4.10 ai

[TeeJay82]

So im messing around in single player and no matter what plane i take, i get outrunned by AI

FULL REAL SETTINGS gear up, flaps up :P throttle 110%


EX: bf109e4 vs hurricane mk1c @ 500meters above ground

i fly bf and get massivly outflown by the hurricane (pitch auto) at level flight and rad closed followed by a 10-15degree climb

and then i take the hurricane mk1c at the same settings, 80%pitch, 100%mix rad closed and the 109 just farts away from me in level flight and in climb.

no matter what plane i fly i allways get outrun by the ai fighters, (same year production)

What am i doing wrong??

the only plane ive managed to keep in range with is the MIG3 41 vs the bf`s cr42s and 239`s (1941 campaign)

[DD_crash]

AI cheats :( doesnt overheat, black out and has perfect trim. They will also steal kills. At least you can steal theirs :)

[LoBiSoMeM]

... and they are "stupid" as any AI in the world.

Human opponents is the way to go: real and a true challenge. Don't waste much time in SP.

[NNFFL=Clovis=]

Modifications to IL2 1946 links and discussion is prohibited.

[IceFire]

How good is your trim technique and how much effort do you make to keep your planes energy? The AI does cheat... but part of the difference is that people make mistakes, aren't efficient and are often not very smooth fliers. Not right at first anyways. Partly because we're only human we'll always have inefficiencies in the way that we fly whereas the AI is pretty much perfect in some respects.

Most AI cannot out run me whenever I have the faster plane... Bf109E-4 is definitely faster than both Mark I and Mark II Hurricanes. But if they catch me flat footed without energy I'll have to find a way to make it up fast because the AI is not forgiving in that respect.

If you can improve your technique against the AI you'll also find yourself faster than some of your human opponents online. Air races for me really made me think about how I fly. If everyone is flying exactly the same plane and takes off at the same time... why is it that a couple of people pull ahead and continue to open up the distance? They are better pilots and know how to get the best speed out of their plane. So there is room to improve and while the AI does cheat... it shouldn't stop you from pursuing the goal of getting better. It's a subtle art of flying fast... takes time, experience and technique. Just focus on being smooth.

[TinyTim]

EX: bf109e4 vs hurricane mk1c @ 500meters above ground

i fly bf and get massivly outflown by the hurricane

... then you must be doing something massively wrong. Bf 109E is a lot faster than the hurricane MkI at low altitudes, even the "cheating" AI can't make up for that.

Bf 109E can run at over 480 kph on the deck if memory serves me well while Hurricane manages barely over 400. Messerschmitt is also vastly superior in climb.

Are you sure he doesn't have initial energy advantage over you?

[TeeJay82]

Yeah.. about me doing something vastly wrong there is no doubt about :P

im trimming, trying this and that but in the end i allways get outrunned,out climbed, and out dived! does the AI dive with 100%pitch and 110%throttle?

[TeeJay82]

well... after a few more experiments i decided to cheat as well... 10%fuel and unlimited fuel cheat on :/ did the trick but i dont like it

[Jumoschwanz]

Ace AI Hurricanes do not run from bf109s in IL2 Sturmovik 4.10, and if they do they are easily run down and shot to pieces.

The AI bf109s will run away from a Hurri though and set up a pass.

It is the same with all AI aircraft in IL2, if they are slower than you they will turn and if they are faster they will B&Z.

If you can not catch and shoot down an AI Hurri with a 109E4 with equal fuel loads etc., then you must be a very inexperienced pilot.

[rga]

One on one, as long as you're flying faster plane, AI doesn't stand much chance. They're annoying, though. Getting on their six is never a problem. But AI has eyes in their tail, and they are master of handling aircraft at stall speed (as matter of fact, they don't stall). You're now facing a dilemma: keeping your speed, you will overshoot, chasing them, you will be slowed down. Players tend to go the second way, it's quite boring having AI on your 6, extending for 15 minutes before you can loop around to go head-on and do everything again.

When fighting more than 1 AI, be careful since AI is master of drag-and-bag. You slow down for the kill and another will get you from behind. Sometimes, when my speed advantage isn't very great (P-51 vs. FW-190 for example), AI tries even more sinister tactic: one AI drags you down low, the others keep climbing. You can get one AI and find yourself 1000m under 3 other FW-190 circling above :))

Another no-go when fighting AI is steep climbing when AI is on your six. AI will get you in no time with their excellent deflection shooting. But I know, AI can master substained climb rate without bleeding energy. I can't because my handling at slow speed is terrible.

[Blackdog_kt]

What rga says agrees with my own observations too.

In fact, if i setup a QMB scenario with some late model FW190s or 109s vs P51s, the axis fighters are faster if the AI flies them but if i switch around it's the P51s that are faster. :-P

This is my main gripe with the AI, when the mission involves energy fighters with similar performance the battle tends to evolve in long running chases climbing into the stratosphere. You can still win this, but the ways are not very realistic or believable and the main culprit is IL2's engine modelling: everyone can run maximum manifold pressure for ages, with the caveat that the player overheats and needs to back off once in a while when the AI doesn't.

I'm sure that in the new sim a lot of match-ups will be re-evaluated due to its updated engine modeling and management, giving results that are closer to historical reports and documents. A Spit MkIX +25lbs means nothing when you can run that setting for a mere 1 minute before cooking your engine, as does a 109 with an uprated engine or a Pony that does a maximum of 70 inches manifold pressure but the maximum continuous power that won't break the engine is around 50 inches.

Also, the engines overheat in cases where they probably shouldn't in IL2 because power settings and heat build-up are partly based on the position and travel of the throttle lever within its available range.
In reality however, things depends on manifold pressure and the outside temperature, which is a totally different thing. Just because you can push the throttle to the stops doesn't mean you have to, in fact the real life takeoff power value for a Spit Mk.IX was something around +12lbs and the maximum continuous power was around +8/9 lbs. This means that in terms of throttle travel you could be half way between idle and the stops and still be making take-off power, what the IL2 interface would display as "power:50%".
The rest of the power available to you is meant as a "bank" to use when you go higher and the air is thinner in order to be able to maintain that +8 lbs in high altitudes and not to be used in order to get +18 lbs or whatever on ground level.
The +18lbs in this example is probably the nominal maximum achievable engine power, measured in a set of specified conditions (probably in standard atmosphere/ISA conditions and sea level) so that engineers have a common basis of "lab conditions" to compare engines, because it's far easier than having to do all kinds of different sets of measurements in different altitudes and temperature/weather conditions.
They just measure what's the maximum achievable boost on sea level and a standard, agreed-upon temperature so that they have a way of comparing stuff, but that doesn't mean the engine will survive if running constantly on that setting.

With that in mind, it's easy to understand that the main cause of high cylinder head temperature is a high manifold pressure and a cylinder overheat is caused by running an MP that exceeds the specified maximum continuous power setting for the specific engined, not the position of the throttle lever.

Try this for example, take your favorite fighter in QMB, set the altitude to 500m and go 110%+WEP, then note down what the manifold pressure/boost/Ata value is. Do the same thing but spawning at 10km altitude and note down the values again. You will see that for the same throttle position, due to the drop in the ambient atmospheric pressure around you, the value taken at high altitude will be much lower than the one taken at sea level. In fact, the base non-supercharged power available to any engine is equal to the outside air pressure. If you ever have the chance to fly in a non-boosted cessna or similar civilian aircraft you'll see that near the ground it's making around 30in at full throttle, but at 8000ft it's probably struggling to achieve 25 or even less.

Going back to our IL2 example, starting at a certain altitude band and from that point higher, you'll see that even on 110%+WEP the engine is unable to achieve high MP values even when using superchargers, due to the low pressure of the outside air. But since the cylinder head temp (and oil temp as well) is more or less linked to that, that means we should probably not overheat above the engine's critical altitude (the altitude where the engine starts being unable to deliver it's maximum rater power).

If i'm flying a 190 with a maximum Ata of 1.4 and a max continuous of 1.2, i should definitely overheat at some point when pushing 1.4 Ata at 2000m altitude. However, i shouldn't probably overheat if even with 110% throttle i'm making 1.05 Ata at 10km of altitude, but in IL2 it does overheat. However, in reality an overheat is a much more serious affair than in IL2. In IL2, if i cool the engine down it's like i'm "resetting the timer" and no damage is done. Usually most engines in the game have to be run at overheat for 5 minutes or so before they suffer damage, so as long as you cool it down within that timeframe you can be sure that it will take another round of abuse.

Along this line of thought, you can exploit the simplified overheat mechanics in IL2. At high altitudes and cold air and if you're doing a reasonable amount of speed, you can cruise on 110% all day long in many aircraft. Then, just as the overheat message pops up you reduce it to 100% until the overheat warning disappears, rinse and repeat. What i usually do is run 100% in the altitude bands where my aircraft is faster and keep the 110% for the altitude bands where i know i'm slower.

Another thing you can exploit is that as long as the AI doesn't feel overly threatened they will not commit to their usual slow speed antics and most importantly, the wingman of the AI formation will never break off to attack you but stay glued to his leader. In fact, the wingmen attack either when they are trying to clear their leader's six, or when they have been made the de facto new leader (ie, you shot down the no.1 plane or damaged it enough to force it to return to base). This means that you can put yourself in a shallow climb towards the lead AI in a lead pursuit curve and at some point his wingman will be about 500 meters away in front of you, a bit higher and to the side.

At this point you have three options. You can either keep pressing on to the leader and the wingman will never start attacking you until the leader starts taking evasive action, at least on medium AI levels (just getting back into IL2 after a hiatus and i haven't practiced against ace yet). The leader starts his "eyes on the tail" evasive maneuvers as soon as you close to within 300m AND you have him close to your gunsight. Meanwhile the wingman can easily have YOU in his sights but ignores you until the leader starts "feeling" threatened.
The other option is kill the wingman. You keep following the leader, but when the wingman is within 300m you adjust your pursuit curve so that you he crosses your sights with minimal maneuvering. This gives you a steady, almost wings level deflection shot with a good chance of scoring hits on the engine and cockpit.
The third option is to just attack with the aim of forcing them to maneuver.

Whatever you choose, the AI will either start doing scissors or split S and bug out. At this point you have the advantage. You can follow them down and keep chasing, which will invariably lead to a repeat of the previous scenario and the fight descending to lower altitudes. However, they have a lot of energy from the dive they just made and if they can even slightly pull ahead of you they'll try to do a vertical reversal on you and wrestle the advantage away.
What i like to do in this case is an energy conserving turning climb with a high yo-yo on the end. This gives me enough separation and time before the next firing pass, so that their excess speed picked up in the dive will have bled off by the time we cross paths again. As they turn around to face you again, you will be right on top of them with a significant E advantage and at that point you can start boom and zooming them. This forces them to evade yet again and further solidifies your energy advantage.

Also, if you are having trouble keeping up with the AI in high altitude fights, you can take advantage of the fact that hard maneuvering is not something they do up there. After the initial head on, if they turn right i will turn left (so that we circle in opposite, but converging directions) and aim for a succession of slightly offset head-ons with a bit of lateral and vertical separation to make sure i can hit them but they can't. If they turn right and you also turn right to put yourself in tail chase, most of the time they will be able to pull away if your aircraft have similar performance. It's riskier on the higher AI levels because they will take you head-on, but if you are flying against average AI all they do is break off to the side and never shoot you. In fact, this seems to be the main difference between AI levels, the higher ones are simply more aggressive.

All this feels a bit like gaming the game sometimes, but it does help you master the limits of what your aircraft can do and improve your flying, with one notable exception:
The AI is very good in almost impossible high deflection shot and against sitting ducks, but for some weird reason they have no chance in hell of hitting you if they are on your six and you are doing a moderate turn with some back pressure on the stick. This leads to bad habits and not learning how to properly execute an evasive break turn. I learned that the hard way when i first started flying online :grin:

In short, the AI is nor easy or bad, neither overpowered. Its main problem is that it feels too artificial and not enough "human like", because in order to offset their disadvantages that stem from programming constraints and also wanting to give the player a chance , they have been given some equally "funky" advantages. This is more obvious when flying solo against the AI and not so much in big fights with a lot of AI aircraft involved, because the ones on your side balance out the ones on the enemy side. The way gunners work is also along those lines, but that's another long post for another time ;)