Lets hear your positive 4.11 comments!!!

[koivis]

As a guy who enjoys air racing & bombing & anything with big guns, the new patch is just pure awesomeness. The old 'overheat fot a certain time-cool until normal-overheat-repeat' thing was getting a bit boring in the racing, but now the engines really work (and sometimes don't work) like they should. The ambient temperature is a huge deal now, on Gulf of Finland winter map no-one was able to break the engine at high speed, but on the moderate Slovakia Summer map, it was a spectacular show of splashing oil, boiling water and jammed pistons!

And then the new planes... the Pe-8 is one of the most majestic, ugly, and brutal aircraft ever, and now it's perfectly modelled here. Same for the Il-4 & the Tse-Tse Mossie...

Haven't tried the AI yet, but from what i hear, it's great. Keep up the good work!

[Treetop64]

A milestone has been reached with v4.11.

In pursuing an AI enemy, firing at him, and scoring hits (just a few non-critical, rifle-caliber hits), this is the first time I've ever seen AI - in any flight sim or game I've ever played - react by actually panicking and turning too hard, stalling, spinning, and recovering. I actually cheered after seeing that, thinking "Wow! I can't count how many times I reacted like that when being shot at!".

I've seen lower skill level flights of AI scatter and run when being bounced.

Another thing worth mentioning is that I've noticed the AI is no longer content with doing aerobatics in front of you in an effort to be a difficult a target as possible. Now they consistently make honest efforts to get on your tail, at all skill levels, with the corresponding levels of flying proficiency per skill level.

It's not quite perfect, as I've still seen some goofy behavior, like one lone AI pilot not immediately involved in combat, flying inverted for nearly a minute before correcting himself. Neverthless, this AI is good. They actually perform like human pilots.

TD nailed it.

[JG26_EZ]

Originally Posted by Treetop64

I've seen ..... one lone AI pilot not immediately involved in combat, flying inverted...

I think the AI dropped his cigarette.

[Kittle]

The had something bout that in the guide, I haven't seen it yet, but AI pilots will roll over on their back to get a look below them! Got to keep that SA up. The comment about the AI trying to attack instead of not die is spot on. Dogfights don't seem to take as long either. Things are fast and violent after the first few turns more often then not. I think this is a better representation then what we had previous. Just about every book on this fighter ace or that, the biography of Erich Hartmann being the most recent to me, will tell you that 80% of the kills they earned never knew what hit them!

I can not imagine having to do this for real within the first 40 missions or so. When I was young and started MMO flight sims, I was killed so many times in a row it was sickening. WWII did not give that opportunity, many noobs had to die in flames for the other 20% of the airforce can claim the other 70% of kills scored throughout the war. Those numbers are the USAAF in the South Pacific. The way it was written out in the book, the fighter pilots who broke the back of the Japanese air fleets had 3 kill markings on the side of his aircraft. That's the top 30%, the other 70% had 2 or less, crazy to think of.

Sorry, I ramble. That book is "Fire in the Sky: Air War over the South Pacific". Awesome read, the author slips my mind, but he wrote another book in the same vein covering the ground war in the South Pacific. I love both, great stuff!!!

[Tuphlandng]

Great thread should have been started a long time ago. Team Diablo have always done an awesome job. There efforts keep this Old Game flying. After installing 4.11 in a clean 4.10 I have had no problems. Great work and Thank you for all that you guys and Gals have done for the IL 2 community

[I/JG27_Zimmi]

Excellent work on 4.11, nothing more to say. However one small issue that confuses me is the ability of the IL-4 to perform several loopings without any cognizable sign of over-G, E-loss or stall (FR settings). Just open a quick mission, level the plane out to gain speed and pull the stick back. The stall recovery characteristics seem to be pretty good compared to other planes of that size as well. Perhaps someone could confirm this.

[Lagarto]

I have another positive comment to make - the two new masking nets in the FMB are excellent, even a Fw 200 fits in under the bigger one.
Also, the red-orange neon 'MISSION COMPLETE' thing is gone, or so it seems. Anyone confirm? I'm being shot down by the new AI so often I'm not sure if I managed to 'complete' any mission so far

[maxwellbest]

Sorry, I ramble. That book is "Fire in the Sky: Air War over the South Pacific". Awesome read, the author slips my mind, but he wrote another book in the same vein covering the ground war in the South Pacific. I love both, great stuff!!!

Eric Bergerud. Excellent American Historian. Oddly enough, some of the best stuff written about the role of the RAAF and RNZAF as well as the Australian Army in the Pacific has been written by Americans.

[AndyJWest]

Positive comments about 4.11? I'm positive the AI is fake, and team TD is secretly flying it themselves.

I've just set up a nice little one-on-one in the QMB between me in a P-39, and a 109 E - starting at 3000m on the Slovakia map. Got myself nicely trimmed into a cruise, rads open (I'm paranoid about overheating since the patch) when the 109 appeared. So what did Emil do? Bimbled past, as if he hadn't seen me... Didn't want to fight, eh? I gave chase, trying to sneak up on him from his low six. He know I was there though, and proceeded to start a vertical/horizontal turning fight, which I was winning until I went into an inverted spin. Heaving back on the stick fixed that - I was now spinning upright instead. Some frantic stick-stirring somehow got me out of it - at about 1000m, over tree-covered foothills. Emil, who'd presumably been watching and waiting, took advantage of my plight, and zoom 'n boomed a few times, before we got back into a turning fight. low over the trees, I nailed him eventually, but only after running out of cannon ammo, and almost colliding with the treetops. If Emil had been an online pilot, I'd have given him a salute - so instead, I salute TD, and in particular, whoever is responsible for adding the extra 'I' to the AI.

P.S. 'average' AI - I'll have to try the same thing against the ace setting - I've a feeling that Emil will be reporting back on the result.

[FC99]

Thanks to everybody who shared they positive experiences, as far as AI is concerned there will be more changes in future patches.