4.12 ai...

[Bearcat]

OK as some of you may know I have been pretty hard on the AI.. the friendly AI in particular.. but after flying quite a few hours offline since 4.12 was released I have to say that .. it is not as bad as I thought.. In fact the AI in 4.12 is pretty darned good.. on both sides.. There are ways around the AI gang bang issue. For one thing the commands have changed .. and it is a big change so before doing anything else take a good look at it.. Anyone Help Me used to be TAB 7 .. it is now TAB 8.. so if you are hitting TAB 7 .. well duhhh (smacks himself upside the head..) and that is just for starters ... I have also found that mixing up the commands between target all and attack fighters flight by flight seems to help... In this respect something like VAC is priceless!! In another post I made in here griping about the Gangbanging AI while the friendlies watch thing... JtD suggested that I let the rest of the flight press the attack early then jump in.. He was right.. !

Aside from being able to assign a flight number to my flight this is the best tact to take I have found.. Once the fighting starts .. if you keep an eye out and don't try to make all the enemy flights aces .. and act like you are fighting live pilots (as in don't take it for granted that they won't see you or that they will fly a predictable pattern.. because they don't anymore..) you can survive and actually have fun.. even in a 16 vs 16 fight.. If all the flights are actively engaged they will respond more readily to commands.. it is only when they get outside the immediate battle zone that they get stupid.. or really stupid I should say.. I have also noticed that the enemy AI are still good shots.. but they seem to suffer from some of the same things we do .. like panic.. and blind spots.. I was able to actually hide from 3 190s that were after me by hiding behind the mountains just south east of Sevastopol on the Crimea map. I nailed one of them before the other two caught me in a pincher .. but it was a very engaging fight.. In another incident I was able to stay underneath a bandit.. and he had no idea where I was so when he came out of his roll I was able to nail him with a few shots and that was all it took.. once he was wounded it was just a matter of staying on him till the right shot appeared.. In another fight I was being chased by 3 bandits and I was able to loose them in the clouds ... None of this was possible before.. not like this ..

Don't get me wrong there are still some issues with the AI .. but given the complexity of AI programming .. which I know absolutely nothing about.. I am in no position to speak too loudly.. As a consumer and particularly one who remembers how it was 6 years ago.. I have to tip my hat. I imagine that getting it the way it is was a challenge enough.. but it is much better than I thought initially. Now on all enemy ace AI it will be a short fight with anything more than 4-8 planes each.. at least with me... but by mixing it up, particularly on the enemy side.. (I make all the friendlies aces or veterans..) it can get interesting.. Hopefully at some point in the future we will be able to program each individual pilot in the QMB like we can with the skins on the pilots and AC in the QMB now.. since we can do it in the FMB.. that would really make it interesting.. for those of us who like to use the QMB ... but even as it is.. with some creative commands and not getting too ambitious on the enemy AI.. it can get pretty nice when you are going for the quick in the morning before going to work sim fix... yes indeedy!

With some of the other features in 4.12 the whole flying experience is different now.. Very nicely done!!