Single Mission Flight Size

[ShrikeHawk]

Lately, I've been flying single missions with enemy activity set to "heavy." This works fine if I'm flying with Air Force or Marine aircraft in flights of 8, 12 or more aircraft. When I inevitably encounter 16 or more enemy aircraft, I have enough guys to take them on and survive it. Unfortunately, when flying the Navy planes on a Fighter Sweep, for instance, I only get a flight of 2 or 4. That's just not nearly enough in a target rich environment. My wingmen go down quickly and I'm often facing an enemy with a 16 to 1 advantage.

 

I looked into formations.ini to see how to boost the Navy flight size, but I see little difference from the Air Force formations. Is there a way to make the Navy flights larger?

[Icarus999]

Or how about a way to do away with 16 ship formations altogether. I would much rather have multiple smaller flights than a 16 ship flight of anything post WW2.

[SkyStrike]

Now that you mention it.. I've been having similar experiences with my merged installation of SF2 (Vietnam, Europe, Israel & North Atlantic)

 

By any chance would you happen to be flying these missions with maps with aircraft carriers.... such as Iceland and Vietnam for instance?.... I'm asking because you said that you experience these issues only while flying Naval (or should I say) carrier-based aircraft....

 

Just an assumption:

 

Since these issues don't seem to appear while flying Air Force (Land Based) aircraft; Apparently your flight size is larger simply because an airbase you would start out from is able to support and deploy more aircraft  which would be assigned to your squadron... For example: If you are flying in a map without carriers (e.g. Germany or Israel) and you're flying a land based aircraft such as an F-15 or F-16 and set the air opposition option to 'heavy' you will have sufficient resources to deal with heavy opposition.... The same will be the case even if you fly a carrier based aircraft (e.g an F-14 or an F/A-18) on these maps....simply because there is no aircraft carrier in these maps and even while piloting Naval aircraft you would start out on landside airbases

 

In the case of maps with aircraft carriers such as Iceland or Vietnam; You wouldn't experience the issue of insufficient wingmen to deal with heavy opposition while flying Air Force (i.e. land based) aircraft simply because the airbase you start out from is large enough to support and deploy a sufficient number of wingmen to your squadron... However the same is not true while flying Naval (carrier based) aircraft, simply because the carrier which you'd start from is not large enough to assign or should I say support and deploy more aircraft to your squadron... so as a result you'd have a maximum of 4 aircraft in your squadron including yours...

 

I guess this issue is due to game code limitations as more than 3 support aircraft cannot be assigned to the player's squadron while piloting Naval aircraft operating from aircraft carriers....

 

Sorry I couldn't be of more help....

Edited December 30, 2014 by SkyStrike

[+Wrench]

I think it's a coding glitch induced by SF2NA.

Like other, many a time it's only you and one wingman defending the boat. 

[ShrikeHawk]

 

 

In the case of maps with aircraft carriers such as Iceland or Vietnam; You wouldn't experience the issue of insufficient wingmen to deal with heavy opposition while flying Air Force (i.e. land based) aircraft simply because the airbase you start out from is large enough to support and deploy a sufficient number of wingmen to your squadron... However the same is not true while flying Naval (carrier based) aircraft, simply because the carrier which you'd start from is not large enough to assign or should I say support and deploy more aircraft to your squadron... so as a result you'd have a maximum of 4 aircraft in your squadron including yours...

 

I guess this issue is due to game code limitations as more than 3 support aircraft cannot be assigned to the player's squadron while piloting Naval aircraft operating from aircraft carriers....

 

 

Yes, you're right. This is in NA and Vietnam with carriers. I simply can't fly carrier aircraft on "Heavy" because my flight is overwhelmed by up to 6:1 odds. Not so with land-based planes.

 

I've considered, as you suggested, that a carrier has a limited number of squadrons and thus is unable to field more than 4 sorties at once.

 

I wonder if editing squadrons.ini might help or is their some in the <carrier>_data.ini that puts a limit on the number of planes on that carrier? Maybe re-assigning a value could fool the game into thinking more planes are available and thus larger flights might be possible?