My wonder list

[greybeard1]

Yes, wonder since I ask myself following things since I started playing IL-2 a few time ago and also because I fear they are impossible to make.

1. To make an aerodrome requires two things: an airfield and a windsock; taking-off and landing without it would be suicidal, especially with strong cross winds often active in game. It should be doable since present e.g. in Joint Strike Fighter combat sim (Eidos - 1997).
2. WWII era runways were often "airfields" allowing taking-off almost in any direction, according to wind. If not feasible, at least runway should be along prevalent direction of local wind: why in IL-2 wind is always across runway?
3. A realistic runway should be at least twice wide the current one in IL-2 and free from obstacle in the vicinity: why control tower (and a lot of vehicles, trees and any kind of obstacles) are always alongside?
4. Aircrafts should take-off at quinconce: since set in line astern, how player can SEE to be cleared for take-off?
5. Why was decided to distress player with loss of padlocked view shortly after it is "masked" also by a tiny cockpit frame? In RL pilot should move his head or repeat search until retaking visual contact. Since this can't be performed by a PC monitor, the right thing was to keep still padlock view.
6. Why forcing player to fill sky with icons, so disrupting immersion? Since visual identification by a 500 dpi eye can't be modeled on a 96 dpi screen, would be effective to set "selective" keys to point at different target - e.g. "F" for friend, "M" for mate of same flight, "E" for enemy and so on, like in Red Baron 3D (Dynamix - 1998 ).
7. Why not implementing internal views with some "panning" along the four directions (up, down, left, and right) WHILE PADLOCKED on friend or enemy (or ground object): this would help reading instruments, e.g., that currently can't be done hitting 5 on NumPad without adjusting also FOV.
8. Why player isn't provided with a serious flight plan? How can I lead a flight if I don't know altitude of each waypoint?
9. Why ground control assistance is so poor? Germans, for instance, did have radars in a net informing pilots about enemy flights (this was present in European Air War - Microprose, 1998 )
10. Also ground object padlocking should be fixed, so not forcing player to keep it in external view to keep track of runway during approach.
11. Control tower should give a safer assistance to landing operation and not allow another plane to land just after having authorized player to do.

Pardon me if I seem not grateful for 1C and Daidalos work, that's not so.

Best regards,
GB

[Aviar]

6. You can do that now by using custom icons.

7. Try the 'Instant View Forward With Padlock' command. It does what you want except you can't pan while looking forward. However, you should be able to see most of your instruments.

10. So you are asking for a 'Padlock Runway' command. That would be nice. What I do now is padlock a friendly unit near the runway. This basically has the same affect and keeps the runway in your padlocked view.

Aviar

[IceFire]

Since 4.10 the wind direction is directly specified by the mission builder including speed, direction, gust level and turbulence.

Runways on older maps tend to be fairly generic while on newer maps they tend to be specific to the real airfield. Some WWII airfields were very small grass fields while others were large and expansive. We see a mix of both. If you check out the airfields on the Slovakia, Bessarabia, Solomons, Burma, and Kurland maps (just to name a few) you will see very historical airfields.

If you don't like icons...they can be turned off.

[greybeard1]

Thanks for replies.

About custom icons, I know they could be turned off and anyway "customized". What I meant was totally different: since actually average player CANNOT perform visual identification like in RL, because in RL he use an eyeball having a 500 dpi resolution, in game resolution is bottle-necked by 96 dpi screen - five times less!

As a consequence, older games like Red Baron 3D gave to different letters on keyboard, different effect in searching and padlocking in sky various aircrafts: "E" for enemy, "F" for friend and much more. This allowed to get rid of icons, because when e.g. player hit "T" key, nearest threat is found and padlocked. THIS IS NOT unrealistic, because, given limitation mentioned above, that replicates what in RL pilot would do - this is called cybernetics (study of human behaviour applied to machines) a science vastly forgot lately. Unfortunately, more often, instead of cybernetics, we apply personal opinion (always arguable), so e.g. we think: "keeping visual track, into cockpit, thru' canopy frames is impossible, SO we make padlock view lost when this happen". Actual pilot behaviour, instead, is move is head so to keep still track of his target and, if visual track is lost, he restart search until he track again! This, in front of (again) a 96 dpi screen can be performed only by selective key, if we do not want read banners in the sky attached to various aircraft, that is HIGHLY unreal.

This also mean that padlock view should NEVER be lost if not intentionally by player. This for runway too, since currently padlocked view on a ground object is lost as well as soon as a visual obstruction gets in the mid.

Sorry for my poor english and lenght of message, I'm only trying to make myself understood; maybe something better for this sim gets through.

Cheers,
GB

[Aviar]

I understand exactly what you are saying. However, IL-2 still has some of what you are looking for. As I mentioned earlier, you can use custom icons so that you really couldn't see them at all. As far as this part you mentioned...."different effect in searching and padlocking in sky various aircrafts: "E" for enemy, "F" for friend and much more."....IL-2 already has the following Padlock commands:

Padlock Enemy
Padlock Friendly
Padlock Enemy Ground
Padlock Friendly Ground
Padlock Next
Padlock Previous

All of the above are INTERNAL (in-cockpit) commands. They seem to do exactly as you have described above.

I do understand that you would like your virtual pilot's viewing system to be more human-like. I agree. That would be great. (Be aware that there is a large percentage of IL-2 players who are totally against Padlock and disable this feature altogether from their server(s).)

Personally, I use Padlock. Could it be improved? Just about anything in IL-2 could be improved. However, I have been playing flight sims for many years and in my opinion, the Padlock implementation in IL-2 is the best I have ever seen. (Yes, I also played Red Baron 3D.)

Aviar

[greybeard1]

Hi Aviar,

you're forgetting an important difference about padlocking in respect of RB3D: when you hit, for instance, "M" key, RB3D performs search for you and then padlocks! To padlock on a flight mate in IL-2 you must have it in front sight, first, not to mention that IL-2 does not distinguish between "mate" and generic "friendly". So if you want padlock a mate, you must first perform his visual identification, which is impossible if he'sn't very close, that's to say you need (again) icons!

I'm always for maximum available customization, let no-padlock fans free to play the way they like. This does not force to have icons, if more effective devices are implemented.

I respect your opinion, although would be curious to know what's worse in RB3D system.

Cheers,
GB

[Tempest123]

Good post, these are some of the things that have always confused me about IL2. It's very realistic in certain areas, but not in others. The airfields are a perfect example, with obstacles around the runway, and the thin runways (but that is not always the case on certain maps, or with custom runways). The new Solomons map has great, historically accurate airfields, and I understand its not really feasible to redo all the other maps.
Takeoff needs to be corrected, but spawning from static plane positions should solve this for custom missions. I'm not sure why by default the aircraft would be set up line astern down the runway for takeoff, if you're the leader you're starting your takeoff from 1/4 of the way down the runway, that's bogus, esp. if your carrying bombs.
Flight planning needs work, and this was one thing I noticed immediately back in 2001 when I got Il2, and it has seen a little improvement but not much. There is no altitude shown for waypoints, and that's basic. No time for different legs, no fuel consideration (its a guessing game for the player), no speed listed either, or type of formation and no wind information. It leaves a lot for the player to include in the briefing, and unless you write it down, its missing from the in-flight map anyways. This forces the player to hit auto pilot on missions with no nav-aids because there isn't enough info.
The funny thing is that these are all factors that can be set in the FMB (ex. wind can now be set in great detail), so it's not like IL2 is lacking in realism, they just are hidden on the briefing map.


And the air-ground comms are so bad (expect maybe the vectors, these are okay). Why does the tower yell at aircraft in panic telling them to go around, and why does the tower sound angry when I ask for landing clearance? Sounds like someone left the janitor to run the airfield. I would gladly volunteer my voice to fix some of these things.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Tempest123

And the air-ground comms are so bad (expect maybe the vectors, these are okay). Why does the tower yell at aircraft in panic telling them to go around, and why does the tower sound angry when I ask for landing clearance?

I think that the "angry" ground controller voice is just for the Germans, and that it's more of the way that that particular German accent sounds to the ears of native English-speakers.

I always mentally imagine the German ground controller as a pompous ass with an invented "von" in front of his surname, who got shipped off to the front lines because his superiors back in Berlin couldn't stand him.

[wheelsup_cavu]

Originally Posted by Tempest123

And the air-ground comms are so bad (expect maybe the vectors, these are okay). Why does the tower yell at aircraft in panic telling them to go around, and why does the tower sound angry when I ask for landing clearance?

We have some Voice Packs at M4T that can be used to help with that problem. http://www.mission4today.com/index.p...ownloads&c=587


Wheels

[P-38L]

Just few ideas

1) Long time ago, Daidalos Team said that they were going to implement the Refuel/Repair/Rearm option. I would like to have this in the next update.

2) Another idea: if we are having right now the navigation option, the map should be only a map, nothing more. With no moving objects or your own icon moving across the map. In real life in WWII era while you were airborne you had a map, a paper map, with the location of the airfield, antennas with their own designation.

3) Variable and randmoize weather. You get airborne in a beautiful sunny day, and few minutes later suddenly start raining.

4) The only AI aircraft that is affected for the torque is the TB-3 (the bomber with four engines), the rest of the AI airplanes are always perfectly trimmed, what about to implement torque in all AI airplanes.

5) Key combination for realism in starting engines. Eg: Master, Alt, Avionics, fuel pump, primer, etc.

6) In HOTAS controls we have power and prop. I think MIXTURE should be implemented too.

7) Randomize animation of animals in an area designed in FMB. For example horses, cows and others.

Since pilot figure can run, we can get advantage on this to have more "life" in airports, like people (mechanics, pilots, officers) walking, and vehicles moving. I know in FMB you can get moving vehicles, but this option stops when the end of the line finish.

9) Light from an airplanes illuminates the ground. But when you put light icons in FMB they don't illuminate the surfaces or ground around it. Why?

Thank you.