Author Topic: Aircraft Hardness/Durability (Read 1033 times)

MrSpanky · « **on:** October 28, 2006, 11:17:42 AM »

Anyone know if there's any info on AH aircraft hardness/durability?

MrSpanky · « **Reply #1 on:** October 29, 2006, 09:32:45 PM »

I'm guessing thats a "no".

calan · « **Reply #2 on:** October 29, 2006, 10:54:58 PM »

Here is a project I started back at the first of the year. I never got enough support to really finish it, but it may help. It has some subjective ratings under the "Dmg" column.

http://www.jcsautomation.com/AH_View_Planes.asp

Also, I don't know how accurate it is any more because I haven't played in a while.

1895 · « **Reply #3 on:** October 30, 2006, 06:48:28 AM »

Spanky, there is nothing specific but you can match weapon damage Here

I can also tell you damage, from experience at various points on the aircraft from various weapon types. If you need, ill write this up and post it later on today.

Trikky · « **Reply #4 on:** October 30, 2006, 07:25:18 AM »

Nice site calan, must of taken ages to do.

My evaluation of durability is based on wing tip damage alone. For example Spits or any of the F4Us do not need wing tips to fly, I fancy they were included in the original design purely for aesthetic reasons. They continue flying about, strafing, bombing even out manouvering other planes quite happily sans wing tip.

Similarly, the P51 seems actually faster without a wing tip although only in a straight line, and the Typhoon can lose both and still out run you.

Planes that dont do so well are Yaks and 109s, 205s, and thats about the limit of my experience.

MrSpanky · « **Reply #5 on:** October 30, 2006, 08:09:03 AM »

That would be awesome Krypto. Calan has a great resource, but I'm curious how your wirteup would compare. Thanks guys. Cool stuff.

calan · « **Reply #6 on:** October 30, 2006, 03:01:23 PM »

I've dusted off the site and am in the process of updating the numbers... this time with a little more of an analytical approach where I can. For example, the speed and climb numbers are now taken directly from AH's charts and scaled appropriately.

I'm anxious to take a look at Krypto's stuff!

Calan

gripen · « **Reply #7 on:** October 30, 2006, 04:05:12 PM »

Is there a way to record number of hits in the AH?

If such information is available, it would be quite easy to calculate some statistics on aircraft durability.

gripen

calan · « **Reply #8 on:** October 30, 2006, 05:22:57 PM »

I'm trying to use Tony's numbers for weapon effectiveness (given the most likely gun arrangement for typical AH play)... the problem is, not all planes are covered.

As for damge ratings, I need some type of test where I shoot each plane from a fixed distance with a certain weapon, and see how much time or how many hits it takes to kill it. (I think)

The test wouldn't have to be anything in particular... just consistent across all plane types for a comparison.

Anyone have a way of rating visibility, other than opinion? Like... percentage of sky visible in certain views? I dunno on this one... has to be some way to quantify it though

MrSpanky · « **Reply #9 on:** October 30, 2006, 05:55:46 PM »

i bet there's something out there that you could use. I'll keep my eyes peeled.

calan · « **Reply #10 on:** October 30, 2006, 06:09:57 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by gripen
Is there a way to record number of hits in the AH?

If such information is available, it would be quite easy to calculate some statistics on aircraft durability.

gripen

I bet Skuzzy has (or could come up with) a spreadsheet of damage, weapon effectiveness, and other numbers for us analytical types if he wanted to.

I mean... they had to gather this info to program the flight models, right?

IF totalDamage = 324 THEN
PRINT "You have been killed"
END IF

trotter · « **Reply #11 on:** October 30, 2006, 07:30:30 PM »

calan your sheet is an absolutely great resource. if that is kept accurate, you should really get it more out to the community, like gonzoville or soda's page.

calan · « **Reply #12 on:** October 30, 2006, 08:01:49 PM »

thanks trotter... I started it about 8 months ago and initially had a lot of interest in it... but it's hard to get time to generate accurate numbers, which led to it being more subjective.

I'm playing with it again to make it better, but need some people to help with specific areas to really make it work. Unfortunately I don't know if I have the time to get all the numbers myself. We'll see

I have a spreadsheet that shows speeds and ROC at various altitude, but I have to go through each plane and compare the values I have with AH's charts, which is extremely tedious to do. Also there are some planes missing in my sheet.

(now if Skuzzy would just send me his charts in spreadsheet form....)

Mace2004 · « **Reply #13 on:** October 30, 2006, 11:42:53 PM »

Calan, that's a great chart and obviously a lot of work, thanks for the info; however you'll have a heck of a time trying to quantify "hardness" for the different planes unless, as you suggest, HT provides some numbers. Most of your numbers like climb rate and acceleration are empirical and can be easily quantified, but how are you going to account for an aircraft with weak wings but strong fuselage and good pilot protection versus the reverse if all you do is shoot each one in the wingtip as suggested? I'm not sure where/when I read it but I understand each aircraft has hit zones which vary in damage required to destroy it. If this is right, all you'll really know is relative wingtip hardness. To do this right you'd have to divide the airplane up and test each section and that would be a very laborious task. If this is what Krypto has done then kudos to him, that'll be very nice info to have.

An alternative idea would be to go back to the subjective measurement and take a poll of the experienced guys in AH to see what they think are the toughest (i.e., most damage resistant). For instance, in my opinion, I'd seriously disagree with ranking the Hurricane a 3 for damage resistance. It's much tougher than that and at least equal to the F4U that you've ranked a 5. I'd also say that both the F6F and F4F should both be rated a 6. I've had several occasions to hit both of these with 20mm only to have them fly away with no apparent damage (i.e., no smoke, falling parts, etc.) which is very unusual while I've never noted 109's as being anything other than average to below average in toughness (especially the empennage) so I'd rank them a 2-3 because they're almost always a one-shot kill. Same with the 38, one long-range shot in the empennage or a tailboom and they're done while the inboard wings are fairly tough.

EDIT: forgot to mention that a poll should ask what type of weapon (20mm, 50cal, .303, etc.) they get their most kills in, it'll make a big difference as almost no airplanes will stand up to more than a couple of 20mm hits so all airplanes will appear much weaker than if you typically fly a P-51.

These are just my opinions, I'm sure many would probably disagree with my examples but that's the point to the poll, opinions would even this all out.

Mace

calan · « **Reply #14 on:** October 30, 2006, 11:58:37 PM »

Hey Mace...

Someone else mentioned the wingtips... I have no idea how I would test damage. I agree that it has to be something conclusive under set conditions, or hopefully get some kind of "total damage" number from HT.

The rest of your post hit my difficulty with this project square on the head. The problem with subjective ratings and especially polls, is everyone has a different opinion and they are usually biased or more familiar with certain planes.

The only way it can work is if one person rates all the planes in a given category relative to each other. For example, someone very familiar with ALL the planes could rate each one for visibilty, with a 6 for the best... a 1 for the worst... and everything else inbetween based on there opinion. Even though it's one person's opinion, it would work because you are rating the planes relative to each other from a common viewpoint, rather than against other people's opinions.

The problem is finding the person(s) with the knowledge, time, and objectivity to do it....

NOTE: I do want to mention that Widewing was extremely helpful in getting this project off the ground many months ago

For now, I'm concentrating on the categories I can quantify..such as speeds and ROC (and weapon effectiveness if I can fill in the gaps in Tony William's excellent info). It's a bit tedious in how I'm developing the new ratings, but assuming the AH data is correct, they should be a pretty accurate comparison between planes.