Lexx you keep on saying that but I for the life of me do not understand how you keep coming up with these 95%-5% type numbers... it seems to me like you are pulling out of thin air or something.... can you substantiate these numbers... at all? And not from a 5 year old quote... but from 2007.... 2008 would be even better... but I am sure you have no source whatsoever for these theories of yours...

There you go again... I have yet to see that silly simplification anywhere in this 111 page debate... and "let's customize this or mod that for optional use only." !!??? :D That is rich man... yeah..... real rich... If it were really that simple this thread would be on page 2 by now. Yeah.. lets have that option to put a 25lb spit in a Mk5.. or better yet the FM of an La-7 on a Mustang.. so we can fix it... yeeeahhhhhhh that's the ticket.... let's fix 'em all....!!!

and this little gem really takes the cake....

Everyone who bought the sim paid for it's developement.... and each individual... unless he bought multiple copies... paid the same price give or take adjustments for region and time of purchase relative to release of whatever version we are talking about..

Personally I bought 2 copies of IL2, 3 of FB, 3 of the FB GOLD pack... and 3 of 46... all which I gave away as gifts to promote the sim.... because it is IMO THAT GOOD.. While working at Best Buy for 2 years I sold EVERY SINGLE COPY of the GOLD pack that came in the store and several PF standalones as well... (Not to mentuion joysticks, RAM, video cards, sound cards.. all directly related to the sim... ) so by virtue of your logic.. does that mean that I have more of a say so in what goes on in here? I dont think so.... Your logic is NOT.. period.. It is a good thing that you are not an attorney because if you were you would be one poor sob my friend.

Our house was in order until you lot hacked the sim.

And I do in fact know right from wrong, something you obviously do not.

Well said Bearcat.

The relative numbers of Offline/Online play customers have changed over the years, possibly to a greater Online proportion. This is crazyivan's conjecture. Before today, back over the life of the sim, Oleg's quotation of 95% of paying customers being Offline players stands.

Bearcat (emphasis in bold ~LEXX):: Is that what YOU are modding? For Shame Bear! :grin:

We will just remind you again that "modding" also means things other than aircraft modding -- greater Smoke and Fire visibility, creating more historical runways and skinning runways, etc... It took you "2 years" to admit this at the western publisher's forum, but when you did it was like a breath of fresh air.

--

Bearcat:: Correct! Rama also failed to look at the customers in greater detail that a developer/publisher must consider. We shall review...


Say a jar of marbles has 95 red marbles, and 5 blue marbles, for a total of 100 red and blue marbles.

We could claim the jar has red and blue marbles, and we would be correct! We would also be missing more detailed information about the jar's contents -- relative numbers of red and blue marbles.

Offliners and Onliners each paid for each box that each purchased.
Offliners in their vastly greater numbers paid for the sim's development.

This is a simple analogy. A far better point was made by an honest Online player poasting at simhq about 2 years ago...

Yes Lexx you are right about one thing.. this whole line of reasoning you are on is simple....

Look I know some of those mods are good things that folks have wanted for a long time... that is why I don't go around trashing guys who use them... and not only that I still have a great deal of respect for some of the guys I know who use the mods.. because I know that they will not use them where they aren't wanted.. but until online play can be secured from those who do not have the same values, as much as I might want to try out some of them.. and I do.. I will not.... and I do that because it is right for me.... I can't judge YOU... or anyone else who prefers to do otherwise.... or anyone else who takes a more adamant stance than I do.. I think it is silly to not expect people to jump on this bandwagon at all.... but for you to come here with your no speak.. I cant even call it double speak... it is just a non point. If this whole issue was a debate, there might be others in the debate on the pro mod side who would have at least some points.. but your arguments barely qualify as arguments on the matter. I can tell the difference between valid arguments in a given debate and the Bullwinkle logic... You know.... "Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat.... nothin up muh sleeve..... PRESTO!!"

NON sense... and as for the if not for the offline base we'd be paying $12 to fly online.... BS... this sim has been a hit online from day one... because it was designed that way..... Hyperlobby was icing on the cake and I am sure that Oleg didn't say "Hey Jiri can you... help a brutha out..... " Jiri did it because he could and he wanted to.... but we still had UBI... and we could still connect IP to IP... Your whole offline vs online due to numbers thing is not even a hose of cards... it is built entirely on vapor.....

The bottom line for me is that I hope that a fix comes soon.. one that will be at least complex enough and scalable enough so that none but the ones who have nothing but cheating in mind will want to try to break it. If the fix is scalable then all those who claim to just want to "customize this or mod that for optional use only" will be able to do so.. and those who want to make sure that the Spitfire that shoots them down is a legit Spit flown well and not some hacked up chump chariot can also do so... because you know.. the onliners may be a minority (though your numbers are laughable..) but they still have just as much if not more of a "right" to fair and level online play as you claim you do to mod it as you see fit.

What is this continuous arguing achieving?

Why not lock the thread and BAN all talk of the mods? I mean obviously NO-ONE here is mature enough to discuss things civily!

I thought I was quite civil... ;)

I can appreciate your interpretation.

"To modify the Multimedia Product or create any derived work" is as I understand it is in reference to the programme itself, not any "work" created outside the programme. ie. Any artwork created by the user in Photoshop is not owned by Adobe, nor is it modifiying the programme.

I would have thought that the scenarios that users have been building is allowed by UBI/1c as they are created solely from their very own supplied FMB. They even supply voids to assist the skinners. The fact that there has not been anything to the contrary for seven years sets precedent. I am sure "levels" and "scenarios" in the EULA is in reference to programme versions and revisions rather than game functions.

The EULA that everyone agrees to before they load the software is to prevent the misuse of the software as it was intended. Skinning and mission building yes, decompiling code no.

Really? If your own house was in order then use of the Sound Mod in non-mod online servers wouldn't be an issue would it? All online players would play with honesty and integrity regardless of the availability of changes to the game that can un-balance online play.
The existance of the sound mod in no way coerces palyers to utilise it in unscrupulous ways.
I can only assume, that as there is such concern about so called "cheating" in Online servers, that there is a lack of trust amongst the online community, that online players doubt the integrity of the people they play online with and that there is at least a small proportion of bad apples amongst that community who will take advantage of whatever means are available to give themselves an advantage.
Far from having your own house in order you have extrapolated you unease at the behaviour of some of your online colleagues and used it to wage a campaign against people happily utilise community generated third party mods to enhance their own gameplay experience.
Any issues with online cheating could quickly and easily be resolved by banning cheaters, stronger server administration and a move away from anonomous online play. That wouldn't require a constant stream of Online players repeating the same old boring arguments against community modification. It wouldn't require any programming effort to develop server side file verification and it wouldn't rely on a !C developed fix to the simulation.

As for right and wrong...really, whats wrong with enjoying a simultor I have legitimately purchased (on a number of occasions) in the way I see fit...

What strikes me as odd is that this is the only simulation of any kind Air, Naval, Racing etc where a proportion of the community has come out against third party and community development of the sim, beyond the point where the developer has stopped further support...

With this sentence, you only show your full ignorance of the problem.
No this can't be solved easily by banning cheaters. Every honest onliner know this...
... please stop talking about what you don't know.

You're double wrong there:
1) third party and community development of the sim has been intensive during the last 6 years... and very wellcome by all the community who praised all the patches and free addons in which this third party and community work was delivered.
2) No developper of any other game had got a continuous and constant support during 6 years. ALL OTHER have stopped long before. Nobody has forced M:1C to stop the support after 6 years, it is a plain normal and understandable decision in order to work on the following game. I can tell you that The distributor, Ubi, was absolutly not pleased to see M:1C continue the support of IL2 during 6 years and thus sacrifying valuable ressources for the developpment of the follow-on game they pay for....

From this, I'm sorry to tell you that what's striking you.... is just your ignorance and your wrong look of the situation.

No one is criticising Oleg for stopping support of the IL2 series at 4.09 and shifting to BOW-SOW.
I applaud Oleg and his business model...I think he has been savvy enough to continue to release patches through the long period between PF and BOB-SOW to maintain interest in his games when it might have died off...
But it is natural now, as there is still continued interest in the game series from its user for the community and for third parties to continue development of the game outside of the aegis of official patches, expansions and mods...
This is what has happened with every single other flight simulation in history...

Why cannot Cheating be prevented by stronger server administration or stronger policing of the Online community? Surely if anyone caught cheating was perma IP banned, cheating would tail off pretty quickly...All it would take is the major servers exchanging usernames/IP addresses of people abusing the system on a weekly basis and bingo! Problem solved...