Complex engine management

[VO101_Tom]

Lots of Original Bf 109 documents (if somebody would not know it):

http://www.germanluftwaffe.com/archi...cmitt%20AG.htm

Looks so, they will be needed

[Raggz]

I just had my first flight on 100% realism. Everything on and had a ball flying the Bf109.
Managed to keep the prop and temp. Took some engine damage in the end by a tailgunner from a Wellington but made it back to base and belly landed and survived. But i shot down 2 Wellingtons. Jesus what a thrill
It really gets busy when you constantly have to keep an eye on the instruments, trim and pitch. This experience opened a whole new world for me with WWII planes. This game fekkin rock.

And i made it thanks to this brilliant thread and the A2A video

[Blackdog_kt]

It's funny how many people were against such stuff when a few of us discussed such possibilities. They would tell us that this is not the realm of a combat sim to delve into, but more appropriate for civilian sims like FSX, that it's impractical in combat, etc, so it really means something to me to see so many people not only enjoying it but picking it up and learning it "on the fly" so to speak with relative ease.

I'm not saying maddox games did it because we asked for it (they probably would have evolved anyway), i'm just glad they did and people appreciate it. And ironically enough, it's true that most of what i learned about CEM and navigation was learned by flying 3rd party FSX add-ons for a few hours on a friend's PC, especially the A2A ones and the aerosoft catalina (god, what a lovely bird that one, even if she's probably slower than a current day family car)

Originally Posted by Zorin

For now, true, but with the war going on the Allies are still mostly stuck with manual labor, while the German planes are fully automated.

This would be very interesting because it would turn the late war high altitude fights into a rock-paper-scissors game. It would be balanced while still being historically accurate and different: allied hot-rods got the better performance but you have to work for it, while the axis fighters have lower but fully automatic performance.

This is in total contrast to what we had in the IL2 series, where the stock 190s actually performed better on manual mode while P47s could cruise around on wep and full pitch all day long.

It's going to be interesting to try both sides of the coin, for sure.

Originally Posted by Osprey

In the series 'Hunters Of The Sky' there is a PTO '47 pilot interviewed and he said how he was escorting B-17's back home. They were on the home run but still away from base, but not too far. He said he's setup his machine for a comfortable cruise at which point he began to start crying during the interview as he told that his personal complacency had cost the lives of 10 men when a Zero burst out of the sky and shoot down one of the 17's. He recalled being unable to prepare his machine for the dive in time to stop it. It was very sad because clearly he'd carried this guilt with him forever afterwards.

Wow, that's definitely a hair-raising account.

On the other hand, i'll be extremely happy to have similar things happen to me while i'm pretend-flying my pretend-planes on my PC and also do the same thing to others. It appears that the element of surprise will be paramount when flying CoD in full real (especially since it's apparently harder to spot aircraft than it was in IL2 according to Luthier), as well as planning ahead to avoid it.

You might call me a masochist but after all we all are to an extent, so let me be honest. That's what i most expect from CoD, to be scared shi*tless, rendered helpless and get blasted out of the sky knowing that i really had no chance at all to prevent it no matter what i would do. This doesn't only give a better glimpse to the experiences of a real pilot, reinforces the awe factor and heightens the sense of achievement when you start improving, it also creates moments in your gaming history that stay with you for ages.

I still remember the first time i heard the flak on B-17 II: The mighty 8th, or the first time i came up against a huge bomber formation in European Air War. I eagerly expect the same to happen with CoD

[Les]

Maybe I'm over-estimating the extra complexity, but I think it'll be interesting to see how this all pans out, in tactical terms.

It almost sounds like, initially (and perhaps forever when dealing with inexperienced fliers), half the 'kills' people are going to be getting while flying 'full real' will be engine kills, forcing the other guy to bite bullets or blow his engines (or both ).

It could be though that as people become more proficient at recognizing and dealing with the extra level of variables, which is to say, as people learn how to fly with this more complex engine management, new ways of managing the combat aspects of the sim emerge too. It would make sense if there emerged new forms of commonly used tactics and 'game-play'. I'm not thinking of anything radically different to what can happen now using IL-2:1946, but just in terms of people operating within new sets of limits, and finding and taking advantage of new tactical exploits.

For example I can imagine cases of opponents just deciding not to engage in combat at all, knowing under the circumstances it just wouldn't be worth the risk or that they just wouldn't be able to get away with it like they once might have. What would have previously been an opportunity for a quick or easy kill might no longer be. Another example would be as I mentioned above, where you earn your victory by using tactics that force the other guy to wreck his engine, before disengaging, maybe without any shots being fired at all.

It could change people's willingness/reluctance to bail out too. You could conceivably fire a single short burst at someone and it could hit a critical component not previously modelled, and next thing you know your opponent's bailed for no apparent reason...

Anyway, in short, it could be a real game-changer in a lot of ways, predictable and not.

I personally welcome the extra complexity and would like to reach a level of proficiency where I'd be competitive online in a full-real server. But if it's all too much I'd also settle for just being able to take uneventful, scenic, full-real joy-flights off-line too. Am looking forward to trying at least.

[Blackdog_kt]

Les, what you describe is certainly very possible. It's also much closer to the stories we've all read in memoirs by real pilots of the time.

The inability to keep up with the workload in a combat situation is a big part of why real pilots preferred to play it safe whenever they had the chance, protracted engagements were usually the exception and not the rule as the chance of making a mistake grew the longer the engagement would last.

It will be an absolute blast

[Anvilfolk]

I'm currently going through "Bud" Fortier's book while he was a pilot in the USAAF in WWII, and from his accounts the missions where none had to turn back at some point because of some malfunction in their P47 or P51 (not even combat related) seem to be the minority. Of course, he reports mostly on the missions where something interesting happened... like someone having to go back at some point, even though the rest was a "milk run".

I already suck at Il2... this is going to make me suck even more! I can barely wait

[Azimech]

I still suck at gunnery after all these years but I'm a more technical type so there's still hope for me.

[Mingan]

I've noticed that there is only one lever for fuel tanks in Spitfire II whereas there should be two for each tank. Is the model inaccurate or am I wrong??

[Deadstick]

I can't get the game running properly yet, but I am VERY greatful for this thread. Looking forward to the challenge.

Cheers.

[Toaster]

Originally Posted by Mingan

I've noticed that there is only one lever for fuel tanks in Spitfire II whereas there should be two for each tank. Is the model inaccurate or am I wrong??

I thought the Spit Mk II had one Fuel Gauge and if memory serves it should be at the bottom right. I could be wrong though...