VonS

I was able to get the holes visible on the fuselage using the advice in this thread, but nothing for the wings. I'm assuming that some skin files or lod files are missing for the Halb D.5 that would make this damage modelling possible - I doubt that the improvements can be implemented directly from within the data ini file. I look forward to new discoveries regarding this. Happy flying, Von S

Great stuff, this is a beautiful looking, single-seater, "hybrid" dogfighter. Adjusting the FM for bomb weight should be easy enough in FE2 as I discovered with Geezer's Martinsydes that also had a dual-role (although those are not very effective as dogfighters). The trick is to test the aircraft first in something like "offensive" mode that doesn't give it bombs, tweak the FM to correct stats., and then to plug it into bombing mode or army coop - the top speed automatically goes down because of the addition of bombs. I look forward to tinkering with the FM once the project is released. Happy flying, Von S

These are excellent ideas 'gents. I've been contemplating the idea of a "single mission linker"-type application for FE2 for several weeks but this would probably require some fancy coding...will look further into this, to see if it is feasible. The idea is that you would start in a single mission in a theatre of your choice (let's say Palestine, Sept. 1915, flying as a Fokker. E.IIa pilot for the Ottomans - and then you would automatically after completing the mission be "randomly" thrown into another, perhaps a month or two later, either of the same type, for example, offensive, or randomly, another type doing a balloon busting mission or army coop....this would require of course code to "randomize" things...also to switch between "light" and "heavy" air activity depending on the theatre and period of war). The Palestinian theatre would have only light and moderate air activity, something like the Western front would shift to heave air activity by early 1918...other variations would be implemented for the Eastern and Italian theatres. This would then allow a kind of "linear" approximation of the campaign modes, but flying in "interlinked" single mission mode. Lots of ideas to think about. Happy flying, Von S

Thank you for the kind words. The .dll files are easy enough to extract from the game on the OS X side, in WineSkin...I think the magic one is the FlightEngine.dll...but it's useless to me since I'm not a coder and don't understand what to do with the file. Opening it in a simple text program gives me confusing machine code that would have to be translated over into something readable using another program of some kind...the only thing I've been able to learn is that FE2 is probably written in C++ computer language. Perhaps FE2 flyers who are also software developers or code experts and are running the game in WineSkin will extract the FlightEngine.dll file for themselves and have a look at what's inside...I'm sure that the code for engine controls is somewhere in there - but that is way beyond my tweaking abilities. Another problem would be how to re-integrate a modded FlightEngine.dll back into the core FE2 game itself on the Windows side...in WineSkin it's easy enough since from the UNIX/OS X side of things I can just dump in the new dll and replace the old one - and then fly in FE2. I have no idea how this kind of re-integration would work in Windows. Happy flying, Von S

Hello Crawford, results are very good in several areas (increased realism in FE2 with historical ammo. loads, gun jams, also improved gun sounds) - I have had some success with engine tweaking but this only affects them once they're damaged - still no way to get arbitrary engine failure going without damage. My full post on latest developments can be found here.... http://combatace.com/topic/88786-fe2-observations-and-musings/page-2?do=findComment&comment=719218 Happy flying, Von S

Tinkering further with the max. firing angles, I'm pleased that now the novices and "green" pilots are sometimes taking shots at me from 90 degree angles, peppering my fuselage in the process. The moves are reminiscent of the famous Verner Voss fight with perpendicular hits being taken and whatnot. I will incorporate the extended firing angles into a ver. 8.0 update of the general aircraftaidata ini file. Further testing has revealed that it is not possible (for now) to generate arbitrary engine failure in the game. I was rummaging through the data ini for the P-47 Thunderbolt to see if any WEP settings could be manipulated into the WWI data inis, to over-rev engines in dives for example, but from what I've seen there is no magic ingredient in the SF2 data inis that can be "retrofitted" into the FE2 data inis for arbitrary engine damage. However, post-hit engine damage seems to work well, with variety, by tweaking the settings for DamageTempDelta and OverheatDamageRate. The other entries mentioned in my previous posts for temp. rate change are best left untouched, also the overheating point of 100 degrees. The OverheatDamageRate, from further testing, seems to go from 0.0 to 1.0, whereas the DamageTempDelta is a percentage value. A good variation that works... Two-row Rotaries DamageTempDelta=20 OverheatDamageRate=0.3 Single-row Rotaries and also Radials DamageTempDelta=30 OverheatDamageRate=0.4 Early Inlines DamageTempDelta=60 OverheatDamageRate=0.7 Later Inlines DamageTempDelta=50 OverheatDamageRate=0.5 The logic is that rotaries, like radials in WW2, are a bit tougher to damage than inlines where things can get hosed quickly. I am slowly applying these changes and will upload in an 8.0 release. It seems to have improved chances for engine fires after damage, as far as I've been able to test. Some pics below...an engagement between German-flown Nieu17bis types and RAF Camels in the Mesopotamian front. Also being applied slowly are historical gun-belt lengths (number of rounds) per plane per theatre, more realistic unjamming times (more waiting), and ejection of bullets in all cases except for observers (with cartridge bags) and on some pusher types like the DH.2 that also carry bags (danger of cartridges hitting the prop in the back). Reading some of the big names on TheAerodrome, I've learned that empty cartridges were ejected through chutes even on the Nieuports, the empty gun-belts would be rewound and reused, but cartridges were always ejected on those types supposedly. Also revised were rates of fire for several of the guns, and new gun folders have been installed - this wil take a while now to "link up" the data inis with the changes. Revised now are the following types and rates of fire: Hotchkiss - 450 rounds (these were usually detuned to such values in the field, from the theoretical max. of about 750) Lewis - 750 rounds Vickers1 - 400 rounds Vickers2 - 600 rounds Vickers2muzzleboost - 850 rounds Parabellum - 550 rounds synchronized / 900 unsynchronized Spandau early - 350 rounds Spandau mid - 450 rounds Spandau late - 550 rounds Schwarzlose early - 350 rounds Schwarzlose late - 500 rounds Also tweaked was gun reliability and accuracy where necessary Also included are new sounds for the Lewis, Hotchkiss, Vickers types, and Spandau types - tempo was changed on the original files to slow or speed up the sound of the rate of fire. Two late Spandaus on the Alby. types sure can make quick lunch of the flimsy Nieuports now, as tested with Alb. D.3 and Nieu. 16 types in the Mesopotamian theatre. Also tested was a left muzzle-boosted Vickers Mk.2 and right Mk.2 (as was typical) on the Camels. The faster rofs are now deadlier, also noticeable is that you - and the AI - run out of ammo much more quickly now - which is a good improvement towards realism. I quickly became a pepper-pot for these new guns on the Camels while testing the Nieu17bis against them, although I could have climbed away and escaped - but it was too much fun. Pics below... Will upload the revisions as one big update (8.0) once it's all done - it's a slow process - instead of uploading the fixed theatres in parts. Happy flying, Von S

Hi vonOben, The main settings I've found that help increase frame rates are ground detail, also the terrain effects and objects on the ground - those when set to "medium" have helped me with reasonable frame rates. Also, I usually keep the water detail at "medium." Haven't experimented too much with the other settings to see how much they help. Here are my graphics settings from the Options.ini file: [GraphicsOptions] DisplayDeviceID=0 DisplayWidth=1600 DisplayHeight=900 DisplayDepth=32 AspectRatio=1.777778 AntiAliasing=4 UseAdvancedShaders=0 ForceDX9=FALSE ForceVSyncOff=FALSE LensFlare=2 DetailLevel=4 ObjectDetail=1 ObjectTexture=1 CockpitTexture=1 CockpitMirrors=0 CockpitReflection=0 EffectsDetail=1 TerrainDetail=1 TerrainTexture=1 HorizonDistance=0 GroundObjectDensity=1 WaterDetail=1 CloudsDetail=2 Shadow=0 They give me good frame rates but you might have to tinker with them further for your particular graphics card (I have the HD 4000, the integrated one from Intel, in a quad-core i7 Mac Mini). Alternate in-flight maps are probably what you are thinking of (if you don't like the stock ones with text). Here are a couple of variations on in-flight maps (I haven't tried the alternate ones out so I don't know how well they work): http://combatace.com/files/file/11899-new-fe2-in-flight-map/ http://combatace.com/files/file/14555-planing-maps/ Your installation of the terrain z-buffer shader alteration is correct (it goes into the relevant terrain folder under the "terrains" folder). I would assume that 30% utilization of the second processor core is acceptable variation. It's possible that FE2 is programmed to use one core and then "some" of the other core for an extra multi-processing boost. It's way beyond my technical knowledge whether programs can be coded to take advantage of only part or a fraction of a core, rather than the whole core - I see no reason why this wouldn't be possible (to offset some tasks from the game, but not all of them, to a second core). Those with degrees in software design might want to pitch in with some of their thoughts here. Thank you for the post regarding the FM tweaks (have responded over there to those). Happy flying, Von S

Here's some more interesting info. on rate of fire in WWI, from what I've been able to observe in the excellent thread on the subject over at TheAerodrome. Dave Watts writes: "This would look more logical on a graph chart. The point is the rate of fire for the LMG goes up and down according to the motor rpm and not at a constant rate. You can have the full rate of fire of 440 at 220 rpm and then at 221 the rate drops to 221. Note that the gun remains constant at 440 for motor rpms of 660 to 880. You have a drop again and then the rate is pretty constant from 1100 to 1319." (Some of this correlates with my post above, that max theoretical rof would be achieved at cruising rpms of about 1000 rpm and higher.) Also, it seems that the twin Spandau setups had rate of fire set to about 400-450 on one gun, while the other was set anywhere from between 300 to 500 - this still averages to about 450 or so. The Spandaus could not be set to higher than 700/min, but usually nothing beyond about 550 was attempted. The Lewis had an average rof of between 700 and 800 - although this is largely a theoretical limit since you have to stop and change drums on it, which reduces your rof/min greatly - because of reload pauses. Vickers were initially doing about 400/min, increased to about 550/min by late '17 approximately. Also interesting is that the Constantinesco synchronization gear probably contributed to this increase in rof for the Vickers since it was coming into use by the summer of '17. Muzzle boosters were also often added to Vickers by 1918, further increasing the rof to about 800/min - the usual procedure was to have a muzzle booster on only one Vickers in a double-Vickers setup, giving one gun a rof of about 800, and the other would still be at abut 550. The theory on TheAerodrome is that, by 1918, rof on a twin-Vickers setup would then be better than with twin Spandaus on German aircraft. It's also likely that muzzle boosters were avoided on single-Vickers setups - they increased the likelihood of gun jams - leaving you with no gun effectively if you only have one Vickers and it jams. Also I noticed that the Germans were improving their synchronization gears especially by the time the twin-gunned Albatros came out - planes prior to the Albatros D.I had earlier (Fokker) interruptor gears, the D.I and D.II featured a mid-war type, the D.III featured a newer type, and there were further improvements from the D.V onwards. The transitional period for the Entente seems to have been sometime in '17, when the Alkan-Hamy gear was still prevalent (particularly on mid-war types like the Nieu. 17) - giving way to the Constantinesco particularly on British planes, by 1918. My previous estimate of rof ranging from 400 to about 800 on a good day, at cruising rpms, can then be expanded further, with this historical info, to give us a rough table of static values (since Dave Watts' comment about rof going up or down across the whole rpm arc probably can't be modelled in FE2, so I'll stick with estimates). German planes up to about mid-1916: average rof 350 to 400. German planes from late '16 to about late '17: average rof of 450. German planes from early '18 onwards: average rof of 500 to 550. Entente/Vickers planes up to about early '17: average rof of 350 to 400. Entente/Vickers from mid '17 to early '18: average rof of 550 for Spads and Se5a and Camels, around 400 for Tripes, Pups, and Nieuports type 17, 23, 24, up to about 550 again for Nieuports 27 and 28. Entente/Vickers from mid-18 onwards: average for twin-gun setup with one muzzle booster becomes about 700/min. I will do some digging into the gun data inis in the "Guns" folder for FE2 (user game folder) to see how close the rof is in those files to what I've listed here - more tweaking and testing ahead. One interesting exception is the Parabellum mounted sometimes on early Fokker Eindeckers and given to observers on German planes - its rof is high, about 800 to 1000/min. With an interruptor gear in place, it's anybody's guess what the rof would drop down too, I'm thinking something like 450 is a good estimate, still making it about 100 rounds faster/min than early Spandau setups on the Eindeckers. Von S

Yes, this would be wonderful if arbitrary engine failure could be incorporated - will test further and post results should anything successful happen. Getting the engines to over-rev and overheat would be key to having this happen, or at least some code that "cuts out" the engine when we don't expect it. Von S

Excellent question. I'm assuming that since it shares code with SF2, there might be "latent" settings for wep mode available, to incorporate from SF2 into FE2 - this might do the trick to "bust" engines arbitrarily. Historically, there was no wep mode in WWI since superchargers were not used on engines until after the war (experimented with in late '18 but never used in combat) - there were altitude-compensating carburators, also sam "ram air" modifications on the Oberursels I think (rarely), and later use of aluminum instead of iron pistons, to save weight and increase engine HP. But no one would "know" that the supercharger/wep code is busting the engines in FE2 when engaged - since from the pilot's end all you see is an engine that has arbitrarily failed or caught fire....this is a very interesting possibility. Having the wep mode be engaged "automatically" in a dive that over-revs and engine would then produce the appropriate historical results in FE2. Sort of like putting the engine into "110%" power in a dive only - this would be a great compromise. The mystery is figuring out what code in SF2, under Engine settings in the data inis, is responsible for wep power - and then tinkering with that code in FE2. Happy flying, Von S

Hi Geezer, yes this is an obscure area of WWI history that I find very interesting. It was treated in some detail on the Aerodrome forums a few years ago but with no clear conclusions. There were some overall assumptions given, that for four-bladed props being driven by reduction-gear Hispanos - where the total rpms of the engine might be as high as 2300, guns would be interrupted twice in a prop's full revolution so that they fired on every second gap rather than every gap of the four blades - and considering that the prop is rotating more slowly because of the reduction gear anyway - this gives an overall rate of fire similar to that for two-bladed props. Perhaps such modifications were possible for two-bladed props as well, to have a shot fired on every full revolution (not shooting on one of the gaps) rather than half revolution - to reduce rate of fire where engine rpms were too high and no reduction gears were being used. The counter-rotating Siemens-Halske engine solved this problem by rotating at around 900 rpms in one direction, with the prop and shaft rotating 900 rpms in the other direction - I think they carried this theory further with their two-row rotaries, having them turning in opposite directions. Then again, considering that a propeller has at least two blades - let's say fixed to a LeRhone rotary running at between 1100 and 1300 rpms full power - that set up should have a max rate of fire for a machine gun of about 600 under ideal conditions - since the prop is fixed to the engine and rotates at the same rpm. This would be the same theory for direct-gear inline engines like the 6-cylinder Mercedes. Rpms on the Mercedes, depending on what type, would run anywhere from about 1100 to 1300 thereabouts at cruising speeds (similar to the rpms for most rotaries) - considering that it was not recommended to push the Mercedes inline much beyond let's say about 1500 rpms for risk of damage. This should then be the "theoretical" rate of fire approximately for Entente and Central powers rotaries and the often-used Mercedes inline engine - maybe a bit higher for the direct-gear Hissos that have cruising rpms of about 1400 to 1600, top rpms of about 1800 to 2100, depending on what HP variant of the Hisso we're talking about (150, 180, 200, 220, 235 HP). If we then factor in a liberal estimate of rpm variation for engines and props of as high as 300 or 400 at a constant setting, to account for over-revving of engines in dives, also to account for sometimes imperfect performance, defects, flawed fuel/air mixtures...we get, to use the LeRhone as an example, running as slowly as maybe 900 rpms under poor conditions, maybe going as close as 1400 rpms in a dive (anything higher would of course destroy a rotary). This then gives a +/- variation of about 150 or 200 in the rate of fire, half of the variation approximately of the engine/prop rpm variation. The "theoretical" rate of fire of 600/min then ranges anywhere from 400 to 800/min - and this is on a good day and at a constant, "cruising" rpm setting. Might be even worse if other physics of engine, interruptor gear, gun belt problems, are taken into account, and obviously lower-band/mid-power rpms somewhere in the range of 600 to 1000 rpms. The rotaries would of course conk out somewhere below about 400 or 500 rpms if they were well-tuned, maybe already below 600/700 rpm after daily wear and tear. inlines could be throttled back to about 200 or 300 rpms, as low as 100/150 or so in later-war variants - and then there's the prop "windmilling" that also becomes a factor in dives, even with engine at idle or in the case of rotaries "blipped" off - although the smarter thing would be to shut the fuel valve on the rotary and then reopen it again to give the engine life. Lots of fun factors to consider. I'm being very crude with the math here but it gives a general plan for further revisions of the data inis. Von S

Hi Do335, thanks for the info. I was testing all sorts of variations today for those entries under the "Engine" section of the data inis and I think you're right that it affects the speed at which an engine is damaged or stops working once it's hit - it doesn't however affect what happens with engines that are working well from what I've been able to observe. Oh well, the good news is that I can focus more now on tweaking ammo loads, rate of fire, also unjam/jam settings. It's possible that a separate application would have to be made that "plugs into" the FE2 code and handles engine failure rates - sort of like ReLoad does for RB3D - this of course goes way beyond my computer skills. Happy flying, Von S

Thank you for the link to the relevant discussion on Aerodrome, Nick. Will read those discussions soon. I'm pleased to read that you were able to get more firing of ammo in the game with the wider fireangles. Aces are very stingy with the ammo in my current aircraftaidata ini setting - will test further using your suggestions and incorporate the modifications into a version 5.0 of that file. Your results look very realistic, with most novices emptying their ammo during fights. I'm currently tinkering with some of the obscure settings under "Engine" in the individual data ini files - my concern are these entries: GasTempChangeRate=0.1 OverheatTemp=100 DamageTempDelta=20 OverheatDamageRate= Have tried testing with different values here, including for OverheatDamageRate, but there is no arbitrary engine failure showing up. Now I'm thinking that perhaps a mystery "DamageChance," "FailureChance," or "FireChance" entry needs to be included here, or perhaps something like "DamageDelta" - to actually make arbitrary engine failure possible. Will test further with this mystery entry for failiure or some kind of failure or damage delta settings and will post results soon. Von S

This is all fascinating info., I hope that I can incorporate some of it into further FM tweaks. Can't remember the exact post now on TheAerodrome, but a few years ago there was a big debate over there regarding average rate of fire for guns firing through propeller blades, considering that most props would rev exactly as much as the engine, with the exception of some of the sub-types of Hispano-Suiza that had reduction gears and the four-bladed propeller, later replaced with fixed gears once again. This of course is probably too much for the FE2 code to handle, to have faster rate of fire in a dive with engines revved, and to have slower rate of fire with engines cutting out or not giving full power - but I will see if some kind of "educated estimates" can be brought into the data files, to account for best and worst rate of fire. Von S

Thanks Geezer for this info. I'll look into the Vickers on the Nieports too, can't remember now if those ejected cartridges as well, or collected them in a box...that's another great point that I will attempt to address in a version 8.0 update. I'm thinking that the five factors to address, for more historical realism, are: (1) ejection or storage of empty cartridges (2) length of cartridge belts (depending on period in the war used) (3) gun jams and speed of unjamming (to simulate cloth or steel belts, also length of cartridge belts, shorter being better in terms of less jamming) (4) rate of fire of synchronized guns (also of unsynchronized ones too, I remember reading that the Hotchkiss had an average rate of fire of something like 700 rounds/min but this was usually detuned to about 400 or 450 to minimize jamming) (5) arbitrary chance of engine failure and/or fire (I'm thinking along the lines of fuel temp., overheating, things like that, not so much oil pressure loss since tampering with the oil settings under "Engine" in the data inis might lead to permanently poor engine performance during a flight, instead of the chance of problems arising...there is a +/- setting in the ReLoad program used with Red Baron 3D that helps regulate "air flow" to rotary engines, but such dynamic tampering might not be possible to that great an extent in FE2...) Happy flying, Von S

This is great stuff Geezer, thanks for posting. I remember reading somewhere that the Germans continued using cloth belts well into 1918 but had ironed out some problems with the system, while the Entente was running away from the cloth belts because of all the problems. Maybe the Germans were trying to save weight on the planes by continuing with cloth instead of going with steel belts? An interesting theory that I'll think about for the 8.0 update of the FMs...maybe something along the lines of greater frequency of gun jams, and longer wait times to unjam would approximate these problems in FE2, especially with earlier planes. More jams with cloth fed ammo, fewer jams with the steel belts...but also to have shorter jams with steel fed ammo later in the war. I'll think about this in terms of smaller ammo loads and also the version of gun being used on the plane types (Vickers 1, 1.1, 2) since the rate of fire becomes faster later on....this will make it more exciting overall, with greater realism. Coupled with arbitrary engine failure, it looks very promising. Happy flying, Von S

Try tinkering with these settings located under the "Engine" section of the aircraft data inis: GasTempChangeRate=0.1 OverheatTemp=100 DamageTempDelta=20 OverheatDamageRate= I haven't dug into those yet but they look promising...increasing the overheatdamagerate, maybe also lowering the overheattemp slightly, and increasing the gastempchangerate might do the trick. Try something like this for starters, to see if there's a difference: GasTempChangeRate=0.2 OverheatTemp=80 DamageTempDelta=20 OverheatDamageRate=30 I will experiment with this too - interesting find. ReLoad for RB3D has random engine failure settings, it sure would be nice to get an effect like that into FE2. Von S

This is all very fascinating information, hadn't thought about the synchronization improvements too much but it makes sense that the rate of fire would increase by the second half of 1917 approximately, this will help further with ammo depletion and make FE2 more realistic. Have now tested the general aircraftaidata ini file further, with one-on-one dogfights with a DH.2 and Fokker E.IIa (comparable opponents) - and noticed that aces now shoot only when very near, sometimes being too conservative to shoot unless very close. Will readjust the maxcannonrange values a bit for more realism - perhaps something like 600 or 800 for the novices, 400 for the regular pilots, and 300 and 250 for veterans and aces - this will probably result in more variety and quicker ammo depletion (150 and 200 seem a bit too short from what I've tested, although I will admit that historically aces would open up only when right on your tail...although René Fonck is rumored to have been accurate even when shooting from a distance). Will post back with further results. On an unrelated note, it dawned on me that it's more realistic to have separate aircraft folders for Belgian Nieuport 16 and 17s, and have them co-exist in the Western theatre with French Nieuports, also to have a separate folder for an RFC Nieuport 17 than only one folder where you have to switch nations in the game's menu. This will provide for more historical realism. Also, I will add a Belgian Hanriot to the Western theatre but designate it as VERY_RARE so that it shows up less than other aircraft types in that theatre. The Italian theatre has had a Hanriot for a long time already. This will all be included in a 7.9 maintenance update. I will leave machine gun rate of fire, also gun belt lengths, for further testing, to be incorporated in an 8.0 update that will feature another 7 or 8 important aircraft for the Western theatre, as listed below: Beardmore or French-built Nieuport 12 BE.12 Hannover CL.II Hannover CL.III Albatros C.III Avro 504C Farman F40 Vickers FB5 I may leave these aircraft for a 9.0 update and focus on revising gun belt lengths and rate of fire advancements in an 8.0 update (I think this may be more beneficial, to increase realism further). Happy flying, Von S

Hi Nick, thanks for the detailed comments as always. Here's what I have currently added to the aircraftaidata ini file (that's missing from the version 3 upload of that file). novice CannonFireAngle=8.0 MaxCannonRange=300 MinCannonRange=50 CannonBurstLength=7 green CannonFireAngle=6.0 MaxCannonRange=300 MinCannonRange=50 CannonBurstLength=7 regular CannonFireAngle=5.0 MaxCannonRange=200 MinCannonRange=30 CannonBurstLength=5 veteran CannonFireAngle=3.0 MaxCannonRange=200 MinCannonRange=20 CannonBurstLength=3 ace CannonFireAngle=2.0 MaxCannonRange=150 MinCannonRange=20 CannonBurstLength=2 The cannonburstlength info. I've just added today (thanks to your advice) and will see what happens with it - ideally I'd like to see the novice pilots more quickly getting rid of their ammo and disengaging from a dogfight (that would be more historically realistic). Speaking of ammo usage/load, this is a topic that I've been digging into somewhat, also on the forums at TheAerodrome website - and I've tried in many cases to give historical approximations for ammo load in the data inis for the planes (although there are several files I'd like to revisit regarding this). For example, the Germans well into 1916 used 200 or 400 clip belts in their single Spandaus (on such types as the Eindeckers). By the second half of 1917 from what I could research, total load that could be carried went up to about 1100 clips, this is 550 clips per Spandau on the two-gun planes like the later Fokkers, also the Albatros. Loads were usually kept a bit lower to save weight and not hit performance of the aircraft too much. Typical loads of the later war period would then be something like 450 or 500 per machine-gun, for the Germans. I frequently see a load of "380" given to the Spandaus in many of the data inis and have changed this in several cases, but will more consistently revisit that data somewhere down the road. Entente powers were using 200 and 250 clip belts well into 1916, maybe also 1917, on guns like the Vickers, changing over somewhere in late '17 or early' 18 to the typical 400 clip belts that are seen in several of the data inis for Entente aircraft. The Lewis guns would have the smaller 47-bullet drum until about late '15/ early '16, and would standardize on the 97-bullet drum by the summer of '16 approximately. This is all interesting since it means that some of the Nieuports from '17, also earlier examples of the Camel, should have about 250 bullets per gun (this means a total of no more than 400 or 500 rounds for earlier Camels, even though they have two guns....there may be several other examples to draw from, especially on underpowered aircraft of both sides in the war, with shorter belts being chosen to save weight). Overall, this is another excellent (and historical) way of cutting the ammo loads down in the game and making the dogfights more realistic - shorter gun belts coupled with longer gun bursts - I see this as an excellent solution (particularly to have novice pilots disengage more quickly). I've increased the GunnerFireChance from the default of 70 or 80, to 90 (in the current upload of the aircraftaidata ini file) - this change from what I could see in previous testing makes the gunner fire more frequently, or may also impact on his determination to fire at targets - I've left that setting at 90 since I think the more frequent firing is once again more realistic for novices. GunnerFireTime I haven't tested yet - and left at its default value - I think that setting is either interval between bursts or delay from the gunner fixing targets on the enemy and deciding actually to shoot. It seems that that setting is linked to GunnerFireChance somehow - will test in a later iteration of the aircraftaidata file since I think there may be something important in those settings. The suggestion about advancing to waypoint 8 makes a lot of sense. I've also found that in certain tight situations it's best, after a dogfight, especially after running out of ammo myself and being outnumbered in a fur ball - to signal my flight to regroup, and we would then do a wide ascending turn, at full speed, out of the area and on to another waypoint. Usually I would give the order to regroup while already ascending and turning out of the area - the flight would soon follow - the higher up I was at the time, the more quickly they would get out of the area too, with stubborn enemies following but usually not being able to climb so quickly (works best to give the order to regroup when you are already at least 500 meters above the rest of your flight, since it then pushes the remaining dogfight below into the "vertical"...and is safer than giving the regroup command from the same altitude, since many from your flight then leave their six open to lucky shots). Happy flying, Von S

A quick update and some more musings. I'm happy so far with the results of the general aircraftaidata ini file that I've included with the 7.5 FM upload. Planes now fly well in formation without "waltzing" back and forth - the reduced value of 3.0 for formationroll seems to have been a good choice. I've also noticed that the gunneraimaccuracy setting is a very important one...and have been tinkering with possibilities. The default value was something like 20 or 30, but I had increased it to 40 in the aircraftaidata that's been uploaded here. Further testing revealed the following: values of about 60 provide for challenging dogfights values of about 80 provide for very dangerous fur-balls where one or two well placed shots can blow off your wing or kill your pilot, or give you an engine hit (and fire) values above about 90, also tested at 100, sometimes give peculiar results where the ai hesitates as to what to do - to shoot or not to shoot (interesting stuff) values of 40 are also more challenging than the default value for aimaccuracy, better than no alteration certainly - and a good choice for variety of dogfights encountered I've set the aimaccuracy to 60 now and will upload the changes in a small 7.9 FM update - I've also included the additions for cannonfireangle and maxcannonrange for the different dogfight skill levels and results seem to be promising so far. The general aircraftaidata file is proving to be a good one since any values missing from the individual aircraft data inis are then "plugged" into the game by this file. On an unrelated note, also changed now is the seating position of the pilots in the Morane Bullets (with their eyes at mid-level with the wind screen...they were sitting too low previously), and I've redone the Nieuport 17bis folder posted here with my earlier tweaks into a proper 17bis folder, a 17 C.1 folder (the common type of Nieuport 17), and the Siemens-Schuckert D.1 folder (pics are available above in this post, of that one). The three types now display their own quirks, with the 17bis a powerhouse more effective in many ways than the type 23, the C.1 being the delicate and slippery type it was known for, and the Schuckert D.1 being the "poorer" copy of the Nieuport, underpowered by 1917 and less maneuverable somewhat than the real 17. Wings can be broken when power-diving the C.1 and Schuckert more easily than on the 17bis. Will post these latest additions after readjusting the service dates for the different theatres. Happy flying, Von S

Hi vonOben, Yes, it's best to edit the Default.ini from within Notepad for stubborn key mappings, retest in the game, then modify again in the Default.ini file if necessary and re-save in Notepad. All of my FM tweaks allow for unjamming. I think such was the case historically, with the rare exception of a Lewis gun on the top wing of a Nieuport or SE5a in a nasty slipstream or in the heat of a dogfight - you would then have to get above the dogfight, stop fighting, and reload the guns - clumsy but probably workable if you were fast enough. Although I'm assuming that pilots would just continue using the Vickers, or get away from a fight if they had a serious gun jam and no extra gun available. Most of my FM tweaks are tweaks of the Peter01/Ojcar FMs. In cases where this was not possible, I tweaked the older Laton/Texmurphy FMs available for some of the models here. My tweaks cover about 70% of the aircraft available in the game and on the site here, for the rest of the stuff I recommend the Peter01 mods - I will try to get around to doing another 10 or so planes in my next version 8.0 update of the FM tweaks but I think I have covered most of the important (popular) types so far. Only in three or four cases did I choose the Laton FMs to tweak over the Peter01 ones - for the Morane Bullet (N type), to differentiate it slightly from the Morane Bullet (I type) for which I used the Peter01 mod of the type N. Also for the Pfalz E.I and E.II I stuck with tweaking the Laton FM and used the Ojcar one for the Pfalz. E.IV, again to give a sense of differentiation but tweaking for similarity, to give a historical sense of the same line of aircraft, with different capabilities of course. Also for the Nieu. 11 and 24 I had to tweak the Texmurphy FM since I think that is all that's available for those types - but eventually this worked out well, though those FMs were tough to tame. The only other FMs available for some of the types are the old Bortdafarm ones, but those are difficult to tweak - I was lucky to be able to fix up the Fokker B.II (single-bay Fokker version of the D.II) since there is an Ojcar/Peter01 FM available for the D.II that I already tweaked - this required some combination of data from the D.II with the B.II file but eventually resulted in a flyable Fokker B.II in FE2, a rare plane but fun (and dangerous) to fly. Happy flying, Von S

Is this the same great vonOben who hosts the vonOben mods site that still includes a nice section for Red Baron 3D? Welcome to FE2 by the way. I'm unable to answer all of your questions but I can try helping out with a few of them. One thing to keep in mind, in order to reduce flickering of tiles, towns, objects, and other things in FE2 - is never to set anything to "unlimited." I see two settings are set to unlimited in your choices - those should be reduced to "high." That might also help with frame rates. Turning off lens flare and in more extreme cases reducing the resolution to 1600 x 900 might do the trick with better frame rates too. Since I run the game in WineSkin on a Mac, I am frequently aware of mapped keys getting stuck or not working - the only solution to that is to go into your user game folder for FE2 (not the game itself but the user game folder) - and search for a folder called "Controls" - inside that folder is a Default.INI file that can be opened in any text editor. Go in there and modify key mappings manually and re-save the file. That should solve the problem with stubborn or stuck key mappings. FE2 uses multiple cores - FE1 and FEgold used a single processor core I think. "Bouncy elevators," also known as porpoising - can be reduced by lowering the "ElevatorDeltaPitch" value in the data ini file for the aircraft that is displaying the problem. (Values should be set to between about 1.0 and 1.5. Often they are as high as 3.0 and this causes nasty bouncing when the AI is chasing you.) Same thing with gun unjams. The gun unjam setting can be toggled either to true or false (allow or don't allow for gun jams) - this is in the data ini file too. Those files reside in the aircraft folder that you've installed and can also be opened in a text editor and modified. Planes that came stock with the game probably don't have the data ini present (for those you have to extract their data inis from one of the game's files known as CAT files). A much simpler solution is to download my FM tweaks for the game and install either all the data ini tweaks or choose the ones you want, since I've extracted and modified the data inis for the stock planes too, and I've tried to get rid of elevator "porpoising" whenever possible too. There's a detailed Read Me file included with my FM tweaks - if you are familiar with the Greybeard tweaks for RB3D - mine are similar in the sense of trying to be historical. My FM tweaks are located at: http://combatace.com/files/file/15857-tweaked-flight-models-for-fe2/ To improve accuracy rates for guns fired by AI, try tweaking the following three settings located under the AIData section of the data ini file for the plane that's displaying the lousy marksmanship: GunnerFireChance= GunnerFireTime= GunnerAimOffset= The above three settings are still a mystery to me as well and I haven't yet bothered tweaking them. Also, if you want more easily to try improving AI accuracy (of opponents) - set the enemy skill level under game settings from normal to hard and see if this improves things, before tinkering with the data ini settings. Happy flying, Von S

Hello Gents', Thought I'd post here instead of starting a new post since these are musings on FE2 anyway. Has anyone been able to get the streamers going on the Morane Bullet, or the Le Prieur rockets on the Nieuport types? Also, what about the mystery/invisible Vickers machine gun on the late, "Vickers" Nieuport 16? I was tinkering with the Vickers Nieuport 16 today, thinking of "converting" it to a Siemens-Schuckert D.1, but the invisible machine gun is making things difficult. This is possibly so since the multiple Nieuport 16 variants pack available here was probably made for FE1 initially. I did have good luck tweaking the basic "Nieuport 16" folder and data ini file for FE2 many months ago - that Nieu 16 has a single Lewis gun above the top wing, "baked" into the skin of the model I think, and works beautifully in the Mid east and Western theatres (assigned to the RFC and French). The late Vickers Nieu. 16 on the other hand is ghastly to tweak. I did manage to get the muzzle blast for the Vickers visible, but no gun. Frustrated with the poor results, I tweaked the Nieu. 17bis data ini today instead, that I had previously tweaked anyway to remove the top Lewis gun, and it now behaves beautifully as a SSW D.1. The cowling should of course be opened at the bottom, a spinner added to the prop, and the top wing lowered by about 6 or 7 inches (in real world terms...don't know how much of a change that would require to the wing in game) - for it to look more convincing as an early Siemens (this is beyond my talents) - but for now I'm happy with this temporary solution. If somebody figures out how to make visible the Vickers for the Nieu. 16 - I'll try "converting" that one to a Siemens-Sh. D.1 instead since it already has the half-open engine cowling. Here's a couple of pics of my current solution...will perhaps upload this for a Version 8.0 update. Siemens-Sh. D.1s were used on the Eastern front, not so much in the Western theatre where they were largely trainers. Happy flying, Von S

The Bortdafarm FMs are indeed a mystery - I "fixed" the Fokker B.I by Bortdafarm a while back and the revised FM is available in my FM tweaks for those interested. It now flies as well as that single-bay, wing-warping Fokker should have flown. Previously it would just hurtle into the ground in FE2. The type is a good climber though - for most of the fixes to work I had to transplant some info. from the Peter/Ojcar FM for the double-bay Fokker D.II - and revise through trial and error - otherwise I tend to avoid the Bortdafarm FMs, although the models are indeed beautiful and cover some of the rare types. Happy flying, Von S

Yes, the fuel leak effect happens on occasion - I've seen it happen a bit more using the Starry effects, but it's possible to get going once in a while with the Laton effects too - a nice white stream of fuel vapor, then the engine cuts out after about 10 seconds of the fuel vapor effect. This of course requires either a lucky shot on your opponent or a well-placed round usually from below, and right into the engine area. I maybe get one fuel vapor/leak effect into an opponent every 7 or 8 missions - they are quite rare but aesthetically pleasing. Von S