Author Topic: Gun damage: Overmodelled? (Read 758 times)

MANDOBLE · « **Reply #15 on:** February 13, 2002, 09:00:36 AM »

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/neilpage/background.html

Here you will find some first hand experiences fighting buffs. 190s opened mg fire at 400 yards and then 20mm at 200yards from dead six attacks while the buffs opened defensive fire at 1500 yards. The interceptors were surviving massive defensive fire along a 1300 yards run.

mrsid2 · « **Reply #16 on:** February 13, 2002, 09:32:04 AM »

Lol I'd like to see the story after the veterans faced the AH b-17..

We approached the bombers from behind, the bombers opened defensive fire at 1700 yards. By the time we closed to 1000 yards, most of the attacking fighters were lost after a couple stray hits from the bombers guns.

None were able to kill any gunners, at least it was hard to tell since they kept on shooting and nobody dared to stay lined to the bombers anywhere under 1000 yards.

After a couple swooping attacks, a couple bombers were smoking and the luftwaffe lost all of its 190's.

mauser · « **Reply #17 on:** February 13, 2002, 11:28:03 AM »

One thing I always wondered when seeing clips of guncam footage is what happens when you are shooting at a target from directly behind. Specifically, what happens when you shoot at the wings or horiz stabs from directly behind. All you see is the thin profile of the wings... bullets in this case impact at very low angles wrt the surface of the wings. In AH when I nail a target from dead six in the wings, I see hit sprites on the trailing edges of the wings. I wonder exactly how hard it is to hit the wings in the trailing edges? Were hits on the trailing edges common irl? And if bullets strike the wing surface from straight behind, do they penetrate, or does the low angle cause the bullet to deflect a tiny bit and instead of punching a hole in the wing, it makes an elongated groove or gash in the skin?

Wrt bombers, I usually don't go for wings. I split-S over the bombers and rake the fuselage from nose to tail hoping for a pilot kill or damaged top turret. However, it takes me several passes sometimes, and it seems like the folks who go for wings only need one good pass to shear off a tip or a whole wing.

mauser

Vector · « **Reply #18 on:** February 13, 2002, 01:42:06 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by LLv34_Camouflage
In real life, hitting at ranges above 200yds was more luck than skill. Atleast the pilots hardly ever shot from that far... They went much closer, "until the target fills the windscreen".

Well that depends of what kind of armament fighter carried. I'm just reading book "348th FG Kearby's Thunderbolts", book is full of great A2A combat accounts . 348th FG pilots usually started to fire at distances 250-300 yards and even at 700 yards (and still scoring kills, 700 yards was maximum effective (theoretical) range for 50cals). Tonys and zeros started to smoke or burn after relatively short bursts.
What comes to bomber killing, I've stopped to do any 2oc high or similar attacks, I just park my jug to bombers 6 and start to fire at 1000-1100 yards keeping that distance. It requires 3-4 seconds burst to tear B-17 to pieces, but it usually works and I don't get too many holes to my jug.

Tac · « **Reply #19 on:** February 13, 2002, 02:34:50 PM »

Gijoe showed me the way to kill buffs. Aim for the wings. That bastige kills buffs so quick it gives me fits.

On the lanc aim for the inboard engine. A few hits and it catches fire.. disengage, count to 11 and lanc explodes. Wish the zeke did that!

Lephturn · « **Reply #20 on:** February 13, 2002, 02:39:09 PM »

Lots of snippage...

Quote

Originally posted by LLv34_Camouflage
I think this mostly a matter of the hit bubble size and the laser range finder. For a concrete example of the hit bubble issue, compare AH's long range gunnery to IL2's and you'll see what I mean.

What hit bubble? That's WB you are thinking about... there is no "hit bubble" in AH... you have to actually hit the plane itself. I'm not disputing the IL2 is more difficult, I just don't agree with your reasoning behind it.

Vermillion · « **Reply #21 on:** February 13, 2002, 06:08:33 PM »

What Lephturn said, there ain't such a thing as a "hit bubble" in Aces High. Even AW had gotten rid of the hit bubble (at least in FR) by the time of its demise.

Tac, also realize that many of the guncam film's you see on TV, and in video's, are there because they are the most spectacular. Either (A) the plane getting shot at die's a spectacular explosive death or (B) the plane getting shot at gets chewed to pieces and is hit a thousand times. Your just seeing the most spectacular fews mins out of thousands of hours of gunfilm, so I don't think you can use it to judge if something is "right" or not.

I do agree that our damage model could use some advancement as discussed, but I think lethality is probably about right, or maybe even a little weak. For instance the Russians and German 109 pilots thought a single 20mm and x2 MG's were plenty of firepower, where as in AH its almost useless.

LLv34_Camouflage · « **Reply #22 on:** February 13, 2002, 07:06:10 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by Lephturn

What hit bubble? That's WB you are thinking about... there is no "hit bubble" in AH... you have to actually hit the plane itself.

Based on my personal experiences, I have to disagree. I don't know what the official word is, though. I searched for posts about hit bubbles and gunnery modeling, but didn't find posts by HTC regarding the matter. Is there official info on this?

Camo

Karnak · « **Reply #23 on:** February 13, 2002, 09:00:30 PM »

I can blow the wing completely off of a Lanc, a bomber renown for its durability, with 12 rounds of 50 cal ammo.

That tells me there is something wrong.

Naudet · « **Reply #24 on:** February 14, 2002, 08:17:57 AM »

1st one thing about AH and IL2 gunnery modeling.

I just played the IL2 demo and was completey astonished of how much 20mm hits a YAK1 can take while on the other hand those Yak1 blew my G2 with a short burst.
Is that just a demo thing? i think no fighter would keep flying after about 15-20 20 mm hits from 80 meters.
Otherwise i found the gunnery distances etc. in IL2 way more realistic. No 500 yrds 70 degree 0.5 cal snapshort killer shots.

Now back to AH. I think AH doesnt model hit bubbles, its long over that i saw a game using that. U can test that offline with the drones, u can see that only if a part of the plane is it, there is a hitflash.

The problem i see with AH is, that iit doesnt use different models for full metal rounds and HE rounds.
A full metal rounds dmg is based mainly on kinetic energy. So weapons like the Hispano or 0.5 cal are quit strong in this way. They have high muzzle velocity and so high kinetic energy.
In AH when such a round hits, there is no question "does it hit a vital part?", it dmg value is simply substracted from the "armor" value of the location hit.
So u can use 10 0.5 cals to saw of the wing of a fighter, cause the added dmg value just overwhelms the "armor" factor of the wing. While in RL (especially when used in a snapshoot) those 10 hits would simply put 10 holes in the wing, without damaging the wing spar.
Btw this is the same reason, why an Osti will always get the kill it is together with a PZR attacking another PZR. The many many 37mm pings will just produce a greater dmg value than the few "strong" 75mm AP hits.

In the cannons on the other hand, the HE effects seem to be underrated, thats the reason why hispanos and the type 99 do consideralbe more dmg that the german MG151/20.
In RL the hispano is a killer if it hits hard parts of the tgt. But it would simply pass through soft parts (skins, control surfaces etc.)
while the high HE load of the MG151/20 will just (up to its maximum range) blow of those soft parts.
The MG131 also features a HE load (just a small but even thats more than the 0.5 cals have), and so the GE 13mm is much more effective against soft tgts than the 0.5cal.

In AH the kinetic dmg seems to be the decisive factor, and therefor the 0.5 cal and the hispanos are the incrideble killers they are now in AH.

Lephturn · « **Reply #25 on:** February 14, 2002, 08:55:54 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by LLv34_Camouflage

Based on my personal experiences, I have to disagree. I don't know what the official word is, though. I searched for posts about hit bubbles and gunnery modeling, but didn't find posts by HTC regarding the matter. Is there official info on this?

Camo

Well, I don't think I can dig back far enough to find where HT or Pyro talks about that, but I'm quite certain that not only is there no hit bubble, but also each round is modelled individually. The only compromise in there I'm aware of is that instead of having 2 or 3 different types of rounds mixed in the ammo feed, each round is sort of a mix between AP/HE/I ammo. Pyro I think has talked about his on the BBS as well, although I'm not going to dig around and find it, it was long ago.

I have often watched rounds fly just either side of a bit of another plane and not hit anything. Sometimes if you get strikes at longer rages, the hit sparkles can look a bit weird but I can't remember ever seeing stikes that should have missed. If you want to know for sure, simply take up a P-38 in the TA with a buddy and run a couple of tests. I'll bet you can shoot through the big gap between the 38's booms ahead of the horizontal stab and not register a hit.

If you can do that, there is no hit bubble. Film it just in case, and you'll have your answer.

Lephturn · « **Reply #26 on:** February 14, 2002, 09:21:33 AM »

Erm, I think this landed in the wrong thread HT... should be in Mand's Rocket thread I think.

Thanks for the info though...

Tac · « **Reply #27 on:** February 14, 2002, 10:32:52 AM »

well, even after seeing the film again.. even if it is in slow motion, its still a heck of a lot of hits before them fighters go down..and mighty close.

WhiteHawk · « **Reply #28 on:** February 21, 2002, 02:32:22 PM »

After i saw the gun cam of the p47 8 .50's hitting the horse
drawn wagon, i belive that 8 .50's can devestate any aircraft
within 3 seconds, regardless of where the hits are. I think the
gun models here are very good. Fair chance for the fighter to
kill the bomber, fair chance for bomber to kill the fighter.
Btw, the chunks of meat were flying 100's of yards and all was
left was a stain on the road.

hazed- · « **Reply #29 on:** February 22, 2002, 11:17:30 PM »

sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!!

this is the first time youve realised the 50cals are overmodeled?

Honestly Tac!, Ive said this about the B17 a hundred times. Too weak and guns are too powerful.

50 cals were not as effective as in AH and id bet evry penny i have on it.

But when i say it Im a 'luftwhiner'. NOTHING annoys me more than infantile name calling when I know my interest in getting things changed is to make this game more fun.

We should be able to struggle home a lot more than we do now,running out of ammo should be a very common occourance.

fights would be more fun if we lasted longer imo.