Indeed, the situation was much worse and got quite a bit better. I think the G limit modelling implemented by TD had the largest effect on the aircraft as it can still technically perform the bat turn but it will break the airframe doing it. Also the German planes got some much needed love as well.


I wouldn't mind a look at the La-5/7 series FM again. The problem with the La-5FN not stalling I believe is to do with elevator authority. Every other La-5/7 can pull quite a bit harder but also stall... so in some ways the La-5FN is a bit handicapped although in some ways its a benefit as it artificially prevents the pilot from stalling it seriously. It also reduces its peak ability.

Well, maybe you are right, but still, when I tested the maneuverability of the La-5FN, versus an ace AI A6M2, I couldnt outturn the Zero, but I definitely could keep up with it. In a red vs red test, Yaks had no chance in a turning fight vs La series. The Yak-3 was close, but still not enough. The La-5 was good, that cannot be denied, but not THAT good.

Somewhat unrelated may be the turn times being a little too low.

The trick with the Yak is that although it's a good turner (and generally gets better as the series goes on) the best turn speed is at a medium speed around 300 or 350kph. Keep it at that speed and you can out turn any opponent that the Yak is likely to face in a historic battle.

The La-5FN seems to turn well at more speeds... which may be an error. I'm not sure. It is a top performer which I wouldn't want to take away from it. But it would probably benefit from a close look.

Correct me if Im wrong, but I read somewhere (dont know where, it was long ago) that the Lavochkin's initial turn rate was excellent, but sustained wasnt that good. Still much better than 190, and comparable to 109G. So unlike Yaks, it wasnt a true dogfighter, but had incredibly good low altitude speed performance, and it was best employed as an energy fighter.

Concerning speed performance:
From NII VVS tests (most reliable source I think), it is revealed that low altitude performance (up to 3000m) is more or less OK for La5/F/FN, ingame but above that, they are either too fast (15-20km/h - La-5FN, 20km/h - La-5) or way too fast (30km/h - La-5F) And this is if we compare the best performing aircraft tested by NII VVS and what we have ingame.

Real turn rates are 1-1.5 seconds worse that ingame. This sounds insignificant, but it isnt.

La-7 is a different beast, which was definitely far superior to any german plane. We would need an additional 1944 version, with lower performance as in NII VVS tests.

Here's two "eye candy" options for multi-crew planes:

1) The ability to order specific AI crew to bail out without triggering a full-crew bailout. That is, you could order just the bombardier or tail gunner, or both, to bail out.

2) The ability for a player controlled crewman to bail out without triggering a full-crew bailout. That is, you as tailgunner could bail out leaving the rest of the crew behind.

The first option is a nice bit of eye candy for bomber pilots who want to give badly wounded and bleeding crew a chance of surviving, albeit it possibly in captivity.

Historically, it wasn't uncommon for Western Allied bomber crew over Axis-occupied Europe to bundle their grievously wounded colleagues into their parachutes and toss them out the escape hatch. The idea was that the wounded man was almost certainly going to die if he had to spend many hours at high altitude before he could get medical care, whereas the Germans might take pity on him and save his life if he survived the parachute drop.

Another reason for the first option is to simulate the heroic bomber pilot who orders everyone out of the plane except for himself prior to attempting to land a badly damaged plane, or orders everyone else out while he attempts to keep a mortally wounded plane flying prior to bailing out himself.

The second option is sort of silly, but I guess it would allow players to quit a mission without ending it.That way you could still watch the action from your parachute or some other view. For online players, bailing out would be slightly less of a dick move than just logging out of the server.

Either option could also be used to simulate secret agent drops, with a particular crewman actually being a spy/partisan. It would allow any bomber that doesn't have a dedicated paratrooper loadout to drop a few parachutists.

Two months left?

Any news about 4.13? Should we hope or already not?

Thanks for update, I'm reeeeaaalllly wanting to take a B-24 out for a spin.

Hey TD Dev's, got a couple of quick suggestions for you on the upcoming patch.

First Suggestion: Aircraft/Ships/Vehicle/Objects/Target sorting (including stationary). --- Can you please make it to where we can select aircraft or other objects for use in the QMB/FMB something like this: Allies > US > Navy > Fighters > F4U-1a. Objects> Buildings > Airfield > US Hangar

Second Suggestion: Manual Landing Gear: --- Can you re-code to make it to where all I have to do is hold down a key on my keyboard Instead of repeatedly punching it several times.

Third Suggestion: Amount of objects at one time to add --- Make it possible to add as many as 32 aircraft/vehicles/ships/personnel at one time in the FMB. Because frankly 4 at a time just gets crazy with the amount of clicking we have to do.

*side note it would be cool to actually have historic levels or aircraft on the carrier. 8 on deck to spawn and the rest spawn inside and get brought up by the elevator.


--

Why would you want to have that?!
All you need to do if you would like to have this, is to program a controller to repetitively sent these key presses.
Personaly i like the manual gear for some planes. It keeps you busy as would be in real during take-off or landing :)

A quick seach on internet did return this if you do not have special controllers. Maybe you can give it a try:
http://www.computerhope.com/tips/tip209.htm
http://www.autohotkey.com/

Cheers,
Ray