Quote:
Originally Posted by secretone
I have read that Japanese and Russian aircraft radios were notoriously unreliable during the Second World War. This must have greatly affected how pilots fought as individuals as well as overall unit effectiveness. I have read, in fact, that in some cases defective radios were actually removed from aircraft to reduce their weight. I wonder if simulating these communication problems would make the AI even more realistic offline - and I am not sure what to suggest about the online game.
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+1
There are at least 5 parts to this request, some of which are more difficult than others.
1) No ability to communicate with AI if you don't have a radio. Radio messages disabled and no ability to command AI unless you're within 50 meters or so of another plane (reflecting use of hand signals and signs), or you drop a flare and the other planes can see it.
The first part is fairly easy. A distance requirement is almost as easy. Getting AI to react to flares or other external signals is much trickier.
2) "No radio and radio masts" added as load-out option to reduce weight and slightly boost performance.
Probably reasonably easy to do.
3) Radio damage added to DM. Damage to radio usually results in "Radio Destroyed," but sometimes "send only" or "receive only."
Probably easy to do.
4) No "radio" for online players who are flying planes without radios. But, this would have to be implemented at the server level and would require that communications between players be run through the server, which would be very complex and might impact server speed. Also, it would be virtually impossible to prevent audio communication between players via third-party programs such as TeamSpeak.
A load of work, probably for no good purpose.
5) Changes in AI group tactics based on presence/absence of a radio on a particular plane.
A load of work, but would need to be fitted into progressive overhauls of AI performance.
6) Radio reliability. Radios fail randomly.
Easy to implement, but possibly part of a larger "random equipment failure" package.
7) Radio signals fade with range.
Probably not that hard to implement, but lots of data collection would be needed regarding ranges for historical radio equipment.
Radio jamming. Ground stations and/or ECM aircraft have the ability to jam radio communications. This was an important tactic during the war, especially for foiling ground-directed nightfighters. A related feature would be the problem of people "stepping on" a particular radio frequency - jamming up the airwaves so that other people using the same frequency can't communicate. Rookie pilots were particularly prone to causing this problem in combat.
A big project, requiring a lot of study of period radio technology and ECM/ECCM tactics. But, a welcome addition to any add-on which focuses on nightfighters and night-bombing.
9) Historical modeling of radio frequencies. Planes often carried several radios and had the ability to switch between multiple frequencies to communicate. Due to the limitations of the technology, however, not all frequencies were available using the same radio set.
Currently, IL2 only allows you to listen to all friendly or all enemy aircraft and only communicate with squadron-mates. It doesn't require you to mess around with radio dials to find the right frequency to communicate with different squadrons or listen in on specific enemy frequencies, nor does it allow you to communicate with the enemy. (Yes, this happened, most famously, when Greg Boyington spoiled a Japanese ambush by misreporting his squadron's actual altitude and position to a "friendly" but suspicious-sounding ground control station.)
A hell of a lot of work, requiring a lot of study of period radio technology and modeling radio equipment in every cockpit/navigator station in the game.
10) Intercom communication. Multi-crew planes had some sort of intercom system. Effective use of this system was an essential part of a bomber's defensive tactics. It was so important that loss of the intercom system was considered a legitimate reason for U.S. bomber crews to abort a mission.
Currently, IL2 only allows limited commands from the tailgunner to the pilot, but not between gunners, or from the pilot to other crew.
A hell of a lot of work, possibly requiring gunner stations to be reworked to include functional intercom controls, and revising (or writing code for) AI multi-crew plane behavior to reflect (lack of) communication between crew. New commands would also be needed from crew to pilot and vice-versa.