IL2DCE: A dynamic campaign engine for IL-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover

[csThor]

I took some time to really think about this but quite honestly all I can offer is an opinion and some snippets.

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Banks

I'm totally with you a dynamic campaign is not realistic. But how to create a semi-dynamic campaign? Which are the dynamic variables, which are static?

Quite honestly I think only the missions can be dynamic, not the setting and the "strategic environment". At first at least I think you should concentrate on making the missions dynamic enough to be believable (use of submissions, triggers, events etc) and logging damage states to static area targets once that is possible (i.e. airfields, bridges, radar stations, railway installations etc). The second step would be to give these things a meaning: damaged railway means impact on supply situation in an area and - if possible - rerouting of supply trains to another line (with all the congestion this overload of traffic causes), damaged airfield means lower maintenance states for your squadron if the hangars are down, etc etc pp ...

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Banks

If looses are dynamic but front line is static there could be a situation that one side has lost all ground units but still the front line doesn't move. Or a vital air unit can't operate anymore because it lost all aircraft in a unlucky operation. How to have static locations/transfers of air units of the front line moves dynamic?
In addition it's not possible to simulate the whole ground war in detail for performance reasons.

Influencing frontlines is a very difficult matter and I think this shouldn't be attempted too much, if at all, since too many factors and variables are outside the scope of a flight sim. As you said it's not possible to simulate the whole ground war with its ten-thousands of vehicles, guns and tanks so a situation like "one side has lost all its ground forces" just should not happen.

Historically ground warfare was heavily dependant on different sets of factors such as training, doctrine, Command&Control, Communication and whether one side was on the strategic offense or defense. The Red Army of 1941 was numerically powerful but totally unprepared for the Blitzkrieg style of war practiced by the Wehrmacht. The germans won a lot of battles not through firepower but through coordination, movement and training. We can't simulate those advantages in a flight sim ... Which in turn means the impact of a player should be confined to the location he is in and the timetable for the advance/retreat could be shifted only minimally.

Originally Posted by 41Sqn_Banks

As far as I can see at the moment the only practicable way would be to have a scripted definition of the exact locations of air and ground units for certain dates, e.g. 1 August 1940, 7 August 1940 and 14 August 1940.
Between those dates everything happens dynamic, but when one of the dates is reached the scripted definition is applied and basically resets the dynamic changes to the ones defined for the date.
The only exception could be the squadron of the player where looses and experience of the squadron mates remains throughout the campaign.
This would result in a basically static campaign progress with randomized missions and dynamic development of the own unit.

This may be a way. We do, however, have to take into consideration that there were two reasons for unit relocation during the BoB:

1.) A unit may have lost too many aircraft and/or its crew is suffering from fatigue so RAF FC may decide to move it to a secure location to recuperate and bring a fresh squadron to the battle area. Same goes for the LW.

2.) The LW may want to concentrate certain assets in one area for increased impact on operations, just as it happened to the fighter units which were concentrated in the Pas-de-Calais area in August/September 1940.

[41Sqn_Banks]

Dev update. I will host a test server that runs the latest build in a few days. The server will not run 24/7 but for a couple of hours on maybe some days a week.
I have not decided yet if I will include spawn points or instead run a coop script that allows selection of AI aircraft.

[Osprey]

Guys, I have been watching this thread with interest and I'm delighted to see work resume. If I may offer my opinion from a different perspective, one which developers such as yourselves may think is nonsense but this comes from the users point of view, and indeed it may not even be possible, but all the same.

In 1946 i've never flown DCE type stuff and had only done the odd co-op, we always built our own maps versus AI based on history for 're-enactment', immersion and fun only. Competition for me was match based in the USL - my competition days are behind me for now. The point is that I don't care about winning or losing wars, I care about my crew being able to fly together at once in a war like scenario, getting into a fight and returning in 2's and 3's back home, perhaps to prepare for another attack. The whole thing need not run for more than 2 hours. To do that in 1946 I had to have known numbers and spend a long time in the FMB - I don't want this for COD.

My crew is RAF, we are growing a Luftwaffe arm (or trying to).
I would like something which enables players to join the server, warm up their aircraft at our own base and await some sort of instruction, from the game and the flight leader. What the mission needs to do is generate a German bomber formation and a target and let everybody know appropriately. For German flyers they need to be told a rendezvous point, and for RAF they need to be notified of a Luftwaffe buildup over France, where, approximate numbers, height and heading. From that point flight leaders take over, that is perhaps an in game menu available (I've seen code for this) for flight leads only which gives a co-ordinate, height and heading (or vector and height) to the closest bomber formation. The German flyers probably should be told the target/route (maybe this is a briefing option).
The mission can be padded with AI, perhaps by setting a range, when one side has too few humans. We would also want a refly option.

In terms of history there could perhaps be 4 phases (different colour front markers defined on the map?), 1. Kanalkampf, 2. Outer airfield and RDF station attack, 3. Inner airfield attack, 4. Blitz.

I do not mind doing FMB work as long as it is either basic each time or a one off.

Ok, you may think at this stage that I'm talking rubbish but what this does give a squadron is the ability to re-enact the kind of BoB events which happened even though they aren't the actual events and we don't know what is going to happen. The Germans are given escort or the leader can sweep ahead supported by AI fighters (single and twin), the RAF have to scramble and intercept, perhaps with some AI fighters spawned on patrols over the south east.

There is no competition in this at all, I don't care who wins - in fact it's better without competition imho because it's more relaxed and fun that way. Anyway, please tell me what you think, I hope I've provided some info on what quite a few crews would like to see. If you have any questions please ask me.

[41Sqn_Banks]

Once again I'm facing a stupid bug in the dedicated server environment. If a player uses an existing AI aircraft the AI won't interact with it, this means they don't take-off after the player or they will circle infinitely around the airfield as they don't recognize that it has already taken-off. Very frustrating ...

[Osprey]

From my perspective we need not interact with AI aircraft, but I realise that other people may wish to.

Does my previous post make sense?

[41Sqn_Banks]

Originally Posted by Osprey

From my perspective we need not interact with AI aircraft, but I realise that other people may wish to.

Does my previous post make sense?

Your post makes perfect sense, thanks for the feedback.

I'm just tired of those stupid bugs that pop up on every end of this game.

[Ataros]

Try contacting naryv via PM if you need help. He answered questions about FMB and scripts at sukhoi and he speaks English. Here is his profile: http://www.sukhoi.ru/forum/member.php?u=1967 Forum interface can be switched to English I think.

He helped Small_Bee with his missions via PM or e-mail.