Armchair aces over Italy

[+ojcar]

Well, Armchair Aces over Italy is uploaded and pending Admin approval. 

25 brand new campaigns from October 1916 to the war end!. Fly as Italian, Austro-Hungarian, French, British or German pilot!

Get it while is hot!

[+Stephen1918]

Excellent!

[Trotski]

super duper !

 

[+whiteknight06604]

Thank you. It sounds great! 

[+Stephen1918]

I'm enjoying the new Armchair Aces over Italy campaigns. It took me a while to get my Italian Front install sorted out - mostly by adding planes and skins. I'm using FE1 and haven't encountered any problems, I didn't have to do any editing at all so far. (The nice thing about FE is - even if you don't have all the planes, the campaigns will still launch, you just won't be able to select some squadrons in the menu screen.) 

Edited November 14, 2019 by Stephen1918

[Crawford]

I found that your Hansa_BrandenburgDI_E.ini mainfile in the Shadow section says “FALSE” instead of “TRUE”

[Shadow]
CastShadow = FALSE <------------------------ ???
ShadowCastDist = 10000
MaxVisibleDistance = 800

Why? As far as I remember, this old model had no problems with displaying shadows. In my opinion, the shadows give the impression of a living volume. A plane without shadows looks flat and "unrealistic." 

In addition, the MaxAmmo=350 - is a big exaggeration. So many cartridges would simply not fit in a cramped 'baby coffin' (officially it was called Type-II VK). There is generally little information on this machine. As they write in the book of the Windsock Datafile, in the 'baby coffin' there was a 'reduced' tape, but they did not write how much was reduced. We know that the standard Schwarzlose М07/12 infantry machine gun feed system was made with a 250-round cloth belt (or, rare,100-round). So, In my opinion, the ammunition of this aircraft did not exceed 100 bullets.

 

Edited January 11, 2020 by Crawford

[+ojcar]

About the shadow, it's the same setting I found in Peter01's Hansa-Brandenburg FM (basically the same plane with different engine). Maybe he was trying to save some framerate, I don't Know. About the ammo, I really don't know, as I have no info about that. Again it's based in the old Hansa-Brandenburg DI we had.

Surely VonS has better data about it.

[+VonS]

Hello gents',

The relevant info. I have in the data ini for the "Spider" (located in the ver. 9.7 folder of my update pack, see the eastern front and Italian front folders) - is as follows:

GunTypeName=8MM_SCHWARZLOSE_M0712unsync
InputName=FIRE_PRIMARY_GUN
GunGroup=1
MuzzlePosition=0.00,1.19,1.215
LightPosition=0.00,1.19,1.215
AimAngles=0.0,4.0,-0.1
MaxAmmo=250
EjectShells=TRUE

I've been liberal with the max ammo setting (250) but may reduce this further to about 150-200. Also take note that the rate of fire is slightly faster on the unsynchronized than the early synchronized versions of the 07/12 Schwarzlose. I've therefore linked the Spider's gun type name with the un-synced variant of the early Schwarzlose. The relevant folder can be found in the "Guns" folder available in the larger ver. 9.5 consolidated update pack folder that's also available in the ver. 9.7 download.

My general ini files for FE2 have shadows set to false on my rig, to preserve frame rates, but I will eventually get to setting them to "medium" - eventually  - in SF2 I have them at medium settings and they work fine on the Mac Pro (2013). Hopefully setting them to medium in FE2 won't shave off too many fps.

Happy flying,

Von S 

[Crawford]

19 hours ago, ojcar said:

About the shadow, it's the same setting I found in Peter01's Hansa-Brandenburg FM (basically the same plane with different engine). Maybe he was trying to save some framerate, I don't Know. About the ammo, I really don't know, as I have no info about that. Again it's based in the old Hansa-Brandenburg DI we had.

Thanks for the answer. I understood you. My computer is also quite slow for me. But, no matter what, I use shadows. To maintain an acceptable framerate, I lower the screen resolution in the game.   By the way, this plane still has one problem with displaying shadows. The interplane "spider-like" struts of this aircraft do not cast a shadow - the game engine stubbornly does not want to see them. But I think this is better than nothing...

[Crawford]

19 hours ago, VonS said:

I've been liberal with the max ammo setting (250) but may reduce this further to about 150-200. Also take note that the rate of fire is slightly faster on the unsynchronized than the early synchronized versions of the 07/12 Schwarzlose. I've therefore linked the Spider's gun type name with the un-synced variant of the early Schwarzlose.

They write that the 250-round belt had a length of 6.62 m; in curb weight weighed 8.25 kg. As you can see, there is not much space in the Type-II VK so that so much ammunition can be packed in its cartridge box. I completely agree with you.
The Type-II VK, which received the macabre nickname 'baby coffin' due to its shape, is remarkable in that it was possibly the first example of what today would be called a gun pod. It weighed about 40 kg (it is not clear whether this is the curb weight of the gun container or its empty weight). Inside the 'baby coffin' there was also a spring-loaded drum, on which, by analogy with the Nieuports, an empty cartridge belt was wound. The spent cartridges were collected inside. By the way, in the back of the 'baby coffin' was a gravity fuel tank.
Right view with the cover removed; behind the water-cooling barrel a drum for an empty cartridge belt is visible:

Edited January 6, 2020 by Crawford

[Sky High]

'Armchair Aces' is a great title for these campaigns, speaking as a sim flyer who is afraid of even modest heights!