Another request for P4

[von Baur 54]

I've recently gotten back into campaign flying and would like to address a couple of pet peeves.

 

As I've posted elsewhere, my wingmen are truly Hell's Angels when it comes to enemy scouts. They watch each others' backs (as well as mine), double-team them if there aren't enough teabags to go around, and basically no Bristol Scouts that have come close enough to engage have made it home, but they remain absolutely indifferent to two-seaters. On my latest mission the five of us approached four BE2's from below and behind. I lit up the leader and as I swung around I could see two other of my flight closing on two of the remaning enemy aircraft. To my dismay they completely ignored the buf's and it was left to me to down all four. On the one hand I feel as though I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth complainig about having the easy kills basically handed to me, but on the other hand it does fly in the face of immersion and unrealistically inflates my kill tally (and ego).

 

Somewhat on the same subject (wingmen's kills), although they've taken down more aircraft than I have their tally doesn't seem to change on the kill board. I've received confirmation after confirmation and my fellows must feel like Stachel (not our beloved Otto von, rather his lesser-known brother Bruno).

 

Still on the subject of wingmen's kills, can there be a way to credit a wingman with a kill. Yes, I know, you can't confirm for someone if you don't know who it is and the only way to know is to have labels on and yes I fly with labels but they're my modified labels that don't distinguish friend from foe by color and are just barely visible and I do it so I can tell (if I get close enough, fly steadily enough, and stare hard enough) who's who just as they could irl, btw ***takes deep breath***. I'd love to have a form to say I saw Leutnant Hammhocker shoot down a DH2 east of Douai or something to that effect.

 

Finally, and this is by far the least important, pilot rosters. I've restarted my June 1915, FA62 E-III pilot for the third time now (no deaths, just ideas that pop up, "Hey! This would be a neat thing to do with the next pilot" turn into "Screw it, I'll just start over and incorporate it now.") and while Boelcke, Immelmann and Parschau have remained constant the supporting cast is always different. And I'm guessing the English, French and American squadrons are the same way. I imagine it would be a somewhat daunting task to have a fixed starting roster of extras for each squadron, so that this doesn't happen, but it would be nice to see the same names, IMO. Just tossing it out there.

 

 

Thanx for a great game, guys. Don't misunderstand, these aren't knocks, just suggestions for tweaks.

[von Baur 54]

Okay, so the italics thing doesn't work in the topic . So sue me.

[Barkhorn1x 14]

Some good suggestions. Is P4 even based on the CFS3 engine? If not (fingers crossed) then that opens up a whole lot of potential, yes?

 

Okay, so the italics thing doesn't work in the topic . So sue me.

Ha!

[von Baur 54]

Is P4 even based on the CFS3 engine?

 

 

Truthfully, Barkhorn, I hope it isn't. I'm a multiplayer nut at heart (part of why I like seeing who I'm flying with and against) and there seem to be some serious game-based problems with human-v-human action online. If the devs do choose to find a new engine I hope they pick one with good mp support, because there are a lot of people who are into it in a big way and they deserve a product as good as OFF.

[Duce Lewis 3]

Is P4 even based on the CFS3 engine?

Having our own engine has been the dream for several years now

IIRK, a good flight sim engine costs abot $10k

P1 & 2 donations were meager and had to cover operating costs, bandwith, etc

BH&H & HitR have added to the pot but how much? ...only the devs know

I think it's safe to say P4 will definately be cfs3 based

But maybe someday

 

Truthfully, Barkhorn, I hope it isn't. I'm a multiplayer nut at heart (part of why I like seeing who I'm flying with and against) and there seem to be some serious game-based problems with human-v-human action online. If the devs do choose to find a new engine I hope they pick one with good mp support, because there are a lot of people who are into it in a big way and they deserve a product as good as OFF.

I never played multiplayer but it took a big hit when M$ shut down the cfs3 servers

Co-op guys have done a good job on-line though

[von Baur 54]

There are two big problems with mp, DL. One is a phenomenon in which aircraft in tight turns such as would be used in air-to-air combat point in directions other than what they're moving. For example the plane will be standing on its tail but the exhaust/damage smoke will be coming off straight out the bottom, and testing indicates that the smoke appears to be right. Of course we're conditioned to use the visual reference of the aircraft itself to lead our shot resulting in a lot more air being shot up than usual. The other is an incredible amount of lag that exists regardless the connection speed. It's not uncommon to be well between 4 o'clock and 8 o'clock to someone and take damage from him. And both of these only come into play when going against enemy aircraft piloted by humans. There is some stutter that occurs against AI aircraft but that usually clears if you can just wait it out a few moments.

 

I flew with Vasco's Volunteers and it was fun. But it was all human-v-AI, which really got to feeling like a bunch of human players ganging up on the already disadvantaged AI. What I believe raises the bar in mp is taking on living, breathing, thinking opponents instead of automatons with preprogrammed and predictable responses. As good as the AI is in OFF (and it's the best I've run across) it still falls short on intuition, innovation, and adaptability. And these qualities make human opponents considerably more dangerous than the computer generated variety, IMO.

[Duce Lewis 3]

Rex Hannover did a great job cracking the cfs3 code

That's why BH&H AI was a big improvement over P2

Website shows he's still working at it so there's good hope that P4 AI will be even better

 

 

[Burning Beard 14]

But, I have found that flying against AI has an advantage in multiplayer in that you don't have guys picking on that weak newby. The better the AI the more I like it, and face it Von Baur, we have all been shot down by AI online.

 

What I really like about the online experience in the interaction of the guys. Somebody in command and wingman covering you. That is superior to some fanboy that has a zillion hours in a DVII jumping you when you are in an N11, which was a standard scenario in Red Baron.

 

Beard