Is ammo modeled at all?
 

Speaking from the Red side, I've tried different loadouts - ie., clean with all guns either loaded with AP or Ball or DeWilde for example, and during offline testing found that there doesn't appear to be much difference in the damage caused. Even mixing loadouts shows little difference. Incendiary for example does not create any more flame than AP.

I do notice that different Luftwaffe bombers seem to have a different damage model. I've found that regardless of the type of ammo used on a He-111 the same results ensue - the crew are completely killed and big holes are seen on the airframe. Do-17's show big holes and flame - Ju-88's only show small entry holes and vent - 110's are flying tanks - 109's will vent and flame regardless of the loadout.

So, I'm thinking that the devs have not really modeled the ammo as it should be.

Thoughts?

Cheers

You are doing something wrong.

***** Damage Caused *****



Plane: Do-17Z-2
---- Inflicted:


Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel pump damaged

Fuel tank small leak

Ailerons disabled


Plane: Do-17Z-2
---- Inflicted:


Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank small leak

Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank small leak

Fuel pump damaged

Controls generic damage

Ailerons disabled

Elevator disabled

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage


Plane: Ju-88A-1
---- Inflicted:


Pneumatics hose perforated

Cockpit damage

Fuel tank tiny leak

Wheel brakes failure

Wheel brakes damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Compass failure

Fuel tank small leak

Pneumatics container perforated

Under carriage damage

Hydraulics tank perforated

Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank small leak

Fuel tank hose perforated

Pneumatics container perforated

Electrical battery damaged

Machine gun failure

Under carriage damage

Hydraulics hose perforated

Engine water cooling damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication

damage
Plane: Ju-88A-1
---- Inflicted:


Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine water cooling damage

Engine water cooling damage

Hydraulics tank perforated

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Fuel tank tiny leak

Ailerons disabled

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Fuel tank hose perforated

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine damage

Electrical battery damaged

Pneumatics container perforated

Fuel tank tiny leak



Plane: Ju-88A-1
----

Inflicted:

Fuel tank tiny leak

Flaps failure

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Fuel tank tiny leak

Engine water cooling damage

Engine water cooling damage

Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank hose perforated

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Fuel tank small leak

Fuel tank small leak

Pneumatics hose perforated

Hydraulics tank perforated


Plane: Ju-88A-1
---- Inflicted:



Electrical battery damaged

Fuel tank tiny leak

Pneumatics container perforated

Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank small leak

Fuel tank small leak

Pneumatics hose perforated

Flaps failure

Hydraulics tank perforated

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Wheel brakes failure

Wheel brakes damage

Engine damage

Engine water cooling damage

Engine damage

Engine water cooling damage

Fuel tank tiny leak







***** Your plane has these damages: *****


Machine gun belt broken




***** Your plane is missing these parts: *****

All of them downed Do-17's PK, 1 Ju-88A shared but didnt have leaks or smokes when I attacked.


***** Damage Caused *****



Plane: Bf-109E-4
----
Inflicted:

Machine gun belt broken

Pneumatics container perforated

Engine water cooling damage

Fuel tank tiny leak

Navigation failure

Machine gun line damaged

Fuel tank tiny leak

Electrical failure

Electrical battery damaged

Engine water cooling damage

Fuel tank small leak


Plane: Bf-109E-4
----
Inflicted:

Fuel tank tiny leak

Engine water cooling damage

Controls generic damage

Engine oil cooling/lubrication damage

Cockpit damage


Plane: Bf-109E-4
----
Inflicted:

Fuel tank tiny leak

Fuel tank small leak

Electrical battery damaged

Engine damage


Plane: Bf-109E-4
----
Inflicted:

Navigation failure




***** Your plane has these damages: *****

Machine gun failure

Machine gun belt broken

Wheel brakes failure

Under carriage damage

Wheel brakes failure

Machine gun failure




***** Your plane is missing these parts: *****

Heavy dogfight with lot of pilots feet wet from Hawkinge, 4th 109 stalled low and went into the water.Two PK's.

Check your convergention settings and practice shooting.

well, with the beta patches and now the final one, it indeed seem to contain changes in regards of ammunition and their effects....i cant speak about the RAF types of ammo, but on the LW side for example the B-Beobachtung(Observer) rounds lost their historical correct explosive effects...

maybe the devs reduced/deleted the different effects of different rounds to safe performance?
overall it indeed looks more random now than it did before.

Hi Vranac,
You've missed the point of my post completely. :)
I asked it the ammo is being modeled correctly.

Yes, I see and get all that you have listed.

What the original post is about: Is there any difference between the ammo damage. For example, is there any difference between AP and DeWilde being modeled? Does incendiary actually work? Does AP penetrate deeper? From my tests, I see no difference whether using Ball, AP, DeWilde or a mix. The results are very similar.

Good point David.
My suspicions are that they did not spend a great deal of time programming the ammo except in a general fashion. I'm guessing that modeling the loadouts took a back seat due to all the other issues at hand and that they were concentrating on getting the sim engine perfected to be able to proceed to the sequel.

IMHO, considering what would be required to track each and every bullet fired by ballistics, type, location of hit, type of damage to be modeled and much more - I'm of the opinion that it would take a considerable amount of time to perfect it and also, that in the state of the sim - it might bring it to its knees with stutters.

Hopefully some others will jump in here who have done some tests also.

Cheers

I'd point at the DM rather than the ammo. ;) Like you said, why in aircraft of simular construction and materials do you get different results?

Good point Farber!!
This makes it interesting online for example. Different damage model for different aircraft can certainly create an imbalance in gameplay between flyable models. Many have expressed some observations on just this but cannot put a finger on anything specific.

I agree with Farber on this, luthier having told as much...in the old game there was a modder with a ammo fetish, he was gonna in and make it right:rolleyes:. He was astounded to find that the ammo was modeled correctly. I'm sure that is the case here with Clod

Yes there are differences,I was acting as target to my friend to improve his shooting for the championship.
When he set belts and convergention right he started killing my poor pilot :)

I haven't performed any extensive testing, but I recently switched from carrying belts with more AP, to more De Wilde and I've noticed rather than knocking pieces off, or making the aircraft vent oil or coolant, now they burst into flames especially noticeable when targeting bomber engines.

The question has nothing to do with convergence, that's just about shooting properly. The question is about the loadout in those belts.

Which bullets was he using before he started killing your pilot?
Which bullets was he using after he started killing your pilot?

Catseye's suggestion is that, regardless of the damage done, it doesn't really matter anymore what ammunition you load onto the belts. They all seem to do the same thing. At least if you're flying red. That's been his experience with the final patch, anyway, as far as I'm led to understand.

If it is not modeled, it would be easy to prove: place a fighter on the ground facing a small hill and a bomber on this hill in front of the fighter's guns. Than load this same mission several times with different ammo and shoot.

There is a script that can show damage inflicted too.

He was using default ammo belts and convergention because he reinstalled game recently and forgot to set them right.
After inserting mainly AP situation changed drastically.

Shooting on right convegence is very important if you want to inflict damage.
You can cut a wing or whole tail of 109.

Do you know what his ammo belt was that was better?
or . . . . do you think that it was just his convergence settings that made the difference?

If it makes little difference on the loadout selected, then convergence becomes the deciding factor I think.

Convergence is not a part of this question. This will muddy the water completely. It is a question aimed directly at loadouts only.

Correct! Spot on!

I'm wondering if others have noticed and hoping the feedback demonstrates the pros and cons. For me, it would help to understand this more in order to be more judicious in my loadout selections.
Cheers

Let's keep convergence out of this. It has nothing to do with the original question regarding differences of loadout affect on the target.

Ah, okay. So AP seemed to be more deadly to the pilot? That seems likely if the DM is giving the AP a higher penetration rating from dead six. More bullets likely to get through to the pilot.

Absolutely. No one denies this. The question is whether shooting on right convergence does different things with different bullets. You've indicated that AP gives your friend a higher pilot kill count.

I'll start testing immediately! :) Watch out, Blue!

Both are important.

To see what is the best convergence settings for you I recomend Repka 4.
There are icons to see the distance and you can record tracks there without being kicked from the server(at least for me) and alive pilots.
You can see on what distance you shoot most of the time.

Then set it and try again.

If it is possible to make own loadouts for bomber guns, using a bomber for testing ammo is much more efficient, as it allows you to fire at a single item of the test target from a stable platform. Here's a pickie from an old test I did in IL2 1946:

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a37...yer/He-111.jpg

Again, yes. We understand the convergence issue and set our gun sights appropriately.

At the correct distance (convergence) the OP is suggesting that there is perhaps very little difference between the different belts. Your statements regarding AP will give us more to work with in our testing.

Thank you :)

Ataros,
Nice idea!
I think I will have a go at setting this up. Hopefully it will show any differences, if any, that this setup will bring to light.

Vranac,
That is a given. You are changing the original question.
I, we and others know all about this and don't need lessons in how to set convergences for the most damage.

At the risk of repetition.
The question is: Is the ammunition modeled correctly?
It has nothing to do with my or anyone's ability to hit the target or inflict damage. That was never stated, implied or help asked for.

Please, I must ask you to stay on topic. It is a question to determine if anyone else has noticed that the bullet modeling has little to do with the damage inflicted. The best comment so far is to indicate that it is perhaps not the bullet modeling but rather the aircraft damage model. I tend to think this is also the case.

Have you seen any difference in the damage inflicted to your target when utilizing different loadouts?

I'll make it easy for you.
Select your optimum convergence settings and select a specific target and shoot at the same spot 10 times for each type of loadout setting. Then, do you experience any differences to the damage inflicted for the different loadouts?

Excellent!
I just need to find the best spot on the map to set this up.

Looks like a P47 Gunsight?

IIRC there was an issue with loadouts saving. If you do testing I would suggest to include tracers of different colors into different loadouts just to make sure they are saved and loaded correctly. (This would not work in single player. MP and FMB only)

Or he could click the little square next to the custom" to view the load out.

Noted: Thanks

yeah pretty much....there is still a difference in my view as well....though they made B-Beobachtung unexplosive now unfortunately....because this was modeled correctly already and now for some reason that effect is gone...

Didn't have time to read the whole thread, but saw you mentioned you were testing ammo in offline missions...where you just changing loadouts in the loadouts screen before you fly or going into the mission builder and assigning your custom loadouts to your aircraft? The former has zero effect as it always defaults to the normal loadout.

Hi AbortedMan,
I created a mission wherein I am 6'oclock to a target. Then created multiple missions by changing the bombers to a different type and then saving them with the appropriate name.

What I find is, that the loadout for my aircraft defaults to the whichever loadout has been set in the settings menu before going into the mission. At least when checking the "aircraft" screen in the mission it shows the last loadout that was selected in the main settings screen outside the mission.

So, I created different loadouts and also a "test" loadout where I could change to whatever combo I wanted.

To ensure the required loadout is in place, I had to go outside the mission and make sure it is selected in the settings page for the appropriate aircraft I was flying and then re-enter the mission and you're good to go. This loadout will stay in place through any FMB missions until you change it in the main settings page.

Are you saying that this doesn't matter and that it returns to the "default" settings?? That would explain the consistent results! Does changing the default settings make a difference?

I just loaded up with "Observer" rounds and saw lots of damage. Now I'm beginning to suspect what you say is very true as there shouldn't be any damage at all.

hasn't been working since day one.

But I think if you go into a MP game.

Then load-out your plane.

exit the MP, and then go single player I think the ammo load-outs are working at this point?

If you use the loadout screen that's in the "plane" menu, the button next to "fly" when you're about to load yourself into the cockpit, nothing changes no matter what you enter...only your convergence sticks.

You have to save a quick mission (or any custom mission, or create a new one) to the folder your single missions are in, I forget where it is, or copy your quick missions to your single missions directory. Once that's done, you have to open the full mission builder, load your mission, select your aircraft group and edit its properties under the appropriate tab...there's a dropdown field that is labeled "loadouts" or something to that effect, change it to what you want, save the mission, and load it.

It's a lot to do, I know, and my instructions are vague (sorry cant walkthrough it right now, building a new PC). This is the only fix I've found that works.

Note: you can test to see if your custom loadouts are actually working if you change your tracers, ie, make the 4 and 5 guns load tracers instead of the default 1 and 8. The game loads whatever ammo the mission data file specifies, not the loadouts menu, that only works in multiplayer.

This is correct. The ammo types do work. Only reliable way to test is make a mission in the editor starting behind enemy plane and load the different ammo types.

Fires start very easily with dewilde loaded and fuel tanks ignite often. Thankfully the wings don't blow off bombers every time this happens now.

Nope, the dual MG on an SBD, I was testing MG effectiveness in starting fires.

ok I tried this and it won't let me save the ammo load-outs it remains blank...
also when trying to test from the MB load mission play, the guns do not work?

ok second time I reloaded and it let me change it. the Launcher crashed on me so there must of been a loading error.

I don't know what happen but now my guns will not fire the game recognizes my key fire button on the stick but on the game it does not fire?

anybody know why? will not work with the default QM, you have to make your own..

Then it works.

Thanks,
Very clear.
I'll make the changes that way and see if I can start testing.

Edit: Works like a charm!

I already have a number of different loadouts made in the Settings/Planes/Loadout main screen. I opened up the FMB selected the test mission I had already created and selected the drop down menu General Settings I think. Then selected the loadout I wanted and saved it. Then saved the mission and then flew it from within the FMB.

It's easy to go back to the FMB and change the loadout and go back into the mission for the next test.
Damages do show differences so now to test further.

Thanks for the heads-up. I think that this is the initial explanation for my seeing very little damage differences when doing my initial testing. So now, I'm curious to further test it.

I'm wondering about making a coop mission and creating my own server, entering the server, do the test and then retrieve any damage log files if they are available.

Thanks again.

In SP loadouts are a part of the mission file and can not be changed via game menus, only via FMB afaik.

Thanks Ataros,
Using the FMB for single missions works nicely.

I'm changing the parameters this way for future testing.

Cheers

My Hurricane ammo belts:

[youtube]_K_dBPWq2wU[/youtube]

With just incendiary De Wilde loaded:

[youtube]jw7WvaWuXf0[/youtube]

Yes: ammo is modeled. But we don't have explosive ammo in RAF belts, so we don't have Hollywood explosions, just more chance to start fire with incendiary ammo loaded, but for engine or tank fire, load some AP or Ball too...

Catseye I forgot to add that there's a nifty mod out there that displays what you damage on any aircraft you fire on. I forget where it was and unfortunately don't have it anymore but a simple forum or google search for "cliffs of Dover mods" may send you in the right direction.

I used this when I was doing testing and it is really helpful. Definitely more insight than just visible damage notation.

I was considering just this thing. I wanted to have some empirical data but did not know that a tool existed for this.

Thanks, will check around.

ps. I have found a combination of loadout that knocks the engines off bombers, puts large holes in the aircraft, sets the whole wing on fire and multiple vents. It will surprise most what it is. But I want to grab the tool you indicated exists for an unbiased result.

Check this thread out here, first post is the script to add in your mission to enable damage indications in an info window...all three pages of the thread have some useful information as well.

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?t=25337

Fill me in on your secret loadout!

Now this is great!!

Still a bit more work to do on the loadout. Results on the 401 forum when ready.

Cheers.