4.13 development update discussion and feedback

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Treetop64

Yet another issue is, as you stated, a formation will continue a fight against long odds (well-defended bomber formations, attacking well-defended airfields, etc.) until every aircraft in that formation is destroyed.

This is part of the morale issue that IL2 AI either neglects or can't model. Historically, the sight of all sorts of tracers and/or flak shooting past the formation would have had a demoralizing effect, making all but the most determined attackers break off the attack prematurely, or make one fast attack on the target before bugging out.

There are historical examples of planes bravely slogging through fighters and flak to certain doom (e.g., Fairey Battles at the Albert Canal or the Sedan Bridge, the kamikazes), but I think they're notably rare.

Suicidal morale aside, it's also worth pointing out that all levels AI is still stupid about not using "nap of the earth" flying and other tricks to minimize flak effectiveness.

AI should also selectively take out the first vehicle in a convoy, or the locomotive, when making ground attacks against vehicles or trains. If possible, Veteran or Ace AI should also try to line up strafing attacks so that they can shoot down the length of a train or convoy, or across a line of parked aircraft.

Originally Posted by Treetop64

Another thing that has actually become quite an annoyance is how often the no.4 in the flight goes inverted and performs other gyrations checking his six and what's underneath him, even when the flight is almost at treetop level.

I think that this problem has mostly been fixed. But, the rolling behavior seems a bit odd; it's my impression that the "Tail End Charlie" mostly checked his 6 by making rudder turns and banks.

Finger four formations would often have planes in each section weave across each other's paths to check mutual blind spots.

Fighters in close escort with bombers didn't need to "check 6" since they could rely on all the eyes in the bomber formation to keep a look out for them.

In any case, "check 6" behavior should happen a lot less frequently. Some doctrine said to not fly more than 10 seconds in a straight line in the combat zone, other doctrine suggested no more than 30 seconds. I'd split the difference - Ace maneuvers or otherwise checks 6 about every 10 seconds, Veteran about every 30 seconds, Average about every 30 seconds, but often forgets, and Rookie either doesn't check or doesn't check much beyond every 1 minute.

Originally Posted by Treetop64

On the whole the new AI is an improvement, but there are some areas that really need addressing.

Agreed. AI programming is an art, and DT has mostly got it right. Certainly, it's a joy to fly offline dogfights now. Ace or Veteran AI is quite challenging, and if you can win in a 1:2 or 1:4 fight against an equally matched Ace or Veteran plane, it's a real achievement.

[Laurwin]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

AI should also selectively take out the first vehicle in a convoy, or the locomotive, when making ground attacks against vehicles or trains. If possible, Veteran or Ace AI should also try to line up strafing attacks so that they can shoot down the length of a train or convoy, or across a line of parked aircraft.



I think that this problem has mostly been fixed. But, the rolling behavior seems a bit odd; it's my impression that the "Tail End Charlie" mostly checked his 6 by making rudder turns and banks.

Finger four formations would often have planes in each section weave across each other's paths to check mutual blind spots.

Fighters in close escort with bombers didn't need to "check 6" since they could rely on all the eyes in the bomber formation to keep a look out for them.

In any case, "check 6" behavior should happen a lot less frequently. Some doctrine said to not fly more than 10 seconds in a straight line in the combat zone, other doctrine suggested no more than 30 seconds. I'd split the difference - Ace maneuvers or otherwise checks 6 about every 10 seconds, Veteran about every 30 seconds, Average about every 30 seconds, but often forgets, and Rookie either doesn't check or doesn't check much beyond every 1 minute.



Agreed. AI programming is an art, and DT has mostly got it right. Certainly, it's a joy to fly offline dogfights now. Ace or Veteran AI is quite challenging, and if you can win in a 1:2 or 1:4 fight against an equally matched Ace or Veteran plane, it's a real achievement.

I'd like to see better AI-ground attack capability for sure. It's annoying when they can barely hit targets on the ground with bombs rockets or cannon. Yet they have the mechanical precision deflection shooting sometimes LOL. 'This is annyoing when you play ground attack campaign with fighter-bomber, and your teammates suck. Well, more glory towards me I suppose.

About being outnumbered in dogfight... Some pilots became aces by exactly speaking avoiding bad situations... avoiding such disadvantages, and gaining advantages.

Erich Hartman said that it's ok to bag one or two kills per day, but survive back to home base. War continues in the next day.

Better to become ace by stacking all the advantages in your own favour, especially when in war deployment.

That being said, there exists offensive flying, and defensive flying. Defensive flying is important for surviving, but... being defensive is not usually good, but certainly it's better to be defensive than DEAD. But even so, defensive fighting is to be avoided, it's an indicator of bad things to come.

Pete Bonanni said this in "Art of the Kill" video. Pete who was an F-16 pilot, said that he wished there was some magical manouver which would tip the scales against bandit, like in the movie top gun "slamming the breaks". He said that sadly no such manouver exists which is guaranteed success in defensive flying.

Think about the so-called UFC fighting/mixed martial arts. It's always better to be the one who is giving strikes and submissions against the opponent, rather than receiving and suffering and defending.


There is also so-called neutral situation dogfight, where neither side is especially advantageous over the other.

traditionally these are some advantages that can exist in dogfight.

-detection advantage, allows you to manouver for time period against immobile bandit (he's immobile or sluggish relative to your own movements)

-positional advantage, you start behind bandit's tail (behind 3-9 line, measured from bandit's clock positions)

-energy advantage, you start with more energy than bandit

-numbers advantage, over bandits

-sun behind your own back, and the bandit in front of you. This simply causes shadow formed from your aircraft and makes it difficult for bandit to locate you against backdrop of the burning bright sun!

[TexasJG]

It's been estimated that it took, on average 800 rockets or 3500 bombs to hit a tank sized object in battle field conditions.

http://ftr.wot-news.com/2014/04/04/g...-tank-busters/

Air attack was much more effective in constraining movement of POL (fuel and lubricants), ammo and supply than it was in actually stopping armor.
See page 10:

https://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=450926

Supply vehicles are extremely vulnerable to strafing attacks. Strafing is easily the most accurate and effective means of ground attack available to fighter-bombers in WW2. Armor is virtually impervious to it.

Posted at 242 Squadron by "Tanker"

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Laurwin

About being outnumbered in dogfight... Some pilots became aces by exactly speaking avoiding bad situations... avoiding such disadvantages, and gaining advantages.

Sadly, that sort of ace makes for a boring game.

I don't know how exactly TD has programmed the AI, and if they will choose to make any further changes to it, but I still think that the best mix between realism and fun is to have different levels of aggression compared against different levels of various traits/skills such as gunnery, vision, situational awareness, G tolerance, etc.

Select for cautious aggression, superior distance vision, air tactics, situational awareness/tracking ability, and gunnery skills and you get your "realistic" ace. Select for reckless aggression, superior flying, situational awareness, and gunnery skills to get your "fangs out, hair on fire" dogfighter ace who goes out in a blaze of glory. QMB would automatically have the latter sort of Ace AI. FMB or campaigns could have the realistic type.

Maybe that comes a bit too close to "role-playing" for some folks, but if you're going to realistically model the human element, you have to start modeling human traits, including the basics of human mental and emotional traits.

[majorfailure]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Sadly, that sort of ace makes for a boring game.

I don't know if this necessarily is the case. Wouldn't that be similar to fighting a cautious but good human opponent? If not ALL ace AI would behave the same, a very challenging opponent for occasional duels. And maybe he would even be easier to escape from, as his cautiousness would forbid him from following you at all costs, he would rather keep his superior position. And some cautiousness wouldn't hurt the AI all across the board - and at least the better AI could once in a while try to avoid a fight at bad terms. Or to just get away when they see the fight is not going their way.

And another thing AI usually is bad - using a speed advantage. Planes like Bf109 in AI hands are not employed well against nimble but slow opponents - and I think at least regular to ace AI should know a little about what their plane is good at - veteran and ace to some degree what the enemy planes are bad at. They should of course not be omniscient. Maybe too complicated, but say an ace AI has virtually brought down 10 P-40 in his Bf109, then he should at least know he can outclimb them, and maybe know he is usually faster - and has a little disadvantage turning and rolling.

[Bearcat]

Originally Posted by majorfailure

Rookie AI is below that level in many aspects - their aiming and shooting is beyond useless. And maneuvering is at best okay. What I think could and should be corrcted is their awareness, its quite a rare ocassion shooting down one of them pursuing a friendly - they seem to know or guess where you are pretty good - an ability even a regular and if in a bigger furball even a veteran should not have. Over the years I have become a better pilot - but I still lack the SA to track more than a few planes - and as a rookie I could track one plane barely - which more often than not got me shot down.

This where for me icons and sometimes (depending on the time of day.. my morning eyes are terrible..) external.padlock helps because sometimes I just cannot see a thing. The padlock I can turn off .. but I need the icons.. I just make them tight. I don't see anything beyond 1.0 for friendlies and .9 for enemies .. bu that little bit helps.

Originally Posted by Pugo3

I agree with and appreciate the various inputs and opinions re my inquiry, and want to state again, I think it is absolutely great that the AI are as deadly as they are in ACE mode. I would also re-emphasize that they do veer away if you stay steady and have them on dead center gun sight - I have fired a very brief burst on several occasions to deter them from continuing, a sort of warning shot if you will, and they most times veer away, again, a notable and welcome improvement from 4.10 and earlier. Of course, sometimes they take me out or we collide, no complaints here, my bad all the way!

The part I wrote about my plane veering down or away and the subsequent "magic bullets" is the aspect I mostly question. If you try this a few times in Invulnerable mode, and watch the tracers from the AI, you'll notice a pattern somewhat as if you spread your fingers of your hand as wide as possible, then altered the angle of various fingers upward and downward. Either those armament guys have performed some feat of field shop engineering, or that pilot has somehow acquired 'Jackie Chan' levels of mastery in dancing those tracers from each individual gun to cover an amazing spread up, down and sideways in a few seconds! It appears to me that the tracers are angled downward towards me while the AI aircraft is flying over me

Test this yourself and see if you find the same result; again, shells coming downward while the AI plane is in process of overflying me directly front above, and look for the 'W' spread of tracers, which of course should be parallel.

Not to worry, just thought to bring it to TD's attention, but I can live with it (adapt) either way.
p3

Isn't that a matter of convergence though..?

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Sadly, that sort of ace makes for a boring game.

I don't know how exactly TD has programmed the AI, and if they will choose to make any further changes to it, but I still think that the best mix between realism and fun is to have different levels of aggression compared against different levels of various traits/skills such as gunnery, vision, situational awareness, G tolerance, etc.

Select for cautious aggression, superior distance vision, air tactics, situational awareness/tracking ability, and gunnery skills and you get your "realistic" ace. Select for reckless aggression, superior flying, situational awareness, and gunnery skills to get your "fangs out, hair on fire" dogfighter ace who goes out in a blaze of glory. QMB would automatically have the latter sort of Ace AI. FMB or campaigns could have the realistic type.

Maybe that comes a bit too close to "role-playing" for some folks, but if you're going to realistically model the human element, you have to start modeling human traits, including the basics of human mental and emotional traits.

What I would like to see them do with the AI is make it possible to assign a specific pilot level to each individual AI... in the QMB as well .. Right now you can only do it in the FMB.. Even if they found a way to make QMs editable in the FMB .. but as it is now when you assign a skill level to a pilot it goes to the entire flight in the QMB... and truth be told.. there are a lot of folks who still just jump in the QMB.. or online more than anything else.. I never was one for campaigns...

I have found that when you mix up the AI on an individual basis you get a much more interesting fight on your hands..

Originally Posted by majorfailure

I don't know if this necessarily is the case. Wouldn't that be similar to fighting a cautious but good human opponent? If not ALL ace AI would behave the same, a very challenging opponent for occasional duels. And maybe he would even be easier to escape from, as his cautiousness would forbid him from following you at all costs, he would rather keep his superior position. And some cautiousness wouldn't hurt the AI all across the board - and at least the better AI could once in a while try to avoid a fight at bad terms. Or to just get away when they see the fight is not going their way.

And another thing AI usually is bad - using a speed advantage. Planes like Bf109 in AI hands are not employed well against nimble but slow opponents - and I think at least regular to ace AI should know a little about what their plane is good at - veteran and ace to some degree what the enemy planes are bad at. They should of course not be omniscient. Maybe too complicated, but say an ace AI has virtually brought down 10 P-40 in his Bf109, then he should at least know he can outclimb them, and maybe know he is usually faster - and has a little disadvantage turning and rolling.

Sometimes it seems to me that they knopw just all that!! But maybe that's because I am still so bad after all this time..LOL.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Bearcat

This where for me icons and sometimes (depending on the time of day.. my morning eyes are terrible..) external.padlock helps because sometimes I just cannot see a thing.

I sometimes rely on these features as well, although the way that ground padlock works scares the hell out of me, since you continue to track the target after you've passed it, when your eyes really need to be forward and your horizon, bank and airspeed indicators.

I also wish that the "enemy pointer" icons were available in cockpit view, for the same reason.

Purists might bitch, but I think that icons, padlock, etc. are valid aids in a "full real" combat sim.

First, your "window" on the game world is limited to a 45-60 degree cone, when a real person's eyesight is more like a 120-140 degree cone. Basically, you're driving a plane through a "window" that's more like the driver's hatch or periscope on a tank!

Second, your window on the game world is a "Virtual Mark I Eyeball" - rather than being able to resolve the game world as a real person could, you're limited by pixels and graphics rendering.

Third, arguably combat flight simulation is a form of roleplaying game in that you are pretending to be a (typically) 18-25 year old man, selected for his intelligence, athleticism, reflexes, distance vision, tracking ability, coolness under stress and physical fitness. Most flight simmers definitely lack some or all of these traits!

[Derda508]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

you are pretending to be a (typically) 18-25 year old man, selected for his intelligence, athleticism, reflexes, distance vision, tracking ability, coolness under stress and physical fitness.

Don´t forget to mention that we are amazingly good looking as well!

[IceFire]

Originally Posted by majorfailure

I don't know if this necessarily is the case. Wouldn't that be similar to fighting a cautious but good human opponent? If not ALL ace AI would behave the same, a very challenging opponent for occasional duels. And maybe he would even be easier to escape from, as his cautiousness would forbid him from following you at all costs, he would rather keep his superior position. And some cautiousness wouldn't hurt the AI all across the board - and at least the better AI could once in a while try to avoid a fight at bad terms. Or to just get away when they see the fight is not going their way.

And another thing AI usually is bad - using a speed advantage. Planes like Bf109 in AI hands are not employed well against nimble but slow opponents - and I think at least regular to ace AI should know a little about what their plane is good at - veteran and ace to some degree what the enemy planes are bad at. They should of course not be omniscient. Maybe too complicated, but say an ace AI has virtually brought down 10 P-40 in his Bf109, then he should at least know he can outclimb them, and maybe know he is usually faster - and has a little disadvantage turning and rolling.

From what research I've done in the literature surrounding AI and AI programming, you're describing something that is still kind of a dream. We can program in specific behaviours and I'm sure an abstracted system might be developed to boil it down for the AI so they can make some artificially generated judgment calls - but to truly have the ability to size up their opponent and suss out a tactical plan based on that is still something only a human can do.

This is especially true if we try and factor in a fog of war scenario where you know your opponent's aircraft generally but maybe not all of his capabilities or weaknesses. Developing that knowledge organically is the stuff of neural network research and they have made great strides in that area but it's still just in its infancy I think.

A long time before we'll see a game AI with the abilities that we'd all like them to have. And by then... AI might be a little scary to behold. Just ask Elon Musk about what he thinks of that

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by IceFire

From what research I've done in the literature surrounding AI and AI programming, you're describing something that is still kind of a dream.

Currently "Artificial Intelligence" is still an oxymoron.

The good news is that air combat is a very limited sphere of activity, closely bound to the laws of physics, and further bound by historical doctrines and the limits of human physiology. With those limits in mind, AI can often be abstracted into decision trees and flow charts.

For example, currently damaged enemy bombers often behave "stupidly" when choosing whether the crew bails out or crash lands/ditches. A simple decision tree or flow chart could be used to make them behave in a much more realistic fashion. For example:

Can I hold altitude? N/Y > Am I over friendly territory? Y/N > Can I get to an airfield long enough to land the plane? Y/N > Is there open ground where I can crash land? Y/N > Can I reach any water within 300 m of land? Y/N? > Fly towards land > When within 300 m of land, turn parallel to the wind and ditch.