Carrier Landing single mission - landing waypoints not activating

[Raven Morpheus]

Hello

I've been playing IL2 1946 on and off for a number of years now, although I don't claim to be any good at it, but recently I seem to have mastered taking off, both on the ground in a P38/Corsair and also from a carrier in a Corsair, however I usually let the autopilot do the landing for me because I'm rubbish at it, especially when it comes to carrier landings.

Last night I thought I'd have a go at the single mission carrier landing for the USN in the F4U Corsair to see if I could teach myself how to land on a carrier - and I actually managed to do it...

...but I landed on the wrong carrier. I landed on the one to the right of the actual target carrier. Lol.

So today I went back to try it and I just can't do it, so I thought I'd switch to autopilot and see how it does it.

Now, one thing I immediately noticed is that it doesn't follow the route set out by the 5 waypoint roundels on the minimap, not precisely at least.

Second thing I noticed is that when the autopilot crosses waypoint 4 or 5 (it actually missed out one of the last 2 waypoints) it activates a series of other waypoints designed to bring you in for the landing and the tower gives him the all clear.

Thing is when I'm flying I don't get that series of extra waypoints that shows the landing glide path nor does the tower give me the all clear! I follow the waypoints on the minimap as near as I can and I go through all 5 of them.

So, how is the autopilot activating the series of landing waypoints and how can I do so as well?

[Aviar]

The game is not programmed to display (for the player) the same landing circuit waypoints that the AI uses. However, there is a workaround.

When you hit your next-to-last waypoint (before the final Landing waypoint), activate your Autopilot for a second and then turn it off. The AI landing circuit waypoints will be displayed on your map and will remain there even after you disengage the Autopilot.

*This workaround may not work with certain Difficulty settings and certain game modes, such as Coop.

Aviar

[Raven Morpheus]

Thanks, I didn't realise they were for the AI only.

I tried your suggestion about turning on the AI just prior to landing on a campaign that I'm doing (Battle of Britain redux) and it worked so I'll probably do that from now on.

I need a lot more practice though, I still can't land (even after about 4yrs on and off playing the game), even using those markers, not even on grass.

[Stig1207]

Give Zeus-cat's Straight from the farm a go. I reckon you'll be landing in no time:
http://www.mission4today.com/index.p...name=Downloads
Anyway, I'm impressed that you can takeoff from a carrier, I've only managed twice so far

[Raven Morpheus]

Originally Posted by Stig1207

Give Zeus-cat's Straight from the farm a go. I reckon you'll be landing in no time:
http://www.mission4today.com/index.p...name=Downloads
Anyway, I'm impressed that you can takeoff from a carrier, I've only managed twice so far

Thanks I'll try that.

I don't use full realism btw. In my USMC pilot career I am 1st Lt having started as Gunnery Sgt, I've flown 5 sorties (I thought it was more than that, I started over a year ago now so that tells you how little I play this game) and have 15 kills and I've been awarded the Bronze Star and the DFC, but I don't have the following difficulty settings on by the looks of it -

Engine Overheat
Torque/Gyro effects
Flutter effect
Stalls/Spins
G-Force limits
Reliability
Wind and Turbulence
Limited fuel
Limited ammo

None of the view difficulty settings are on, they don't make it any less difficult imo.
I also turned off head shake because I don't like it. It causes some of the gunnery sights on fighters to move about. unnecessarily imo.

Occasionally I use FaceTrackNOIR but I don't suppose that makes much of a difference.


Despite all that I do quite often get shot down or end up in a spin that leaves me in the deep blue and having to restart missions quite a lot.


However as a test I've just started a new USMC pilot career (Iwo Jima, my other one is Okinawa) and all I turned off in the difficulty settings was the Torque/Gyro effects and it's just as easy to take off from a carrier as in my other career - so I'd say if you find take off from a carrier difficult turn off Torque/Gyro effects.

The way I do it is to taxi a little so I'm not in a position where I'm going to drop off the side or hit the superstructure, put the chocks in, lock the tail wheel, extend the wings (on a F4U), put flaps to take off, build the engine to 110%, release the chocks, then when I've got the plane on it's front wheels only and I'm approaching the end of the deck I pull up on the stick to take off.

On full realism I end up barrel rolling straight into the drink. This is obviously caused by the Torque/Gyro effect difficulty setting because it doesn't happen when that setting alone is turned off.


But despite the apparent easy difficulty settings I usually use I still can't land on ground or carriers!

I nearly had a landing last night on Midway island in a single mission in a F4U but it bounced and the right wing caught the ground.

It's just lucky that landing isn't considered a condition of mission success otherwise I'd never complete a mission in any of the dynamic campaigns where I've turned the autopilot off and tried to land manually!

[Raven Morpheus]

Wow!! Those tutorial missions you linked me to are great.

I set the difficulty as stated in the mission brief.

Taking off is no problem on grass, even with Torque/Gyro effects on, haven't tried it on a carrier yet though because I know what will happen with the Torque/Gyro effect on and I can do it without that difficulty setting on - barrel roll straight off the end of the deck!

I just landed on grass 3 times in a row though, although I only managed to hit the runway once but I still landed the plane OK the other 2 times, just off to the left. Never managed to land a plane on grass before now without digging the nose in.

I tired the "Carrier" landing on grass mission but missed the "Carrier" entirely so I gave up on that one and went to one of the single missions by Zeus Cat for actual carrier landings instead.

And I just got my first carrier landing, although it was a bit too close to the superstructure and I couldn't find my arrester hook button until the very end...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Isj518UlF1c

I think I've managed to work out a sort of way of doing it that I can remember - make sure the landing strip is lined up with your gun sights/nose, keep at about 30%-40% throttle, set flaps to landing, and as you come in and the edge of the strip appears to get closer, i.e. it looks like the nose/gunsight is touching it, reduce to 20%-25% throttle, then deploy the landing gear keep the speed at 80-100mph and let the plane drop and flare as you get closer to the ground.

Seemed to work OK on land and worked OK on carrier landings although my first attempt I kind of fell short of the carrier, got down to 0ft without realising it, tried to increase throttle and pull up but ended up just clearing the end of the carrier deck and rolling right and into the water...


Just have to go back and see if can repeat my success just now again and again and again...