ShrikeHawk

You can build out a very good ww2 experience with Strikefighters 2, if you don't find enough responses regarding EAW.

Can anyone explain what determines an aircraft's toughness? I've got a Bf-110C that I've been fiddling with. Presently, it takes roughly 350 hits (NOT just shots fired - 350 Hits) with .303 rounds to bring it down. That means flying in close and pounding away accurately for a long time. That seems outrageous to me. I've reduced the "MassFraction" and "StructuralFactor" on a number of systems and it's still very tough to bring this bird down. I've done things like this: [LeftWing] //MassFraction=0.15 MassFraction=0.09 //StructuralFactor=1.5 StructuralFactor=1.1 I've only had very moderate success fiddling with them. Is there something else I should look at?

They really did a great job. If they'd been armed with cannon, they might've shot everything down!

8 Macchi C.202s vs 16 P-40Ls I have this C.202 that was giving me fits. The AI simply couldn't handle the FM very well. If the AI cannot perform the settings for them as directed (climbspeed, cornerspeed, etc) they tend to wallow or wander aimlessly. I've been getting good results with the C.202 when I noticed it seemed very floppy in the pitch. The AI were doing better, but I wanted to fix this for me. I adjusted the cmdc in the elevators. This could potentially reduce maneuverability, but I thought making the plane a more stable gun platform would be worth it. It had better results than I expected. I edited a random single mission to pit 8 Macchis versus 8 P-40s. In 8v8 missions you can get a better idea of AI performance than in 4v4.There were other enemy flights, but I rarely see them during the mission, so I ignored that. I started the mission and noticed right away that my cmdc edits were paying off. The Macchi handled much more smoothly, with more certainty. And then things got ugly. Just as we engaged the enemy, a second flight of 8 P-40Ls arrived. My 8 C.202s now faced 16 P-40Ls. I build my FMs to make for extremely aggressive AIs and the P-40s are very, very good at this. The C.202s have very weak armament (2x .30 cal, and 2x .50 cal). Usually, the AI get very few kills with such weak guns. Even if they can engage successfully, they often blow their whole ammo supply without a decisive result. I figured I'm dead because the AI won't hold the enemy fighters off well enough, and this test is a bust. I fought on anyway...because it's fun. Much to my amazement, I survived the battle. Even more amazing, I only lost two of my wingmen! Nearly every single one of the P-40Ls were hit. The engagement ended with nearly half of the 16 P-40s wandering off with damage. Every time I targeted one, it had damage. The AIs performed magnificently! In this battle, I got a very high hit percentage. The weak guns couldn't bring a P-40 down quickly, but it could tear up the controls. I just kept shooting at the moving targets until their controls were shot out. My plodding targets lost the means to evade. And that's when I bored into point blank range with guns blazing. I never once shot a wing off, but tore everything else apart. Often, their engines just quit on them. It was a proud moment for me. Everything worked better than I expected. Making the plane a more stable gun platform was an immense payoff. It benefited the AIs as well, who now seemed more aggressive with more stable pitch controls. Below is the final tally, and below that, a typical shootdown during the mission.

Please check your PM. Thanks!

I see links for both planes but the downloads aren't there. Does anyone have them?

I like that Cockpit, Coupi. I'm gonna use it. And yeah Wrench, I realize the Sagittario wasn't a major contributor to the war effort. I've always loved it, though. I think it's a gorgeous airplane. In my What-If MTO install, Italy lasted until 1945. This means the very best Italian fighters (the 5 series - G-55. C.205, Re-2005) will be battling against the very best allied fighters. So the Re-2005 would figure largely in such a scenario.

That's about the size of it.

Yep, Re-2005 is the Sagittario. I just looked for it again in the all-inclusive Wings Over Africa (WoA) and also in all-inclusive WW2Europe for SF2. I don't see it. They have the Re-2002 Ariete, but that's it. Do you have one?

Well now, where are all the folks who said the US was vile and evil because of drone strikes in Yemen? Now the Saudis are striking Yemen, and where are all the guys who condemned the US for aggression, hmm? Where are they who said the US attacks for no good reason? Oh right, probably drinking champagne and swallowing oysters in an ivory tower somewhere.

Thanks so much for releasing this Wrench! I can easily live without the shadows. I'm having loads of fun with it right now in my SF2 MTO install. Fiddling with the FM of course, but it's already giving the Mustangs fits. The Sagittario is no longer findable at the Skunkworks. I thought it was there too. Perhaps some brave, kind, generous, good-looking, altruistic soul is willing to make one? If only Blender could be made to work, I'd do this myself.

My god, that looks gorgeous. A model this beautiful shouldn't sit idly on the shelf. I'd be happy to work on the FM if it would help get this beauty available for everyone.

Dang. I don't know about fixing those. I can handle FMs. Any modeler out there able to fix something like this?

What sort of issues? With the FM?

Don't be! That was great information and I thought every bit was useful. Thanks very much! Thanks Kevin and FastCargo. I think I've got what I need now. Much appreciated!

LOD viewer works great, but hang on. Do need to be able to edit the LOD to change the hitboxes? Could I just change the collision points or the min/max extents?

Thanks for all the replies everyone. I've been a big fan of gun convergence for a while. It really does make a difference. In the Spit Mk I, the AI were missing everything. Averaging 0.8% hits and no kills. Tweek the guns and now they're actually getting kills and being helpful. Do335 - Thanks for an outstanding and informative post. I really appreciate it. I have much to look over. Baff - I will definitely look into Mues' Lod viewer. Could be really handy. Thanks for that. Wrench - I'll put the settings back. Changes didn't help what I wanted anyway. It's good know about the balancing. Gatling20 - Thanks for the confirmation. Much appreciated. Alrighty, I'm off to have a look at the hitboxes Cheers!

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?

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?

I'm wondering how much of this should be believed. The US CIWS fires 4,500 rounds per minute, so naturally the Chinese CIWS fires 10,000 rounds per minute. Our weapon is a 20mm, theirs is 30mm. It seems like China is saying, "oh yeah, well...well...Ours goes up to eleven!" As though they looked at our specs and decided, whether in reality or not, their weapon would do everything one better. Can anyone confirm or deny the Chinese specs in the link below? http://www.wantchinatimes.com/news-subclass-cnt.aspx?id=20141211000100&cid=1101