however you will catch them up when they settle.

The AI waypoint stuff is tricky, we have done lots of work to get it good enough, and at the moment it's the best it will get until we can redo many things.

 

Yeah at the moment the AI DRIII completely dominates the SE5A, while trying to dogfite them my aircraft becomes unflyable in a matter of 2 manuvers whilst the DRIII flits merrily thru the sky doing any manuver without penalty and unlike the REAL DRIII they never seem to loose any energy while completing verious loops, chandels, etc??