Modelling engine wear and WEP limitations

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by Seadog

OK. Now how to sim that?

A few people already gave pretty good ideas on that, but it's currently buried under the Merlin debates

As a short recap:

a) accelerated engine wear model if spawning with a brand new airframe on each sortie, selectable by the player from the difficulty options

b) realistic engine wear model if spawning with the same airframe (relevant aircraft parameters carry over from one sortie to the next in the context of a dynamic campaign), along with a penalty for deliberately "recycling" airframes with abused engines, both for single and multiplayer...once again, selectable from the difficulty options

c) the two above models are mutually exclusive...we shouldn't be able to enable both an accelerated engine wear model and a "carry over" model, clicking one on the difficulty options would deselect the other, but it would still be possible to disable both

This makes sure that if the player is so inclined, he can fly with the uncertainty and chance of mechanical failure that engine abuse would pose.

Simple, clean, optional

[TomcatViP]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

A few people already gave pretty good ideas on that, but it's currently buried under the Merlin debates

As a short recap:

a) accelerated engine wear model if spawning with a brand new airframe on each sortie, selectable by the player from the difficulty options

An accelerated wear model wld be very difficult to achieve in term of stability. Mind that any programming glitch or non-anticipated player action would hve its repercussion magnified by the accelerated engine code.
I guess that 1C will need a lot of trying in here that way.

[Crumpp]

"I had to return from Nuremburg in a Wellington II on one engine and used maximum boost and revs on a Merlin X for five hours with no sign of distress..."

As a RL pilot, I see that as maximum continuous which is THE engines maximum boost and revs....

He does not say he used "Emergency Power"....

[csThor]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

b) realistic engine wear model if spawning with the same airframe (relevant aircraft parameters carry over from one sortie to the next in the context of a dynamic campaign), along with a penalty for deliberately "recycling" airframes with abused engines, both for single and multiplayer...once again, selectable from the difficulty options

Well ... for a campaign (or an online campaign for that matter) we'd need to use the Werknummer/Serial Number to track airframes. Meaning the unit the player flies with has a pool of airframes (according to historical values). Each pilot would be assigned one aircraft and the campaign engine would have to track not only engine parameters but also combat damage or accidents. Then we enter real-life inspection cycles and repairs so that it may happen the player gets another aircraft for a mission while his own crate is being serviced/repaired.

[TomcatViP]

Seems great.

Would you add fleet management at squadron level for online campaign ? I bet you'd get a large success that way

[csThor]

For the Luftwaffe this would be wrong. Here the Gruppe is the entity that does the "accounting" and one Officer is especially there to oversee the technical aspects of the aircraft (called the "Technische Offizier"). He and the Oberwerkmeister (Chief Mechanic) of a Staffel would be responsible for the technical "well-being" of the unit.

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by csThor

Well ... for a campaign (or an online campaign for that matter) we'd need to use the Werknummer/Serial Number to track airframes. Meaning the unit the player flies with has a pool of airframes (according to historical values). Each pilot would be assigned one aircraft and the campaign engine would have to track not only engine parameters but also combat damage or accidents. Then we enter real-life inspection cycles and repairs so that it may happen the player gets another aircraft for a mission while his own crate is being serviced/repaired.

Initially i would just have "no-name" airframes that just suffer wear and tear through missions to make things simpler to implement and test.

However yes, what you describe would be the end goal in terms of this feature and how it would/should be implemented

As for squadron/fleet management some people like it and some don't, so i would advocate it being optional. The campaign engine would do it automatically if the player wouldn't interfere, but it should be possible for example to go into the squadron's dossiers and assign your best wingmen some healthy airframes.

This is similar to European Air War, it just expands the same idea into more features, where you were presented with a computer generated sortie roster before each mission but were still able to change who would fly if you wanted to.

In short, the PC would take care of all the "accounting" if i didn't do anything, but i would still be able to change things around if i wanted to without having to stick with a full time job of squadron logistics on every single mission.

This enables those who like it to go all out on it, those who don't to just leave it to the PC and the rest to simply change a couple of things and leave everything else to the PC.

[335th_GRAthos]

Originally Posted by cheesehawk

That gets a bit too far into "Historical accuracy!" Most of us paid for a flight sim, not an accounting sim!

+1

This reminds me of the "Analysis - Paralysis" saying...

I am afraid that, if some people do not look at the whole thing from a more practical point of view, CoD will become a great historically correct simulation which nobody will want to play, much less buy


my 2cents

[Al Schlageter]

Geez, they can't even get the game to function properly as it now and people want more complication added.

[TomcatViP]

Originally Posted by Al Schlageter

Geez, they can't even get the game to function properly as it now and people want more complication added.

Well are u talking of a bunch of late operated Spitfire with 100octane fuels being fully modeled according to some's fantasy dreams ?