SoW proposal: For force sensing sticks

[MikkOwl]

QUICK SUMMARY

Force sensing sticks aren't as unreal as one might think. With special consideration to them in Storm of War, they would become far more realistic in many ways than other joysticks.

BACKGROUND

I always dismissed force sensing for WW2 sims at first, in favour of moving sticks (G940 for example). A month or more ago I had a pleasant conversation with a British gentleman (a veteran of IL-2 multiplayer since it first came out). He had a force sensing joystick he had assembled from parts. It did not move at all, just sensed his imputs. He could tweak how far the range would be (that is, how much force was necessary to get 0-100% input into the game).

With normal sticks, there's a discrepancy in how much you move your stick and the one in the game moves in two ways: 1. The 'courve' we use to make our planes flyable with such limited movement range, and 2. when suffering compressibility and those things, the in game stick moves less than it should compared to the joystick, which moves easily to max (since there's not much resistance to stop it). If there was a conventional stick with very strong force feedback, and a good movement range, this could be solved.

For a force sensing stick those things are not an issue. Instead, if the plane does not turn enough with a certain strength of pull, one pulls harder until getting the desired result.

But there are still limitations. The 'pull harder to get the proper results' mentioned above only functions properly when trying to input less than 100% movement in a direction. Because the stick will give 100% at a certain weight (2kg for example). And since when flying normally it often happens that we want to do 100% turning, especially out of a dive in IL-2, the range will be limited by the maximum pull the stick will register (0-2kg means more than 2kg has no effect). Another problem is that if the stick has a range from 0kg to say, 8kg (a lot) then to turn under normal circumstances in IL2 you always have to pull 8kg, which is not good either.

THE SOLUTION

Storm of War needs to interpret input from force sensing joysticks differently. It must be possible to set it so that, under normal circumstances, maybe just 25% input from the joystick is 100% in the plane (normal/slow flight). Then, depending on the resistance the plane wants to offer, which depends on speed and airplane model (some are heavier in the controls than others), just like in force feedback, but instead of increasing resistance in force feedback motors, it requires more and more 'input' from the joystick (user pulling harder and harder if a force sensing joystick).

THE RESULT

The only limitation for realism in forces involved depends on how big the range/resistance of the force sensing joystick is. Some people have home built models, some are commercial models. There's a lot of possibility here to make it a great alternative to other types of joysticks.

The result will be that take off and normal flight (in easy to fly planes without much resistance in the controls) is easy and light. But when flying a heavier plane (Bf 110 at higher speeds) or in dives and so on, more and more input from the joystick is required, so the user must pull harder and harder to get the same input, until it's too much.

• Suits pit building because the stick does not have to be tall or move around. Can then be center mounted easily (normal 'non tall' sticks are very unsuited to center mounting, sharp angles of the wrist involved when moving the stick around).
• The unrealistic angle of the conventional sticks is avoided.
• Is similar to control surface force feedback. When the plane goes faster and you have to push the stick forward to keep the plane from nosing up (typical situation), applying some trim will make you able to relax the pressure on the stick, just like real life. There's no hassle with a force feedback or other stick needing to be physically forwards to do it properly.

The lacking thing then is the same as any force sensing stick - the stick doesn't move as far as the real stick should (aircraft sticks back then moved very far often, just look in the cockpit of your plane in IL-2). But every stick so far lacks in realism in some way, and this is a good option. Force feedback in terms of vibrations and those things could help you feel buffeting when near stall even in a force sensing stick. Up to the manufacturers to come up with models that allow for a big range of force and force feedback.