Something I Really Do Like...

[Guest Pfunk]

As a terrain maker, I am very much liking the ability to base aircraft off the map and have them spawn in.

 

It's a pain to have to model a terrain and put a whole bunch of air bases down to support all the air assets you need. No more. Terrains no longer need to be enormous to be interesting. You can focus your efforts on specific areas and make the scaling much more accurate

 

Example, say you just want a Strait of Hormuz scenario. Well, there's not that many airfields in just that one little area to give you all the air assets you need. But, now, you can get away with only three or four airbases because you can put all the others off the map and spawn the aircraft in. This allows you to focus on ground actions, sea actions, strike, interdiction.

 

This is one thing TK did well and I'm glad a CAT extractor was made to look at how he does all this.

 

I'm still learning the water maps. I may actually shrink down the Black Sea map to western Georgia and Abkhazia to focus on real world events.

 

Is the new Iceland map an actual 1000km x 1000km map? Or is it smaller?

[+DoctorQuest 125]

Is the ability to generate carrier based missions a terrain attribute? It would be nice to propagate that to, say, SF2V....

[Guest Pfunk]

There's some fancy footwork that needs to be done to get it to work. I think you have to edit the water .bmp file.

[+Dave 2,322]

Another thing I noticed was that DanW made a lot of skins for the Tomcats. Even some of the obscure units. Great job there.He's probably tired of looking at F-14's now.

[+SkateZilla 49]

VF-101 FTW

[Wrench 9,848]

It's a pain to have to model a terrain and put a whole bunch of air bases down to support all the air assets you need. No more. Terrains no longer need to be enormous to be interesting. You can focus your efforts on specific areas and make the scaling much more accurate

 

That certainly sounds like the Lazy Man's Way ™ of doing things....

 

Well, there's not that many airfields in just that one little area to give you all the air assets you need.

 

I'd suggest taking a look at a real map --- Google Earth will do fine.

 

Detail in maps is what WE do ... I kinda take offense at that statement. Look at the shot below; chopped out of planning map3 for the Persian Gulf terrain, and dosen't show the bases further noth and west (like Bahrain, Saudi, more UAE or the carrier stations) ... thinking you can get away with just 3-4 airfields is udder nonensense.

 

Some of us are the 98 percentile region of the Real World ™, when translating it to the Game World ™

 

People don't want a little piddly 500x500 map. When they DO get one, they'll always bitch and moan (where's this or that? How come there's no cities? Where's the ____ (fill in the blank). Nobody's EVER complained that "there's too much detail" in any of MY terrains -- EVER (too much AD, yes , but that's cause I know where all the SAM batteries are - in the Real World ™)

 

Chuck, I must completly disagree with your statements on all levels.

[+Gepard 11,296]

If i remember correctly the Falkland mods used off map airbases a long time ago, doesnt it?

[Guest Pfunk]

Mods like ODS kinda have to go big or go home.

 

But a 750x750 map is big enough to get the job done, and you can put more detail into the map. How many runways do you really need to be able to hit when they pretty much look the same?

 

I don't see it as being lazy if you're putting more detail into a smaller terrain and diversifying your targets.

 

I don't need 30 runways in a terrain to feel like its challenging. I feel a challenge when I'm hitting just one really well-defended target.

[Wrench 9,848]

don't forget, the 750x map is really only 670 due to the missing 80km surrounding it behind The Wall. Hence, some of the issue IselandNA is having. Even with my Expanded Worlds Trick (patent pending)

 

I think we can agree to disagree, and keep it friendly! You have your way, and there's The Right Way

[Guest Pfunk]

LOL! Okay, okay, my head is bloodied, but unbowed.

[+Stary 2,427]

don't forget, the 750x map is really only 670 due to the missing 80km surrounding it behind The Wall. Hence, some of the issue IselandNA is having. Even with my Expanded Worlds Trick (patent pending)

 

I think we can agree to disagree, and keep it friendly! You have your way, and there's The Right Way

except the patent is one me

[+streakeagle 871]

For me, TK is steadily heading the opposite direction of what I want.

 

Given a choice between detail and scope, I prefer scope. A full globe with no walls. Initially, the globe would be pretty empty: all flat open ocean at sea level. With each official release, the appropriate area would be filled in. While modders fill in whatever they like. Of course, when official terrain overlaps modder modules, the end user can decide to overwrite the official terrain with third party terrain, just like aircraft mods. Using Google Maps, I bet modders would have a global terrain comparable to the early revisions of X-Plane in just a few years (or maybe even months if the terrain tools worked well).

 

Instead, the terrain is becoming more and more like an FPS. Try flying a jet in the OFP/ArmA series. Lots of cool details that usually can't be seen except at very short ranges and you reach the edge of the island maps very quickly. Small maps are needed for the much slower/lower flying helos, but jets need some room. TK's trick of scaling nm to km helped him fit the geography necessary for historical conflicts into a much smaller package and overcome the absence of in-flight refueling, but I have never liked it. Now the maps are even smaller.

 

While I am not optimistic, I am still hopeful that third parties will succeed in making MS FSX into a reasonable combat flight simulator. FSX is even more open to modding than the SF series and is capable of being much more realistic, yet retains the option to dumb down the difficulty to a "lite" sim. I am excited by the possibility of flying an Accusim F-4 or F-104 mated with an air combat expansion module covering the radar, rwr, ecm, and weapons. Of course, all of the WW2 aircraft would work as well or better. As long as the weapons/avionics/damage models are comparable if not superior to the SF series, I would be extremely with this setup. But it appears to be wishful thinking. I haven't seen any news from either of the two companies supposedly adding air combat to FSX.

 

So for the duration, the only useful option I have for F-4 era combat is the SF series. But aside from the new approach to terrain, the view range has decreased and the clouds have too many restrictions on them. I am really tempted to abandon SF2 and go back to SF1 to regain multiplayer. But to the best of my knowledge, there are only 3 left of the long term core online group and my free time/schedule hasn't really improved much since the time I was forced to abandon multiplayer. If the overall attitude of customers towards SF2:NA is as bad as the forums make it out to be, TK will finally move onto something else anyway.

[Wrench 9,848]

stary: can we split the profits? 70/30 (70 to you!)

[+Stary 2,427]

stary: can we split the profits? 70/30 (70 to you!)

naa, 80/20 to you my friend! 80 to you. Kilometers that is

[+Brain32 265]

For me, TK is steadily heading the opposite direction of what I want.

 

Given a choice between detail and scope, I prefer scope. A full globe with no walls. Initially, the globe would be pretty empty: all flat open ocean at sea level. With each official release, the appropriate area would be filled in. While modders fill in whatever they like. Of course, when official terrain overlaps modder modules, the end user can decide to overwrite the official terrain with third party terrain, just like aircraft mods. Using Google Maps, I bet modders would have a global terrain comparable to the early revisions of X-Plane in just a few years (or maybe even months if the terrain tools worked well).

 

Check out Outerra engine, it has a free demo they call alpha, it sure has some bugs and the people there say it's still unoptimized but let me tell you something, I still didn't pick up my jaw from the floor after running it...craaaaaaaaaaaaaazy stuff

[+Dave 2,322]

Well I am having a freaking blast with this new sim. It covers exactly what I like. At the pace I like and can make it as I like. Just need a patch to fix some things and I'm good. TK made me eat my words and I am gladly eating my humble pie and got seconds.

[+PureBlue 71]

Check! Same here Dave..

[arthur666 65]

As a terrain maker, I am very much liking the ability to base aircraft off the map and have them spawn in.

 

This is a great campaign feature. I was never comfy putting B-52's at bases so close to the front line on the Europe map, plus now I can have a virtual Diego Garcia on the Dhimar/Paran map.

[+Stary 2,427]

Very good post from day one SF veteran

Hmm, Streak, back in late 2010 when as I noticed back then things started to change in TK's approach to SF2, I was strongly hoping for Jet Thunder to make it, now it seems it's very slim chance of seeing that sim again in years. I considered back then slightly moving to JT territory given it was a good, stable modding platform. From a gamer and modders point, SF is the series that fits my need best, not to forget the great community we have. BUT in past several days, up to two weeks, I see some change in TK's approach to community that worries me to be honest -we had other thread about it, now locked, but I think many well known members voiced their opinions there on the matter.

 

My "problem" is I don't see any good sim replacement around, DCS being cool, great and all, but not fun for me, FC2 (and FC3 incoming) being torn between survey and study to a point it's barely playable for me (but I love A-10 in it more than DCS one!), Il2... Il2 I try on regular yearly or so basis to force myself to like it, but it has no spirit in it for me, and as single player guy I find it lacking that hard to describe thing that makes one stay awake just for one quick dogfight more or mission replay.

 

Funny as all mentioned titles are from ex USSR.

 

CLOD is as good as dead for me, waste of money, ROF... it's great WW1 sim, beautiful and fun to fly, but for me gets repeative and boring after hour or so, maybe OFF Phase 4 will get me back into WW1 flying despite it's older engine. Heck I still have CFS3 ETO and MAW installed and like it for some flying on occasion.

 

Geez I miss modern tech Janes' USNF/ATF/FA redo... that's why I stick to SF series I guess

 

@Brain32: Outerra is great tech demo for now, but I find it hard to imagine full playable sim being build around it, I hope I'm wrong.

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

Pfunk::

As a terrain maker, I am very much liking the ability to base aircraft off the map and have them spawn in.

 

It's a pain to have to model a terrain and put a whole bunch of air bases down to support all the air assets you need.

 

I'm thinking all you had to do is detail a central portion of a map, leaving the rest blank flat terrain out to the edge, with working airfields with a stock LOD having no ground objects (nor lighting) nor defenses, far beyond the play area of interest. You will never see these airfields in normal play. But that's another point: Off map spawning is not a great idea when you play the units spawning. Granted for some things (B-36 for example) that could be a prohibitively long way off, depending on speed (B-70 for speedy counter example).

[+Julhelm 266]

CLOD is as good as dead for me, waste of money, ROF... it's great WW1 sim, beautiful and fun to fly, but for me gets repeative and boring after hour or so, maybe OFF Phase 4 will get me back into WW1 flying despite it's older engine. Heck I still have CFS3 ETO and MAW installed and like it for some flying on occasion.

 

Geez I miss modern tech Janes' USNF/ATF/FA redo... that's why I stick to SF series I guess

 

@Brain32: Outerra is great tech demo for now, but I find it hard to imagine full playable sim being build around it, I hope I'm wrong.

Well I for one am eagerly anticipating War Thunder: World of Planes which is steadily shaping up to be everything that Storm of War promised to be, but with 10x the content, online dynamics campaigns, lots of battle areas all around the globe spanning the entire period of 1936-1953 (Yes, it will feature Korean theater as well). I hate to say it Streak, but you can probably wait forever for VRS Tacpac for FSX and it'll always have a diminuitive playerbase since FSX market is 80% civilian airliners. IMO the best chance we have of getting a proper Vietnam-era sim anytime soon is probably with Gaijin. It wouldn't surprise me if they're going in that direction now that they're doing Korean theatre.

[+Stary 2,427]

LOL I forgot WOP... true, but I'm single player guy only, will there be some campaign in WOP for someone like me?

[+Julhelm 266]

There's supposed to be a lot of PVE content:

 

What PvP-mode options will the game feature?

 

There will be a lot of them:

• Quick Game is a battle with random enemies of comparable skill levels based on scenarios such as aerial domination, capturing airfields, providing assistance in naval battles, defending or destroying enemy bombers, and many more.

• Tournaments are battles with special rules that happen on a schedule, with requirements for all participants.

• Global War is a mode about which details will be revealed later, but the general idea that a player chooses his side, and each battle is not a random game but a successive line of historically consistent victories and losses.

• Sandbox mode leaves players free to define rules, limits, and goals on these servers

• Dynamic campaign, user missions, single missions, and quick editor are modes in which players fight against AI, under certain circumstances.

 

Besides PvP-mode, are there any other game modes in World of Planes?

 

Our game is not only an entire online world of multiplayer air battles, but it’s also rich in various PvE missions such as dynamic multiplayer missions and single player missions. Alos, World of Planes players will be able to create their own missions with the Mission Editor.

[+Stary 2,427]

good news, somehow I couldn't find it myself... I hope they will select me for beta, anyway saving for it

[+Gepard 11,296]

http://na.worldofwarplanes.com/

 

World of Warplanes by the makers of World of Tanks, is now in Alpha Test phase.