Give me some "holy sh... did that just happen" ideas [Archive]

Feathered_IV

11-12-2009, 12:46 PM

Thank God you asked. Just a few that I would suggest:

* AI that don't just have skill levels, but also levels of aggression. Aces that fight defensively/rookies that throw themselves in. Bloody minded types that will shoot you after you bail. AI on a slider. Or rather, AI on several sliders.

* Anti-aircraft box barrages as an object that can be positioned in FMB. Currently the Il-2 series has every single gun calculating the shot and eating up cpu cycles. Really dense flak is not practical. Better to have an extra option for a placeable barrage you can put down yourself. When hostile aircraft enter the area, it sparks and bangs and hurts you if you get too close.

* AI crewmen that give intelligent information and can see and report on the world around them.

* First-person bail outs. No more arcade jumps to third person view at the moment of greastest immersion.

* Oxygen on, gunsight and reflector on. Or off for that matter. Thrill your mates with stories of the perfect bounce - that would have succeeded if only you'd taken the guns off saftey...

* Bailing out. Ctrl-E key does everything for you? Meh. How about an difficulty option for complex bailouts. Different inputs required to disconnect radio, oxygen, straps, jettison the hood, get over the side and then pull the rip-chord. Try doing that when you are on fire.

* Hypoxia

* More than one effing radio frequency!

* After Mission Reports. Lately I've modified my install of Il-2 so that the enemy-destroyed messages are removed. It is surprising what you can and can't remember after an engagement. What if your campaign victory claims are granted or rejected based on how much information you can provide in a the debriefing screen? If you know the time and location of a kill, plus other particulars, you'd stand a much better chance of being awarded a destroyed, rather than a probable.
The lazy or disinterested player could have an option to bypass such a feature.

A few other choice rants from the darker days of the SoW news blackout:

"The Il-2 series is pretty. I have no doubt that SoW will be very pretty too. The weather will change. The AI will occaisionally sh*t their pants and the FM's will be great.

And we'll all go around, doing the same things as we are doing now. Just in a more detailed environment.

But really, don't you think there should be more to the future of air combat simulations than just cookie cutter dogfights and dropping a stick of bombs? Do you really just want to play the exact same pair of missions all over again for another five to ten years ?

What if other mission perameters were coded in? What other options could we get?

Maybe instead you'd like to pilot a Lysander for SOE. Fly over to France at zero altitude in the dead of night. Alone in the dark, you would struggle to find 'that little field' marked on your map and glide into it, engine off so as not to alert the Jerries.

Perhaps you'd rather fly a Storch, evacuating wounded from the combat area. Or maybe spotting for the artillery? What if you could give directions and targeting information to ground units?

What about unarmed photo recon? Take your Blenheim across to France to take photographs of the invasion barges. Photographs that the campaign generator can judge and pass you on.

Coastal Command perhaps? Why not have a crew that can actually call out the sightings of distant ships and other objects and give an intelligent description of their range, type and heading?

Or nightfighters with AI radar operators that can actually guide you to the kill?

Wouldn't you like to try to fly a danerously overloaded Ju-52 into the icy landing strips of Stalingrad one day? Or a C-47 over the Himalayas?

There has to be more to this genre than, fly to waypoint and shoot stuff down. Or fly to waypoint and drop some bombs. There has to be. :( "

Some more:

"It is heartening to see so many people feeling the same way about this. I just hope that Oleg and the team do too.

Taking the SOE Lysander mission type as an example, certain parameters would need to be coded in to make it work convincingly. Most particularly target waypointing and ground unit AI behaviour.

Imagine this:

Having crossed the Channel in the dead of night, you bank and circle "that little field" that you were directed to in the briefing. The target has a rendezvous time (get there too early and the enemy ground units will arrive before your friends do). At the appointed time you get a flashlight signal from the from the ground. (Hidden Target Complete). You cut the motor and sideslip in. The game engine is designed in such a way that it can recognise just how close the player is to the rendezvous point when their aircraft rolls to a stop. When you are on the ground, the clock is ticking. Land close to the friendlies and there is not long to wait. The further you are from the landing point the longer you have to sweat it out. If the friendly units make it to your aircraft, you get the Mission Complete and you can get the hell out of there.

While this is going on, you have AI enemy ground units that are smart enough to detect your presence and converge on your location. Maybe they will get there first....

Similar mission building parameters can be used for air-ambulance missions or supply drops, providing the builder can vary the duration of the stay on the ground. It is a simple enough idea, but versatile and effective. It just needs devs who care enough about it to put it into practice."

Between missions:

"Another aspect that would greatly benefit offline play is a kind of Renown System. Something like what is available in Silent Hunter 3, which btw gracefully managed to avoid the corny CFS3 roleplaying element.

At the moment in the Il-2 series, you fly missions and get kills and rise up the ranks. But it is meaningless in any broader sense, other than whether you get to fly at the back of a formation, or whether you fly at the front. Your success or failure has no other significance.

What if as a neophyte pilot in SoW your aircraft is the war-weary crate that no one else wants?

What if as you gain experience and become an asset to the unit you get entrusted with a better aircraft? How would that be?

What about if you rise to the rank of Flight, or even Squadron Leader? Higher rank means higher responsibility. Perhaps the amount of work you would be expected to do in between missions will become even greater. You would need to manage your pilots and personnel. Allocate your flights, request replacements, and give commendations. Instead of just gawping at the briefing screen before a mission, what if you could actually issue orders to your pilots before the mission begins? You could assign your pilots objectives, waypoints, altitude and strategies. How would that suit you?

And what if you became an ace? A real experten? You would have your pick of the ground personnel. Your aircraft would be top of the line. Your renown would ensure that new aircraft and equipment would flow in. Requests for reassignment or replacements would be looked on favourably by Command. Experienced pilots would request transfers to your unit....

Honestly, am I reaching for the effing stars here??? "

Still more:

"I guess being a Kanone of greater rank would have bestowed some perks that would translate nicely into a flight sim. Getting priority on equipment, aircraft and the like for the unit. A well serviced personal aircraft with less chance of mechanical failure than the latest sprog's. The chance to request a transfer (and maybe even have it granted). Or the chance to poach experienced pilots from other units. Your input on a tactical level would be respected and considered before a mission...

It's details like that that I support, certainly not cliched roleplaying"

"What happens if you rise in rank? Will you just get a warm fuzzy feeling and just fly at the front of the group? Would a rise in rank from Staffel Kaptain up to Kommodore be completely meaningless in your SoW? How should such a promotion effect your game? How would it effect, 'the role of a pilot in WW2'? "

Finally:

"Working Radar Control in Online Play:

You log on to an SoW server and join the game. A mission is already in progress. On the briefing map, you can see that there are plots all over the board.

You select RAF and choose a Spitfire flying out of Hornchurch. The server auto-generates you the callsign Baker, Blue Three.

Entering the game, you taxi out of your revetment and scramble immediately. Climbing hard, en-route for Dover you ask control for an intercept vector. You key in the commands for this (promising yourself you will get around to sorting out the voice activation system one day soon. Everybody says it's amazing).

You key in: Tab> 1> 3> 2. "Hello Control> This is Baker Blue three> Requesting vector."
Using voice samples similar to those in the old Il-2, the AI controller replies, "Hello Baker Blue three. Steer 160. Bandits inbound at angels zero. Range 40 miles. Over" The AI controller has appointed you a "channel" based on your location on the map. Not everybody hears the same control messages, thus avoiding clutter. A pair of Hurricanes nearby have heard this however, and change course to intercept.

"Hello Baker Blue Three. This is control. Are you recieving me? Over."

Ah whoops! Unlike the Il-2 series, this controller actually requires a response to communications. If you do not respond to calls he will keep calling you, before finally giving you up as lost.
You key in: Tab> 1> 3> 6. "This is Baker Blue Three. Received and understood."

Minutes later, speeding across the feilds of Kent, you key in a request for an update from control.
"Hello Baker Blue three. Steer 160. Contact faint. Bandits at angels zero. Range 20 miles. Over"
They are holding course then. Twenty miles would put them just north of New Romney...

Suddenly the AI control breaks in:
"Hello Baker Blue three. Bandits now heading two zero. Steer oh seven oh. Buster!"

You acknowledge and open the throttle wide, swinging onto the new heading. Your heart skips a beat as two Hurricanes flash across your nose.

"Hello Baker Blue three. This is control. You are right on top of them."
You dip your wing. Can't see a bloody thing. No, wait...there they are! Three fast moving shapes. Darting across the town of Ashford. Rooftop height. Me110's from Erpro-210, making a run for Biggin Hill. You key in the last call - a tallyho to Control. Saftey catches off. Gunsight on. As you half roll into the dive, the gunner of the rearmost 110 is already firing...... "

Well, you did ask. ;)

lep1981

11-12-2009, 12:51 PM

I totally agree on the mechanical failures problem... as long as it fits the real issues reported by pilots and/or ground crews back then and trying to get them in the same frequency (obviously aproximately). Example: failure or misreading of the fuel gauge, inaccurate altitude readings in the instrument panel (could "spice" the trip during a bad weather/low visibility flight) but being careful not to over use those failures.

Also, secondary/oportunity targets or objectives... example: I'm a british pilot, scramebled with relatively low fuel, main mission is to intercept a few bombers with escort, and we succed or not... however, my squad is returning to base, but suddenly the radar spots a second formation incoming to the coast, my fuel is very limited by then, do I attack ot not?? is my plane in conditions to face a new attack or do I have to land for repairing/rearming?... to really make all this count, your decition should have an impact in the whole single player capaign somehow.

nearmiss

11-12-2009, 12:57 PM

What about navigation for the player flight that doesn't require following a waypoint path directly. The player flight follows a heading or ADF beacon and enters a waypoint area, which is set for size in mission builder. Allow for Aircraft scrambles with no briefings. Radio comms give directions, altitude, and expected enemy contact.

The player will have to maintain a better feel for where he is going by heading, landmarks and/or homing signals.

Radio comms for mission changes on the fly.

The AI follows waypoints, and has alternative waypoint options that can be changed by triggers.

It is so not for real following waypoints. I'd be willing to bet most players do just like I do. They 8x to action areas. Does it make any sense to just ride along for 30 minutes looking at a computer screen or however long it takes from waypoint to waypoint to arrive at the action area?

If the waypoint track has got to be followed in some cases then allow for both methods, for player only.

Feuerfalke

11-12-2009, 01:07 PM

On ground:
Spawning: It would be great if you could e.g. choose the position where you spawn either from fixed options or freely in a given area. This would also add a lot to squadron activities and limit the occasions where teammates have to taxi 10 minutes to coordinate a teamstart.

Airfield Activities: Another good point already mentioned is airfield activities. I wouldn't even go as far as interaction with ground-crews, but e.g. fueltrucks or vehicles being spawned randomly around the airfield when the mission starts. That would also make raids on airfields a lot more interesting.

TASKS: More decent briefing. E.g. by assigning different tasks. Simple example: Teamgame, each with groundtargets available: Choose between Task Strike, Escort, CAP or FreeHunting. You could even have specific briefings and loadouts per task. If this would also be listed e.g. in score-screen, it would be much easier to coordinate even without sophisticated c3.

Tower communications would also be nice, e.g. informing about wind- and general weather conditions and takeoff-direction.

In flight:
C3: Ground c3 by not only reporting enemy planes located by spotters or radar, but also from groundunits unter attack and leading flights to corresponding areas. Even if not realistic, it could work like this:
Unit A is under attack, c3 calls out location and asks who will assist (not all players fly in teams or squadrons, so IMHO you have to account for this at least online) - Then pilots have the choice to either accept the mission or continue with what they are doing.
As with the example with Tasks above, you could also integrate this and change tasks inflight.

More communication especially with gunners on multicrewed bombers, giving position, number and types of attacking aircraft.

Playable ATC/c3

Ingame communications only with Push-To-Transmit. Really, really, needed. I don't want to hear pilots barking at their wifes or sneezing or eating. It does more than killing immersion...

And of course my all-time-favourites:
Killmarkers and individual markings ;)

Well, just a few ideas ;)

Feathered_IV

11-12-2009, 01:13 PM

Unusual but distinctly BoB AI behavior, such as a group of Me110's that adopt a defensive ring when attacked.

Blenheim formations that bunch together and drop down to wavetop height when engaged.

Crew members that can be seen to be struggling to escape or even stuck in the hatch of doomed aircraft.

Parachutes that don't open.

Friendly fire. Both on the ground and in the air.

Aircraft that will abort from a formation.

Radios or even oxygen that can be knocked out.

Bombers with one wheel dangling as the hydraulics are shot away

Very rare - Bombers that drop their wheels in surrender and can be guided back to your base.

Feathered_IV

11-12-2009, 01:20 PM

Static aircraft avilable in FMB with extra visual options:

Skin selection

Cowlings on/ cowlings off

Ground crew in attendance

No ground crew

Being fueled

Being armed

Destroyed 1, 2, 3.

Cannibalised for parts/abandoned

Feathered_IV

11-12-2009, 01:36 PM

Unique FMB triggers. You could have one that triggers a .wav sample when you fly through it. You could have a folder full of user-made samples that you could instruct the trigger to generate on command. Everything from ground control, crew intercom (banter, oxygen checks, navigation etc) or mission instructions.

Bomb aimers that give you the "left, left... steady" routine on the bomb run.

Gunners or pilots of other aircraft that wave or gesture when you form up really close

Feuerfalke

11-12-2009, 02:01 PM

In multicrewed bombers ability for crew to man other guns where applicable, if the original gunner was incapacitated or killed.

Need to reload gunners MGs where applicable.

Ability to switch to ouside view on own aircraft, even on cockpit restricted areas, as long as the plane is on the ground (e.g. to see your skin in action, or as an easy method to walk around the plane after the mission, if it is not implemented in 1st or 3rd person mode.)

Specht

11-12-2009, 02:05 PM

Sudden engine failures even without taking any damage...

SlipBall

11-12-2009, 02:38 PM

More along the line of "did I just see that"...OK how bout this, you set her down in a field in enemy territory. You notice the farmer leaving the barn carring a pitch fork as he scurries to the house.:o

JVM

11-12-2009, 03:11 PM

Hello Luthier!

Like I said earlier the changing weather is an inexhaustible source of aggravating events during missions. It may be interesting to combine this with some instrument failures especially altimeter and compass...A great many A/C of all nationalities met their fate because they did not know where they were, or how high they were, because of failure or heavy icing and they finished their careers on high ground or power cables (think Helmut Lent, Werner Mölders and so many others...). It did not really matter if they were rookies or aces...

About interesting events:

- during a patrol set an unsuspecting trainer coming out of nowhere in the middle of the flight at same altitude (works well with an unsuspecting enemy A/C)
- bad weather attack (again) meet barrage balloons...Remember the Ju 88 who pancaked on a balloon...and made it to base (its pilot would become one of the bomber aces)
- attack on heavy railway gun tracks in the Pas de Calais area (was happening during all BoB length, usually using Bleinheims)
- recce flight on obscure forward airfield being setup somewhere in North of France (where is the damn field? lot of examples)
- help Bleinheims dealing with the field you discovered the day before
- If DYNAMO operation at Dunkerque is allowed time-wise, protecting the ground troops during evacuation
- Game in Game: in charge of testing an A/C with a certain problem: identify properly the problem, bring back the A/C without crashing...
- other game: forcing a Bf 109 to land/go to sea without firing one shot
- one day the bad weather during the night has reduced your potential take-off run to 300 yards and the enemy is coming at you...meet him and come back on the same 300 yards.
- these damn He-115 are minelaying again: find them and deal with them (at night, obviously)
- Resistance informs us that one high ranking officer of the Luftwaffe is intending to visit coastal airfields with its personal Bf 108 unescorted at a certain hour near a certain place: try to find him before his subordinates find you with their Bf 109...

This what comes to my mind for now...

JVM

Igo kyu

11-12-2009, 03:37 PM

For me, personally, I'd say don't bother.

The cool things happen by random chance, if it's scripted it's not cool. Give the AI some realistic options and just by chance, occasionally, they will combine those options in unexpected ways.

ECV56_Guevara

11-12-2009, 04:13 PM

Lovely thread Luthier!
If i understood you, here are my suggestions;
The targeting system in Il-2 it´s great but when you buil 500 mission it´s a lil bit repetitive. We need more "targets"
IE:
- targeteable airfields , whit also targeteable components, like fuel depot (whith its own marker) the runway itself, service buildings, bomb and ammo bunkers, AA fire control units, barraks etc..the posibilities are multiples. The final status of an airbase could be an average of its components status. Theres no need for modelling ground crews. for example a raid hit hardly the airfield, destroying the mechanics barracks, so the af will have a lower repair rate. Could be supply convoys that change that status, in general or particular aspects.
-The same for other targets, like Industries, radar stations, docks, etc...In Il-2 to "damage" a factory we need tu put markers inside. It would be great a kind of industrial damage marker, that decrease the factory output.
-rescue mision targets (pilots, resistance members, etc..)
-Triggers
- Real recce missions, whit a airborne camera in the plane, something like the bombsight view, I don´t know how could it be done.
- Mine layers !
- cargo convoys whit real cargo, like trains, ships, trucks, etc..
whit stuff like these, Bob still remains a fligth sim, but with more ground interaction.
Thanks!

lep1981

11-12-2009, 04:21 PM

Originally posted by ECV56_Guevara
The targeting system in Il-2 it´s great but when you buil 500 mission it´s a lil bit repetitive. We need more "targets"
IE:
- targeteable airfields , whit also targeteable components, like fuel depot (whith its own marker) the runway itself, service buildings, bomb and ammo bunkers, AA fire control units, barraks etc..the posibilities are multiples. The final status of an airbase could be an average of its components status. Theres no need for modelling ground crews. for example a raid hit hardly the airfield, destroying the mechanics barracks, so the af will have a lower repair rate. Could be supply convoys that change that status, in general or particular aspects.
-The same for other targets, like Industries, radar stations, docks, etc...In Il-2 to "damage" a factory we need tu put markers inside. It would be great a kind of industrial damage marker, that decrease the factory output.

I love this idea :) certainly something i've always wanted... in fact, the first main attacks of the luftwaffe on england were focused on airfields, so giving realism to this situation would be amazing.

ECV56_Guevara

11-12-2009, 04:29 PM

I almost forgot, all Feathered_IV suggestions are wonderfull!
Bomb aimers directing the fligth rocks!
nigthfighters whit radar operators!
Lysander missions, air supply whit real cargo, I.E to keep operative and airfield, you need to land 4 transports, or 75% of its cargo.
Hidden targets, like killing or capturing an high rank officer in ground or in air, whit a bonus effect in moral or airfield status or something. It could make rescue misiion for both sides, the first in rescuingave a few more ideas. Later I´ll post it.
By the way is this what you asked Luthier?

secretone

11-12-2009, 04:35 PM

Historically correct sounding voices in the recordings with attention to appropriate tones of voice, attitudes, accents and even RAF slang.

http://natureonline.com/37/56-ap4-glossary.html

Historically correct background music.

Pictures, recordings of historical figures (Churchill, Hitler etc.) and events taking place at the time so as to create the bigger picture. Newsreel or radio broadcast format simulated perhaps.

Lucas_From_Hell

11-12-2009, 04:52 PM

Pictures, recordings of historical figures (Churchill, Hitler etc.) and events taking place at the time so as to create the bigger picture. Newsreel or radio broadcast format simulated perhaps.

I don't know if it will be possible, as I think Hitler's image is forbidden in some countries (I don't know it in details, but I'm sure I've heard stuff regarding to this before). Maybe if they set it as an option it would be OK, but I'm not sure. If I remember correctly, this was also the reason why swastikas are missing on IL-2. Can anyone confirm this?

About the suggestions, I have an interesting idea, but it would only work properly if there's a way to set a one in a million probability of this happening.

Setting real human-like actions to the AI. People ofter only worry with tactics, and they forget the respect that airmen had between them.

In a less rare (but still much unusual) scenario, enemy aircraft ceasing the attack when noticing their target is in serious trouble, and attackign would be acting cowardly.

In a very rare case, the airman from the opposing side could even approach the aircraft, wave wings, or maybe doing some hand signals, and break away.

And now, adding the one in a million chance I've mentioned, facts like escorting them to safety, as happened with Rudorffer twice, once escorting, and once being escorted.

I'm not aware of all the limitations of the engine, so I don't know if this is anything close to being possible, but these are features that would give a much more human feel to the simulator.

Mango

11-12-2009, 05:13 PM

Feathered and others have some excellent ideas here! And for the most part, it should not require much more coding and resources.

Just look at how much more fun FSX was with the introduction of missions, and all they did was throw a bunch of voice recordings over some scripts and triggers. Very little custom animations were required, just this vehicles goes here and that plane flies there kind of thing. A large part of the immersion comes from what we hear over the radio.

As others have said, setting up challenges that were unique to the Battle of Britain and placing more emphasis on communicating with control would make a huge difference. The player should feel very distinctly that this is 1940 Britain, not any other theatre. The situation is desperate, the weather is crap, and invasion is a very real possibility!

Feathered's account of "Working Radar Control in Online Play:" makes my hair stand up. Somehow the sharp, concise exchanges with radar control makes things much more exciting (at least it did in Battle of Britain movie 1969). Imagine trying to process all this information coming over the radio while orienting yourself in the clouds, scanning for enemies and dealing with an unreliable engine.

Peoples ideas here for non combat missions are excellent too. Having the odd recon mission between interception sorties will help mix things up.

Chivas

11-12-2009, 06:02 PM

Triggers, Triggers, Triggers

Option to turn off instant Refly

Refuel, Rearm, Repair with an option for user defined turnaround times

Lively Airfields...I'd hoped for ground crew, but I understand your limits at this time
You could however have refuel trucks and equipment driven to meet you at the turnaround hard stand for refueling and rearming after landing and taxiing to a dispersal point.

Let say we hit a formation of bombers over Manston that are heading to London. I would like to land at Manston rearm and refuel and hit the same bomber group heading home after their mission.

Do you plan on ground crew in some future addon in the series?

A very acurate ingame map for navigation using the mark 1 eyeball.

An Off-line 24/7 campaign that you can keep running, fast forward, or pause. Jumping into any flight at any time or just taking off from any airfield with or without wingman to do your own thing.

An On-line 24/7 campaign where the AI are performing normal attack and defend BOB missions were players could jump into any AI aircraft at any time. Or take off alone or in groups for frejag and jabo missions with triggers to intercept if detected.

The only real difference between the Off-line On-line campaigns is user defined options and server defined options, and the amount of players that can join.

ruxtmp

11-12-2009, 06:14 PM

How about cut scenes for when you are shot down, crash, die, promoted, earn medals, instead of a text just saying what happens.

Rescued - scenes showing you being picked up by destroyer, rescue dingy, float plane, or if you do not go for a swim walking back to base, hitching a ride etc.

Captured - shows your pilot being escorted away to a POW camp, picked up at sea, being held at gun point by a angry farmer etc.

MIA- lost at sea scene showing you floating away never to be found, maybe with a search and rescue team almost finding you but turning away too early.

Death - military funeral scene, telegram notice being delivered to family, etc.

Crash at airfield - fire trucks, ambulance, other vehicles and personnel running to your plane to rescue you.

Wounded pilot landing - ambulance racing to your aircraft as you pull off the runway etc.

AA_Absolute

11-12-2009, 06:41 PM

Disable superhuman pilots turning time and time at semi-high G's with no vision damage, how time could fly one pilot (no g-wear)at 3-4 G's?

S!

Feuerfalke

11-12-2009, 07:34 PM

Effects of icing/freezing on instruments and flight characteristics.

Secondary explosions after shooting at ground-targets.

Nice effects for shattering glass or canopy e.g. by influencing vision.

Partially blocked controls.

Jams depending on maneuver and conditions.

Fire causes further damage not only by exploding a tank, but e.g. by burning elevator and rudder if located directly behind the fire.

BTW: In B-17 II flying through dense FlaK caused a thrilling sound, when the plane collided with a non-lethal shrapnel e.g. falling back to the ground. That increase immersion vastly. IIRC the smoke from the FlaKpuffs also left some dirt on the glass.

hiro

11-12-2009, 07:46 PM

That's great asking for ideas here . . .

heinkill at sim hq said the maps were 1:1

a previous poster mentioned this also . . . some way to auto speed (and lot run out of fuel like in IL-2) past the monotonous times to the action.

Or a 8th AF bomber flight, it said they were up there for hours not seeing anything .

While it would be cool for ultra realism, I don't have several hours to fly across the channel and bomb my target if I wanted to play the Luftwaffe bomber role.

mission variety . . .

your pilot is ordered go with special forces to capture their new fighter plane (while you don't see a movie or what not) you spawn inside an enemy plane, with / without a fire fight going on around you

You take off and then you have to get back to home, avoid enemy fighters and even your own fighter.

Some charity asked someoone in your squad to over fly and do some flight manuevers over an orphanage and somehow your name came up.

Alot of it would be to remove the static / independent of the sim.

Say for example your unit is not the only one operating in that area . A german bf 109 pilot, say if running out of fuel and having to return early, would see the german air sea rescue, the sea plane, the escorts flying about.

Or if you over fly a an enemy airfield in the early morning and no flak, but few minutes later, they launch fighters to intercept you.

On joining up, the formation is missing a squadron or has too many

etc

On the way home, you get remaining pieces of other flights (planes) rejoining up your group for added protection.

You squadmates have different personalities. Some are overly aggressive, some are very calculating. SOmetimes one will say something, "Oh S***" before you roll in to attack enemy fighters.

Sometimes the funny one will make a quick joke or tell quick story and leader has to tell them to shut up.

Mechanical . . .

Sometimes you take off and you're leaking oil or something and your squad leader tells you to go home.

An Option for refly ONLY if you: crashed, landed, or bailed out, or pilot is dead or too injuired to fly.

Ground control interaction would be nice.

Enemy does more actions than just engage you. AI makes mistakes. Some may aggressively engage, or sometimes they may run, or do something half hearted, and run or then go full intent to kill you. Or they run and return back with some friends etc

Ground targets like trucks drive off the road and disperse, or if one end of the bridge was just bombed they try to get off of it, or go the long way instead of lining up before the bridge.

There is a furball above your airfield and you decide to take off (single player only LOL)

AAA ranges you (starts by being far off, then closer and closer).

Radios . . .

The site below has lot of information
http://www.virtualpilots.fi/hist/WW2History-MaunoFrantila2English.html (not the article that had the radio)

I remember reading some of the article of finn pilots and they had where the radios sometimes picked up not just your transmissions but others.

They would hear the other Finnish squadrons operating, the Russians ordering their crews, and sometimes the Germans in idle talk . . .

It'd be cool to get radio interference in the form of random stuff from the otherside (not exactly from your opponents you are fighting with but other squads operating in that area).

Random stuff

Say you read the briefing ... usual combat patrol, as you're about to engine start, the staff / captain runs up to you, and you get NEW briefing on a totally different target, another base is being bothered and you need to go there with your squad and provide fighter cover.

Or you're cleared for take off but have to wait (sometimes ) while a damaged spit comes in for a landing or your hot headed "friend" jumps ahead and takes off.

Women. The civilian woman with the blown skirts would be a good selling point for the game LOL if you buzzed by with your Spit.

It'd be cool to hear them as ground controls . . .

Maybe not for BOB, but when you guys get to VVS . . .

- Also it would be cool for say if you were a german pilot and fighting against a VVS pilot, you zipped close by on a nose 2 nose pass, and it was Lilya Litvyak!

VVS had the options for 586th Fighter Regiment

Or for US, you run into a flight and its WASPS chatting . ..

wjc103

11-12-2009, 07:48 PM

To whom it may concern,

Oleg has already mentioned this, but I really was interested in the idea of being able to fly rescue missions with a sea plane. Or, after bailing out being in the first person, and waiting to be rescued by a sea plane.

Also along those lines of being able to bail out in the first person, it would be interesting, I think to many, to walk around until captured would be interesting. I don't think a tremendous amount of animation is necessary for this to be an interesting feature. I think many would be satisfied to just have the view, and very rudimentary controls left, right etc. No shooter animation needed, just another vantage point.

Whether or not the sea planes or first person bailing out is in the release, could be something for the future.

CH_kurkio

11-12-2009, 07:54 PM

We're trying to spice up the single player experience, so I'm trying to come with either more exciting mission types, or some one-off mission events, surprises for the player that can happen under the right circumstances.

Once upon a time I used to make missions for CFS2, a whole campaign based on VF-17 actually. And one thing that was good in CFS2 was the mission builder. For example you have triggers, they can be area triggers for example. With these one could give the player the choise wether to go back to fight or fly home (ok, CFS2 also had the skip/jump option) or the triggers could be used to spawn more enemies or so that the enemy base holds fire until you are in the assigned area.

And another thing would be nice, random trigger. For example you fly to a certain area the trigger is used and here comes the random trigger, you have stationed 3 planes near the area where the player is, but the random trigger says wich one is spawned, not all just one and all of the 3 can have different planes, skill, altitude etc. With this randomisation the same simple mission is actually three missions in one.

-CH-

fuzzychickens

11-12-2009, 08:09 PM

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8324640976189633970#

Cannon ammunition in fw190 wings being "ignited" p51 50 cal fire.

Look at some of this footage. I think catastrophic failures like these with realistic probability of occuring would be absolutely heart racing when they do happen. Combine that with a nasty boom and shockwave through your "buttkicker" feedback mounted to your flight seat - woo hoo!

You can just about feel the intensity of some of those violent explosions.
I think it is currently modelled in IL2 but the wing just kinda pops off - no satisfaction.

Surely the fw190 wasn't the only plane this occurred on. What about planes carrying bombs? Did any catastrophic events occasionally occur there?

Also, I second the previous poster who mentioned the running into flocks of birds - that would be realistic and intense.

Alien

11-12-2009, 08:42 PM

Oh, and VERY SIMPLE commands by manouvers. I mean, i.e. reaction on friendly fire. You sweep your wings and then see your friend leveling with you, taking hand to canopy and flying away. It would be very nice to see

SlipBall

11-12-2009, 08:52 PM

I think that Feathered_IV has the answer to what would make SOW stand out and be a rewarding gaming experience...please concider his points

Feuerfalke

11-12-2009, 08:52 PM

Well, considering the initial wish:

This is what I always felt was important for SP-experience:

It's an absolute immersion killer, if you can be sure you're alone in the sky, maybe one other friendly squad and 1-4 enemy squads, maybe, but groundtargets only at your base and in your targetarea.
In games like Falcon, however, you have a feeling of being part of an actual war going on. There are numerous other plans and groups acting together, bombing targets, capping, etc. Also the enemy territory is never empty. You see convoys heading for the front, ships on the sea, and literally hundreds of units fighting on the ground along the fence-line.
It makes a huge difference, e.g. when just flying from Germany to England staring at the sea below and actually seeing or even reporting shipping and watch other units attack those. Maybe even submarines or speedboats nearby.
On the british side, what about squadrons being on alert. When your group runs into trouble, you can call for assistance.

In SilentHunter this also combines with being witness of important battles or operations. That's also definitely great for immersion.

As part of that, the most thrilling and intense moments I had, were when going into combat, taking of or enroute to the fence-line and you see other planes returning, smoking, engines out, attempting belly-landings, etc.
Also damages to groundunits, equipment and buildings staying that way over missions.

slm

11-12-2009, 09:28 PM

Three ideas:

-a bit more AI added to ships. If they notice a bomb/torpedo attack they could do some evasive manouvres, instead of staying on the path planned in Mission Builder. Like here:

http://users.swing.be/navbat/edito/navires/yamato2.jpg

-plane damage modeling effect not in IL2: in some planes when getting enough damage, the landing gear would go to landing position while flying and slow down the plane

-add a small explosion object to mission builder. Person making a mission could place such object inside buildings, static ships, fuel trucks etc. When it is hit during game, it would produce an explosion. The strength could be set in mission builder.

This way you could simulate things like ground attack hitting an ammo dump, fuel truck etc. Player couldn't see this effect in advance, because the object would be hidden inside bigger objects.

choctaw111

11-12-2009, 10:53 PM

Ilya, simply the best thing I can imagine, is to be in a virtual world that is believable, meaning a living breathing environment at the airfield, and even on the rest of the map.
The smallest sign of life on the map would be a huge plus.
What if we were flying over the countryside in France and occasionally see some people walking around, especially over a target, or even chickens, cows, birds. These are things you really don't need in a combat flight sim, but if you did find a way to put these things in, it would give a "holy sh**, did that just happen" kind of feeling.
What we have now are targets that are devoid of life. Just a bunch of objects we can destroy with some 3d gunners that really don't add life to the environment.
How about bridges and other objects that actually collapse when destroyed, not just a destroyed version versus an undestroyed version of the same object.
When I blow up a bridge, I want to watch that sucker fall into the water. When I blow up a tank, I want to see the turret pop off sometimes. When I blow up a car or truck, I want to see it flip over on occasion. What we have now are vehicles and trains that all blow up the same way. There needs to be some surprises when you blow stuff up.

Snuff_Pidgeon

11-13-2009, 02:15 AM

I think a nice idea might be to have some kind of dialoge with your mechanic ie.As your aircraft gets some flying hours up, you might notice your engine supercharger needs tunning or motor might be running a little rough or engine hoses and pipes wearing out.Also the availability of different grade octane fuels or even cotaminated fuels.Or in other situations your mechanic might be not so experienced and makes mistakes!In other words i suppose a serious ground check before flying, also a ground gun convergance target would be cool..

Romanator21

11-13-2009, 02:23 AM

Feathered's ideas are great, but I won't expect them in the first iteration of the release. Maybe after some patches. Remember, the most important and foremost thing is basic codework, then everything else falls into place.

Still, I hope to see them!

I like the idea of first person bail out, but I think (but I have no clue really) that this will take too much time/resources. It would be simpler to just use a cut scene rather than modeling the character doing all this stuff. I think cutscenes could be used in the example where someone requested driving a kubelwagen to their plane.

I like the idea of modeling hypoxia, and hopefully better modeling of becoming wounded. Blood does not need to be animated, but maybe, more blurry vision rather than red out, delay/ difficulty in the movement of your head. AI that makes friendly fire is a great idea that I hope to see, especially for rookie pilots. AI that can't see through their plane/clouds/into the sun. Also would be great if when AI was looking at his wingman to his right in a close formation, he might not see you coming from his left, even if it's in his normal field of view.

I hope there will be angular momentum modeled to some extent. If a bomber loses a wing, it will slowly lurch over and fall, not just instantly tumble like a leaf in the wind. Also if the planes do start to spin quickly, some G induced break up. On the idea of inertia, 'heaviness' of moving a machine gun around by the player: mouse movements dampened/delayed making aiming more difficult/realistic.

But above all: AI, DM, and FM. The nice animations can follow later when there's time and when there is a place in the engine.

Oesau

11-13-2009, 03:09 AM

Missions by their very nature are repetitive; brief, take off, fly to wp1, 2, 3, 4, action, land, debrief.

As stated what changes this are triggers, events etc so you can always through in different possibilities and variations on the mission by adding in % probably factors. Allowing mission triggers to control weather changes (if possible in the weather engine), failures, events by flying into different patrol zones that you weren’t briefed to.

Of course we do not know what mission tools are available for SoW so it can be difficult to provide some ideas that may be feasible.
However single player missions that have dynamic components can really provide some interesting missions that have a brief, but will be different for say… at least 4 times.

The method of brief and debriefs will be interesting to see what happens in this space (personally would love to see a mission planning components with the ability to print the map out with the waypoints drawn out etc etc).

Necrobaron

11-13-2009, 05:36 AM

Great thread! I've read some great and interesting suggestions.

I can think of some things however its hard to determine whether these would be scripted/triggered events vs. things that could happen dynamically. Anyway, some preliminary thoughts...

-How about a friendly pilot who goes absolutely crazy or loses his nerve?

-How about a friendly pilot who defects to the enemy?

-How about a friendly pilot crashing on take off?

I guess the above would have to be relayed somehow through radio comms or else people would blame this stuff on flaky AI.

-How about blowing out a tire and inducing a ground loop on takeoff or landing? I guess this could be more related to the DM than a scripted event.

-I think seeing blood splatter on the inside of the cockpit after being injured could be shocking. Maybe you could even bleed out or lose consciousness.

-Perhaps you could bail out and strike your plane, killing or injuring you.
________
Ship Sale (http://ship-sale.com/)

vpmedia

11-13-2009, 08:26 AM

well, thanks for asking:

- returning smoking bomber/recon plane over the Channel coming from the opposite direction, maybe escorted by few fighters

- seeing a returning smoking fighter coming home, while waiting for takeoff

- being jumped by a pair of fighters at unexpected locations where you feel secure otherwise

- seeing few aircraft battle over your field while takeoff, your side is in advantage

- seeing convoy of ships being attacked by stukas or coast artillery

- german speedboat formation engaging ships

- smoking/burning damaged ship, leaking oil maybe, sailors in lifeboats

- floatplanes operating, rescue operation in progress, pilots in water

- huge smoke columns in the distance, distant artillery fire

- trafic on the roads being attacked

- fishing boats operating and being attacked

- barrage balloon being hit by pair of fighters

- sudden starfing attacks out of nowhere

- enemy plane hitting ground while escaping in panic at low alt (for rookie pilots)

- enemy aircraft scrambling from airfields when attacked

- groups of horses/cows/sheep near farms/rural areas

You need very visible/oblivious things which capture the players attention
imho smaller details remain ofter unrecognized by the user.

lep1981

11-13-2009, 08:40 AM

Hi Luthier,

Another thing I've said before in another thread, but just to try to keep it always present, is the score system in multiplayer games (sorry to get in MP matters here but it looks appropiate).

To avoid whining online and to maintain the team spirit, kills should be scored by all the planes who HIT an enemy plane, I don't know how hard could this be to encode but I hope is something achievable within the time frame you guys have.

In IL2 if you kill an smoking plane you're not a good team player, you're a shoulder shooter or "kill stealer" and I have to admit sometimes I understand why the hard feelings... it is very annoying to see someone else rewarded for YOUR efforts while you're left with just 0 points.

So it would be great to be able to share kills.
;)

kendo65

11-13-2009, 02:49 PM

Hi Luthier,

I think Feuerfalke hit the nail on the head:

"It's an absolute immersion killer if you can be sure you're alone in the sky, maybe one other friendly squad and 1-4 enemy squads, maybe, but groundtargets only at your base and in your targetarea.
In games like Falcon, however, you have a feeling of being part of an actual war going on. There are numerous other plans and groups acting together, bombing targets, capping, etc."

Building on this - would it be possible to code a "randomise" function (I'm thinking of something similar to DGen where you could set levels of random friendly and enemy flights / ground activity, but much more powerful).

The difficulty lies in breaking out of the 'scripted' element of the missions - in real life you could NEVER be sure that intelligence / briefings were correct. So, how about REALLY screwing up the predictability of a mission by deliberately including the possibility (through the "randomise"function above) that what you actually experience flying the mission bears little or no resemblance to the briefing?

I can already hear the protests so let me try to explain:

In a proportion of the missions the randomised elements would completely overwhelm the scripted/briefed elements - eg you are expecting / briefed to fly a fighter-bomber mission over enemy territory - what you actually experience is being bounced shortly after take-off by enemy fighters. But here's the key - this happens on a random probabilistic basis (9 times out of 10 it won't occur. Other things will. Maybe you make the target and drop your bombs as planned)

I understand this has the potential to completely screw up BALANCE - so it would probably have to be switchable by players, but it definitely provides the possiblity to experience the unexpected (at the expense of truly 'balanced' missions)

For some possible examples of randomised occurences I quote from vpmedia's post:

returning smoking bomber/recon plane over the Channel coming from the opposite direction, maybe escorted by few fighters

- seeing a returning smoking fighter coming home, while waiting for takeoff

- being jumped by a pair of fighters at unexpected locations where you feel secure otherwise

- seeing few aircraft battle over your field while takeoff, your side is in advantage

- seeing convoy of ships being attacked by stukas or coast artillery

- german speedboat formation engaging ships

- smoking/burning damaged ship, leaking oil maybe, sailors in lifeboats

- floatplanes operating, rescue operation in progress, pilots in water

- huge smoke columns in the distance, distant artillery fire

- trafic on the roads being attacked

- fishing boats operating and being attacked

- barrage balloon being hit by pair of fighters

- sudden starfing attacks out of nowhere

- enemy plane hitting ground while escaping in panic at low alt (for rookie pilots)

Along the same lines I'd add:

on your way to your mission you see a damaged friendly bomber coming home low under attack from enemy fighters. What do you do? Try to help or press on as per your briefing?

Urufu_Shinjiro

11-13-2009, 03:50 PM

Someone mentioned this earlier but I really like this idea, being selected to test pilot new variants as they come online. I also like the idea of a group flying to another field to pick up some new planes or even the new variant your squadron is moving to, maybe even get jumped or diverted while on this delivery mission. I know animations have to be kept to a minimum but I would love to see the occasional enemy pilot waving his fist at you, or some of the displays of chivalry you hear about, like if the enemy pilot runs out of ammo before downing you, he'll pull alongside and waggle his wings and salute, this would have to be rare of course or it will loose it's significance.

I would also like to see if a pilot bails out in front of you just the wrong way he can hit and damage your AC.

Maybe on long bomber runs some member of the crew will tell a joke to break the tension, etc.

C6_Krasno

11-13-2009, 04:01 PM

-An interresting mission could be the calibration of radars, would require a lot of interaction with the ground control, but I understood that this interaction was already in the code. Maybe once in a campaign ?
-When downing an opponent over the sea, we could be able to tell the position of the enemy pilot to the ground control, so they send a rescue plane / boat. Idem for a wingman, if we see him under a chute. Maybe the player should have a feedback on his action : if the pilot was on his squadron, the simple fact that he is still here will be fine, but if it's an enemy pilot, maybe this enemy pilot could give the player his decorations, or something like that (in ROF, the player have a little gathering of objects he got during his missions : decorations, bits of planes, letters, etc).
-Even if you don't want to implement random failures in the player's aircraft, it could be interesting to fake them for his IA wingmen. For ex., your flight of 6 aircrafts takes off to intercept an enemy raid on your base, and one of your IA wingmen leaves the formation, while saying on the comms "Oil pressure down, I have to abort the mission".

wjc103

11-13-2009, 06:19 PM

I think VPmedia had a really good point, regarding, maybe having to wait on takeoff while a damaged fighter or bomber is landing, and listening to some "disturbing" radio chatter between injured pilot and ground control.

This could really put people in the right mood, before heading up to engage a bomber stream etc.

Blackdog_kt

11-13-2009, 07:55 PM

Some excellent ideas all around but without meaning to offend anyone, Feathered takes the cake as it seems he's been thinking a lot about it.

I would really like to sometime see similar things in SoW, especially non-combat missions or missions with unarmed aircraft. If i'm reading and deciphering Oleg's posts right, these guys are building an engine to handle everything in the sim at a centralized level, so most of what you have in singleplayer you could possibly have it in MP as well. If the engine is as moddable as they are hinting it is, then we could have different campaign layers to interact with, all of which would be possible to enable/disable. Do you just want to fly around and shoot things? Good, because you can. Do you want to read intelligence reports on your or the enemy industrial output and strategic priorities, then plan the sorties yourself? Fine again, you can do that too.
Imagine that we're 2 years in the future, flying an expansion of SoW and we have something like this...

According to the latest orders, we need to switch our attention to the enemy's oil production and metal works. To that end, we need to identify major targets in the Ruhr. We need accurate information about target layout and possible defences.
To that end and since you've recently been promoted to squadron leader and you want to lead by example, you're taking a photo recon mosquito this morning.

Taking off and climbing early before the sun has even risen, you are thinking about how to do this. Do you fly under the radar and make a low-level run, or climb really high for a better shot of the target and hope your altitude and speed will be enough to escape any interceptors the enemy radars will throw at you? You decide to come in high and get some good photos of the target, flak and fighters be damned. This proves to be a good choice, as on your way out there is a small fleet of German torpedo boats attacking some friendly ships. If you were low they could probably spot and report you, but you're too high for them. If you can see them however, you can report them and let Coastal Command vector someone to their vicinity to dispatch them. Nobody sees anyone though, so you both go about your business.

Crossing into Holland you check your navigation, you don't want to fly too close to any enemy airbases so your flight plan is zig-zagging between them. Radar will pick you up at some point of course, but why make your job harder? Nearing the Ruhr valley you make for the target. By this point it's almost certain that they know about you and your heading. Yep, just your luck, there's 4 little specks in the horizon, still below you but climbing hard. Wait, what is that? God, it seems like a dozen or so aircraft, maybe it's time to abort the mission. Firewalling the throttles you start climbing again, doing your best to keep high but not above the start of the contrail forming layer, something that will definitely give away your position for miles around (mig alley anyone? contrail formation height was a briefed item in that sim).

Suddenly, you see another contrail off in the distance and then another and they gradually multiply. Your heart stops racing as you realize that the specks you saw, now marginally identifiable as 109s, are not after you but some 8th AF heavies that are heading out on a raid of their own. They appear to have been engaged already, as some are streaming black smoke. You wish the heavies luck and swing around to avoid the 109s, just as you see 8 specks break away from the rear of the friendly formation and their contrails moving towards the 109s at a considerably faster rate. Yep, these must be the P47 escorts. This is definitely not your fight.

After a quarter of an hour you are over your briefed target, you snap your photos and make for home. You can see some activity in close-by airfields, dust is being kicked up by engine starts, so you assume they are now after you as well. Some 109s are returning with battle damage after their scrap with the 47s and some new ones are taking off, all in all there's a lot of activity going on and you need to slip by undetected. Firewalling the throttles again, you turn away from your briefed heading for a few minutes. Then, you go into a steep dive right down to the weeds. You are now under the radar and they should be looking at the wrong heading. Turning 90 degrees towards your real heading and having the extra speed from the long dive, you should be able to put quite a distance between your real position and the one they estimate...

One and a half hour later you are back at the base. In the evening your photos have been analyzed and the strike planned for the target. You take a look at the suggested flight plan and alter a few things, then distribute it to the squadron. The next evening, you strap into a mosquito with target marker flares and set out to guide the squad to a night raid on the target. As you cross the north sea, you are briefed about contacts, possibly enemy. These Ju88s are at it again...

Wall of text, i know, but sometimes it's better to tell a story than go all technical, as FeatheredIV demonstrated ;)
Just one final word for all this to work we're going to need a lot of dynamic triggers. We can't expect to have all this running on a current day PC, but it can run in the background and spawn/despawn accordingly, as the player nears or moves away from the items in question. Just my 2 cents.

drafting

11-13-2009, 08:44 PM

I still go back to bailing out...

I think it should be a pretty violent thing, which IL2 didn't quite capture...

Maybe pilots should tumble a bit after coming out of their plane instead of the sky-diver's 4-point fall from IL-2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUjveURQaFw#t=0m25s

I feel a bit crass relating this to real life, but here's actual guncam footage of pilots bailing out during the war:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTAiatDAaWI

Maybe your own bail out could be the same way. There won't be a physical body in the cockpit, but your view could mimic your escape with pulling back the canopy, turning, 'leaping out', and tumbling away from the plane...

Maybe the g-forces on the plane could limit your escape... If it's too violent, you aren't getting out at all (or it might just take longer).

mazex

11-13-2009, 08:50 PM

well, thanks for asking:

- returning smoking bomber/recon plane over the Channel coming from the opposite direction, maybe escorted by few fighters

- seeing a returning smoking fighter coming home, while waiting for takeoff

- being jumped by a pair of fighters at unexpected locations where you feel secure otherwise

- seeing few aircraft battle over your field while takeoff, your side is in advantage

- seeing convoy of ships being attacked by stukas or coast artillery

- german speedboat formation engaging ships

- smoking/burning damaged ship, leaking oil maybe, sailors in lifeboats

- floatplanes operating, rescue operation in progress, pilots in water

- huge smoke columns in the distance, distant artillery fire

- trafic on the roads being attacked

- fishing boats operating and being attacked

- barrage balloon being hit by pair of fighters

- sudden starfing attacks out of nowhere

- enemy plane hitting ground while escaping in panic at low alt (for rookie pilots)

You need very visible/oblivious things which capture the players attention
imho smaller details remain ofter unrecognized by the user.

Good suggestions! We already have the last one about enemy planes hitting the ground for no good reason in IL2 ;)

PanzerAce

11-13-2009, 09:55 PM

One thing I'd like to see is times where mission breifings aren't all that they could be. Instead of "Find a train in this location", it's "Find something to blow up", or "we *think* an attack is coming, better take off just in case."

Also, times where maybe you've done your patrol, you're about to land back at base, and the radar stations pick up an incoming attack. No time to land, rearm, refuel, so you have to turn right around and engage the new formation.

Also, as mentioned earlier: Other engagements happening while we are flying. That's one thing that kills IL2 single player for me. No other planes, no other ships, no ground targest beyond flak...It isn't war so much as jousting.

This could result in some interesting situations, like some of your escort fighters diverting to intercept an enemy bomber formation that has been spotted.

SlipBall

11-13-2009, 10:02 PM

Also, as mentioned earlier: Other engagements happening while we are flying. That's one thing that kills IL2 single player for me. No other planes, no other ships, no ground targest beyond flak...It isn't war so much as jousting.

You know of course, that you can create a mission as busy as you would like?

Igo kyu

11-13-2009, 10:07 PM

_RAAF_Firestorm

11-13-2009, 10:45 PM

Good call Ilya - a few have called up systems failures but there are some subtle ones that could add atmosphere, here are some suggestions:

1. An unexpected noise - something starts to clatter in the back of the cockpit, you cant make out what it might be... just makes you nervous, need to go through a systems / control check again.

2. Static over radio - can still hear but it's not clear, adds frustration to the heat of battle.

3. Morale failure, your wingman calls an engine failure and proceeds to RTB, do you let him go and proceed alone, or do you see him back to base?

4. Fatigue, your wingman falls asleep behind the stick - you have to wake him up through frantic radio calls.

erco

11-14-2009, 06:21 AM

Thanks for asking, Ilya. My thoughts are that a big ol' dose of the unexpected is always good- missions that don't go as briefed; changing conditions that demand a DECISION by the pilot (with the attendant consequences), finding that the 20 109's you just went out to intercept are 50! That sort of thing. And I wouldn't worry about making such events play-balanced- David vs Goliath is very interesting!

Other things that would be interesting: As you taxi in or out, a flight of (whatever) comes in low and fast, makes a snappy break and comes round to land; A training aircraft blundering into a dogfight; CAPing your downed comrade in his raft, as you try and cover the rescue boat or plane so that they can make the rescue before the other side can capture him.

A bomber intercept with hundreds of aircraft in a very small volume just HAS to be exciting! With tracers, collisions, explosions, smoke and debris flying around it makes for an incomparable picture.

But, the one thing that keeps coming back to me is that you guys just HAVE to leverage the weather abilities of your new engine. Taking off into a fog, breaking out into a brilliant sky above, or having to shoot a GCI approach to land after combat, possibly damaged, possibly in formation. Or shutting down your plane to see the first snow starting to fall- gentle and delicate after the stress of combat. Or trying to beat a thunderstorm to the field.

And having the weather worsen during a mission. One scenario that would be cool would be a bomber intercept in the midst of rapidly growing thunderstorms. Around the clouds and through the valleys between, lightning, turbulence and heavy rain when you inadvertantly penetrate a cell, popping out of a cloud to find yourself point blank with an enemy formation. That would be awesome!

How about an airshow mode? Fast-forward from the war to modern times and have the games' aircraft all staged for the greatest airshow ever. Or a setup for a spot landing contest?

There's so much that could be done. Thanks again for asking our opinions! I can't wait to see what the finished product will be!

Romanator21

11-14-2009, 08:06 AM

One idea: I imagine pilot's would not have the same plane for every flight. It would be nice if a damaged plane is returned you get another on the field which may have different weathering/performance issues. The damaged plane could appear in a hangar for repairs. If during a mission only a few non-damaging bullet holes are made that these remain for the next mission or two, or are patched in some way. It would also be nice to see that in a flight, the numbers are not totally in order. Ex, in a flight in IL-2 all aircraft are marked 1, 2, 3, 4 and fly in that order. If one has MatManager, then you can have a flight numbered 5,2,9,3, etc. For Bob, maybe the change in letters: ex. FH G, FH L, FH A, FH, Y.

drafting

11-14-2009, 04:25 PM

I think there are a lot of 'Holy sh..' moments in ground strafing...

Watching Youtube, usually when strafing ground targets you'll see some smoke or maybe fire, but every now and then, you'll get a 'HOOOOLLLYYY SHHHIIII' gigantic fireball and shockwave and see the pilot frantically yanking back and away from the towering inferno:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3t8nlIaQJaI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKomzCUZZDw

There're tons of stories too of pilots clipping trees and getting branches stuck in their wings, knocking off chimneys, sawing off the last half of their propellers from flying too low, and even flying through and out of those huge fireballs.

If Storm of War allowed that kind of stuff, I bet you'd hear all sorts of 'I can't believe I made it out of that!' stories. :)

Alien

11-14-2009, 05:24 PM

And you could make real-time bail outs. I mean when Heinkel is being shot down on 3000ft it's almost impossible that every crew member will bail out in the time. It would be very violent, but reallistic view, if you see Heinkel shot down by you and only 2-3 men bailed out.

ECV56_Lancelot

11-14-2009, 06:29 PM

Well, i will give you my personal list, even if some of them wouldn't be needed in Bob because of the scenario.

1) Firefighters. See firefighters trucks throwing water to aircrafts, hangar, or what ever, that is burning. See it when you will take off from an airfield that was recently attacked.
Or see it when you land on an airfield that just been atacked.

2) Have to use aircraft that are partially damaged (for example on a mission after being your airbase attacked), or even have some instruments missing because you don't have spare parts.

3) See trucks or tanks cross rivers in open field, in areas where the depth allow it.

4) Seeing "movile bridges". I don't know the term in english, i'm referring to armored vehicles that are modified to carry a folding bridge. And see them actually working, with tanks and vehicle passing over them after it defolded its "bridge".
My apologies for not being clear here, i don't know how to explain it well in english.

5) Ugly one! Have malfunctioning bombs. You drop a bomb and it doesn't explode. Its very realistic, but nobody wants it to happen to him :D.

6) Minefields: Have minefields where if you have infantery and or vehicles and tanks, you see the explosions and destruction cause by the mines.

7) Power generators. You destroy one with bombs or rockets, and lights turn off. Or something else stop working, like a radar or radio station for example.

8) Vehicles moving at night with ligths, and turn them off when they hear an aircraft near by (vehicles near the combat front), or are attacked by one (vehicles that are in areas that are unlikable to be attacked by an aircraft).
Can't be sure how realistic would this be, don't know if troops vehicles or civilian vehicles traveled with lights on during night when they are away from the front.
Movies are not a accurate source of information :D

9) Submarines: seeing submarines perform emergency sumergions when they spot bombers or several aircraft together flying towards them. But if they see a lone fighter, either submerge or decide to try to shot you down.

10) As the video posted bt mkubani, seeing secondary explosions of ships, holes made by torpedoes. Or even ships that brake in half.

11) More accurate aircraft operations. If 40 aircraft could be on the deck of the carrier and take off, i want to see that, and be part of that.

12) Silly one :). When you land after a mission, you could go out from your aircraft and walk to the building where the debriefing room is, and when you enter the building the mission stops automatically and you are on the debriefing room.
Of course, if you dont want to waste time, you can press escape and choose MISSION OVER like we do with most sims.

13) Ammunitions depots that explode and cause damage to near by buildin with all the explosiones and proyectile being throwed anywhere.

14) Very large, thick and dark smoke columns created by fuel on fire, either on ships, refinarys, fuel depots, and so on.

15) Ships AI. Ship that maneuver and react according to the situation. Complex enough to see ship battles, with ships trying to get the better firing position and formation to defeat the opposite side.
Not just SHIP1 goes straight from A to B at a fixed speed, SHIP2 goes from C to D also at a fixed speed, and they shoot each other while in range, after that they continue theyr way.

16) Ships peforming evasive maneuvers while being bombarded.

17) Hear the "pig" of the squad (there is always a pig and other pesonalities in every group) perform "unpleasent" sounds on the radio. :)

18) See a dog walking thru the base and pissing on aircraft wheels. :D

19) A damn and very disturbing insect flying inside your cockpit because it got stucked inside during take off. :rolleyes:

20) Dolphing swiming along ships, whales swiming on the sea, shark atacking downed pilotos :-P

21) UFO kidnapping bombers crews. :grin:

22) If you are shot down, being able to climb to the aircraft of another player, and be transported back to base.

23) Get airfields with cannibalized aircrafts, or partially damaged.

24) Aircraft being destroyed inside of hangars

25) People running around in an airfield under attack.

26) Better damage model of bridges, and realistic size of bridges. On IL-2, eveng on the bigger bridges, a fighter have's not enough space to go along the bridge.

27) See vehicles and tanks go on the same road, or route, on opposite directions at the same time, crossing each other side by side.

28) Troop camps with camouflaged nets over tents, AAA units, trucks and tanks.

29) Damaged aircraft that have crushing failures of structures because of a hard maneuver, that on a normal situation that aircraft could stand it perfectly.

30) More realistic harbours, with ships docking and undocking, cargo being transferred. In other words, like with airfields, have ALIVE harbours.

And i will finsh here for the moment. :)

wjc103

11-14-2009, 06:47 PM

It seems to me that the following seems to be of interest to a lot of people:

Human activity on the airfield during:

1. taxiing,

2. landing,

3. attacking,

In my opinion, that kind of extra activity would really "fill in the gaps" and set the simulation apart from everything that has come before, and add a tremendous amount of immersion and interest for the offline player.

Of course time and resources surely would govern how much, but I don't think it would take a lot of "activity like this" to really make everyone excited and bring some life to simulations.

Abbeville-Boy

11-14-2009, 10:35 PM

you crash land in enemy territory, that trigger sets off vehicles that soon arrive with soldiers beating the grass looking for you:grin:

Jaws2002

11-14-2009, 11:06 PM

Looking at the title of this thread, maybe you can make the AI from time to time say that "holy sh... did you see that" when some of this more uncommon things happen.:-P

ElAurens

11-14-2009, 11:12 PM

Vera Lynn singing "White Cliffs of Dover" for the title music.

That would be the best surprise I could think of.

Perhaps proper music on the radio when you are at base, instead of the canned Hollywood Movie music like Pacific Fighters had.

Flashes of bombs going off in the distance as London is bombed at night, and the glow of the fires in the sky from the attack as well.

The sound of a train in the distance.

It's the small things that make it real, not the OMG! stuff.

PanzerAce

11-14-2009, 11:24 PM

You know of course, that you can create a mission as busy as you would like?

And some of us prefer flying to making missions ;)

Another thing I've thought of that would be cool is random weapons failure. You sneak up on an enemy fighter, close up, hit the trigger...and only one of your cannons fires. Or you're on a rocket attack, and some of the live rockets decide to stay on the plane, or a bomb doesn't release and you have to deal with it, or hope that it comes off on it's own (don't know if that could even be modeled with the stuff already extant)

airmalik

11-15-2009, 01:14 AM

It seems to me that the following seems to be of interest to a lot of people:

Human activity on the airfield during:

...

Spot on! But I'm afraid we'll just see limited human activity due to the sheer amount of work required to generate the required animations. What we really need is procedural animation which doesn't require manual keyframing/mo-cap for each animation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi5adyccoKI&feature=related

With an engine like this and 'intelligent' characters that react automatically to the external events, there'd be no end of "OMG did that just happen?".

Some of the greatest moments in IL2 are the results of aircraft AI automatically reacting to the environment and situations. This engine provides the same for human characters.

Every bailout would be unique depending on airspeed, g-forces, aircraft attitude etc.

Wing riding ground crew wouldn't have to be specifically keyframed to do that with different animations for each aircraft's wing. Imagine hitting the brakes and watching the wing rider fall off the front of the wing. Even better, wait for someone to climb on and then power up suddenly. Bonus points for tricking the guy into hanging on while you take off :grin:

Human characters wouldn't just be puppets going through the motions of their programmed keyframes; they'd have a sense of self-preservation. Jumping away from the prop if you don't warn them with a 'clear!' before starting the engine. Seeking bomb shelters on seeing diving bombers or hearing the air raid siren.

This stuff isn't idle pie in the sky musing. There's already a few games using this technology. Look up Euphoria Engine from NaturalMotion on YouTube.

I don't pretend to understand all the challenges involved in implementing such technology in a flight sim using today's technology but I sure hope we won't have to wait another ten years for the next version of IL2 to get this.

drafting

11-15-2009, 03:04 AM

Now that... that would be really incredible.

wjc103

11-15-2009, 04:14 AM

Second that...

Specht

11-15-2009, 05:34 AM

Euphoria would be awesome, yes, but I do believe it's pretty much out of question, it would take too many resources.

bhunter2112

11-15-2009, 06:39 AM

blottogg

11-15-2009, 08:35 AM

Good idea, Ilya. Thanks for asking for input.

Nothing really new from me, but to repeat some of the suggestions I've seen in this thread and like:

- Secondary explosions. A stick of bombs from an He-111 walking across an airfield, and plowing up nothing but dirt until one bomb hits an ammo bunker. There's nothing better than instant feedback on your targeting. This could apply to ammunition and bombs inside airborne aircraft, too. Nothing gratuitous, but where appropriate for the amount of damage taken, and the explosive nature of the point of impact.

- Fratricide. This might be annoying (especially if it's your wingman shooting you down by mistake), but from reading historical accounts, this happened fairly often. Give us a reason for all the recognition stripes and colors, besides really cool paint schemes from the skinners. In other words, make the Ai make human-like mistakes, instead of computer-like mistakes. To steal a line from the beginning of 'Rustler's Rhapsody': "For starters, maybe he wouldn't be so damn perfect all the time."

- For historical accuracy, some squadrons during some periods will have the same mission type day after day. Others will be more dynamic, and controllable by the player. Examples of the latter include Rhubarb, armed recce and Frei Jagd type missions. Motorcycle gang tactics, cruising an area armed and looking for trouble.

- After a swirling dogfight, finding a friendly Ai fighter and joining up on him for mutual support while leaving the area.

- I'm not sure how to implement it, but if players on non-recce missions see something of interest, give them the opportunity to report it, and possibly have that report generate a mission to attack it (or at least photograph it) later. This might encourage folks to look around, instead of just droning from waypoint to waypoint. For example, while escorting bombers to airfield target X, the player notices a supply dump 5 km south of the target airfield. Or a group of ships in port making steam in preparation to depart.

- Lost aircraft going the wrong way, and occasionally landing at the wrong field. This happened with allied aircraft landing at a different (friendly) field fairly often, and much more rarely with aircraft landing at an enemy airfield.

- The ability to commandeer a subordinate's aircraft after yours has been damaged, or suffers a mechanical problem before takeoff. Rank Has Its Privileges, though this could have repercussions on the junior pilot's experience and skill.

- I like the idea of landing to rescue a downed squadron-mate too. This opportunity would be historically very rare, and very difficult.

That would be the bottom line for most of these "holy sh**" moments in general. They should be rare enough to be realistic, but not so rare that the player never encounters any of them. One of your biggest tricks is going to be finding the balance between over-saturation, and historical rarity. Good luck, and I look forward to your efforts.

ECV56_Lancelot

11-15-2009, 10:54 AM

- Water falling over the windshield when you pass through a water column created by a bombas explosion over water. It could even make your engine couf or shut it down, if you absorb too much water.
I dont know the techinical detail of how much water the engines could absorb without shutting down.

To all people asking for AI mistakes, please, be carefull with what you ask. Because later on with the sim in our hands, we start to get threads everywhere complaining about "stupid AI shot me down", or crash over a mountain or the ground when it was chased by another aircraft, or complaining that they don't shoot down anything, or that they shoot down everything before i get the chance to shoot down an aircraft, and so on.

TheGrunch

11-15-2009, 01:46 PM

Because later on with the sim in our hands, we start to get threads everywhere complaining about "stupid AI shot me down", or crash over a mountain or the ground when it was chased by another aircraft, or complaining that they don't shoot down anything, or that they shoot down everything before i get the chance to shoot down an aircraft, and so on.
I don't think the idea is always that these are events that are in the main AI routines, more like they can be scripted into particular missions.

Insuber

11-15-2009, 03:16 PM

1\Few against Many
A common place of the BoB was that often few Spits and Hurricanes were sent to intercept huge gaggles of German bombers and fighters. Imagine popping out of the clouds just to see several miles long of tight bombers formations, with fighter covers already diving on you.

I had that thrill with Shockwave's Battle of Britain II, watching dozens of enemy planes sailing among beatiful towering clouds.
The Tally-Ho! of the squadron commander gave me that "Holy ...t!" feeling, that I can remember even so many years later.
Something similar is magisterially described by Pierre Clostermann in the last chapter of his "The Big Show", when they attack a Norwegian base among swarms of enemy planes.

2\Sector Control
I believe also that, as Feathered suggested, realistic radio comms from the Fighter Command and Sector Control, vectoring you to the bandits, will add a lot to the immersion. BoB on british side was all about Fighter Command, early wake ups, readiness in the dispersal barrack, calls from the phone, up in the air and then the voice of the controller on the radio (maybe with real Fighter Command characters like "Woody" Woodhall).

3\BBC
A funny fact, related by Brian Kingcome, was that the first radios were shortwave, and one could tune them in flight, so Kingcome used to tune on the BBC channels to listen to a popular songs program during the long and tedious convoy escorts ... all that ended at Brian's scorn, when VHF sets with fixed frequencies were fitted in the planes ...

Regards,
Insuber

ElAurens

11-15-2009, 03:44 PM

3\BBC
A funny fact, related by Brian Kingcome, was that the first radios were shortwave, and one could tune them in flight, so Kingcome used to tune on the BBC channels to listen to a popular songs program during the long and tedious convoy escorts ... all that ended at Brian's scorn, when VHF sets with fixed frequencies were fitted in the planes ...

Regards,
Insuber

Hence my comments about Vera Lynn.

:grin:

Igo kyu

11-15-2009, 04:13 PM

Vera Lynn singing "White Cliffs of Dover" for the title music.
It was a 1942 song, so though in some ways appropriate, it would be anachronistic.

Avat

11-15-2009, 04:15 PM

1. Oxygen system failures on high altitude (often in early months of BoB on Hurricanes Mk1)

2. More things to break in cockpit (like electricity fail, sparks from gauges etc.) and more available mechanical failures

3. Viewable pilot's hands and legs inside cockpit (and an ability to turn it off, just like in DCS)

4. Feeling like you're only small gear in war machine (lot of action everywhere)

5. Movie actions (just look at Call of Duty series - these guys are masters in emotion creation)

6. Bad airfield conditions like mud etc (hell for late german pilots)

7. Human animation (this Euphoria is great)

8. "Beepers" used by RAF to identify squadrons on radar

9. Full weather implementation

10. Crew members moving, talking, screaming inside planes

11. Every button available to click, everything available to turn off or turn on! Every gauge working! Just full working cockpit!

12. Bailing out and falling on a parachute - everything in 1st person perspective

13. Heavy pilot's breath in cockpit while under heavy G, wounded etc

14. Lot of radio communications, i dont want to hear 20 times same text in one mission

PS. Sorry for my poor English

SlipBall

11-15-2009, 11:11 PM

Flying over the black forest and you spot her, I did'nt really see that, did I?

edited: may be against the rules, unsure

ECV56_Lancelot

11-16-2009, 12:46 AM

- Se depth charges explosions.
It would look cool if you are flying over the north sea or the channel and find one or several destroyers throwing depth charges trying to hunt a submarine. :)

LoyalNine

11-16-2009, 02:01 AM

1. I would like to see a user history more like Falocn4:AF that you can carry with you from one install to the next. Total time, a-a kills, a-g kills, ect...

2. An in depth After Action reporting system.

3. More of a campaign engine (again) line Falcon has. Falcon is years old and still has a campaign that pulls you in like no other and makes you feel as though you are part of a war enviorment that is truly alive.

4. I would like to see airfields have fuel depot (gas), Hangars (repairs), Office areas (morale or leadership maybe...) and runways (for taking of and landing obviously) depending on what you hit and damage you inflict could mean losing that item there. For instance if the fuel is 100% knocked out you can respawn there but start with the fuel you landed with. Or if they are damged, depending on teh amount there is again a points or time penalty to use it. If the just hangars are knocked out you respawn with a full tank but you still have damage or a time penalty to take off...

5. Damage that stays (Damaged) until its fixed somehow. If you launch an attack on an enemy airfield and crater the beginning middle and end of the runway than good luck talking off... of if you just crater one side of it it would have to be a short takeoff. If teh damage shaowed it would also allow other to know what to target because they can see it. I would love to see big smokin craters in the middle of a BLUE runway ;)

6. Lastly I would like to see Voice Comms and a Hyperlobby style multiplayer area built into the game. None of these gamespy crap so many games use... sopmething tailored for the IL2 flight sim crowd. It may convince others to try online multiplayer if they see us catting it up in comms via voice and/or VOIP.

------

I love this sim. - Oleg and the devs you guys have done great over the years.

Igo kyu

11-16-2009, 03:13 AM

5. Damage that stays (Damaged) until its fixed somehow. If you launch an attack on an enemy airfield and crater the beginning middle and end of the runway than good luck talking off... of if you just crater one side of it it would have to be a short takeoff. If teh damage shaowed it would also allow other to know what to target because they can see it. I would love to see big smokin craters in the middle of a BLUE runway ;)
Eh? Fixed by the player? that doesn't sound like fun.

Runway craters would have been filled in a few hours at most (as they used to say at the time, there was a war on).

If you mean bullet holes should not evaporate when the graphics card gets bored of them, I'm with you, but if you want everybody to suffer unrealistically long-lasting effects from offensive actions, I'm absolutely not.

metro163

11-16-2009, 05:31 AM

-aircraft jumpseat position
-panorama view in ATC tower
-fly airship or yacht with a girl for holiday sightseeing
-photo wall in pilot club
-checklist before flight
-operational AAA gun
-fuel dump when airborne
-newspaper or aircraft flight manual reading during bomber flying
-signal flare before takeoff
-swim to float plane for rescue （perhaps after signal flare）
-parachute diving training
-lubricant oil maintenance
-fueling
......

Feathered_IV

11-16-2009, 12:46 PM

Been thinking a bit about how one might make multi-crew aircraft more interesting. Especially with regards to the roles crew members should play. AI Flight Engineers should tell you when an engine is overheating. A navigator should man a turret if a gunner is killed or wounded. All crew should be given some awareness of the outside world and be able to report on it. Below is how I hope a mission in SoW might play out:

Inter-Service Communication & Crew Management and in SoW...

You are flying the latest mission in your Blenheim bomber's single-player dgen campaign.

It is September 1940.

You are with 53 Sqn based at Detling. You mission brief is to patrol a section of occupied coast on a line from Ostend to Zeebrugge, and on up to Middleburg.
On the Met screen (a handy innovation for SoW) you can see that there is expected to be 8/10th cloud all the way. Not bad, you tell yourself. Your orders are to return however if cloud cover is insufficient. 53 Squadron has taken a beating in the last few weeks. The Blenheims stand little chance against determined fighter attack, and on this mission you will be flying alone.

A look at the Nav-screen (another first for SoW) it shows the Navigator's suggested course for the patrol. Looks okay, but you move the return waypoint near Middleburg a little further West.
No need to tempt fate...

In the air, you see that the weather is much as the met boys predicted. Eight-tenths, down to about 3000ft. You cross the coast near Ramsgate, skimming in and out of the cloud base.
You key in your first instructions to the crew. This is done in a similar way to which you communicated to AI wingmen in the Il-2 series. Hitting the Tab key, you go to the Crew-All list
and select the command to instruct them to report on all Land-Sea-Air contacts. The AI crew's reaction time in searching if you choose a specific area to search (air, for example) is much faster
than all at the same time, but on this show you'll be needing a good lookout.

Far out into the Channel now. The AI navigator gives you a course correction. Steer one-one-oh. You look down at the compass. Must have wandered off a bit... You put on a bit of right rudder
and the nose of the Blenheim comes back around. "On course" says the Navigator approvingly. At almost the same moment, the wireless op/gunner suddenly calls out, "Ship to starboard!"

Where? You dip the wing and peer out through the cloud and mist. Can't see anything. The gunner's skill in identifying sea and land targets isn't the best. He is just a gunner after all, and his
experience level has been modelled appropriately. The AI navigator/bomb aimer however is more informative. "I see it" he says. "Bearing fifty" "Destroyer, one of ours!"

You look in the direction indicated. Ah, there it is. Very pretty. Still a ways off though. Might as well say hello...
Throttles forward, you sweep down with the intention of giving the Navy a damn good beat up. You are speeding towards the destroyer when suddenly the ships guns open up. A burst of AA appears to the right, and then suddenly another burst much, much closer, accompanied by the dry rattle of shrapnel. Oh, for F**k sake! You pull up and bank away from the destroyer. At the same time showing the roundels on the bottom of your wings. A few more shots, and the gunfire ceases. Ships in Sow have a likelyhood of aircraft recognition based on variables of distance, weather and angle.

Circling the destroyer at a more respectful distance, you see a light flashing from the bridge. "Ship is signalling..." reports the AI Wop/Gunner. "Message reads: Apologies. Be advised, enemy aircraft in the vicinity..." No future in that, you tell yourself. You hit the Tab key again and bring up the commands for your navigator, requesting a heading to target. Within moments you are back on course, climbing back up towards cloud cover. A moments consideration and you also change the crews lookout instructions. Telling them to concentrate on seeking threats from the air. Not a minute to soon either...

"Fighter, Fighter! Break right Break right!!" calls your gunner. As you throw the bomber into a steep bank, the rear gun begins to clatter . A dark shape booms over the top of your canopy and disappears into the cloud above. "Lost him..." says the gunner. Engines screaming, clawing for height, the first wisps of cloud sweep past...

================================================== =====

The inclusion of crew interactions and management is similar to what we have now in the way we instruct and deploy AI wingmen in Il-2. I think it would be a great boost to the immersion in SoW if these things can be expanded and added to the single and multi player experience. Their inclusion would have great potential in adding the soul that is badly missed in the genre.

;)

kgwanchos

11-16-2009, 01:46 PM

One thing I sometimes found immersion killing in IL2 was the lack of an obvious sense that you had touched down. Would be great if there was much more feedback that

A) made it clear you had landed
B) gave a sense of how well you had landed.

This feedback would come via sound and be anything from a real thud and bounce to a gentle kiss and be accompanied by a POV movement rangeing from a slight nod to a head forced into your lap for a real monster cock up......

TheGrunch

11-16-2009, 02:37 PM

On the Met screen (a handy innovation for SoW) you can see that there is expected to be 8/10th cloud all the way.
I hope the guys understand what British weather's really like! :) Admittedly summer 1940 was one of the hottest on record, but that's not really saying much. :) I mean, even just from Douglas Bader's Wikipedia page:
"On 11 July 1940 Bader scored his first kill with his new squadron. The weather was bad, the cloud base was down to just 600 feet while drizzle and mist covered most of the sky. Forward visibility was down to just 2,000 yards. Bader was alone on patrol, and was soon directed toward an enemy aircraft flying north up the Nolfolk coast. Spotting the aircraft at 600 yards through the mist, Bader recognised it as a Dornier Do 17."
This was July 1940 and the weather was true to British form. :rolleyes:

Igo kyu

11-16-2009, 03:43 PM

I hope the guys understand what British weather's really like! :)
Quite.

It's warmer than would be expected from the latitude, and damp, both due to the sea.

ECV56_Lancelot

11-16-2009, 03:53 PM

- Well, on IL-2 we have damge to the airframe and some instruments of the cockpit. But for example we never have damge to the windshield. It would look cool if the windshield gets perforated when you are bounced by and aircraft. But it must no be random, it must happen if the trajectory of the bullet or cannon shell intercept the windshield but not your head.
In other words, see the impact of bullets and cannon shels to the cockpit and windshield, when they really hapen. If you get hit on your head you are dead and see nothing, but if you ar not hit, seeing the windshield explode (from the front, side or above), for example, would be frightening and cool.
Of course with that it must come that you increase drag, very loud wind sound, and all the problems that come with a broken windshield.
Also, the damage to the windshield should be according to the caliber and ammunition type that hit it.

themink

11-16-2009, 05:09 PM

Some of the fun things we have done in our missions:-
i) Minimum height attacks (Sneaking accross the lines - where mission fails if you are above a set height)
ii) Scramble on airfield attack (Would be better if you started near/in the hangers rather than on the flight line)
iii) Shadow the enemy strike - calling in the rest of your fighter wing for a co-ordinated attack once they arrive.
iv) Waiting "oncall" and then call in the ground attacks based on coloured smoke/FO directions.

We generally use "human observation" to see if people have failed (flown too high/been spotted etc)

Paul

Alien

11-16-2009, 05:17 PM

In AI topic, I would like to see REAL german tactics. I mean tactics of escorts. On first two months it was very liked by fighter pilots because they could fly above escorted bombers and then dive on attackers. But tactics were changed due to bomber losses and they had to stay in formation with the same speed as bombers had and couldn't break before Tommy attack. That was very frustrating.

ECV56_Lancelot

11-16-2009, 06:07 PM

...
ii) Scramble on airfield attack (Would be better if you started near/in the hangers rather than on the flight line)
...

This remind me, that Bob its the perfect example of why it would be great, and realistic, to start on the hangar and have to run to the aircraft, climb, taxi and take off, when an air attack aproaching.
If its impossible, well, at least like themink said, start near the hangar and taxi to the runaway or take off field. :)

PilotError

11-16-2009, 09:49 PM

A few ideas that popped into my head;

How about being able to hit objects like trees, light telephone/ electric cables, without causing a crash, and arriving home with branches and cables stuck on your plane ( I think this one has already been mentioned earlier, but I like the idea ).

Birds are going to be modeled ( seagulls at least ). If their landing gear has been modeled ;-) then you could have a flock of them on the ground ( or in trees if other birds are available ) that would be startled by a low flying plane and they would all take off in unison. A bird strike could be an obvious option here, but not necessarily, as the sight of a flock of birds taking flight would be pretty neat in itself.

I read somewhere a while ago that cows were also going to be in BoB. As with the birds, a low flying plane passing over a herd of cattle in a field would probably cause a mini stampede. A nice little bit of eye candy while flying, but imagine then arriving back at base and in the debriefing screen having the base adjutant inform you that Farmer Brown has just been on the phone complaining that his cows have gone off their milking :-)

If you bale out successfully, what if it was possible for your parachute to get caught up in trees, roofs, church spires etc, leaving you dangling till the mission ends. :evil:

I've never personally seen this phenomenon, but I believe it can be seen on planes in storm clouds...... St Elmo's Fire. That could be quite spooky.

All these suggestions would never be missed if they weren't in the game, but they could add a little more to the immersion if they were.

LoyalNine

11-16-2009, 11:07 PM

Eh? Fixed by the player? that doesn't sound like fun.

Runway craters would have been filled in a few hours at most (as they used to say at the time, there was a war on).

If you mean bullet holes should not evaporate when the graphics card gets bored of them, I'm with you, but if you want everybody to suffer unrealistically long-lasting effects from offensive actions, I'm absolutely not.

I mean this for campaign wars... not dogfight server type stuff. If you take out an airfields C&C as well as runway its gonna take a while to get back in teh fight. (how this is modeled in game via point/time ect.. would be a call on the devs part I guess. Would be a good way to keep/commit the other side from having/using resources. A well placed airfield was always a tasty target.

I am coming at this from Falcon4 where this sort of thing makes a difference in a campaign.

Igo kyu

11-17-2009, 12:22 AM

I mean this for campaign wars... not dogfight server type stuff. If you take out an airfields C&C as well as runway its gonna take a while to get back in teh fight. (how this is modeled in game via point/time ect.. would be a call on the devs part I guess. Would be a good way to keep/commit the other side from having/using resources. A well placed airfield was always a tasty target.

I am coming at this from Falcon4 where this sort of thing makes a difference in a campaign.
I don't know how long you're expecting it to take to repair an airfield. There were a lot of people in Britain then, and the roads were adequate, so getting a thousand labourers or squaddies to a particular airfield to dig soil into holes wouldn't have been an insurmountable problem.

If there were no other airfields affected, it wouldn't even matter, particularly in the BoB where there were many airfields around about. Many were just big flat fields, in those days fighters didn't need the landing room they do now.

Aircraft factories would have taken much longer to replace.

It's not as if an airfield is an isolated installation that is unaffected by it's surroundings. If you are thinking of airfields as items that have to be self sufficient, that reminds me of Command and Conquer, I don't want BoB SoW to become a clone of that.

erco

11-17-2009, 01:09 AM

Ilya, are you guys paying Feathered? You ought to be... His suggestions, particularly that last one, are great!

Skoshi Tiger

11-18-2009, 02:01 AM

I don't know historically accurate it would be for the Battle of Britain but here goes

1) How about exclusive AAA belts or zones where any aircraft that enters is a target. (like during the V1 attacks)

2) And how about flack that stops shooting when a friendly aircraft comes in for an attack.

Picture this. the Crew of a He111 are being bounced aroud as their formation is being hammered by an intensive AAA bararge. All of a sunden everything goes quiet. Theres a sigh of relief until one of the gunners calls out "Auchtung Spitfire!!"

LoyalNine

11-18-2009, 03:25 AM

I don't know how long you're expecting it to take to repair an airfield. There were a lot of people in Britain then, and the roads were adequate, so getting a thousand labourers or squaddies to a particular airfield to dig soil into holes wouldn't have been an insurmountable problem.

If there were no other airfields affected, it wouldn't even matter, particularly in the BoB where there were many airfields around about. Many were just big flat fields, in those days fighters didn't need the landing room they do now.

Aircraft factories would have taken much longer to replace.

It's not as if an airfield is an isolated installation that is unaffected by it's surroundings. If you are thinking of airfields as items that have to be self sufficient, that reminds me of Command and Conquer, I don't want BoB SoW to become a clone of that.

Yes it very well could make a difference depending on the campaign and how it's set up... And if certain airfields have access to certain aircraft or loadouts it could make a whole lot of difference.

Have you ever played Falcon 4 and gotten into the campaign or flown in an online war such as Forgotten Skies and seen how that's set up?? May make a bit more sense than your C&C reference.

Btw - you don't happen to be the guy by the same name that posts over at the AMD forums do you??

Igo kyu

11-18-2009, 03:43 PM

Yes it very well could make a difference depending on the campaign and how it's set up... And if certain airfields have access to certain aircraft or loadouts it could make a whole lot of difference.
Aircraft can be flown into any airfield that has a long enough runway (so maybe not bombers at some fighter airfields).

Have you ever played Falcon 4 and gotten into the campaign or flown in an online war such as Forgotten Skies and seen how that's set up?? May make a bit more sense than your C&C reference.
I tried Falcon 4, I didn't get further than the first flight (instant action?), it has a really nice database of aircraft and vehicles. I don't recall even seeing a box for Forgotten Skies in the shops, though my memory is particularly bad.

Btw - you don't happen to be the guy by the same name that posts over at the AMD forums do you??
No, this is the only place I use this name, I didn't know it wasn't utterly unique, though as it's one possible version of a particular meaningful phrase, there's no reason it should be.

MD_Titus

11-18-2009, 05:29 PM

a lot of ther replies seem to be requests for features that are seen regularly, rather than cool random once in a while events. feathereds suggestions are top notch though.

got a couple here anyway.

when landing at an airbase that's been raided recently, time delayed bombs go off nearby. would teach you to use homebase or a redirected base rather than the nearest one.

a ferrying mission. get bounced by the enemy and have to evade them in cloud until their fuel depletes enough to drive them off home.

foreign object damage as you blow bits off the enemy. perhaps some bits and pieces lodged in the leading edge or chunks flying off the prop causing vibration.

Avimimus

11-18-2009, 06:46 PM

It's surprising how much I've wanted a monocle - ever since the I.A.R. 81 was released as a flyable, actually.

Necrobaron

11-18-2009, 08:10 PM

How about the possibility to collide with the body of a bailing enemy? Maybe see people on fire as they bail from a flaming bomber?
________
Harmed By Nexium (http://www.classactionsettlements.org/lawsuit/nexium/)

Insuber

11-18-2009, 09:48 PM

You are clearly obsessed by blood and gore ... are you sure that you are in in the right game?:-D. Btw Oleg said clearly 'no blood spatters or other gore effects AFAIK.

Ins

Romanator21

11-18-2009, 10:04 PM

Well he is the "Necro-baron", necro meaning death, and I suppose Baron implies having some sort of power over it/through it. :rolleyes:

robtek

11-18-2009, 10:08 PM

@necrobaron

you really live up to your nickname :-D

No, really, who wants something like that? That's ghoulish.

SlipBall

11-18-2009, 10:37 PM

So what do you think of the suggestion's so far Luthier, has anyone hit on any of the ideas that you had in mind?...I know that you were looking for rare, one time events that would surprise the off-liner on occasion. But I think that you have a great opportunity here to learn from these ideas, and to make SOW a truely incredable off-line experience. I think that the more we can interact with AI the better, they are our human crew and our friends in game off-line. Greatly increased amount of commands available to use would help out the most. Maybe even hearing the crew do small talk among themselves, or hearing the navigator telling a funny joke at times. AI can be the substitute for the human element that so many of us crave here.

Necrobaron

11-18-2009, 11:20 PM

Well, Luthier asked for some "Holy sh... did that just happen?" ideas and that would indeed be my reaction if I saw that kind of thing in-game. ;)

I have no problem with blood and gore if its done in a realistic way. In fact its pretty unrealistic not to have it and instead have a sanitized depiction of "how it was".

Make of "necrobaron" what you wish. I guess it could mean a variety of things. :-P
________
porn star Cam (http://www.girlcamfriend.com/webcam/pornstars/)

airmalik

11-19-2009, 01:21 AM

How about the possibility to collide with the body of a bailing enemy?

I've had my wing sawed off by a parachute in IL2 once.

Blackdog_kt

11-19-2009, 01:25 AM

Let me just say that i'm with Feathered on this one. His ideas about communication with the AI are excellent and remind me a bit of a mix between the old European Air War and B17 the mighty 8th.

Both had detailed communication routines, EAW for your wingmen and B17 for the crew members. I distinctly remember that in EAW i would orchestrate coordinated attacks against bomber formations by combining orders. For example, if you told the flight to disengage it meant to abandon combat, but if you told them to rejoin it simply meant to keep in formation without revokig previous orders. So, you would tell them to drop into a wider formation to avoid collisions, switch them to line abreast and then order "attack bombers" and immediately after "rejoin".

This was the equivalent of attacking without breaking formation and it was awesome. The AI wingmen were going wherever you were and attacked the targets you guided them to. Imagine this with a line abreast of 12 Fw190s on a head on attack against 36 B17s. That game is way old (older than IL2) and i still haven't seen such a clever system of controlling your AI wingmen in any prop sims since.

Similarly, in B17 the mighty 8th, the gunners were calling out contacts and even made heated remarks in combat. I didn't get to see all of the messages, but there were people posting what they got over the internet and they would really set the mood. In one case someone was having an encounter with Me262s, the gunner called it out and as it come near he exclaims "Did you see that?!". Or another gem "i'm can't die, i'm still a virgin!" by a squeaky 19 year old voice muffled by the oxygen mask, as the other guy who's giving him first aid examines his wound he says "you're going to be fine, it's just a scratch". It was a single player game and yet i felt bad whenever one of my crew would get injured or killed.

There is no need to over-dramatize things though. Simply following feathered's ideas and using clever dialogue for each option would do.

Necrobaron

11-19-2009, 02:26 AM

I've had my wing sawed off by a parachute in IL2 once.

Yeah, I've had that happen a time or two.
________
Marijuana Vaporizer (http://weedvaporizers.info/)

PanzerAce

11-19-2009, 09:32 PM

foreign object damage as you blow bits off the enemy. perhaps some bits and pieces lodged in the leading edge or chunks flying off the prop causing vibration.

FOD in general would be nice :P

4H_V-man

11-20-2009, 02:26 AM

Once, on-line, I had killed the engine of a P-40 at VERY close range in my Oscar. When the pilot bailed out, his ejected canopy hit the propeller of my aircraft causing my engine to stop. Talk about OH SH!T!!!

Necrobaron

11-20-2009, 03:03 AM

Wow, I don't think I ever had that happen!
________
Suzuki Kizashi (http://www.suzuki-tech.com/wiki/Suzuki_Kizashi)

Viking

11-20-2009, 08:17 AM

I think he is looking at things taht rearly occurs like; a hare or dear that sprints over the runway as you land ( once in a 10000 times!), you look down to check the airspeed and see a fly on the instrument( takes of and never returns), as you try to get away from a 109 on your tail your whole life passes in front of you in 3 sec etc etc.

regards

viking

Bobb4

11-20-2009, 08:40 AM

Things I can think of on the top of my head.
Kill logbooks very similar to Red Baron 3d. Intel briefings listing the highest scoring aces both enemy and your own. The accuracy of the enemy, ace review can be speculation..
Good mission briefings with definable targets and debriefings.
Random plane malfunctions. Agree bailouts should be first person.
An active ready room/pilot room, an office should be given to pilots as they are promoted.
While ai crewmembers need not be modelled, (animated) you should have dossiers on them indication their sate-of-mind, health etc.
As you are promoted or choose at the start to take a more senior role you should have dossiers of everyone in your squadron including ground crew etc.
Medals, rest period and promotions should be under your control.
Example a young sergeant pilot joins.
Three missions later he is an ace. Do you make him a flight leader?
Six sorties into the battle D flight has returned again without a kill – Do you replace Flight Sergeant Bob?
Again most of this can be done without much work on animations and game engine.
Model cowardice, heroism with a lot of stats and figures.
Six kill Flight leader sergeant Smith rtb's shortly before contact with the enemy for the tenth time, in the last 12 missions, what do his medical records show. Does he need resting or has he lost it and needs rotation as an instructor?
The single player that just wants to fly can still become a flight/squadron leader he just hands over the mundane stuff to ai adjutants.
Infligh random but rare radio malfunctions.
Rookie ai that battle to stay in formation, especially new replacements.
Rookie fighter pilots that (ai) cannot shoot, time spent on the range will improve their stats.
The longer a pilot (ai) lives the better some stats should become, counter balanced by moral.
High losses means = poor moral, the loss of a top ace = poor moral.
What I hope for in SOW is that they make the squadron, be it Italian, German or British a living breathing entity, not necessarily by fancy animation but by using just some of the above...

CrazySchmidt

11-20-2009, 09:22 AM

Surprise attacks plain and simple! No matter where no matter when. Nothing visible on maps or radar.

The type of situation that makes you jump like hell when it hits, a little bit like a first person shooter (although I appreciate that there is a lot of mood music happening there) except it may be something like returning to base after a milk run just before landing, or in a briefing for a new mission. Just so long as there isn't any jerky hard drive loading stuff from triggers, it needs to be seamless.

Also, after taking hits and looking down to see ones legs damaged by gunfire, perhaps visible bone and meat modelling would be really amping!! Also in a Spit or Hurri and seeing visible spillage of fuel into the cockpit would be frightening.

Real physical damage to ground personal. Let's all be honest here, we all enjoy first person shooters as well, with the more realistic effects provided by the latest releases and how personal react to taking gunfire. I say an excellent feature would be to model large calibre gunfire on ground troops. I remember reading in an article some years ago, that a P-47 pilot on a strafing mission late in the war over Germany, was horrified by witnessing his own 50 cal rounds dismembering an enemy soldier manning an anti aircraft gun, he stated that he simply hadn't thought of what his guns were doing outside of shooting down enemy aircraft.

CS. :)

PeterPanPan

11-20-2009, 10:29 AM

Some great suggestions in this thread. I think we need things which make you jump, surprise you, get the adrenaline pumping. How's about ...

1. After a mission, you go to lower your gear, and you only get 2 greens. That's bad enough, but then as one of the wheels is stuck partially down, it is blocking your radiator, and your engine overheats. (I'm thinking of Spitfires here for the rad issue).

2. You try and bail out but your hood is jammed. You have to repeatedly key press to get it released, much like manual gear extension, although much more frenetic!

3. Oxygen failure. Think this has already been mentioned. Screen starts going grey above 12,000 feet or so for no apparent reason. Better act fast and get below 10,000 feet.

4. Unexpected weather. You took off in clear conditions, but now you have limped back home after a heavy scrap, with limited fuel and are horrified to see your airfield is covered in fog.

And lastly, is there any way of recreating the "run like hell" when the scramble bell rings?

PPanPan

Wutz

11-20-2009, 02:40 PM

How about something that is still a problem even in modern aviation? Bird strikes?
Comes unexpected, and can be devastating!! :shock:
http://www.bywat.co.uk/birdstrike.jpg
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_KZ5qdgu3avM/SetwvdpyqKI/AAAAAAAABL4/HVq1GSicz5I/s400/Bird+strike1.jpg
http://www.goldengatewing.org/events/images/t28_birdstrike.jpg
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/01/20/nyregion/21bird.cityroom.480.jpg
http://www.jacanaent.com/Photos/Aircraft/Disasters/BaronBirdstrike.jpg
http://www.airlineempires.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/harrier_birdstrike_3.jpg

drafting

11-20-2009, 05:14 PM

Just seeing those pics made me shout 'Holy sh... did that just happen!' :grin:

ECV56_Lancelot

11-20-2009, 05:56 PM

How about something that is still a problem even in modern aviation? Bird strikes?
Comes unexpected, and can be devastating!! :shock:

Oleg already stated that there will be seagulls, and they will cause damage to aircrafts if rammed. Even if you hit several seagulls the plane could go down.

Lucas_From_Hell

11-20-2009, 06:52 PM

This will be good to practice gunnery: seagull shooting! Once you manage to kill them all without running out of ammo, you can even kill a mosquito :mrgreen: !

Reminded of those old mini-games from old games... "Shoot 50 seagulls in 60 secons to unlock incendiary ammunition!"

Insuber

11-20-2009, 08:20 PM

LOL we're in the animal mood, why don't we ask for the Squadron basset hound ... Eduard modeled it already with their BF110 1:48, so why don't we ? Imagine the animal going crazy when the squadron lands, or visiting your grave owling in despair ... I'm kidding of course ... but Ilya threw the stone and then left us going astray ... come and give us a sign before we go nuts !

Ins

II./JG1_Klaiber

11-20-2009, 09:03 PM

I came across this while reading Wikipedia:

VVS pilots usually flew the P-40 at War Emergency Power settings while in combat, this would bring the acceleration and speed performance closer to that of their German rivals, but could burn out engines in a matter of weeks. They also had difficulty with the more demanding requirements for fuel quality and oil purity of the Allison engines. A fair number of burnt out P-40s were re-engined with Soviet Klimov engines but these performed relatively poorly and were relegated to rear area use

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtiss_P-40

This made me think about realistic wear and tear on your aircraft over a series of missions.

Even with the best mechanics and the best parts, real aircraft in war time conditions eventually are negatively impacted by what's happening to them.

You don't have to get shot at to have the performance of an aircraft drop, though MG or cannon rounds into your engine certainly don't help. Chronic problems could arise in specific aircraft within your squadron. And this could add a new level of realism and squadron maintenance. Plus, a few "holy sh.." moments while flying as well.

Meusli

11-21-2009, 01:02 AM

How about if you do well in your career you get to meet the queen/furher who place a medal on you. Could be a cool cut scene, but don't know if modeling Hitler would be suitable, maybe someone else.

Wutz

11-21-2009, 07:42 AM

How about if you do well in your career you get to meet the queen/furher who place a medal on you. Could be a cool cut scene, but don't know if modeling Hitler would be suitable, maybe someone else.
You do know that with an animation like that, it might bann the game from the German market? Those responsible for approving software to the market to not take well to stuff like swastikas or Adolf Hitler animations, that might be seen as a kind of glorifying of that nut.

Lucas_From_Hell

11-21-2009, 09:37 AM

You do know that with an animation like that, it might bann the game from the German market? Those responsible for approving software to the market to not take well to stuff like swastikas or Adolf Hitler animations, that might be seen as a kind of glorifying of that nut.

That's right. Never got these stupid laws - after all, it's history, it happened, and just pretending it didn't happened won't change it.

About the holy shit ideas, maybe modelling something like pilots freezing their butts at high altitudes (maybe by doing some annoying light shaking on the camera), and hearing the pilot breathing inside the cockpit (and breathing heavier when pulling Gs and etc.) Would add a lot to immersion :mrgreen: .

6S.Manu

11-21-2009, 10:20 AM

blottogg

11-23-2009, 02:04 PM

How about chivalry? We've all read the accounts of German fighter pilot Franz Steigler coming across Charles Brown's shot-up B-17 and escorting it to the channel instead of shooting it down. Or Robert Johnson being pounced by an Fw 190 which emptied its magazines into his P-47. Amazed that he was still flying, the 190 pilot saluted and flew off, instead of calling for a buddy to finish the job.

This type of event would be even more rare in the Pacific, or the Russian front. And the flip side could also provide an "oh sh**" moment, like strafing 'chutes.

Wutz

11-24-2009, 02:18 PM

Knights in full armor don´t fit in most cockpits.:-P

Ironman69

11-24-2009, 02:23 PM

what if you are a Luftwaffe pilot, and a life-like animated Herman Goring comes strolling by your airfield with his entourage to inspect you and your aircraft.

ElAurens

11-24-2009, 04:35 PM

Guys, enough with the human animation sequences.

It's a flight sim, and none of us have machines now, or in the foreseeable future that could run all of the crazy stuff you are dreaming of here.

And do remember that visuals of real Nazi "personalities" would get the sim banned in most of Europe.

ECV56_Lancelot

11-24-2009, 07:44 PM

What if you shot down a friendly, when you start next mission you find your self on a empty detention room, where you can see on a windows your squadron taking of, and you have to stay there for all the lenght of the mission, doing absolutely nothing, until your squad return home.
That would be fun as hell!!................. or would be hell!!, i can´t be sure :grin:

rollnloop

11-25-2009, 12:04 AM

Fireteam/Bulldozer:

Fireteam (two or more trucks) is placed by mission designer on the airfield

Bulldozer same

If fireteam detects something burning on ground within 3km distance and no ennemy in vicinity (no intervention under straffing/bombing), fireteam moves to burning thing and sprays water on it, extinguishing the fire in a time proportional to fire size (big hangar longer to extinguish than single seater aircraft).

If Bulldozer detects something on the runway with engine broken or pilot dead and not burning, bulldozer pushes it out of the runway then comes back to initial location. bulldozer does not cross the runway if something with working engine and live pilot is on runway.

zaelu

11-25-2009, 08:08 AM

I didn't read all the thread:

I would like the need to write a report after the mission, and in some mission I would like to have a ride searching for crash sites (friendly or enemy), to confirm kills or KIA/MIA

+1

The scoring system should have a complex form settable by server where you get the points only after debriefing and claiming your kills as accurate as possible. Like claiming an air victory in the wrong sector (L14pad6) in place of (L15pad4) will render a null kill or a probable kill.

PeterPanPan

11-25-2009, 01:49 PM

Did I just see that? A German float plane with clear Red Cross markings looking like it is on a recce mission, not looking for downed pilots? Do I shoot it down? What are my orders? Do I take the matter into my own hands or leave it be?

This really happened in 1940. See here (http://www.battleofbritain1940.net/document-25.html) for more info.

So, how's about random appearances of Luftwaffe operated Red Cross float planes (could use the He 115 (http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=11006) if the He 59 or Do 18 aren't available in game) with a scoring system based on heavy penalties if you shoot down a genuine Red Cross aircraft?

PPanPan

ElAurens

11-25-2009, 04:54 PM

Zorin

11-25-2009, 05:42 PM

An enemy aircraft is an enemy aircraft. That is how it should be looked at. The pilots that don't make it home today are not going to be shooting at you tomorrow.

Point penalty for shooting down ASR birds?

Pffffttttttt.......

You can't honestly want to follow that track... or you end up with: "a hospital is a building the enemy could hide in" so I better bomb it to bits...

Igo kyu

11-25-2009, 06:12 PM

You can't honestly want to follow that track... or you end up with: "a hospital is a building the enemy could hide in" so I better bomb it to bits...
How about an abbey?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Monte_Cassino

bhunter2112

11-25-2009, 07:53 PM

Would that make me abby...normal?

Wutz

11-26-2009, 05:25 AM

An enemy aircraft is an enemy aircraft. That is how it should be looked at. The pilots that don't make it home today are not going to be shooting at you tomorrow.

Point penalty for shooting down ASR birds?

Pffffttttttt.......
With that kind of view a medic, ambulance or hospital, hospital ship, is a person, building or vehicle with a target painted on? People who think that way then also don´t mind randomly bumping off civilians, don´t matter they are enemy.....so why where people upset about Nanking, or the way POWs where threated by the Japanese??
Or the cases where downed allied aircrew where lynched in Germany. On your line of thinking all fair targets as they are enemy.

I don´t like that way of thinking at all.

TheGrunch

11-26-2009, 06:10 AM

Point penalty for shooting down ASR birds?

Pffffttttttt.......
Air battles occurred simply over who was to rescue downed airmen plenty of times during the war. Chances are that your ASR aircraft are operating in the area as well. Captured pilots mean vital intelligence!

Wutz

11-26-2009, 11:40 AM

Yes but I would say it was a minority that took pop shots at downed airmen.
Actuelly you read a lot more of cases where opposing pilots took a rather humain attitude to bailed opponents. But then of course maybe the chute shooters, and medic killers did not boast of their hero deeds?:???:

Snuff_Pidgeon

11-27-2009, 05:26 AM

In the course of real warfare, the combatants have to live with what they have done.It is always best to keep a cool head and not attack the defenceless and leave it to those that have no backbone!

PeterPanPan

11-27-2009, 08:37 AM

... It is always best to keep a cool head and not attack the defenceless ...

I agree, but the point here is that not all the Luftwaffe Operated Red Cross aircraft were defenceless. Some of them abused their position and were armed or simply were not on humanitarian missions - they were providing support to combat missions or on recce flights, all under the guise of the Red Cross.

So the question was, as an allied pilot, what do you do?

Here's the RAF communiqé in full, issued in July 1940:

Enemy aircraft bearing civil markings and marked with the Red Cross have recently flown over British ships at sea and in the vicinity of the British coast, and they are being employed for purposes which His Majesty's Government cannot regard as being consistent with the privileges generally accorded to the Red Cross.

His Majesty's Government desire to accord to ambulance aircraft reasonable facilities for the transportation of the sick and wounded, in accordance with the Red Cross Convention, and aircraft engaged in the direct evacuation of the sick and wounded will be respected, provided that they comply with the relevant provisions of the Convention.

His Majesty's Government are unable, however, to grant immunity to such aircraft flying over areas in which operations are in progress on land or at sea, or approaching British or Allied territory, or territory in British occupation, or British or Allied ships.

Ambulance aircraft which do not comply with the above requirements will do so at their own risk and peril.
1940

So, it seems to me that allied pilots must make their own decisions on whether to shoot or not based on the position and actions of each Red Cross aircraft they see. This could make for some interesting game play.

PPanPan

Ravenous

11-27-2009, 09:31 AM

Hey, I don't know wether someone has suggested it already but here it is.
regardless of wether or not we get a 1st person view of the pilot in the cockpit, we could atleast get some visual effects to go with pilot damage...right??

imagine the differance between IL-2 where your screen gets a slight red filter and the controls get a little less effective ( the more damage the worse the effect) and what we could have in SOW where if your pilot gets hit you get some blood-spatter in the cockpit, on the gunsight, instruments, stick, floor and stuff like that depending on the angle and location of the hit:P

that would ofcourse be alittle much to hope for with the age rating-system the game has to go through and this being mere eyecandy with a bit of realism thrown in..

more in-cockpit damage would be awsome, like smoke from the engine filling the cockpit, fuel from the tanks leaking in the cockpit in the planes that this actually could happen in
glass shattering after dammage because of the stress, cockpit-door/canopy refusing to open because of damage, instrument malfunction and errors.

and lastly if the pilot-DM is complex enaugh it would be cool if the controls one could operate with left arm only would be delayed or non-functional if you take a hit in the left shoulder or arm, and ofcoarse the same would apply to rudderpedals and brakes, and operations one could only use the right arm for:P

Wutz

11-27-2009, 03:34 PM

Well if you had read Olegs posts, you would know that he is not going down that line with blood and gore, as that could in some countries get the game rated as over 18, and so reduce sales. Maybe think what you are wishing for?

Necrobaron

11-27-2009, 07:12 PM

I sound like an old record since I've brought this up before, but I don't buy the idea that blood n' guts will reduce sales in any significant way considering there are plenty of violent games that do just fine with an 18+ rating, not to mention the sim-playing demographic tends to be (from what I've seen) over 18 anyways and thus making the rating a moot point. However, as you said, Oleg has stated violence will not feature in SoW and, as much as I disagree with that decision, it is the final word.

Well if you had read Olegs posts, you would know that he is not going down that line with blood and gore, as that could in some countries get the game rated as over 18, and so reduce sales. Maybe think what you are wishing for?
________
Cheap airsoft (http://airsoft-shop.info/tag/airsoft)

Wutz

11-27-2009, 08:47 PM

I sound like an old record since I've brought this up before, but I don't buy the idea that blood n' guts will reduce sales in any significant way considering there are plenty of violent games that do just fine with an 18+ rating, not to mention the sim-playing demographic tends to be (from what I've seen) over 18 anyways and thus making the rating a moot point. However, as you said, Oleg has stated violence will not feature in SoW and, as much as I disagree with that decision, it is the final word.

Well you might not believe it, but here in Europe a game with lots of blood & gore will be rated as +18 meaning you will not find it in your normal store.That
means only those that know where else it might be available will get it. For your normal users, the game will be next to non existant. Might be differant in your part of the world, but I doubt customers are only sought in one certain region? I think they are aiming at a wide spectrum of users all over the world. That means certain restrictions in various countries have to be taken into account, otherwise its a no go there.

akdavis

11-27-2009, 10:33 PM

Haven't read the whole thread, so forgive me if I repeat others' ideas, but I'd like to throw some general ideas out, particularly in regards to those moments that have the greatest potential for excitement: the application of metal and high explosive to targets.

First, for any of these to be "holy sh!t" moments, the developers must first exercise some restraint. If, as in Il-2, every target suffers a catastrophic fate evey time it is destroyed, the potential for surprising moments diminshes with each minute of the game played. Every ship explodes and sinks in a matter of minutes (an exceedingly rare event in real life); every vehicle erupts in a multi-story fireball when straffed; every structure collapses completely when bombed, sometimes when the structure is not even enveloped in the explosion effect of the bomb. Every single target you attack suffers the most dramatic ending possible. The potential for surprise diminishes to zero.

So before I recommend some "oh sh!t" moments, first there needs to be more mundane potential outcomes. Sometimes vehicles should just burn or smoke, not explode. Sometimes structures should only suffer partial damage, perhaps just a hole or a collapsed wall, and there should always be dust/debris, but not necessarily fire. Ships should typically just burn and/or list while slowly sinking over the course of hours.

With that, here are some truly dramatic moments that could occur:

-If a train engine or steamship is struck with AP rounds or penetrating bomb, there should be a chance of a boiler explosion with attendant column of steam rocketing into the air.

-If a steel/concrete bridge is bombed, there should be only a small chance that an entire span will be dropped (when it happens it would be very dramatic).

-If a train car, truck or ship is carrying ammunition, there should be a chance that attack will result in an enormous and very violent explosion (see 0:54 here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekXG_LO1_uM&NR=1). However, not every vehicle, train car or ship should act as if they are carrying ammunition.

-Likewise, there should be ammo dump or bunker structures with the same potential for catastrophic destruction.

-Flak and other infantry-served weapons on the ground should seldom explode. An explosion should be a surprising event. More typically, flak should simply be supressed (temporarily or permanently abandoned/unmanned).

-If a ship has a torpedo detonate underneath the middle of the hull, there should be a chance for the ship's back to break and split into two.

-A tank should only explode if its ammunition ignites, which should be a violent event with fire shooting out hatches or the turret displacing. Otherwise a tank should simply burn or be abandoned.

-parked aircraft should not have on/off damage models and should not typically explode.

-Not just armor, but most surfaces, including metal aircraft skin, should offer a chance of projectile deflection.

-damage to the bridge of a ship should potentially cause the ship to lose command (stop maneuvering, return fire less effectively); damage to the engine room or propellors should potentially cause loss of propulsion.

-In general, different fusing of bombs/rockets should result in a greater variety of outcomes on the target and "hit point" damage models should be abandoned wherever possible).

ECV56_Lancelot

11-28-2009, 12:19 AM

Taking in consideration the observations just made by akdavis, which are absolutely true, my new suggestion would bë:

- Seeing a tank lossing its turret because of the exposion
- Seing a moving tank get its track (i think it the right term) get broken and start turning, until finally stop and be abandoned, if the crew is modeled. :)
- Seeing vehicles and objects being thrown in to the air due to explosions.
- If a ship explodes, parts of the ship being blown away in to the air.
- Trees being thrown away in radial pattern from the center of an explosion.

Foo'bar

11-28-2009, 08:17 AM

@akdavis: very well said!

drafting posted this one some pages before:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKomzCUZZDw

AdMan

11-29-2009, 07:36 PM

Not sure if these have been mentioned or if already in the works but a couple ideas - I know vehicles like the tanks have opening doors and hatches, I hope to see these doors get blown open or completely off the hinges when they suffer a critical hit. Also when attacking a moving tank having a track suffer a critical hit and come off, leaving it "riding on rims" so to speak.

people fleeing a building or area as they hear bombs approaching or abandoning stations when coming under fire would add a cool factor

not sure how common brush fires were in Britain the summer of 1940, but coming a across one would add some interesting scenery and should be relatively easy to add in, A fire line being pushed along by the wind with scorched fields in it's wake.

maybe a little extra attention to damage of certain miscellaneous ground structures, It'd be cool to see something like water tower loose it's contents after being "accidentally" shot to pieces, or to shoot off the blades of a windmill.

EDIT: OK, tank ideas were being discussed a couple posts above this one, oops...long thread; didn't read

334th_Gazoo0

12-10-2009, 02:52 AM

Sudden engine failures even without taking any damage...

I would like this if it was related to the treatment of theaircraft, ie. Improperly warming up aircraft engine results in specific engine damage.

genbrien

12-10-2009, 03:30 AM

- Trees being thrown away in radial pattern from the center of an explosion.

Imagine how the CPU will hate you : 100 B17 with 20 bombs each........
major lag comming
:grin:

ECV56_Lancelot

12-10-2009, 10:35 AM

Hey Luthier, it would be nice to hear if something good came up from this thread, and what ideas did you liked, if any.

Foo'bar

12-10-2009, 10:36 AM

if any ;)

HenFre

12-10-2009, 11:01 AM

if :grin:

ECV56_Lancelot

12-10-2009, 02:49 PM

You are right, my two mistakes were both "if"!.

I should had said, "Tell us what will you include or otherwise you and your family will pay for this treachery"!!! :D

zakkandrachoff

12-10-2009, 03:35 PM

I would like, when i fly over a some little town or a city, will have some little interference in the radio and listen some music, or listen enemy channel. And to interact since my fighter whit another group of fighters or bombers planes. also would be fine a conversations between your 2° and 3° wings of spitfires formation.

RAF74_Winger

12-11-2009, 05:18 AM

S!

FWIW, it's not really a Holy Sh1t! experience, but in my real-world flying, one thing that gives me the shivers is popping above an overcast layer to find myself between two 8/8 layers. It really is the most otherworldly experience I've ever had.

You might also consider adding in the brocken spectre, which I've been fortunate enough to see on a few occasions:

http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/2355/0690020.jpg

I can appreciate that it probably wouldn't be too easy to get the effect just right though.

You might also consider the green flash (http://www.webexhibits.org/causesofcolor/13D.html), I've never seen it, but I'm told it's spectacular from 30,000 feet.

W.

airmalik

12-11-2009, 05:44 AM

S!

You might also consider adding in the brocken spectre, which I've been fortunate enough to see on a few occasions:

W.

I didn't know there was a name for this. I saw my own 'brocken spectre' once when freefalling over a cloud layer. Neatest thing was when I fell right through it. Awesome experience!

vpmedia

12-11-2009, 12:24 PM

auto generated recon photos in mission briefings + perhaps option to attach pictures from the hd (this was often mentioned in mission building topics, sorry if somebody already posted it, long thread)

ECV56_Lancelot

12-11-2009, 02:16 PM

Posted by zakkandrachoff in another thread.

Seeing this kind of smoke columns would realy give a HOLY $%?T experience! :-)

http://www.ausairpower.net/15th-AF-B-24-Raid-Refinery-1.jpg

Too bad something like that would bring any video card to its knees :(

Former_Older

12-13-2009, 09:25 PM

Ilya, if you're still reading this-

look to some of the well-made user made campaigns that are out there for IL2:1946 for ideas on how to "break the monotony"

Former_Older

12-13-2009, 09:31 PM

With that kind of view a medic, ambulance or hospital, hospital ship, is a person, building or vehicle with a target painted on? People who think that way then also don´t mind randomly bumping off civilians, don´t matter they are enemy.....so why where people upset about Nanking, or the way POWs where threated by the Japanese??
Or the cases where downed allied aircrew where lynched in Germany. On your line of thinking all fair targets as they are enemy.

I don´t like that way of thinking at all.

You're taking it WAY out of context

USAAF pilots shot Luftwaffe pilots in their 'chutes. Fact. The Luftwaffe also did this to USAAF aircrew, but even when each side didn't do it, there was an ulterior motive: interrogation of captured aircrew

The USS Wahoo gunned down Japanese troops in the Pacific after it sank their ship, and the captain was commended- those troops didn't get to kill any Americans

Those examples are a FAR cry from dropping a stick of bombs on a Red Cross Hospital becasue "its full of the enemy". The trouble here is that some folks don't understand that while there is a logical conclusion to some points, logic doesn't HAVE to go all the way to the conclusion

Eldur

12-13-2009, 11:44 PM

Seriously, get "X-Wing Alliance" and play it. This game does extremely well in this matter. You get a mission, but eventually unwanted things occur and you're doing something completely different then. Although Il-2 and SoW are simulations, a similar way of building missions can make it more exciting.
Generally, I'd would really like to see a 100% dynamic campaign similar to the one EF2000 had. Everywhere is something happening, and you take part in it. While you select to fly mission 1 out of 15, the other 14 are done by AI simultanously. That was a great campaign! But I fear this might be too stressful for our hardware with the high simulation fidelty SoW will have. But still, the missions could be built to be anything but "08/15".

This could be: You mission is to intercept some Heinkels... now the weather changes quickly and they're designated another target where you can't intercept them anymore. Instead you'll fly just CAP then and encounter a single recon plane you have to shoot down.
Or: You fly a mission (doesn't matter what) and when you return to you base you see how some Stukas attack it...
Or: You have to attack things with the Bf-110... another group of 109s spots a small bomber group with escort fighters and they'll engage the fighters and call you to intercept the bombers, because you're not so far away. Drop your bombs in the Channel and go Blenheim hunting instead :D

In short: Build some missions where things happen that aren't in the briefing, sudden changes of the situation, weather changes, vulchers, order changes and so on.

Former_Older

12-14-2009, 01:15 AM

Triggers will make some of that possible- you fly to point "X", the weather gets worse. In a randomly determined number of minutes (this can be set by the trigger), one of a set of events (also determined by the trigger) will happen- nothing, enemy fighters, or an enemy obs. craft. At X minutes (set by the mission builder outside of a trigger), the ground control scrubs the mission, giving you an alternate goal

Also, some of what you describe can be done by simply lying to the player during the brief

The "Operation:Flashpoint" mission builder had some quite sophisticated tools and can almost do exactly what I describe above; I would very much hope Oleg and his team are aware of that type of thing, and if not- they should get a copy and look at the mission builder

AdMan

12-14-2009, 02:16 AM

you people are out of your minds

Snuff_Pidgeon

12-14-2009, 05:41 AM

you people are out of your minds.

ECV56_Lancelot

12-15-2009, 11:08 AM

Give me some "holy sh... ideas"

Have graphics like this! :D
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y129/major-setback/album%202/1a34949u10fg9.jpg

Posted by major_setback in another thread. :)

zakkandrachoff

12-15-2009, 03:13 PM

Luth, you remember the first su-27 combat simulator? (my best 1997 to 2000)
look the missions, are complex, big, i want that, different types of missions at the time in different sectors, crossing each other. antis hip, bomber, intercept, photograph, escort, recognizing, a very complex scenery that takes many hours, so if we have in a hurry, we can land, take off go to another direction of a mission, land recharg weapons and fuel, take off again, and go to another direction, all in the same scenery buth with diferent missions to comply.

Another idea is, for example, in as de pikes of Jimenez, 2 bombers crossing in the channel. for example, we flying a He111 or JU-88 in a Raid to england and a engines' failure, so we go to home base, but in the trayect, we cross 2 wellington and we have the order of engage it!

Another is a for example, Stuka against Gladiator. I know that the gladiator was operational in the north of england, so in a small raid of stuka in a little port of the north, 3 gladiators take off and we need fight whit the stuka.
Whit a Bf-110 intercept England Bombers and then, when that mission of intercept as done, landing in a airfield, put fuel tanks in the wings and escort german bombers, and when that mission is over, why need to arrive back to the base , refuel and reload guns and intercept the hurries that that are intercepting others bombers or maybe stukas that come home from another raid.
Or a big range mission of a Bf-110 whit the information that for irland will pase away 1 suntherland whit a EEUU big range general and it will landing in some place in the west-north coast of England and we need shooting down in the middle of the night and escape of the Hurricanes to the channel, when we will have Bf-109 air support.

Hope that in the airfield we can change our armament on the plane. That is the only problem of the old Su-27 Flanker for that time.

I have some Old “As de Pique” 1970 comic strip. I going to found you some nice missions.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_7yMLj8QWQgA/Rq-3EUbeM6I/AAAAAAAAAp8/coEVgr6POqI/s400/As%2B02.JPG

vpmedia

12-16-2009, 08:01 AM

I'd rather recommend books like the JG26 war diary for mission ideas not a comic book :)

zakkandrachoff

12-16-2009, 02:32 PM

I'd rather recommend books like the JG26 war diary for mission ideas not a comic book :)

yes, sure, .. i think you only want is take off with the spit when de raid bomber are just flying up to you, shot a little and go sleep. For that is Birds Of Prey or Wings of Prey.
I am talking here about that i want complex missions

wannabetheace

12-17-2009, 05:03 AM

This thread got me to sign in again and make a comment - probly 2 years since that happened.

Historical is the key for me. The missions probably were very similar. You were not a fighter pilot one day and a bomber pilot the next. Even the fighters were trained in certain areas and armed as such. But it's a game so...

What I want to see. A mission with a soul. Just a little tidbit of info came get you into the flight. Your wingman is a noob...watchout for him. Topcover for a HE115 searescue of a fellow pilot. Running into an ace you have been briefed on. Scramble for takeoff.. a damaged bomber is heading slowly back over the Channel to France...get it .. cover arrive
historical radio chatter.

I want to make a kill/damaged claim after a mission.

Well, I agree with the idea that a mission with a soul.

Here is my 2cent.
How about encountering with enemy ace who is teasing you. Of course he should be top class ace like German Hans Joachim Marseille or French ace Marcel Albert :). Moreover he is in perfect position to shoot you down but doesn't want an easy kill or he just fed up with killing rookies so he just decided to play and make fun of you :grin:. Finally he wave at you and let you live and banks away or some kind like friend&foe just to show some individual's personality.

And you can meet him again where his plane is damaged and it's your choice to finish him off or give him a treat you owe..etc

vpmedia

12-17-2009, 08:08 AM

unpredictable random events & long term playability is what every game needs

(this is where even the big development firms fail, for example for me CoD6 was one day fun and now I'm back to IL-2 1946, 5th year)

Tbag

12-17-2009, 09:48 AM

As has been mentioned before: A good AI crew in multiseat aircraft would be awesome. Gunners telling you where other aircraft are, probably commenting on the battlefield/target, flight engineer giving damage reports, bombardier who gives instructions to the pilot.

Tbag

12-17-2009, 10:36 AM

I posted this a while ago but since you are busy with the mission briefings and such I thought I might post it again:

Original weather-briefing from of the former Luftwaffe:

http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/9069/wetterberichtuw5.jpg

Feathered_IV

12-17-2009, 11:51 AM

Some good suggestions from people. Although I've noticed there has been not further indication that any of this has been noted by the devs. :(

I've been thinking about different roles that a player could have in online and offline play. It sometimes seems that Maddox Games does not think very deeply about other objectives beyond pew-pew/bang-crump. Hopefully this is a false impression though!

Below is how I hope a different type of objective might play out:

Art/Obs in SoW

May 1940, Somewhere (online) in France...

You log into a game and see that a mission is well under way. Ignoring the usual choices of fighter and bombers, you choose a Storch to fly from a forward airfield. Today you will be spotting for the Feldartillerie...

Artillery Observation is one of the most lucrative roles in SoW online play, but also one of the most risky. The number of points earned from directing a successful barrage can be astronomical. However it requires the player to loiter in a known area for extended periods, inviting attack from opposing flights. Other players are merciless when they find an observation plane in the combat area, and will stop at nothing to bring them down. Their points for destroying you are higher than average. Likewise, your points deducted for being brought down are also well above the norm.

As you pass over the artillery position, you can see that only one out of the six guns are firing. Good! Those are just ranging shots. It means that this battery hasn't been directed onto target yet.

Circling the guns, you hit the Tab key and open the text menu in a way very similar to the old Il-2. There are new options in there and special categories dedicated to different roles and mission objectives. The Tab key, 1 then 8 and you are in the Mission Selection sub-category. The defaults are simple fighter & bomber roles, with others such as recon, nightfighter etc. to choose from. You select option #5 - Artillery Observation. At once the HUD menu text turns from blue to black, signifying the change of role. The Tab menu now features mission specific options that allow you to direct the artillery onto their target. Doing this in proximity to this particular artillery unit will bind your commands to it. Other players will be doing likewise with other positions along the front line.

Some time later and you arrive over the designated target - a railway marshalling yard packed with rolling stock. You come in for a close look, but bank away almost immediately as a spray of light AAA is directed towards you. The place seems unharmed. Indeed, you can see the ranging shots from the artillery gun sending up huge clods of earth near a canal almost a mile to the east. Keeping just out of range and throttling back to conserve your engine (you may need every ounce of power later on) you get to work....

The trick is to orientate yourself in relation to the artillery battery and the target. Then to feed corrections to the gun and "walk" the ranging shots onto the target. Once this is done, you can call on the whole battery to bring down the Ten Minutes of Hate that will annihilate it.

Sounds simple? Trouble is, the artillery isn't perfectly accurate. You need to give an incremental correction (via the Tab menu) and wait to observe a few shots to deduce the average result. Once done, you can move the fire further up/down/left/right in the manner of a grid. Don't try to move it too far at once though, or the fire can wander way off the mark. Patience is the key, but it's not easy when you also need to keep out of range of the defences, watch for enemy fighters and avoid collecting a tree in the face.

Several minutes later and you are still working hard. You've walked the shells in a wavering line right into the fields just behind the rail yard. One more correction should do it...

Amazing you haven't been intercepted yet. Respawning players must have seen your position marked on the situation map (another first for SoW). Even now, there must be several enemy fighters speeding for your position. The hairs on the back of your neck stand up as you get "that feeling".
You've worn out you welcome here and your luck won't last much longer.

The next shell lands on the station house, carrying away a corner of the wall and a section of roof. A second shell lands on the tracks between two goods wagons. That's it! You've got them now. Hitting the Tab key again, you put in the commands to call down the fire from the entire battery.

There are three little specks approaching low on the horizon. As you turn away and make a run for home, the entire marshalling yard seems to rise into the air. A stream of Target Destroyed messages are scrolling down the right hand side of the screen. A good job. If you can get back to base safely, you'll make a real killing today...

ECV56_Lancelot

12-17-2009, 02:25 PM

You certainly make it look like fun Feathered! :)

Mango

12-17-2009, 03:34 PM

Note to Oleg: Hire Feathered IV on as a mission consultant! It'll pay off in spades, and we'll all be greatful! :grin::grin::grin:

airmalik

12-18-2009, 12:04 AM

Feathered, you really should be on Oleg's payroll! I'd love to play such a mission.

Romanator21

12-18-2009, 04:39 AM

Excellent!

Feathered_IV

12-18-2009, 11:11 AM

Hi Mango, it's been ages! :grin:

I'm glad that other people also find some of these ideas interesting. I'm certainly not in the employ of Maddox Games though. Indeed, there is no indication that MG plan anything other than the same old stuff that has gone on before. Perhaps I'll expand on some of these things and speak to the Rise of Flight team instead...

Tbag

12-18-2009, 02:05 PM

Again, I'm sure that it's been proposed before:

- An inflight-map that I can draw on and which contains notes from the briefing (or in full-real you have to draw the notes yourself during the briefing).

- I know animations are very far down the list but at some later stage: Crewmembers asking for permission to smoke/eat on long distance flights.

- Getting diverted to another airfield if the weather is too bad at the home field

Borsch

12-18-2009, 04:06 PM

Incorporate SNEAKING into flight!

Sneak up on a sleeping morning airbase - could be alone for one mission, with an active wingman for another, and with a whole squadron in a third (explsions ahoy!).

Use scripting to allow player take out planes during take off from the base - very satisfying!

Recreate the Hartmann momment where he sneaked on two planes
performing acrobatics for the troops entrainment and crashed their party.

Make bouncing a completely unsuspecting escort a reality. Eg fly on a hunting mission like germans did against early war soviets. Drop on the first and torch it before it realised you were there (AI needs to be not omniscient like it is in IL2). then use energy advantage to dispatch the other 2 (Soviets flew in 3s in beginning).

Sneak in low level fog and attack a heavily escorted transport plane with an enemy general. quickly hide/ escape in the fog after your attack.

BOunce a huge and very tight formation of bombers and drop a bomb on one (like german pilot Knocke) to cause it crash into other bombers - domino effect. Scripting needed for that one.

Dive thorough big formation of enemy fighters with all guns blazing ( Marseille's style) causing some of its pilots o loose control and crash into each other.

With Soviets and Americans patroling the same sky, sneak up on one, attack and watch them shoot/fight each other in confusion!

zodiac

12-19-2009, 12:45 AM

I remember reading somthing about a german experiment with flamethrowers that they put on the back of some DO-17s as defence weapon. I believe the goal was to keep fighters at a distance and/or blind them by smoke and light. I think those Dorniers were on the big raid of 15 september. The effect of the new weapon was not that impressive (RAF pilots often thought it were just burning bombers) and I don't think it made some kills back then...

But I think that in the sim it woud come as a real suprise to face a dornier like that. If you play the whole campaign,a player udually has developed a kind of routine tactic for approaching a DO-17. Trying not to end up in a sudden fireball would be a nice and unexpected feature in that mission.

I've only seen some pictures of he-111's and ju-88's equiped with flamethrowers, but it seems that there wasn't much visible of that weapon on the surface of the plane. I think only a small tube was visible, coming out of the tail. So, good news if it should be modelled ;)

To give you an idea how the fireburst looked like, there are some pictures of it at the bottom of this page:

http://www.luftarchiv.de/index.htm?/bordgerate/waffen2.htm

Blackdog_kt

12-19-2009, 11:57 PM

Feathered's ideas are excellent once again, plus his narrative puts you right in the action. For me the top 3 would be:

1) Believable AI and a solid communication system:
Incorporate the kind of modular and mission specific commands that Feathered describes in the player's interaction with the AI, whether that AI are wingmen, ground control, ground troops, crew members or other friendly units.

2) Realistic start-up sequences and systems modelling, with the possibility of later mods/add-ons for optional clickable cockpits:
Despite certain shortcomings in the FS series, FSX does a pretty good job at this. Even if the buttons are hidden under the yoke, you can cycle the camera to the appropriate cockpit spot to press switches or take a closer look at hard to reach instruments. RoF does this well too, pause the TrackIR if you have one, move your viewpoint via the assigned keyboard functions and save it in your presets, which are by the way aircraft specific. This could be toggle or snap view. So for example, pressing keypad 8 in a fighter gives you a zoomed-in view of the gunsight, pressing it in the bomber's pilot seat zooms in on the primary flight instruments and doing the same while in the bomb aimer's seat will give you a look through the bombsight, or through the drift-meter when you are on the navigator's position.

Of course, this doens't have to be a click-everything-yourself affair if you don't want to. Just like in FSX and Black Shark, there should be an automatic engine start and shutdown sequence BUT it should also go through the full checklist and the engine might not fire up if it's cold, you might need to dilute the oil first or ask the ground crew to feed some warmed up oil into the engine. Then, you should have to pay attention to how the engine works and warm it up properly. Imagine this when flying a scramble with enemy fighters approaching, interesting stuff.

Also, please use the rated power settings as per the manufacturer's instructions whenever possible. Just because the Spit can make 25lbs of boost or the 190 can reach 1.4 ata manifold pressure, doesn't mean it was possible to run the engine at those settings forever like we can in IL2. For example, the maximum sustained rating for most Spits was 8lbs and similarly, the FW190 was, if i remember correctly, rated at 1.2 for climbs and 1.4 was used only in emergencies for 5 minutes or so. Ideally, we wouldn't need "throttle:100%" messages, but we should be opening our kneepad if we don't remember the values off-hand (see below), check the recommended power settings, advance throttles until the manifold gauge shows the desired readout, adjust prop-pitch to the desired RPM and that's it. The RPM needle would dance a bit back and forth before stabilising and the manifold pressure would slowly drop as we climbed, making it necessary to push the throttle forward a bit more every few thousand feet gained, but that's how real aircraft fly too.

The bottom line is that we need to get past the point of modelling only the aircraft behaviour and consequent tactics and finally start modelling the systems in some detail, putting the gauge back in the game. It makes flying more complicated and rewarding, gives you something to do that has a real impact on the outcome of your mission instead of just flying along a certain heading until you reach the target, it's an extra incentive to interact with your AI crew or human co-pilots in multi-crewed aircraft and it will make you think more and plan ahead on how you conduct your attacks in single-seaters. For example, the P47 is much more powerful than the Fw190 up high, but the 190 is fully automatic while the P47 needs some careful monitoring of the turbochargers and so on.

If you to know what i'm really talking about, search youtube for the P47 add-on for FSX made by A2A simulations and make sure you view the videos of the accu-sim enhanced aircraft, the way they model the aircraft's systems are superb. For multi-crewed aircraft, their Boeing Stratocruiser with the accu-sim patch is also very well done. It's a four engined plane and each engine presents some variance in temperatures, produced power and generally in how their systems operate, just like in real life. Your throttles are all in the same position, but engine 1 might be running a little hotter than the rest, the turbocharger on engine 3 might be running a bit hot as well and you have your hands full just flying the plane. Luckily, you have crewmen to monitor such things and report to help you out, the flight engineer can take care of calibrating the turbochargers for you and the co-pilot will call out the appropriate speeds and call "rotate" during your take-off run.

Having something similar in SoW would make flying multi-crewed and mutli-engined aircraft much more interesting and rewarding, plus it would make flying fighters something that requires a bit more caution. With all these systems modelled there's a good chance that a careless pilot might break his engine before the enemy has a chance to do it themselves, which will lead to more cautious and realistic flying on everyone's part.

3) Navigation maps, charts, notes, kneepad and a thorough briefing:
This would obviously tie in with the previous two points, as in mutlti-crewed aircraft you could let the AI do the navigation and just give you vectors to correct your course. You could switch to the navigator's position and look at the map yourself, or you could open the communication menu by pressing TAB and ask him to give you a fix on your position, ETA to the next waypoint and so on. Let's have the appropriate systems as well, communication radios to tune to the correct frequencies, direction fiding equipment and radio-navigation aids that fit the time period in question.

As for the briefing, take a look at this documentary of RAF bomber command night operations. That guy has about a dozen sliding blackboards full of info and each crewmember needs to take note of different things. It also features a post-op debrief:
http://www.factualtv.com/documentary/Nightbombers

Ideally, when flying you should be able to open your dossier and view anything from aircraft checklists to mission briefing to personal notes. These notes could be made during the briefing or even during the mission, on top of the original briefing material, the nav map or a blank piece of paper. Just give us an in-flight notebook and some colored pencils, so we can note down the radio frequencies we need to use or mark that new flak battery on the map for another flight to suppress tomorrow.

As for the maps and charts, i'm thinking of the usual ingame map, zoomable and slewable, but with some extra perks. For example, having separate charts showing the layout of friendly bases, tower frequencies, available facilities and the usual approaches would be good. That is because when flying an expansion 3-4 years from now, your battered Lancaster makes it back to England at 3am and it's pitch black with fog, you can take a look at the map and pick the nearest airbases, look them up in their airfield specific charts and request to divert to one with big runways and a FIDO defogging system.

Sitting on the navigator's bench should not just mean that you look through the side window, since you should have a couple of slide-rulers to make conversions and calculations with, plus some plotting tools. I'm thinking something along the lines of Silent Hunter III, with a compass, a ruler and a protractor to measure angles and be able to draw up a flight plan, even on the fly when actually flying the mission if the need arises. In IL2 the gyro compass might automatically point to the next waypoint, but in reality you have to set the heading bug and estimate the distances yourself, or with the aid of your navigator/copilot.

Of course, this would make flying single seaters all the more challenging, as it would also mean that you are either good enough to fly visually and not get lost, rely on the heavies you are escorting for guidance, or you have made a good flight plan before having to engage the enemy. You can't really draw pretty lines on the map with a 109 on your six over occupied Europe, but you can do it before the flight, while the rest of the wing is taxiing to take-off positions or even during the climb-out over the North Sea when things are still calm, using the base briefing material that the sim always supplies you with on each flight as a start. Having a lobby within the server where players can draw up detailed briefings in multiplayer, make notes and distribute it to others will come in handy too.

Now i know some of this stuff seems like too much, some might not be top priorities and all would take quite some time to come to fruition. I'm fully aware of that, i'm not in a hurry and i'm not expecting them to be in the boxed game on release day. However, i would be very delighted to see them come along as the sim progresses, since it will add a totally new dimension to prop-era combat flight sims. I've been having a go at some civilian flying on a friend's PC, he's got FSX and some quality payware add-ons and to tell you the truth, i realised that there's so much involved to actually just flying the plane, any plane, monitoring the various systems and navigating within certain rules and procedures, that i'm missing it on combat flight sims now. I think we should go towards combining these intricacies of flying a plane into the combat flight sim genre, so that just flying around over the countryside in a Hurricane, or buzzing Abeville in a 109 will be an involving, satisfying task in and of itself, long before the shooting even begins. ;)

robtek

12-20-2009, 12:49 PM

I'll drink to that!!!

AdMan

12-21-2009, 02:12 AM

some people need to look up the word "moment"

Blackdog_kt

12-21-2009, 02:53 AM

Well, you have a point there, but since this has turned into a general wishlist thread and various people are coming up with some very cool ideas, i thought i might group what i found most interesting, add some personal dressing and serve in the interest of some more food for thought.

It might not be moments, but having those moments in a non-scripted (scripted=predictable after a while) fashion requires laying down certain game mechanics beforehand. I'd rather they released a stable, working game and then gradually patch into it some sandbox-type game mechanics and accurate systems and operating procedures modelling, instead of for example simply adding some scripted events with a random chance. Scripting means that you need to define each and every occurence yourself. It's faster initially but limits your scope to these 4-5, or 20 effects that you specifically coded. After a while it's "oh,look, that bailing out opponent is giving me a salute again" or "i'm bored with my no2 wingman being the only one who has random engine problems, why doesn't no3 or no4 ever get one?" and so on

Laying down game mechanics however broadens the scope considerably. It's more work to do initially, because you need to define certain variables and how they interact with one another. However, after doing that you can then let them run wild on their own, depending on the greatest randomizing function of all, player input. There's no need to script much at all if you get accurate systems and failures, because half of the time something will invariably come up due to player error under combat stress, enemy action or a combination of both. ;)

Ernst

12-21-2009, 04:16 PM

BlackDog,

You resumed in your two last post all features that a 'hardcore' player (grognard) would want. However it ll be interesting, regard the presence of clickable cockipts, possibility to assign some of this commands to keyboard buttons too (ex. flaps, pitch, trim and other resources commonly used in combat) for faster use.

But your ideia is very cool!:cool:

Blackdog_kt

12-21-2009, 04:45 PM

Of course, there should be keyboard/HOTAS assignments for all of the primary functions. I mean, when i fly MSFS on my buddy's PC i never click and drag the throttles,mixture levers, or flaps, i do it with the stick throttle and keyboard.

However, there are lots of systems and functions to model and at some point you run out of keyboard combinations or they become too complicated to remember. That's where clickpits help, because you can keep adding systems without having to worry if the pilot will have enough keys to use them.

For example, the easiest and most often used case is setting the instruments for the course you need to fly. You could do it with the keyboard too, but i just look where the gauge is, pause the TrackIR with a button on the stick to keep the picture steady, place the mouse pointer over the little knob on the gyro compass and roll the mouse wheel...voila, the indicator of the desired heading moves left or right, depending on whether i roll the wheel up or down. Sometimes functions like these provide a faster and more precise control than having to press the same key combination 15 times, like using the trim wheels for example.

The thing is, mouse activated controls should not be primary controls because clicking with the mouse is slower than pressing a key or two (can you imagine having to click the gun trigger on the stick with your mouse? of course not :-P ). However, they are very useful for controls that you don't use all the time and most importantly, things you don't use during combat but are also part of your aircraft, because that means less key combinatios for you to remember. If there's a complex engine start procedure according to real life aircraft manuals for example, there's no reason not to use a mouse. You only need to start the engine at the start of the mission (hopefully), so i guess it's easier to just click through the switches than setup and memorize 4-10 new keyboard assignments ;)

Alien

12-21-2009, 05:19 PM

Viking

12-22-2009, 05:42 PM

As I take off, retracts my gears, and turn my head to see where my wingie is going I notice a girl on a bicycle with flowing blond hair and billowing skirt waving to me as she pedals along the country road.
Going out of sight under my wing, and never, never to be seen again.

Viking

Lucas_From_Hell

12-22-2009, 05:45 PM

ECV56_Lancelot

12-22-2009, 07:28 PM

And the next thing you see, after staring at the girl, is hangar H. Then, nothing... :-P

Then nothing?

Then a shinning light at the end of a dark tunnel!. Or maybe some guys with red skin, goat legs, little horns in the head, and a trident on their hand.

Lucas_From_Hell

12-22-2009, 07:39 PM

Or maybe just the Station doc and a hot nurse :mrgreen:

ECV56_Lancelot

12-23-2009, 12:12 AM

Or maybe just the Station doc and a hot nurse :mrgreen:

That's way better than the shinning light! :D

Viking

12-23-2009, 04:04 PM

The fun things would be the happenings that are trigged to happen just once in ten thousand.
Like you have a “Hun” on your six blowing holes in your kite and you decide it’s time to leave the “office” but as you press Ctrl+E: instead of the regular dangling in the Shute scene there is a: “YOUR FOOT IS STUCK!” and then in; one-two-three-four seconds your whole life passes in front of you. Youarebornyoucanwalkyoucanbicycleooopsyoustartscho olyuograduateyourfirstgirlyoujoinRAFyourfirstsolof light and the POFF! You are floating underneath the canopy of your Shute as you see your Spit spiraling downwards to the ground.
Scary stuff!

Regards

Viking

KG26_Alpha

12-23-2009, 05:33 PM

Or maybe some guys with red skin, goat legs, little horns in the head, and a trident on their hand.

You mean the RoF dev's ?

:grin:

MikkOwl

03-10-2010, 01:24 PM

Life is too short to read through all 14 pages to make sure it has not already been suggested. Here goes:

Friendly fire (bomber gunners being jumpy, being bounced by friendly hurricanes/109/110's and more).
Undisciplined wingmen go off chasing enemy.
Pilots trying to show off, doing stunts, flying too close perhaps etc. Consequence ranging from commander (angry) interruption, nothing at all, or actually crashing. Happened in the real war (109's stunting over POW camps holding airmen - British doing victory rolls over their airfield when coming back from sortie but having damaged airframes they did not know about).
Pilot or crew unable to get themselves extracted from their plane when trying to bail (heart breaking panicking heard over radio). Can include those stuck in burning cockpits.
Accidents pertaining to ground crew & vehicles & aircraft. Including fuel ignited by someone smoking, severely fatigued pilots veering off left on take off (109's especially) heading straight into the crew barracks (happened).
Landing gear not coming down on some aircraft when about to land. Sometimes pilots unaware. Sometimes someone telling the pilot (also if player) that their gear isn't fully down.
Blacked out pilots (can be due to injury, G-loc or altitude poisoning) causing the plane to do erratic flight behaviour (including loops, or leveling out from dives into crazy zooms) - and the other pilots who see it voice their reactions on radio "wake up!" "pull up!" "jump!" etc.
Pilots & Crew voicing brief shocked reactions to seeing own side bomber/plane get shot down in brutal ways (explode, crash into ground, split in half etc).
Unintentional crew-strikes (replace bird with air crew). Not very likely but still :p
Pieces of aircraft striking own aircraft (oil/coolant over the hood, aircraft parts causing damage, even severe damage to own plane). Falling debris is dangerous.
Smoke in cockpit.
Own canopy will not jettison or open - stuck! Better find some way of ditching it somehow.. And if on fire, well...
Knocked unconcious temporarily on bail out.
British airbase crew running/scattering like crazy when they see bombs falling towards them (I have seen similar in a mod showing AA crew abandoning their gun when scared, and soldiers jumping off and running from their transport trucks - amazing stuff)
Civilian motor vehicles doing funny things if scared (fly towards them low level from the front and they drive into the ditch)
People on the ground being seen ducking down when aircraft flies low over them.
Pilots trying to join enemy formation - thinking they are friendly (but realizing at some point that they are enemy - when alongside or when still trying to approach).
People on ground running towards any crashed/ditched aircraft, including failed landings.
Armed civilians (hunters with shotguns or rifles) as well as soldiers shooting at any 'target of opportunity' passing by. Not a big risk, but they could get real lucky (bye bye coolant/glass cockpit window etc).

Lucas_From_Hell

03-10-2010, 02:30 PM

Armed civilians (hunters with shotguns or rifles)

"Good... afternoon."

"Good afternoon my arse, you bosche bastard!"

:mrgreen:

I would be interesting to hear at least once Polish guys saying "Repeat Please!" over the radio :-P

ECV56_Lancelot

03-10-2010, 02:49 PM

Moments like this, but obviously with german or british aircrafts! :)

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_jcNQzBZlLiE/SYpozyVNwlI/AAAAAAAAJwM/cUKKf1hUwdM/s1024/20thaf_A42693_iwo_b29_crash.jpg

Alien

03-10-2010, 05:29 PM

1. People bolwn off the ship when a bomb explodes on it (dramatic, like in Pearl Harbor).
2. Germans shooting at british parachuters, sometimes at own pilots when mistook.
3. Pilots crashlanding due to be scared by enemy fighters diving behind them.
4. AAA shooting at own planes.
5. You see a fighter is escaping to cloud, and a moment later you see it and another plane, both falling in flames from this cloud.
6. German fighters not shooting when target covers bomber formations.
7. Dying, but not dead bomber pilots, who make maneuvers of death.
8. Pilot doing his last dive when desperately tries to evade enemy, but is on too low altitude...
9. Seeing a chuter whose parachute didn't open.
10. Seeing guts of rearshooter you just killed going out of belly.

robtek

03-10-2010, 06:42 PM

@Alien

i think you need a therapy.

Alien

03-10-2010, 06:55 PM

Why? I just gave some ideas of sights showing brutality and nonsense of war.

KG26_Alpha

03-10-2010, 07:57 PM

Well if the maturity rating is the same as IL2 1946, there will be no "gore=1" for SoW

The blood was turned off for dead gunners and pilots.

robtek

03-10-2010, 08:26 PM

i think we shouldn't "overinterprete" the "Simulation" - Part ;-D

Necrobaron

03-11-2010, 12:15 AM

I agree Alien but I've already made similar suggestions and apparently wanting realistic violence in something that simulates real events means you are a demented sadist. :rolleyes:
________
LovelyWendie (http://www.lovelywendie99.com/)

334th_Gazoo

03-11-2010, 06:24 AM

Explosions of this calibre, From Key targets,with the possibility of dense smoke visible for 60miles. Collateral damage from these explosions should express the energy within the fuel or munitions load being triggered.
eg: This explosion during wwI here in Canada.
http://museum.gov.ns.ca/mma/AtoZ/halexpl.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Explosion

Stiboo

03-11-2010, 09:49 AM

Yes a great thread that we've all been wanting, and great ideas -

My 2 penneth -

I like the idea of rescue mission triggers and photo recon triggers - easy to do and very similar -

Recon - fly over target trigger at X altitude and/or X speed to complete mission

Rescue - fly over target trigger at X altitude to rescue pilot/ship's crew - if flying a campaign that pilot then returns to his Sqdn roster.I've been reading a few BoB books and this happened many times- pilots would land and then take off to look for a downed Sqdn member.( maybe another trigger for this - you land and as you taxi in you are ordered straight back up again to search?)

Talking of Sqdn rosters - in a campaign it would be nice to see how every pilot is doing - maybe a more interactive Squadron menu inbetween missions - Pilot bio, messages from Sqdn leader, aircraft available etc..
, hints, tips...

Another good idea was a random trigger - in the FMB you pick the triggers to be included and the % chance of it happening.

I also really like the idea of triggers for .wav files - fly within distance of another friendly aeroplane (or object- such as control tower) and a famous Ace/another pilot/controller speaks over the radio to you - something funny / rude / or a flying tip - a good wow factor but you would need at least 30-50 clips to keep it fresh - but if we also had the option to add our own .wav files for this trigger in the FMB....endless Wow!

In the BoB books i'm reading often a Sqdn would be given new targets while in the air and re-directed to chase the enemy.

Pilots bailing out, when you shoot down an enemy - lets have lots of ways the enemy pilot can react - parachute not opening, chute on fire, chute gets caught on tail plane ( Douglas Bader had nightmares about a Do17 crewman who's chute got caught and went down with the plane that Bader had shot down... ) this would give a good Wow factor as it wouldn't happen that often.

Also many RAF piots were stunned and wowed by the sheer size of enemy formations - I hope we can look forward to more aircraft in the sky - 64 Vs 64 limit of IL2 was VERY limiting for us campaign designers, lets have 256 Vs 256 - PCs must be 4X more powerful since IL2 was launched !!!! ( yes I know - BoB will also be 4X as complex...)

Keep'm coming!

Stiboo

ps - a release date would make US all say Holy Shi....!!!!!!!!!

MBot

03-11-2010, 11:09 AM

It would be sweet if every now and then, if an AI pilot did very well on a mission, he would do a victory roll when returning to his airfield.

CKY_86

03-11-2010, 12:42 PM

The idea of a pilot or crewman bailing out of a plane only for his chute to not open is a good one. Also if the chute got caught on the plane, or the chute/pilot or crewman on fire if the plane is on fire would get some wow's from me. All of this could happen in a margin of 1 in 50, or 1 in 100 bailouts.

Rescue missions are also a nice idea and would add a differnt perspective to the combat.

Lucas_From_Hell

03-11-2010, 01:04 PM

Hearing your voice while giving orders is a start.

One thing I miss is to answer the calls. An option to say "Roger", "Negative" and so on would be nice.

Got the idea from MBot's post. It would be neat to have the AI to ask you for permission to beat up the field or something, and say Yes or No to him :mrgreen:

=PF=Coastie

03-11-2010, 11:48 PM

I apologize in advance if the following was mentioned already. I just could not read through 23 pages!

I would like to see more real carnage on the ground when doing GA.

1. When you bomb a group of vehicles and the bomb(500lb+) lands right beside them It not only destroys the vehicle but throws into the air or rolls it over as well as other vehicles in a close proximity to such a large explosion.

2. Bombing the control tower of the airfield might break off one of the lower supports and the tower slowly falls over and crashes across the runway blocking it from use.

3. A fuel tank cathes fires due to straffing but does not explode. Then several minutes later it Blevees and takes out everything around it. (As an added feature, the fuel could initially be running out of the tank and fire burns down the stream of fuel)

4. (Bomber gunners): Have them stop firing from time to time due to ammo reload, hot gun or malfuntions.

Thanks,

BadAim

03-12-2010, 03:25 AM

AKA_Tenn

03-14-2010, 05:37 AM

how bout something really cool like... for instance a FW gets a spit on its six, the spit takes out the FW's engine and instead of breaking off the spit sticks with the FW and ends up overshooting it, meanwhile the FW saved just enough energy to pull up its nose and get a pot shot off at the spit, taking the spits wing off with the last ditch effort... and both planes crash...

happened to me yesterday on RCAF_FB :P

kendo65

03-14-2010, 08:07 AM

Hi,

Regarding 'briefings' for missions:

For the Battle of Britain, standard il2-style (or the improved BOB version) pre-flight briefings setting out the target for the mission will be ok and accurate for the German and Italian side, but for an RAF fighter pilot at the height of the battle it won't be realistic (unless they are flying planned 'patrols' over some sector - eg "patrol Dover at 15,000 feet")

RAF fighters should have A LOT of scramble missions to reflect the historical reality - with a ONE-WORD briefing - "SCRAMBLE!" , or even better, a jump-cut directly into the game - pilots charging for their aircraft as someone shouts "Squadron scramble!" (or if the animations aren't available, just starting in the cockpit of your plane)

More information would be passed to the pilot in flight - ie heading, altitude, estimated number of enemy aircraft.

[Edit: this obviously applies more to the 'campaign' generation of missions]

_RAAF_Stupot

03-19-2010, 06:37 AM

If there is dynamic weather, could it be possible to simulate historical weather using bureau of meteorology records?

So, perhaps Saturday 20th July 1940 started out out as a very pleasant day with only light scattered cumulus and a top temperature recorded at RAF Hornchurch of 24 C at 2PM, but a cold front was approaching from the SW, which entered the English Channel area at 4PM. Temps dropped quickly and after the front of storm cells passed through it was around 16 C with a solid overcast at 1000 feet and rain squalls.....

.....and overnight, the bad weather cleared out to the east leaving a beautiful crystal clear morning for Sunday...

HB252

03-22-2010, 01:36 PM

Hi!!

I would like give more realism whit:

There is the option for order: take of ,or landing 2 or 3 planes at the same time.

Thx

jameson

03-22-2010, 06:07 PM

Hi,
If you could model the visual effect of rain (and possibly oil and/or fuel, coolant, and blood?) upon the cockpit glass this would be something of a shock when encountered.
I'm currently doing some research on the FW190, not in BOB I know! But he British noted that although it's canopy provided great all round visibility, it's visibility was poor in the rain. This was further complicated by the fact that the 190's canopy could not be opened in flight.
In BOB, Spitfires and Hurricanes would have some visibility when landing in the rain because they could open their cockpit, the 109 had sliding side windows, which would give some visibility to the pilot but would make landings even more difficult than usual.
Flying inside the glass dome of He111 in heavy rain would also be be pretty impressive visually. If the sound of the raindrops crashing into the planes glass could be added it would be even more amazing and immersive. What German gunners would see from a glass canopy in the rain,would be minimal, I'd have thought.
There must have been occasions when fighting over the Channel in the rain, it would have been very disorientating for attackers as well as defenders. I'm no programmer so do not know if this would be difficult to implement. There were a few missions fought in thunderstorms in IL2 but visibility was always good enough to allow game play. With BOB being the next generation simulator, having to return on instruments to base because of the weather visibility would be novel, don't you think. The weather over the channel can change very quickly from sunshine to rain and back, especially in summer! I know, I live here!
Also 109 wing slats that bang loudly when they open in combat would also add to the tension/terror when dogfighting!
Best Wishes
jameson

kimosabi

03-22-2010, 08:18 PM

Yeah, jameson, that would be absolutely stunning. Hope something like this is being implemented but it would be terribly cpu/gpu intensive to run as well. Maybe include an option to turn weather/raindrops off, or have three different weather realism settings.

Crosshair14

03-22-2010, 08:31 PM

I was in a 14 min. chase b4 without getting shot down by 5 planes that were on my tail. I shot down 4 of the 5 but after i turned the tables on the last plane he turned the tables back and shot me down.

Novotny

03-22-2010, 09:11 PM

Interesting comment on rain effects, hopefully something the dev team can use.

nearmiss

03-22-2010, 09:56 PM

woodchuck

03-23-2010, 01:31 AM

AndyJWest

03-23-2010, 02:13 AM

No doubt this must have been covered before.
How about those hair-raising secondary explosions we see in guncam footage of strafing attacks on rail cars or trucks.
Strafe the wrong rail car and a great load of metal, ammo and debris shoots up several hundred feet right in front of you !
I've seen many guncam clips of this that make it seem impossible that the pilot flew thru all the junk and lived.

That'll put the fear of god in you.
This already happens in IL-2. I've learned the hard way that it is a lot safer to strafe trains side-on than head-on, simply because of the tendency for a hit to set off a chain reaction that catches you as you over-fly the target. Side-on, the obvious attack method tends to encourage an end-to end strafing sweep, which only needs to be continued to avoid any overflight. It would be nice to see a good steam-train blowup though - I think I once saw guncam footage of half the boiler hurling skywards. Not something you'd want to run into...

Igo kyu

03-23-2010, 01:04 PM

This already happens in IL-2. I've learned the hard way that it is a lot safer to strafe trains side-on than head-on, simply because of the tendency for a hit to set off a chain reaction that catches you as you over-fly the target. Side-on, the obvious attack method tends to encourage an end-to end strafing sweep, which only needs to be continued to avoid any overflight. It would be nice to see a good steam-train blowup though - I think I once saw guncam footage of half the boiler hurling skywards. Not something you'd want to run into...
I quite like straffing oil trains, you do have to break off so you don't overfly the explosions. The thing is, or maybe used to be, if you attack from the rear, the flak truck behind the tender will hit the oil waggon closest to it, and you don't get the kills for the waggons that go off after that. I haven't seen it in a while, but I don't attack oil trains from the rear any more.

blades96

03-23-2010, 01:52 PM

No holy sh*t moments but there are a number of general things that would help immersion that would be nice to see introduced. Sorry if some of this has been mentioned already.

1. Pilot careers, where you start off as a rookie that goes up with someone more experienced who can give you some general advice, such as how to carry out an attack, attack from direction of sun, keep an eye on mirror. Then as you go through the missions you move further up the command structure and take control of squadrons yourself. Better develop the characters of those you are flying with as well so you care about them more, rather than just being numbers.
2. Better pilot chatter. More of the pilot lingo that was used such as "bandits at 8" and that kind of stuff. Also, pilots screaming as their plane goes down in flames. Would be nice to hear yourself giving orders as well.
3. Better sounds. It is impossible to get the graphics perfect right now but it should be possible to get a very good approximation of the sounds that would be heard in the cockpit of these old planes.

PeterPanPan

03-23-2010, 05:13 PM

... copied from my other post ...

Here are 3 things which occurred to me today whilst reading Al Deere's Nine Lives. I reckon they would make great additions to SOW.

I wonder if you agree and if anyone knows if any of these will be modelled in SOW?

1. Anti-landing posts - these were wooden posts stuck into fields in southern England to stop German gliders landing. They also proved to be obstacles for stricken RAF pilots making crash landings on home ground during the BoB. Pretty easy to add to SOW I would have thought?

2. De Wilde Ammunition - initially available in short supply in the early stages of the BoB, this ammunition had no tracer smoke but instead flashed on impact. Pilots found this extremely useful as a visual guide to see if their shots were on target. Of course, not having tracer also meant this was a more stealthy way of attacking from the rear. Again, I would assume not too tricky to implement in SOW.

3. Automatic Fire Tenders - no doubt more tricky to implement, but how cool would it be if a fire tender and associated vehicles/personnel automatically rushed over to a crash landed aircraft that made it back to a friendly airfield. Hauling an injured pilot out of the cockpit would be nice too!

PPanPan

Crosshair14

03-23-2010, 05:50 PM

If u in arcade and being chased by like 4 guys that outmanoeuver u. There's nothing you can do but use your speed and do wild crazy manoeuvers to try and shake them off as best you can do.

Tree_UK

03-23-2010, 08:58 PM

Forgive me if any of these ideas have been posted before, but i would like to see the following for single player/campaign.

1. I would like to be able to change the names in the pilot roster for my squadron, I know it sounds a little bit daft, but if you can put names in of people you know then you do hope they make it back in one piece, rather than just red 2 being shot down. does that make sense?

2. I would also like to see an attachment to my aircraft, for example if i take a couple of hits in a mission it would be nice to visibly see in the next mission that it as been patched up, you really would want to get the old girl home if you'd done 20 sorties in her.

3. I would also like to see my kills painted on my aircraft after each sortie.

PeterPanPan

03-24-2010, 08:50 AM

Love all 3 of your suggestions Tree_UK
PPanPan

HB252

03-25-2010, 10:38 PM

HI!!!

I think the following ideas, that are:

- Show the weight when you config. your plane, by example: when i get the default 109 G-6 its weight xxxxx, but I added MK108 gun his weight is xxxx (diferent). The weight would change and SHOW whit the config load and litters in gas tank.

- I read in several pilots WW2 boook that when they were hitted in any surface control the stick jumped and shaking out control during a bit time. It would be modeled. :)

Thx.

MikkOwl

03-25-2010, 10:49 PM

Some people seem to misunderstand what this topic is about.

Instructions, from the first post of the topic:

..looking for some ideas to break up the monotony. Things that make you jump out of your seat. Things that immerse you in the game world. These can be based on historical events, or these can be your own ideas, as long as they're rooted in reality.

This means things that happen before the mission, during the mission, or after the mission. Interesting new mission types. Events. Features. These can be one-off events we may try to recreate during the mission, or more general ideas such as "it'd be cool if X did Y when Z".

Ailantd

03-25-2010, 11:33 PM

See your wingman telling something to you with hand gestures from his cockpit, ( or maby only say hello, even enemy sometimes ) while radio silence. This would be really funny and inmersive thing, eh!, the guy of the other plane is really alive !

furbs

03-26-2010, 12:02 AM

lots of good ideas...here is a couple of mine.

when your plane gets hit it would be good to see...

Gycol(maybe smearing affect on the goggles)

smoke entering the cockpit(clearing a bit if you open the hood)

fire effects in the cockpit(that would make you bail more quickly)

bits of glass or cockpit instruments shattering(hit affects)

cheers

Lonely Ringer

03-28-2010, 07:48 PM

Like flying an I-16 type 6 at 80% throttle , jerk up the stick too fast and the carb gets starved for fuel and the engine dies just after making a straffing run on an IJA tank or supply convoy.... now what the xxxx do I do ? it wont restart as the fuel has now vapor locked and I am at 200 meters doing 250 kph and over heated .... and now theres a Ki-26 on my tail , no radio to call for help and the ground is closing fast " type of thing ?????
1)can't bail out so do I keep trying to restart or
2)throw my hands up in the air and hope the dude in Ki can see me surrender,
3)l hit my landing gear and flaps and try to land or ??????
4)Die.

Feathered_IV

03-29-2010, 01:53 PM

SoW Dynamic Campaign, July 1940.

Another damned convoy patrol! Rotten weather too. You've been flying the default campaign from the beginning. Determined to follow it as closely as possible to real events. Trouble is, you're getting to be as browned off as the real pilots were. There is a big fight coming and you know it. You just want to get on with it and to Hell with all this damned mucking about.

*************************

Too late again... As you arrive over the convoy you can see that they've just taken a beating. One merchantman is listing badly and falling behind. An armed trawler is still blazing away at something which has already fled into the mist towards France. Ahead of the convoy, a parachute decends slowly. In the weak sunlight you can see the blue of the pilot's uniform, contrasting against the grey-green of the water.

As you circle, you continue to watch the parachute. It's getting much lower now. One ship has changed course slightly to meet it.

Neat. I wonder if it will stop to pick him up?

Suddenly you see something else. Low down and moving fast, a 109 streaks through the convoy running flat out for home. As you fumble with the saftey catch and reflector sight, you take your eye off it for a moment. When you look again you see that it's altered course slightly and is heading straight for the parachute. If he doesn't look out he... My God!

The 109 fires into the parachutist with everything it's got. The pilot is knocked sideways with the force of it and a moment later the chute folds. Whats left begins to fall much, much faster.

The 109 banks slightly. In a moment it disappears into the mist on the other side of the convoy before ships guns can even track it. It's gone... Hopeless for you to follow.

You are shocked. Absolutely shaken by what you just saw. This was supposed to be a game. You've played these dynamic campaigns for years, but never, ever have you seen something as cold blooded as that. That was more like murder than anything else. The 109 pilot went out of his way to kill him.

For the first time, you find yourself thinking of the AI pilots as individuals. You wonder who the RAF bloke was. A moment later, you wonder who the Luftwaffe pilot was too. Oh yes. You'd really like to know who he was. If you see bastard again...

A glance at the petrol gauge. Time to go.

There is a big fight coming and you know it. This is not a game anymore...