Curious...Why is this game so hard to get right?

AbortedMan · #1 07-01-2012, 03:56 AM

Why is it so hard for 1C to get the RAF speeds and flight models right? The numbers are all over the internet and various other historical references.

A simple google search I just did afforded me a plethora of information about early Spitfires performance in combat circa 1940. Where are the developers getting their information from?!??! What document or flight test reported that the max speed of a 100 octane Spitfire MK1a at sea level, 30 gallons of fuel, no bomb ordnance, and on a clear day is 280 mph?!?

Everything I've found states top speed at sea level of a MK1a/100 octane is 315 mph+...and even higher still up to 12,000 ft!

Hell, I even found information that the 87 octane topped out at ~280mph at sea level...that's what the in-game 100 octane variants are pushing now

with their airframe shaking everywhere about to fall apart!!! I AM CONFUSE!?

A simple reference to the source that you, the CloD developers, took from and modeled this information into the game would be all that is needed to assuage the raging frustration from players...or just simply state that you "have not created a flight simulation, but a representation of a world where the WWII aerial theater never happened as it did."

This is getting ridiculous.

Wolf_Rider · #2 07-01-2012, 04:14 AM

so are the posts

Blackdog_kt · #3 07-01-2012, 04:23 AM

I think the difficulty comes from modeling a system of factors that influence a set of values, instead of modeling the set of values directly. If we were to simply have X top speed and Y service ceiling, things would be very easy. What we have however is the set of equations that govern these values.

Incidentally, that's more or less how sims in the early 90s worked. You had only a set of values that described each aircraft and they were constant.

The upside is that it always works. The downside is in the real world things don't remain as constant as that: a lot depends on atmospheric conditions, other parameters of flight, etc.
For example, in an older sim a developer could get away with modeling all fighters at their maximum turn rate. However, we know today that turn rates are not constant, they depend on things like available thrust and airspeed at the time of turn, etc etc.

It's just a case of how much you model. The more you do, the better the representation once you get it right, but also the harder it is to get it right because things are interconnected: you make a small change here and it influences 3-4 other parameters down the road, which forces you to go back and reevaluate the model you use itself.

On the matter of tests now, they reflect top performance most of the times. Top performance is rarely continuous in the real world though. It's what we had in the previous IL2 series, where all aircraft could be pushed to the limit and stay there all day long, which was equally inaccurate.

The current system is a better reflection, because it takes more parameters into account and makes for highly situational combat (like the real thing), with features like CEM and so on. But like i said before, it's harder to get right.

When all is said and done and the sim's FMs are finalised at some point in the (hopefully, near) future, i don't really expect our aircraft to be pushing their top speed 24/7 either.

One day you'll get jumped by a 109 that's been in another engagement previously and you'll survive in your Hurricane, because your engine was cool and his was hot, allowing you to to use emergency boost for bit longer than the enemy. The next day you'll have the superior aircraft and lose because you will be the one who's coming from a previous engagement and get bounced by a 110 that has been lazily cruising along 2km above you. Which is pretty much the kind of thing we've all been reading in pilot memoirs and historical documents

P.S. It's not just the RAF models. The 109s are also slower. Plus, you'd be surprised but probably the fastest thing in the sim (at least around a specific altitude band) should be the 100 octane versions of the 110 that are currently missing. It would still accelerate like a brick and bleed speed like a pig (so it's dead meat anyway if it turns with you), but it's still missing some speed and the correct cannon shells

By the way, i was the guy in the 110 that you chased back to France today on ATAG, after i attacked the ships

AbortedMan · #4 07-01-2012, 04:38 AM

Dude, wow, thank you so much. That was a perfectly well written and satisfying explanation, and it really does put it into perspective. Thank you again.

I was extremely excited to catch up to your 110 today, I was yelling over comms in excitement as it was happening...I pulled out all the stops to get to you, my crate was shaking like you wouldn't believe! ~S

bw_wolverine · #5 07-01-2012, 05:08 AM

I don't think that's really the situation here. It's not a matter of sometimes you get the whale and sometimes the whale gets you. The situation here is that the actual Battle of Britain is not able to be modelled here and the conflicts that are being modelled here (the air conflict) are entirely not balanced.

If we had a sim capable of delivering a Battle of Britain with many many aircraft involved, we'd be seeing entirely different attitudes on the boards I think.

But we don't. We have basically a survey dog fight simulator, and as a survey dog fight simulator the summer 1940 aircraft are not a balanced group.

It's not the fault of anyone playing the game. It's just not what we were promised in the title.

I'm seriously getting tired of it. I tried going back to ATAG for PvP action, but it's just not there for me, or maybe I just am not good enough for it. Either way, it's not much fun.

I'm taking a break from the game for a while (going away) but when I get back I'm going to probably going to get hardcore back into designing and running co-op missions like I used to in 1946.

At least until the game is capable of giving us real Battle of Britain content that gives the Hurricanes and Spitfires something useful to do before being shot down.

theOden · #6 07-01-2012, 06:56 AM

When not having release notes done before slapping out a beta shows they don't work in a structural approach.

Like we've seen during more than a year of patching where same bugs come and go indicates they've lost control over the code.

Will Dover get better than this?

I honestly doubt it.

holdenbj · #7 07-01-2012, 07:04 AM

Another reason maybe from Blacksix:
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=32943

"We can't find a free programmers with knowledge of aviation in the Russian labor market. This is a very big problem.
Also, we lost a lot of employees from the old team. "

AbortedMan · #8 07-01-2012, 07:16 AM

I didn't start this thread to throw flames on the "let's bash 1C" fire.

I just wanted a logical reasoning behind the dev teams actions...and one was provided. I do believe there is a lot of fine tuning involved, and maybe it's a little more complicated for 1C to deal with given the state their presumably in with pressure from the community and lack of proper staff.

That being said, this patch has taken steps in an awkward direction. If these current specs are what 1C believes to be historically accurate then this is not a sim that is going to offer an equal or fun experience for half of the players (Red side).

Speaking in hyperbole, the current state of the game is akin to an "Ants vs Humans" simulator...and the humans have a can of bug spray.

holdenbj · #9 07-01-2012, 07:33 AM

@AbortedMan: Not having a bash at 1c , sure they are doing the best with what they have, but as title of your thread suggests "Why is this game so hard to get right?". As you correctly say there is much information to be found on WII flight models, but if there is not sufficient resource to use the information then you have a simple answer, easy to read too much into things "too complex to implement" etc, but if there are not just enough folk to do it you have another reason.

jf1981 · #10 07-01-2012, 07:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AbortedMan

What document or flight test reported that the max speed of a 100 octane Spitfire MK1a at sea level, 30 gallons of fuel, no bomb ordnance, and on a clear day is 280 mph?!?

Everything I've found states top speed at sea level of a MK1a/100 octane is 315 mph+...and even higher still up to 12,000 ft!

Hey AM you're not mixing up IAS with TAS righht ?
If you can reach 315 mph TAS at rated alt it does'nt mean you'll reach that TAS at ground level (woud be close rom IAS then).