I've seen you complaining in the chatline yesterday and my guess is you've been just unlucky. I agree with the others that unless you end up low and slow circling the RAF airfield, the AAA is not much of a threat for a small 109s. In fact even the German aircraft strafing the bases (Hawkinge and Manston as per objectives) didn't seem to be bothered too much and Stukas or 110 got away easily unless they loitered in ther for too long. Yes the visual show is nice, the flak can give your position away and it actually hits sometimes. Like 1 in 500 burst can come really close. In fact it is just as likely to hit your Spitfire in the same area because the ack ack chaps don't bloody care! :D

I suggest you keep flying on ATAG and stay away from the actual bases, fly higher up and you should be fine just like everybody else.

We do and there is rarely anythiung to do up there because all the red fighters are hugging the AA on the deck.

I take it no one actually red my post that hard. :rolleyes:


I must admit it does make me laugh when I see so and so red pilot was shot down by bofors. :-P


I'll tell you the only things that ever happen if you are hit by bofors:

1.Nothing
2.Loss of aileron controls
3.Loss of elevator Controls
4.Loss of rudder controls
5.Pilot kill
6.A combination of the above

So either way you headed back acrros the channel with half your controls gone.

I am in agreement with Farber about the AAA on ATAG. Just yesterday my 109 was cut in half by bofors over Manston and on multiple occasions I've seen people lose wings at high alt just cruising. I have little interest in flying bombers on either side as even a high speed pass over a target will get you pk'd or have a major control surface destroyed. The flak on both sides is insanely deadly. If I'm flying blue and I'm being chased back across the channel, I just drag them to the Oye-Plage target and it's game over for them.

The problem is the accuracy of the faster firing small caliber guns and the composition of guns ATAG's mission builders are using. There are these odd blocks of AAA over bases/targets with 1 large caliber in the center surrounded by 8 smaller caliber guns. Because the guns are so close together they tend to fixate on a single target no matter how many enemy are in the vicinity. Over Hawkinge you'll often see a single 109 getting all the AAA while 2 or 3 buzz about without a single puff going off near them. If the guns were spread out a little more and the ratio of large/small caliber guns tweaked it would be more believable and more planes would come under a smaller amount of fire.

Also, you can't really tell people to stay away from the bases considering there are bases & targets all along the coast of England. The fact is there are very few red pilots who come to France or even venture out over the channel forcing blue to come to red most of the time. So with the exception of the Blenheim boys, most of the red fighter pilots haven't really experienced the might of the AAA. Come to France more often and you might begin to sympathize with what Farber is saying.

I admit I have not flown any 109 sorties in this patch and there were some changes with the missions on ATAG, too. I have had no problem before for I never really enjoyed buzzing the airfields. I remember the times when you could land your 109 in Hawkinge without getting any damage. They might go the other extreme now, I don't know. I also rarely get across to France as I am and defending interceptor. I do fly CAP over French coast quite often, flak was reasonable but I had no reason to go anywhere near the airfields.

I assure you there is quite a few Spitfires flying up there. I believe we had a nice 20k drag and bag tackle with someone from I./JG26 (not sure, just judging from the skill) somewhere mid channel. Don't generalise on all red pilots please. It is true that sometimes you get attacked by LW right after take-off and it's not easy to extend from the fight with the performance we've got. If you have any advise on that that would be appreciated.

I am glad you're having a laugh. Just to let you know that you can easily get hit by own AAA while taking off (the ack acks really don't care and shoot no matter if there are friendlies in the area).

You have to try not to get hit by bofors then. I am aware of that damage, I spend quite a lot of time in a 109 and it's the same if you get hit by the AAA on the other side. Controls gone, engine gone, pilot dead...

I am not saying that ATAG is ok now and realistic because I don't know but you have to take AAA in account if you're the invading guys. What is the altitude where Bofors shoots anyway? I'd say I have never seen the white Bofors burst above some 5000 ft. Heavy flak alright, but that's inaccurate unless you really have bad luck.

You make two incorrect and frankly insulting assumptions. My subjective experience is largely flying along both coasts, for both sides in a fighter at 15k plus and I'm usually alone. After an hour or so I sometimes choose to land at Hawkinge (when playing red) as doing so often leads to some action. I make no assumption or comment about how others choose to enjoy their game.

Septic.

Septic.

Youdo fly 109's or you dont? I am confused. :confused:

The altitude where bofors stop firing at you is 3500 metres. :rolleyes:

Please can we all start to distinguish between AA (bofors etc) and AAA (FLAK, 88's etc) My problem is only with the AA.


SEPTIC:

I did not mean to insult anyone. If you were insulted Im am sorry. However I do not see where I insulted someone.

I do quite a lot, but not on ATAG since the last beta patch is out. I thought it was clear from what I wrote.

I suggest you stay above 10000 ft whenever possible then. Under 3500m I find rather low especially over enemy territory and near airfields.

I agree. Flak and 88' is the same thing btw.

I don't know, you certainly didn't insult me - I just pointed out that there is always a way not to get shot down by the AAA (or AA if you really mind) and that it is certainly not true that 'all the red fighters are hugging the AA on the deck.'

Cheers, hope to see you on ATAG again.

The best solution I can see is if the AA could be set to only open fire on a target within a set range as they could in the old IL2. I think 1km would be right for AA. Whereas the AAA is fine.

Why do you think that? Because it's shooting at you? ;) Bofors has had effective ranges of 3500 yards (cca 3200m) and it certainly attempted to shoot at targets above 1000m. I understand you're reporting this issue from the playability point of view but even in the sim the chance you get hit is lesser if you're further away from the gun. You know there is AA on the airfields and there is AA protecting the targets. Just don't fly down there in these areas. If you do, you're likely to be hit. That's the price for catching the low flying RAF taking off or landing. Pretty fair and realistic I'd say.

I don't know anything about mission making and I appreciate what notafinger! said about blocks of AA guns and their amounts, but I don't see anything wrong with the gun range. Just my opinion of course.

So what your saying is, Im vulching and deserve what I get. Im Vulching if I go below 3.5km? :confused:


Im sticking to this:

No, I didn't say any of that (vulching & deserving) at all. :o

All I am saying is that 3.5km Bofors radius around the airfield seems to be reasonable to me (again, my opinion only). I said stay away from the well defended areas because that's what I would do.

As a pilot that is doing jabo missions with 110 and 109E3 b and 4 b i can absolutly say the AA is deadly. Its very hard to make it back in one peace when doing low level bombing.

1. There is a despawn script running on the server to prevent overloading it. What this means is that any aircraft that is not piloted by a human player will automatically disappear after a while.

2. If you keep your RPM too low you get the black smoke (maybe the injection system doesn't work that well at idle and you get too rich mixture). Try idling at a bit higher throttle, the aircraft is heavy enough to stay in place. If my memory serves me right about 7%-8% throttle solves the problem, which is just a touch of the levers forward.


On the matter of flak now...

I fly bombers or something that carries a bomb 90% of the time (on either team) and i actually like the flak. It forces me to make interesting tactical decisions that drive me to more realistic gameplay behaviors.

Get that Blen up to 4000ft to level bomb and lose some accuracy but defeat all the low-alt rapid firing flak, or make a dive bombing run for increased accuracy and run the gauntlet?

Loiter over the enemy areas in search of targets taking off/landing and risk the flak, or fly higher and bounce them while they climb out?

etc, etc.

If anything, i think the flak is actually pretty ineffective at deterrence (i don't expect it to be the main aircraft killer in the sim, but i expect me to feel some respect for it).

Sure, with some mission profiles it's 99% certain that i'll get shot down (eg, low altitude pass or multiple passes over the target) but even then it's usually because i hang around to see the result of the impacts. In fact, i think there hasn't been a single case where flak has succeeded in defending a target. No matter what, even if i get damage i'm always able to swoop in and drop bombs on the target. And we're talking a single aircraft here, without wingmen or bomber formations to spread the flak out among more players.

I've managed to destroyer the Oye Plage target in one pass in a Blenheim and i've done the same to the armory target in G7 with an 88. Flak be damned, i'ma dropping mah bombs and that's the end of the story :-P

Something similar happens with the ships as well. I can take a 110 and make 10 consecutive sorties that will play out exactly the same. I will skim the waves at 450km/h, sink two ships per run and pick up a Spit or two that will be circling way too low to be able to accelerate in a dive and stop me in time. From that point on it depends on how persistent they are. If they keep following me they'll catch up somewhere over France and if i have no friendlies nearby they'll shoot me down, otherwise i will land back home. In the meantime, the ships are not covered and another 110 is sinking two more of them :-P

I think the problem is that we are forced into artificial balancing through mission design, because we don't have the tools yet that would allow the players to do it on the fly (literally).

If bombers could reliably level bomb (most bombsights are currently bugged), the 109s would be up there escorting them and wouldn't need to play "look at me, i'm over Hawkinge" to get a fight. Then it would make sense to punish the ones that do it by making the flak really deadly. Similarly, the RAF would have a real target and would go up there to tangle with them, especially if the availability of 100 octane fighters depended on not getting its oil refineries and storage facilities bombed to smithereens.

For this to happen however, we need bombers that can level bomb, scripts and FMB triggers that work as intended and the netcode to run all these things reliably. In the meantime we just make do with artificial balancing decisions and these will have advantages and drawbacks. My take on things is just use what's available, enjoy what works and learn whatever i can, then when things get fixed it will be much easier to adapt to the new way of doing things ;)

Well said Blackdog.
As I stated before, let's wait for the game to be fixed before we worry about smaller issues.

S!

I have no problem with flak on ATAG server. As stated above plan your attack so the exposure to the flak is minimal and as it takes a while for them to "wake up" = get in and out fast. Doing so you are most times out of harm's way when they start shooting, at least the Bofors :) Heavy flak is just a nuisance pointing out your general location. If you enter a target with someone already on it then you can be sure flak responds faster as it is already triggered. Or am I wrong?

Another thing is that if you vulch then suck it up when dying :) Flak is awake and waiting by then and you are well within their engagement envelope while circling the field at low altitude and slow speed.

Thanks ATAG again for enjoyable moments :) Was fun!

Phew!

Keller, Colander, Lolsav, Ernst, Chasing Fear and myself just had one seriously awesome sortie.

We all took off piecemeal but eventually met up over Folkestone and flew in a really nice formation for a while which made for nice screenshot opportunities.

Shortly thereafter, BigTrout was hitting targets at low altitude near Manston so we all made our way over there and, using teamspeak to maintain our SA, proceeded to smack down a whole bunch of spitfires (and also a single 100-octane hurri). Oddly enough the Red guys kept spawning underneath us and trying to climb up through the dogfight, so we never really lost the advantage until some of the 71st guys came in from a different airfield.

Eventually it was just me and poor Keller who'd done most of the dragging (and none of the bagging). I can't remember if he got a kill at the end or not, but kudos to Keller for being a good team player.

Big thanks to all you guys for a fun sortie, and ATAG for hosting. http://simhq.com/forum/images/graeml...ult/salute.gif


EDIT: Also, I got razzed a lot because I ran into a Wellington that I swear was invisible. :oops::oops:

Flak is not AA... if this was in refrence to what I mentione earlier - there is a diffrence.


Today I challanged the RAF the to come up to altitude - AND THEY DID! AWESOME! ;)

Despite the usual tactic of swirling around on the deck, I've noticed some serious RAF presence at altitude of late. The =AN= guys have been climbing up to where the Spit outperforms the 109 and then using team tactics to dominate.

I try to stay away if I don't have a wingman :eek:

You don't have to challenge anyone, we fly high regardless of your silly remarks in the chatline. ;)

We fly at different timezones so we never really meet on ATAG, I know =AN= fellas are flying high and so is quite a few of other pilots I know. I would not say Mk.II outperforms the 109 up there, I'd say the performance gap is not as big as at lower altitudes and by deploying some decent team tactics it is possible to have a nice and even(-ish) fights. You can't really dominate a pilot with equal skill even up there. Despite the ususal tactics of running home when things get hotter ;) I am really having fun with higher alt dogfights with the 109s.

As for flying low - I guess it's the same on both sides, only certain squads bother climbing. You can't generalise and also, not everybody enjoys flying at 20k when the skies are empty because the blues are somewhere at 1km above Hawkinge (Manston, Lympne...). Fair enough. It's when I see the I./JG26 boys or our JG26 lads joining when I know the real fun and challenge begins and I climb from my 15000 to 20000 feet. All the best on the US side of the ATAG mate. ;)

I think once you get up to about 6000m/~19000ft then the 109 loses its speed advantage.

S!

Was escorting some bombers after had dropped my bombs on a target. Was flying around 5-6km altitude in the Bf110C-7 and we got engaged by Spitfires. I think Robo was there and some others. But it was rather easy to keep distance from a Spitfire in the Bf110C-7, their speed difference is not that big and I bet most of it boils down how well you trim the plane. I had mine pretty nicely in trim at all times and kept RPM at optimal, required a lot of prop pitch adjusting but manageable :) Shame the Bf110 turns like a brick, but if you get to B&Z it holds it's own quite well :)

They become about equal at said altitude, I wouldn't say that by losing speed advantage you're getting 'outperformed'. I agree with what Flanker35M says - you can get bnzd even up there if you're not careful and it boils down to CEM and trim (overall skill I would say). I really enjoy these kinds of flights, I guess larger bomber groups flying at 17000 also helped so well don ATAG! Yeah and you're right btw, you got involved with No.64 and No.501 Squadrons, there were two 110 escorting the bombers - nice view and good job. S!

Use your head not your heart, keep your energy and speed, never turn with him and stay on top..........:rolleyes:


I'm regretting not joining in btw, I could have but chose to play a bit of guitar instead.....all on my lonesome....yet I could've been nailing Fritz for the second day running.

A message to those ATAG loners, if you want to get involved in a crew then look us up, we like to be up high and in some sort of organised fight. We recruit all standards for red or blue (since we also run JG26)
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showpos...67&postcount=5

Hi, I understand where u are coming from, and thanks for your view.
I am now an ATAG MEMBER. was HC_wolf. now ATAG_Wolf.

I can tell u that in channel command mission the flack is totally re-done. The look, feel, the coverage In England and france, the accuracy etc... Everything is from scratch and looks different from current missions online.

It is not wise to fly around near flak on either side of the channel. It is not crazy or stupidly accurate, it is just well balanced. You will see very soon.

I just love the visual spectacle more then anything.

Tease...:-P

Just wanted to comment on Farber's post...

Most Red's probably hide around base defenses because most Blue's can do the same and hide in their ability to climb...with the current state of the FMs there's not much a Spit can do when met at Co-alt with a 109 but watch it go vertical and rocket up another 5000ft upon contact. Even when the Spit has the altitude advantage, a 109 can easily overtake them if the Spit pilot isn't careful or skilled enough to be aware of the situation.

Spits have to work 10x harder to get to a proper altitude that a 109 can reach with relative ease...this leads to most solo pilots (the majority of the server at most times) not dedicating the couple minutes it takes to get to 22k ft and just taking refuge in the lower populated airbase areas, or they've probably attempted the climb, made contact with 109, then watched it zoom up even then and got frustrated.

Cause and effect. Players are going to "game the game" unless encouraged to do otherwise. I'm hoping Wolf's new mission will alleviate this base-babysitting/base vulching mentality, and we can finally put the "Battle of Hawkinge" mission behind us.

I disagree. The battle of hawkinge as you put it, is because most reds, not all, spawn at the front line bases. That makes easy pickings for a cannon equipped 109 hovering above. The reason this accumulates and turns into the hawkinge show is because more reds spawn in at hawkinge to try to get the low flying 109 that was already there because of the decision of the red pilot to spawn at hawkinge in the 1st place. People's bad decisions shouldn't be blamed on mission design. Every single red pilot could take off and get to 20K without ever a thought of a 109 in the vicinity during the entire climb if they really wanted to. There's more than enough airfields spread out all over England to do just that.

The same can be applied for the 109 fields. I generally take off quite a bit inland so by the time I reach the coast of France I'm already at 4-5km at altitude. Actually most of the 109's I fly with on coms generally take off inland as well.

I do agree that the FMs are not the greatest, but at altitude, real altitude, the spit performs much better than it does on the deck, where as the 109 starts performing a lot worse. The higher the engagement the more even (not saying it's even) the better for a spitfire.

Altitude also takes flak/AAA completely out of the picture. So my suggestion is to simply not spawn anywhere near the front lines. When everyone on red figures this out, there won't be anyone at hawkinge for the blues to shoot at.

+1 I have really been enjoying the high level flying with the new maps , The 71st squad an others we fly with go high !! ( even at 20,000 seems low ,them bad guys ) It is great fun to see a large bomber formation come into view. (then when you can make them out we start counting 109s above them ) Then ts erupts with the number 4 5 6 I SEE 6 (Was doggles an his crew i believe ) Then the jockying for position ( we should have been 22,000) Any way , then it starts (bombers already forgotten about ) Then the call out HE IS ROLLING DOWN ON ME !!!! AND I'M ON HIM HE MISSED ME . And the dance has begun ( i'm thinking i wonder if AN squad is on) While a 109 is trying to hammer head me !! Again, but last pass i got hits on him. ( wow those 88mm cannon rounds almost got me ) It's my story! After what seemed to be for ever. The Dance is almost over, sixes being cleared , Guys saying i;m all red .And many a good pilots being lost from both sides. We land respawn (those that died giggle giggle ) Then it's time to do it again , to repeat the whole thing again (this time at 24,000) Them bad guys!! As we climb up laughing and joking about the carnage ,We just incountered!!! Plain fun :mrgreen: It just puts a big smile on your face when you get your special kill!!!! ( normally the guy that pked you) YEAH!! Any who , THANKS ATAG!! BIG SALUTE!! Dawg PS I like lots of flak hell you can even add some to my plane!! (those bad guys lol)

Yeah 20k seems to be not enough lately. I like it. Good show yesterday.

a few days ago, i think there was a new mission on atag...we spotted a big formation(bigger than normally seen on atag) of german bombers north of manston at +5000meters.i have not seen this before on atag.
we headed towards them and saw a group of spits, it was "our" guys from ACG who attacked the bombers.so we engaged and had a really good fight at 5000meters.
i really like those "high" altitude fights.there it seems to be way more even, and suddenly skill is demanded in a 109.

btw, has anybody now after one and a half years after the release, thought about a mission with bombers heading towards london???
i mean, i have a really weak machine, but have no problem whatsoever to fly on rooftop level above london.i would really like to escort bombers to different locations then the usual ones....the "atag zone" gets really boring now.

German bombers running the gauntlet with multiple waves of RAF fighters trrying to stop them would be quite cool.

So If you intercepted from your base at Manston and had to bail, would you be able to take off from Eastchurch and be able to get enough height to have a second go at them? Croyden for the third go? Hmmm! could we get the height?

I can't remember when I was hit by AA in a 109. I always loiter over the island because that's where the action is all the time.

Spitfire´s able to make 160mph/3000fpm at certain altitudes, combine that with a course heading the same way as the bombers and there you go, lunchtime, yummy, tastee 88s :twisted: .

I got hit 2 out of 2 last night.
First at around 1500 m @ 500kph, from untouched to bam! left wing gone.
Second at around 2000 m @350 kph, from untouched to bam! PK.

Both times bofors.

Actually, you're not disagreeing with me at all...just talking about something different in half of your post. I agree with what you're saying completely here. Reds love throwing their aircraft into the meat grinder for some reason despite constant efforts to rally or strategize the mindless uncollectiveness. I am not one of those, mind you...10k ft is my MINIMUM engagement/first contact altitude in any sortie.

The battle of Hawkinge...I'm not saying this is bad mission design by common definition, but it's a condition that hasn't been addressed effectively, so affords some sort of fault to the mission design simply because it's a misallocation of resources and motivation to get those "meat-grinder" pilots away from the deathmatch areas and start engaging in a proper flight SIMULATOR fashion. I understand what the mission designer was trying to accomplish, but that's not what is happening. It's like trying to make a irrigation ditch with the intentions of routing water around the Eastern side of your house, implementing your planned dig route, then when the water escapes and flows on the Western side of your house you just stare at it and say, "Well, this isn't what's SUPPOSED to happen."...that isn't going to fix the issue. We all know the problem, now the next step is to find the solution. The players are "gaming the game", so now the mission builders need to "game the game" right back to balance it out.

Example, there's not a lot, well...enough motivation and emphasis right now on objectives for the common non-regular player, whether that be to go bomb something (which is not on the common Red pilot's mind/agenda...we only have one buggy bomber), escort AI bombers (no real reason to other than hopes to find other enemy fighters, possibly exacerbating the air-quake mentality issue) defend a grid/building from bombers, etc. If there was a constant stream of AI bombers attacking each Army's *vital, round winning objectives* and actually had purpose there would be constant pressure to take out bomber formations and get pilots off the airfields and onto escorting/intercept missions. As I see it right now, AI bombers are fairly immaterial and just serve as target practice and/or a stage for a high altitude contact scenario with their escorts, if applicable, and go to the wayside never to be seen again after the engagement.

This is a matter of a mission designer providing motivation to do the fun, interactive and balanced activities this simulator has to offer (bombing runs, escorts, interception, recon), meanwhile discouraging the less desirable, unfair, unbalanced activities (vulching, base raping, unrealistic altitude engagements, lone wolfing, "gaming the game"). Stuff like Wolf's Channel Command seems promising with missions on demand, limited aircraft supply (this will be a big one, as it will discourage unrealistic/unsportmanlike bailing out/crashing to skip the flight home), random AI fighter engagements, etc.

Bliss you seem to turn a blind eye to the current mission's faults and have repeatedly cited the pilots as the issue (did you make it yourself or something?), while I don't disagree with you, the pilot's actions are not something that is going to change because of forum posts. Said pilot's actions are a constant. We cannot force or change them, but the mission parameters in-game can. It can be something complicated like an aircraft supply system, or a simple on-screen notification of a formation of bomber's location heading toward a critical mission objective...Or ailerons falling off of an aircraft upon spawn because you don't want to deal with that aircraft in the sky, you big blue babies ;).

All i'm going to say about it is that you can do everything you just suggested as missionmaker, and those players you mentioned will still do exactly what they are doing now.
That is play low level airquake, occasionally intercept a bomber they run into and in general not care about the mission at all. Once the plane(s) they prefer are depleted they will complain a bit and then disconnect.

Now you can argue those players aren't wanted anyway..but seeing as they make up half or more of the players online at times, I'd prefer to have them present.
Just consider them as new pilots (and thus easy targets) and try to convert a few into missionfocused pilots.
Help with their questions, encourage them to hop on teamspeak and wing up. With luck a few will eventually join TS, see the light and turn into great wingmen and even fligthleaders.

Afterall I think most of us started as random players just wanting to fly and shoot at something.
And even many IL-2 vets rarely did anything but play on servers/coops with 3rd person and icons enabled..so it's a big transition for many to play on full switch servers.

Everything you mentioned is being implemented. How is that for an answer? :) feel better now? :mad:

Not complaining or mad about it in my post, just discussing, disseminating, and educating.

One day I hope we can live in an internet that is devoid of sarcastic and ill-mannered undertones and/or the assumptions of such undertones as a default.

+1

Just saying m8 its coming. Seems everyone hates the blue people. Lol

Heh, it's because you're always sticking your yellow noses up our ***.

Nooooooo. :grin:

Also, the "easy pickings" attraction of the front lines base would be nullified if there were more severe consequences for entering that airspace, like a guaranteed 15 sec max survivability chance due to AA damage, no fly zone. This would force the fight at least off shore a bit, which in turn would open up the possibility for the fight to move farther out and into the rest of the map. If Red or Blue still used AA as a safe zone to hide in, that would leave the rest of the objectives completely unguarded to bomb/capture/whatever for the opposing team, so the overall mission feel would inherit a "if you hide you lose, be pro-active you win" sense which we need, imo.

Random thoughts...
 

If anyone out there has the C# skills to script bad ass missions we all would love to enjoy their work!

Be warned:!:

The pay is 0 and invariable someone with little or no experience in mission building will question your effort.

So true.

S! Borris. :-P

Nice. I see what you did there.

I'm truly lovin' this warm reception to potentially constructive and critical debate.

I'mma just start keeping my opinions to myself and let you ATAG guys do your thing...Everyone's got opinions, who needs another...on a forum no less.

What was I thinking? Silly me.

Dont be silly AbortedMan,

We all have been hashing the very same things you bring up for a year.

Im sure if you join us on coms and ask the horse you will get what it takes to make a mission and why all the cool stuff isnt all there yet.

See, you're saying that people spawning at Hawkinge is still a problem, that low flying combat is a problem. Basically what you are saying is the mission should tell people how they should fly. Again, I completely disagree. If we were running some sort of hosted event with signups and everyone knew the exact objectives with the intent of the whole event completing them, had a tactical plan, etc., then I would expect people that signed up to fly a particular way that was intended.

But we are not running an event. We are a public server. The last thing I will ever do is force someone to fly a certain way. One of the main reasons we started the server is because we were sick and tired of playing on servers that had ridiculous rules. If someone wants to spawn at hawkinge and die repeatedly, so be it. If someone on blue wants to dive their Ju88 right into a red airfield, have fun. I'm never going to tell other people how to fly and I'm sure as hell never gonna penalize someone for how they want to fly. Team killing is a different story obviously, but this isn't about that.



As I stated above, I will never penalize someone for how they want to fly. When I'm on red, I enjoy spawning at hawkinge and getting a quick fix. I also enjoy spawning further inland and doing a proper high altitude flight.
But the last thing I'm going to do is penalize people for not flying a certain way. Every single person that joins the server should have every right to do w/e they want (sight seeing in a Tiger Moth, landing a JU88 at london, or w/e minus team killing) without having to hear a rash of crap about it. They paid for the game just like I did and I'm not about to tell them how they should play it.

I'm sorry you seem to think all your desires should be implemented, but when it comes to forcing or penalizing players for their styles of playing the game, I will never agree with you. The missions we run are designed that way. So again, there's no fault in the mission at all. That's how our server is run and will always be run, albeit some special event. I'm sorry if you don't like it, but that's who we are.

Not talking about "cool stuff" talking about gameplay stuff. Fixes for base raping/vulching (more anti-air), a purpose to AI bombers (making them mission essential), motivation to not constantly hover around Hawkinge.

But of course, you guys are intelligent and if there was a fix, it would have been done by now, no doubt. So I'm essentially bored at work and beating a dead horse by stating the (hopefully) obvious. By my logic I was thinking the guy that made the current mission can obviously create missions, but maybe he hasn't thought of what I pointed out in my post. I wouldn't be much of a successful person in life if I just assumed and never took action to ask, or point out what seems to be important information. Maybe it helped and informed someone, maybe it didn't...it kept me awake at my desk though.

Either way I sense some mis-directed forum hostility from some of you ATAG guys. Put down your dukes, I'm not berating, insulting, calling out, or hurting anyone. I come in peace and I'm doing what I can to reach the common goal. It may not be C++ programming, but ideas are ideas and can be invaluable to an undertaking such as this.

Haha, no one is talking about penalizing...unless you mean losing a round counts as penalizing because you didn't play the mission to its objectives, which makes very little sense. This is a multiplayer game, with set parameters (rules, if you will) for winning as per the objectives/rounds/team-based structure. By your logic, the server should be on free flight with no mission loaded at all...and that's not speaking in hyperbole, I'm being literal.

I'm not the only one frustrated about the issue. A few pages back there's a couple other people citing gameplay changes. So what's ATAG's goal with this server? Free flight do-what-you-want or realistic BoB mission style sorties? Declare it now so I can stop rambling about mission suggestions.

I lost my brother to a base raping incident in 2001 so you dont have to tell me about them dasterdly straffers.

Since then I have dedicated my self to never let this happen again.

I never fly without a wingman and upon hearing reports of vulchers near friendly airfields we gain altitude while flying a mission in the area to help my team mates take off safely adding a whole new gameplay element, The Combat Air Patrol.

Regarding game play I have flown on servers with no fly zones/rules of engagement and no vulching.

From my experience, people argued and cried about getting "vulched" all the time and villified a viable mission making there server feel less alive.

Having no rules is way more historical omho and missions invariably, are only as realistic as the pilots flying them.

I really don't mind when I get vulched, war is supposed to be hell.:-P

The issues discussed have been long discussed since the inception of this sim. Just like your other misunderstanding about the hard drive issue, this has been discussed in our forums for quite a while now and if you would take the time to do a little reasearch you wouldn't come in here assuming a whole bunch of stuff that I don't need to explain for the 100th time, along with the various reasons why you can't do this, that or any of the other things that the people that don't build missions don't understand why.

That is the exact reason why I stated for you to build a mission, maybe that will be the only way you'll understand why certain things are done certain ways. Then and only then maybe you'll start to get an appreciation for the sheer amount of time and creativity it takes to work around the problems to get mission playability seem somewhat on the norm.

If you're going to be a condesending jack ass, by all means please stay out of this thread.

:confused::rolleyes: :-P:-P Jeepers man!

My "misunderstanding" was a simple question about whether the server was in-house or company owned and whom was responsible for repairs, I believe it was you and 4-5 others that misunderstood.

I'm flabbergasted by your dickheaded attitude. I take pity on the next person that shows genuine interest in a community that you, Bliss, are involved in and tries to spark up discussion about improving online gameplay in a seemingly dying environment they wish to preserve. You convey a message of elitism from an outside-of-ATAG and non-mission perfection-making god's perspective with your recent posts and it's gross.

EDIT: I've mentioned countless times on forums and in-game how I'm grateful for ATAG's efforts, by the way. And I truly am. If this is the way a civil and intentionally constructive vocal interaction from the community that you host is going to be handled then this game truly is doomed.

Woah!

Well, actually the Blenheim is much less buggy than the 111 currently. The 88s has the same issues as the 111 but it is usable because it can at least dive bomb. I fly all bombers except the Br.20 and have done extensive testing in them, spent entire nights reading up whatever technical resources i could find online about bombsights and their operation, etc.

The Blenheim is probably the most accurate one right now and especially the bombsight is a good mix of realism and functionality. There are a couple of operations that are simplified or handled automatically by the simulator, but other than that it's pretty close to the real course setting bomb sight.

The problem is that it's impractical because it lacks an autopilot and a way to adjust the view to look under the canopy framing in the nose. This means people have to bomb from no more than 4000ft, so that they can see the target early enough to make course adjustments.

I have proposed binding the level stab command that currently does nothing to a new AI control mode that would function somewhat similar to the German autopilots (so that code can be reused) and made available to all bombers. This mode would give control of flying the plane to the AI once engaged, but only the control surfaces. The player would still be able to adjust his engines, but the aircraft would fly straight and level. Then, using the "course autopilot left/right" commands, the player would command the AI to turn. One to three keypresses would result in level, rudder-only turns. Four or more keypresses would result in banking turns, with bank increasing as more keypresses as dialed in. Finally, pressing a key to turn the opposite way would cancel all turns and have the AI return to level flight.

This would simulate the way many bomber crews did it, where the bombardier was guiding the pilot to the target over the intercom: "left, left, steady" etc... ;)

As for the forward visibility issue, the Blenheim sight doesn't have an up/down adjustment neither an automation toggle. Maybe it would be possible to use those keybindings to adjust the view, with the camera rotating up/down in a way that makes it possible to look ahead and under the canopy framing while in bombsight view. Then pressing the automation toggle would return to the proper view angle that aligns the forward and backward sighting rings so that bombs could be dropped.

I think this would be relatively easy to code because it would use existing resources copy/pasted and edited a bit from other bombers, without introducing new keybindings for us.

However, the thread i had opened with bug reports and suggestions didn't gather too much interest apart from the people who fly bombers regularly. So, give me some help you fighter boys and 1C will probably take notice and fix these issues, which will in turn result in more people flying bombers and more targets for you :-P


As for mission design, i agree more or less with what you say, but i don't think it's the responsibility of people like Bliss because they don't have the tools to be effective. There are scripting commands that don't work correctly yet and some netcode issues that prevent the kind of mission environment we would all like to see. Mission designers often have to cut down on features because of this, since there is no known work around for some of the issues.

For example, i was browsing Wolf's thread on the ATAG forums about his new channel command mission and he has had to cut down on static objects quite a lot in order for the mission to run acceptably.

The good thing in all of this however is that focus is gradually moving to the type of missions you describe and a lot of people in the community are engaged in the effort. I think that even with the current problems we can still get a workable mission environment: maybe the scripts will be tweaked a bit to force a work around, which in turn will necessitate smaller amounts of objects on the map to run well, but we can still have maps with interesting objectives that will get people to fly in a certain manner while also enjoying it.

However, this hinges on there being a reason for players to fly bombers. I have been trying to "advertise" this viewpoint for a while because in a sense, fixing the bombers will also give the fighters the kind of engagements they would like to see. However, my success has been limited because everyone was and still is up in arms over getting exact accuracy for fighter FMs, 100 octane and so on.

I'm not insinuating these are not important issues.
All i'm saying is that when the fighters are finally fixed to an acceptable level, there still will be no other use to them apart from your aptly named "battle of Hawkinge" furballs, unless there are bombers around that:

a) are usable and can bomb accurately (fixing the bomber bugs) and
b) the results of that bombing can affect availability/serviceability of fighters (scripting/FMB bug fixes)

So come on fighter boys, rally with us and drum up some support for showing the bombers some love, you'll get free targets out of it :grin:

On another note, let me just say that you guys have always seemed to me like level headed people. I think you are getting in a cycle of misunderstanding because written text on the internet can't convey facial expressions and voice tones, so we all tend to often misunderstand eachother's intent.

In short, i don't have you guys cut out for trolls who stir up trouble on purpose, i've flown with a lot of you on ATAG and while i often don't use a mic because i fly late at night, i've been on voice comms and listening to the lively banter and i didn't get a bad impression about anyone. I think you are genuinely misunderstanding each other. So please be nice and don't go insulting each other over this ;)

No this was your question:

Perhaps your problem is you're unable to type what you actually mean? As I've already stated, all the info is available in the forums on just about anything server-side including answers to your problems.

And I have no "dick head" attitude. You came in here suggesting, even saying "bad mission design". Currently mission design is based upon soo many factors of which you can't even begin to understand until you've actually built a mission. Again, that's why when many of these same questions have been brought up, they've already been answered 100 times.

And perhaps you should look at your own attitude. I wasn't the only one that saw your insults. That's why the others that saw exactly what you did called you out on it. I think you should read what you write before you hit submit. The only person coming on here with an attitude is you.

And there's no elitism in saying that I know what works and what doesn't work in current IL2COD. I've spent literally 1000's of hours testing and building missions. You can have an assumption about something all you want, but until you have any sort of experience with it you really don't know what you are talking about. That's why, yet again, the only way you'll probably figure this out is trying to learn it on your own. It seems you are incapable of believing the person that actually builds missions own words.

Be flabbergasted all you want, but if you honestly think you are trying to have some sort of civil discussion here you truly are lost.

There is one mission like this already on rotation.

I had no attitude or sarcastic tone from the get-go. You chimed in with essentially a "you don't know what you're talking about or know what works" message when that has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I wasn't even demanding anything along the lines of "Why isn't this-or-that in the mission? Make it so!" if you recall my previous posts, I was discussing the logistics and economics of player's actions and reactions given a circumstance in a mission.

Just to touch on what I was talking about and what you're talking about...adding more anti-aircraft to the Hawkinge area as a *possible* way to counter a "Hawkinge furball" and to motivate,not penalize, players *possibly* going out and escorting/intercepting, is **so complex that I cannot even begin to understand until I've built a mission.**

Even though I've never cracked open the mission editor for more than 15 minutes I find that extremely hard to believe.

Just know that I was truly engaging in a civil-mannered discussion and had no ill intentions in my posts. It was an open forum for my ideas to be heard, debated and processed. I had no grandiose visions of superiority in mission structure...just simply wanted some feedback, input/output with no lip, sass, sarcasm, trolling, hatred, or belittling involved.

If my discussion is a demonstration in "condesending" (spelled "condescending", btw) jack-assery then damn, you are some sensitive folk and I need to brush up on my definition of "condesending."

...how was that? Pretty accurate?

+10


I find the fact that Blue Vulching RED and not the other way around happens 99% of the time, to be a defining failure in ANY mission made by ANY mission maker. And when someone brings up that point they are confronted with... DUH its realistic....... Well DUH no it isn't. The amount of flak that a 109 would face (and the Spit fire DOES face) in today's game. Should be INSANE. You shouldnt even think about going it alone into an enemy base. for fear of CERTAIN death, not "Oh maybe Ill get hit", or "OMG I cant beleive I get hit by flak". That was reality.

And Bliss, chill the F out man, Aborted is making points and has been pretty civil about the whole thing. You may not agree but Jesus man, calm down.


I hope that you can fix the missions, but just allowing the BS vulching, because you "didn't want to tell someone how to fly". Well that's kind of a crap cop out if you ask me. Neither team should want to get even close to the enemy base. And as it is now RED doesn't, for very real fear of not making it 2 miles. It should be the same for Blues. Then you aren't telling them how to fly, let them eat flak to their hearts content.

I have to stop you there Aborted, from reading this thread I would say that you were the one that started the "mud slinging" whether intentional or otherwise I don't care cut it out!

I have been vulched by reds plenty of times and if you had taken the time to fly a 109 over hawkinge you would realize your not going to last very long... BOFORS BOFORS BOFORS!

All I can say is that when ATAG1 server was down what was left, regards Channel Map servers, was pretty non existent (except for ATAG 2 running the official version). So I trotted off and tried HSFX6, UP3 on Hyperlobby and found that many servers were mainly 'on the deck furballs'. That's what a lot of folks want and enjoy and it doesn't matter how the mission is set up.

The ATAG server missions cater for everyone and is the most popular for that very reason. My own experience is that the current increase in frequent and large AI formations at altitude with fewer RAF AI bomber groups has resulted in far more players providing LW escort at high altitude.

When I first started on ATAG you rarely saw another player at 18K - now you frequently see many players at 22K+ on some of the missions - and of course you have the players who prefer the low level fun and thats the whole point - MP should be enjoyable for all.

If the ATAG server went off line permanently it would kill CloD MP for me and a lot of other peeps I suspect.

And yet again, you don't understand. We've already gone to great lengths with the AAA (why in the hell am I typing this for the 1000th time I don't know) but anyhow, not only have we found out what AAA/flak is the most accurate and damaging out of all the types, we've found a grouping that works about as good as it's gonna get in the current way of the non-adjustable AAA/flak. This grouping has the exact same elements for both sides. IE - red and blue pieces acting together. Not only did we spend many many hours testing this to come up with effective AAA/Flak (as with what works in game) we also spent time trying to construct many other ways of Airfield defense. These include hiding tanks, even naval ships, all in the ground along with the AAA. The reason, yet again, that we don't have any more AAA/flak on top of all the work we've done actually making them do something is because, as previously posted many times before, these additional objects/groupings are at the limit of pushing people's FPS. What we have right now is on the edge of hurting people's performance. What you also fail to realize is there has been close to 3000 different versions of some of the same missions. All of these changes constantly being made to work around issues within the game and issues brought up by different patches. I love the comments by people stating we've been playing the same mission for over a year. It just goes to show exactly how much of our work, people take for granted.

Again, it's people like you that think you can simply "place more" and that will cure the problem. That's why every single assumption you have about anything in this game will more than likely be wrong. That's why, yet again, it is very complex in the 1st place to get AAA to do something/be effective. Something you just tried to have an insult at. When I say you don't have the 1st clue of what you are talking about with regarding the elements of online mission building, I mean it. That's why your mock is laughable. That's why you would never be able to build an online mission. Because it literally took a few 1000 hours to work around every single issue to make the appearance of an objective based mission. This includes something what most people think is simple, spawning, AAA, triggers, AI timings etc.

I'm sure those that actually started playing the sim when it 1st came out can remember airfields that used to be littered with wreckage, 50% of the spawn points causing planes to blow up, etc. All this stuff has been a constant work in progress. With comments like yours I honestly don't know why we try to do anything.

Because for every one of those type of comments, there are hundreds of people who do appreciate the effort involved and the level of balance achieved over time. They just ain't so vocal. ;)

It's very frustrating what people take for granted. I'm just going to put him on my ignore list.

Bliss, your arrogance is legendary.

Moderators,
I think is would be better to lock the thread, at least for a couple of days while steam (not the one used on the game) is blown off.

Hooves what the heck are you talking about, there has been multiple airfields including rear fields forever that can be used if you dont want instant action.

C'mon man, Bliss is one of the most patient and easy-going guys I know. I suggest we put this all behind us and move on.

I don't think I've ever seen you on Teamspeak before AbortedMan, you should really get on TS and hook up with some of the guys that fly Red. It's easy to avoid the ground strafers when you're on TS because you hear about them 5 minutes before you even spawn a plane.

Nevermind Hooves, he hasn't yet realized that he and I are simpletons and haven't the slightest understanding of what goes on with mission making.

It's not like I spend all day getting paid to comb over .xml code here in Redmond, WA at the Millennium-D Microsoft campus every week day 8am to 5pm or anything. All that mission creating jargon is too complicated for my common forum-going, video game playing, aircraft simulator-keyboard mashing brain.

I are go back to work now, durrrr.

I fail to recognize that...and this was never in front of me, so it's done.

I'm there literally every time I'm on ATAG if the channel is populated and JTDawg is scream-talking into my ear, otherwise I'm tabbed over on ACG's TS.

No buddy ever said anything to me ? ,IF So sorry but you can turn down volume to each player ,which i will do for you ,Aborted you are really reaching hear , we have flown alot together , an now on me!! wow dude , please don't go out like this .

No man, just jabbin at ya since I've made jokes to you about it a couple times while we get in furballs together.

Well can we get back on topic and talk about my awesomness again? I miss that!

And Blackdog shame on you for not giving the BR.20 her due. She's a sexy Italiano and has radial engines. Takes a lot of abuse to!

No shame on you "timej" was it for using the word sexy and br.20 in the same sentence! :P

I've never been able to get a piece of her tail though! Her "engines" get in the way. :)

I think ALL the ATAG guys are Awesome. The work they put into these missions and the help they give has no equal anywhere else in this commun ity. If something god forbid ever happened to cause the ATAG servers to go down I would be very depressed, and upset because I look forward to flying, fighting and talking to the people on their servers.

I have been killed, had my plane blown in half or lost an elevator, aileron just flying low over Hawkinge or the British territory and I didn't like it much. But thats realistic to me and it's the chance you take flying low. I didn't cry about it because I understood what would happened if I did it.

As far as vulching goes it is realistic and a part of war. I love it when a group of British fighters comes to France to vulch at Pihen or what ever because it just means that I don't have to fly across the channel to get a kill, and those battles are the most fun in my opinion. Sure I get shot before take-off or shot right at wheels up but, I get back in a plane and go after the guy who shot me, to make them pay.

Some people just can't stand being p/ked right after take-off and have to cry about it.

Thats my two cents.

I'm not too concerned about getting vulched myself, never really happens to me as I don't put myself in that position. What I do concern myself with is we have about 100 square miles to fly and operate in with various tasks and activities yet most of the time 75% of the people on the server are only interested in the 1 square mile that contains Hawkinge.

Here's my position:

ATAG's main server offers something you can't get elsewhere online at the moment; consistent high bandwidth connection game server where you are pretty much guaranteed to encounter human enemy opposition in the air using the channel map. That's great. Whether people hover around Hawkinge or meet at angels 18 over the channel is a matter for people to decide on their own.

There are other servers out there that offer other options. If you want more structured missions and raids of a historical nature then try ACG's offering. Want instant dogfights then try the Repka stuff. 71sts server is wonderful as well when it is available. The reason I think we all get in knots over ATAG's style of play (mostly unstructured with symmetrical objectives - just my description of it) is that it has the appearance of "the only game in town" due to its regularly being the only highly populated server out there.

I'd love to get the ACG sever onto a fibre line in North America to guarantee good pings and bandwidth but I can't afford to. I'd love to code up my perfect mission but I don't have the time to get familiar enough with the mission builder to do it. Even then I'm not convinced that server ping or mission type are the issues when it comes to server population.

I don't think the current situation is perfect for anyone. Hopefully when the game is patched up to a point where we start gaining more pilots than we're losing then we'll start seeing a higher proportion of players who are willing to gather regularly for a different gameplay experience. In turn that should allow more servers to prosper and take away the problem of having to decide whether to log into a server that has 30 players on or a server that has 0.

Is the channel command on yet or still testing?

I'd like to see some evidence for that assertion, the 75%. I'm not saying you are incorrect you understand. I'm no expert on percentages and statistics.

As for me, I fly red and blue about equally, fighters and bombers and I rarely find myself there.

Septic.

It's up on Wolf's pc for testing, despite the high pings from here it's very playable :)

Septic.

What it offers is missions designed to work with lots of players. IE - we've constantly changed missions and figured out what works for a larger audience. We've been lucky to have the population as our own beta testers essentially, but I have no doubt the population we have is because we do fix problems and constantly improve. Some of the missions have had 1000's of changes. I'm fairly confident the other servers would be at square #1, where we started at, if they started filling up. This isn't meant to be a bad thing, it's just, like I did early on, I thought I had the greatest mission in the world, then soon found out what I had to do to start allowing more people to join it.

You can make some really good historical scenarios when you have 5 people flying it. You soon realize what types of problems go on when you have 20, then 30, then 40, till 100 players. Again, we've been fortunate to have a population as a test bed to be able to figure out what works and what doesn't. But this is no BS when I tell you missions can run great with low amounts of people, but will go to absolute crap when they fill up unless you know just how much you can push it. I've joined other servers and seen some real nice historical escort stuff and the likes, but immediately thought to myself, "this server couldn't have 20 players join it" simply because what they were trying to do with certain amounts of AI and objects I've tried long ago.

Unless there's been some magic wand out there that has helped people magically figure out how to get missions in line with player numbers (IE - what works) I think most other hosters would go through the same ordeal we have for well over a year constantly working around the issues. The bad part for the other hosters is they don't really get a chance to see these issues until there's some sort of player base join. I'm pretty sure the SOWC has helped Farber figure out just how unhistorical # of bomber flights you can have etc., with a good amount of players. I think he even said he tested himself with large groups everywhere and it worked great. I saw the SOWC and a few people weren't able to join, many had slide shows etc. Now this isn't any sort of jab, it's just that Farber probably now has more of an understanding of what you can do online as he keeps the campaign going. I imagine it's as disappointing to him as it was to us long ago when we were 1st trying to do this sort of thing. So I'd wager a guess that people flock to the server quite simply, because the missions work for that many people, as good as one can expect in the current online state.

This isn't a jab at any server hoster btw, I just think they'd all have to go through the same growing pains and enlightenment we did once we started getting players. Making the missions work is what has kept them IMO.

@ Doc - Channel Command is in the rotation ;)

Thank you! You made what could possibly be my last day alive great! Many TANKS!
http://www.thecrosshairstrader.com/w...9/06/tanks.jpg

Just an observational guesstimation...everyone that plays on ATAG knows to go to Hawkinge for a guaranteed quick fight.

Channel command up and running right now, just started!
come try it out. :)

Is anyone here using the ts plugin-volume control...I can't seem to un-pack it even as administrator.
http://addons.teamspeak.com/director...ous/page3.html

ChannelCommander.

Im trying to look at it with new eyes but Im not doing very well. However I only played it for 40 mins so its early days yet.

I started a "random" axis air mission but there was no confirmation as to where or when to meet the high alt bomber attack... Did or do something wrong or is that point? - Its random.

AA/A - same beef, no need to explain. In fact it is worse than the usual ATAG maps.

The radar/contact reports are mental, spamming every few minutes. Im sure there is a way to limit it in the Conf.ini. I will have to look into that.

Orange Writing..................... I hate Orange Writing across the screen. Its a total immersion killer! Can it not go in the chat?

I know its easy to be negative and hard to be positive and I dont believe I've given it a fair crack of the whip yet. It seems quite allot of work went into it but I dont see anything yet that draws me to it. Will have another go at some point. I can say this though, ATAG are Pioneers of exploring new limits in MP but sometimes "a little is allot..." We always get so much to at once from ATAG this is not always a good thing.

S!

Also thinking the same thing as Farber. I'd been trying to catch the new mission all last weekend with no luck, I kept finding the old mission...why all the hype about this awesome new mission on the forums, yet it's not on the server 24/7. I'd think it'd be on at all times for at least a week just for live testing purposes along with maximum exposure to players. With all the work that apparently went into it, I'd think Channel Command would be ATAG's pride and joy and shown off on constant rotation.

Anywho, I managed to catch it on Monday I believe...4 pilots on the server so I wasn't expecting to see anything or anyone. I tried to get a high alt mission going and was prompted with a vague objective, "LW Bombers heading for Canterbury 15,000ft from French Point 20 minutes" (paraphrasing), I was excited to take off and climb, but wasn't sure if the message meant the bombers would be at French Point in 20 minutes, or at their target, Canterbury, in 20 minutes. I headed to French Point (I took off from Canterbury) and made it to 15k ft well before my destination and saw zero bombers...zero aircraft at all, actually.

I cruised around for about 40 minutes fairly disappointed, especially because a blue pilot was reporting in chat that 3 AI hurricanes just attacked him randomly. I kept hoping for 109s to spawn and bounce me, but to no avail. Never found my bomber intercept objective at French Point, Canterbury, or anywhere in-between. I checked out a low-alt mission and it was to fly low CAP for RAF shipping between Dover and Manston. Hung around a single ship just Northeast of Dover at approx. 6k ft for about 30 minutes and saw nothing. Started my RTB and got jumped by a human 109 on my 6...the fight went sub 10k ft and the anti-air was AWESOME. It was EVERYWHERE. Black poofs all over the place, very immersive. GOOD SHOW. I don't think it was damaging the 109 (we were still moving fast and at around 10k ft) but added a lot to the fight...I lost of course due to the "rocketship" nature of the 109 booming and zooming my genitals off. But kudos on the anti-air implementations!

I'll be trying again this week (if I find the mission in the rotation) and hoping my first experience was just a fluke. I can tell a ton of thought and process went into the mission and I'm excited to see it in action. Great job Wolf!

I guess my only gripe is that the new content isn't in the rotation enough, or on my timezone...maybe I can convince my best-good-friend Bliss (or whomever controls mission rotations) to put the mission up all the time?

Yea more AA just what we needed... AAA fine but AA? I thought it was a flight sim not a AA sim.

Is there AI fighters? :rolleyes:

Yes, using it very useful in fact otherwise can't hear anyone over the engine noise. I upgraded to the latest TS release which didn;t include it, had to install separately.

Got a chance with the new mission today:

My first impression is that it needs several small fixes with regard the fighters available. I'm assuming that there are no airstarts for Hurricanes because the patch should be here soon and that's a lot of work to put them in / take them out etc. so that's okay, but there are a few wonky things (like 64 Squadron having Hurricanes instead of Spitfires even though the airfield says the opposite). Just some small tweaks there.

Otherwise, I quite enjoyed the sortie we had. The map is covering a larger area of the battle, so I'm quite happy to see that. Plus the ability to launch mission in those areas makes it much more about finding the current mission that is running and taking part rather than finding the closest point between the bases and running into everyone. So that works nicely.

The orange text: I don't mind it. I would rather turn OFF the text chat and just have appropriate orange text messages at appropriate times than have the messages pop up in chat. It's the people chatting "LOL. where are u?" etc etc that kill immersion for me, not big orange letters saying "Bandits over Eastbourne angels one five. 10 plus. Heading Ashford." It's a shame those messages can't be made from the voice files. That would be perfect. But as it is now, I think it's fine.

Loading time was quite long so that might have accounted for the fewer people on. It's worth the wait though! Didn't play around with it long enough to test out the gameplay of the plane reduction, but it seemed to work. Took three spits out and when we brought them back it said one by one that the number available increased again. Pretty slick.

Also, I didn't think enough of the airfields on Red have the 100 octane versions available. Whether or not it's historical, I think that the option should be there. At least until the FMs have been updated a bit. It's clearly not going to make Red unbeatable, and it'll save people complaining. Really, restricing the versions is just going to make it a little more easy for one side to guess where the others are going to start from.
Now...any London raids in there? HMMM? :) :)

Why would you not want anti-air? A single fighter would have to have a death wish to go attack a forward operating airbase alone. IMO, airbases should be no-fly zones effective by anti-aircraft installments for both realism and gameplay sake.

I've only played this mission once and hardly had time to read the website info but I understand what you mean about the orange writing Farber but I sometimes find the chat box useless because of the other stuff that rolls through it. Perhaps it needs its own info box. But at least with the orange writing its like a brief verbal message that quickly disappears. Actually I think audible messages can be created, there are a list of them in the Actors folder (or something like that) that I was playing with a while ago and I think it may be possible to create and use new ones. Perhaps have voices supporting chat box text?

Other than that, could there be an option to receive only the Orange messages relating to the mission you have chosen to fly? Just a little more scripting :eek: Perhaps not!

The blue airfields are the same. Descriptions that make no sense with what is available. It looks like it was built off another mission and the airfield labels were never changed. What's worse is the mission forces the markings of that unit on your plane.

Remember, you're supposed to fly high above all the AA. Oh...but wait there are bomber formations to be escorted operating at 1000m now. What's a pilot to do? :confused:

Also, I saw where somebody posted they fought a formation of Fw 200 Condors at 5.5k, pretty sure they never flew that high or were ever used against ground targets. Long distance Atlantic recon patrols & low level shipping attacks only for those big boys. I doubt any Fw 200 crew even saw an enemy fighter in 1940.

This is not meant to be a dig at ATAG as their server has basically kept the game alive through these many dark months, but when you thirst for realism & historical accuracy some of these little errors/omissions are a big downer.

I actually don't mind that the airfield forces the markings. I'm happy to take off from Croydon (or Northolt) to use No.401 markings. I think this helps to give an incentive to pilots to spread out a bit (which would be a negative if you couldn't kick off mission, but here works well).

I'll just have to wait for the patch to use the Hurricane in this mission. Also, can we please have the 100octane version Hurricane available for No.401 please and thankyou :)

Yea I know. What would be awesome is if you could move it around like the other windows... ;)