Taking the next steps..

[whatnot]

I'm diving further from quick missions now as I think I have a grip on my 109. Started the german campaign, but came up with a problem:

If I fly full real with no map icons etc how am I supposed to get the planned route? It's not part of the briefing or I'm just too blind to spot it.

Also how do I change the loadouts, convergences etc from the 'briefing screen'?

And no bomber campaings at all, is that true?

[Kianoni]

There is no such information you are looking for.

[whatnot]

There is no such information you are looking for.

No map of the mission ahead in the briefing screen and no way to affect your plane's ammo load depending on the mission? Yet another slipped feature / improvement failed to deliver. Well, I'm patient and hoping we'll get some work done on it one day.

Lack of map is really a bummer, was looking forwards navigating VFR over the beautiful scenery. If I recall correctly you can't switch just the path visible to the on-game map but there will be other icons coming with that too.

[Extreme_One]

The current Beta patch does contain a map of the mission area and shows flight paths.

[whatnot]

The current Beta patch does contain a map of the mission area and shows flight paths.

Great, so I can get just the path and no icons on the Map? I assume this is with putting 'Map Path' setting on. Is there any way to change the realism settings mid-campaing or is it a restart for me to get path only?

[whatnot]

I gave it a try to get just the flight plan (path) to the ingame map, but it's not doable with the settings:

[ ] 'No Map Icons'
[ ] 'No Map Path'
= AC Icons & Path

[X] 'No Map Icons'
[X] 'No Map Path'
= Naturally blank map

[X] 'No Map Icons'
[ ] 'No Map Path'
= Also a blank map

[ ] 'No Map Icons'
[X] 'No Map Path'
= AC Icons, but no path.

How do you usually navigate?

The red and blue planes on the map kills the fun of spotting bogies and a fair game. Good to hear that the briefing screen will improve, but having it in the in-game map too would help due to my poor photographic memory. :)

[Redroach]

As far as I've tested so far (mostly GB fighters), you just can't navigate with anything less than the map ghetto GPS mode - that is map icons, flightpaths etc. on.
The magnetic compass, needed for calibrating directional gyroes, is badly obscured in most planes. On top of that, the magnetic compass seems to be bugged as hell; it's wrongly labeled, the arrows pointing out flight direction seem to be randomly selected from flight to flight and, when you've tackled those obstacles, the heading given is, mostly, way off, too (seemingly by calculating the magnetic/geographical north pole differences in a wrong way).
Adding a simple heading indicator to the info window configuration modes would go a long way, but...nothing so far, sadly :(

[whatnot]

There will be a map path if you have it selected, and if there is an actual flight path to display, i.e. online in a server will obviously not have one, but the dogfight-even quick missions do.

That's pretty weird, because I've a few times with settings:

[X] 'No Map Icons'
[ ] 'No Map Path'

And I get nothing on my map, no path at all. An with deselecting the icons I do get the path but also every other icon including planes, ships, AAA batteries etc.

But have to give it another try today as you seem to be convinced it's possible to have the path only.

[whatnot]

As far as I've tested so far (mostly GB fighters), you just can't navigate with anything less than the map ghetto GPS mode - that is map icons, flightpaths etc. on.


That's a shame. I've managed to do a decent job finding my target and back to homebase in my 109, but it's been almost CAVU weather every time so I just look around to get landmarks to guide me there.

For me the navigation is definately a big part of the experience. But given the other urgent development /fixing priorities I can admit it's not in the top bunch of issues.

[Blackdog_kt]

There's been numerous threads about how to set the compass in the RAF fighters, running a forum search will yield results.

That being said, the compass on your instrument panel is not a magnetic compass, it's a gyroscopic one. The way it works is that you set it pre-takeoff to match the magnetic compass and then fly with the gyro compass. Once every 15 minutes or so, or after violent maneuvers, you need to re-align it because the gyroscopes drift and it gradually loses accuracy.


Check out this thread: http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=21533&highlight=hell

This doesn't solve the difficulty of getting the magnetic compass in view, so maybe we need a second "look at the instruments command" on top of the one we already have.

In the meantime, i've found that if i trim the aircraft well i can just disable head-tracking temporarily and pan the camera around with the mouse to get it in view and adjust it properly. It's not like i'm going to be worried about the compass mid-fight, such things are done during cruise to and from the target area, so it works you fine in the end. Also, you don't need absolute precision 100% of the time. As long as you are accurate to within 5 degrees (i think the gyro-compass drifts 2-4 degrees every 10 -15 minutes or so, depending on how much you throw the plane around) you can easily navigate by the map and looking at the terrain.

[whatnot]

There's been numerous threads about how to set the compass in the RAF fighters, running a forum search will yield results.

My problem hasn't been the compass but the lack path I would need to follow to get to my destination. But as next beta is implied to have a briefing with a map I guess I'll just draw the routes to a napkin ;-)

Flying in formation with AI is quite a challenge too as they do pretty tight moves on robotic accuracy without any heads up. Knowing the planned flight levels I assume is still a thing of the future or does the new briefing introduce those too?