Author Topic: Beyond Visual Range Air Combat dynamics... (Read 3089 times)

AKSWulfe · « **Reply #30 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:03:00 AM »

I'll sell you a dictionary/thesaurus and some real clues... how many P40s and Vals had wingmen? How many had tower operators? How many had radar operators on the ground? How many had visual spotters?

The inflight radar makes up for our lack of having lots of people and organized order of battles.
-SW

Fatty · « **Reply #31 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:08:00 AM »

I like icons, cause I think bouncers are girliemen.

Pongo · « **Reply #32 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:25:00 AM »

They were watching the radar. But it was a brand new technology and they didnt trust it or understand it well. Comanders at Guadalcanal where still distrusting it and still losing ships and 1000s of men to thier distrust.

funkedup · « **Reply #33 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:30:00 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Fester':
the sim does a good job of simulating how modern day fighters use vast amounts of information on the enemy to position themselves for attack and to keep high situational awareness by keeping their head down in the cockpit and seeing far beyond visual range versus scanning the sky for the enemy. one wonders how many pilots in world war 2 would have been saved from bounces, ambushes and other surprise attacks if they were given the tools that our modern fighters have.

So true Fester. The AWACS downlink gives you the ability to pick your way through a big fight even when you can't see a single plane. WW2 fighter pilots NEVER had the ability to see this information on a display like that, and what VERBAL information they did receive came at a much lower rate and with much less spatial precision. It's probably the worst aspect of this game, next to the ground vehicle models.

(Edit: I haven't dealt with the vehicles for a few months - they might be better now. AWACS downlink vertical situation display is still lame though.)

[ 07-27-2001: Message edited by: funkedup ]

Rooster · « **Reply #34 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:32:00 AM »

Didnt HT say something about the size of the icons being a font size issue? related to the font size of the chat buffer i seem to remember, but I have slept since then so who knows...

flakbait · « **Reply #35 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:38:00 AM »

How far out have I spotted a B-17? My personal record is something like 8k, but since icons don't go that far I can't confirm the distance. Yesterday morning I had a B-17 ID'd when he was at 24k; I was climbing up to him, passing 14-16k at the time. I can tell the difference between a P-51B and a -51D at 6k. How? One shimmers, one doesn't. Same thing goes for the P-47's; I can spot the difference between them at hideous ranges for the same reason I can with the 51. One is silver and shimmers, the other don't!

I think radar could be tweaked with some. Namely killing the dar-bar a certain distance out, pulling the inflight dot dar, and doing something about con detection. Icons I see has a nifty feature that helps some, and since they vanish when the aircraft passes behind a canopy piece there's no deflection shooting crutch. Range could be pulled a bit I think; what about the tin horns? Some new guys are so green they have trouble taking off on their own. This ain't an expert's sim until we get pre-flight walk arounds and have to blow perk points on our assigned A/C's repairs.

So implement user-selected settings for icons. Each player could turn 'em off, set the range they pop on at, have 'em fade in or out (both if they wanted) etc... Icons fixed. Next: radar. You can't do the WB's system. Why? Cause it's in WB's and HTC isn't about taking the best everyone else has and copying it. There are some things you can't do much with; the NOE dar-bar for example. A text warning? Won't work cause the messages scroll by dang fast when a country is getting blasted. Sound warnings could work along with a quick message in bright green "Enemy spotted in 11.12.1" or something in the text buffer. Ala Check 6 calls. Dot dar is so limited in the MA now there's no reason to change it. Dar-bar on the other hand NEEDS a fix; I've seen enemy build-ups clear across the fraggin map before. So has everyone else. Limit the dar-bar max range down to say 3 grids around a field. Anything farther and you get squat. Altitude could be thrown into the mix too. How? It's like a cone; the lower you are the closer you gotta get before being picked up. So if you're comin in at 40k you'll get picked up farther out, say 1.5 grids instead of half a grid.

Anything else I should add or will this work?

-----------------------
Flakbait [Delta6]
Delta Six's Flight School
Put the P-61B in Aces High
"With all due respect Chaplian, I don't think God wants to hear from me right now.
I'm gonna go out there and remove one of His creations from this universe.
And when I get back I'm gonna drink a bottle of Scotch like it was Chiggy von
Richthofen's blood and celebrate his death."
Col. McQueen, Space: Above and Beyond

Yeager · « **Reply #36 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:40:00 AM »

the hellcat rear view was like sticking your nose up against a wall.... laughable
====
It was a trade off in terms of engineering design. That big grey wall saved many a cat pilot by protecting him against high velocity projectiles. The trade off was they could not see well and easily avoid those nasty projectiles before the fact?

Would it have been preferred to design the cats with a more worthwhile aft view? Looking at the historical record, No. The Jap designs were superior in performance thus the decision to build that tough wall aft turned out to be correct. Coupled with resiliant tactics, the western airmen prevailed.

The 6 views in AH are too permissive.

Yeager

mason22 · « **Reply #37 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:43:00 AM »

what Toad said.

it's a sim. remember that. enjoy it.

[ 07-27-2001: Message edited by: mason22 ]

hblair · « **Reply #38 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:43:00 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by SWulfe:
I'll sell you a dictionary/thesaurus and some real clues... how many P40s and Vals had wingmen? How many had tower operators? How many had radar operators on the ground? How many had visual spotters?

The inflight radar makes up for our lack of having lots of people and organized order of battles.
-SW

Are you for turning down the gunnery about 50% to make up for the inexperience of the WWII pilots as cmpared to us?

How much for the thesarus and dictionary?

Nifty · « **Reply #39 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:47:00 AM »

Several things... First, in last week's check 6, hang and I were up in Jugs with no inflight dar at all. Maybe 8 people were left in the arena. We had a decent idea of where the enemy was, and we eventually found them; 10 minutes after starting our search (daddog turned the radar back on shortly after this.) It was fun for a SEA event, but I don't think most would find it fun in the MA. Then again, it was with just a few people in the arena, yet all in a very small area.

Icons... get rid of range and replace with rate of closure, tho that might be a little too difficult for gunnery purposes. I wouldn't mind short icons for plane ID purposes tho. In most SEA events, friendlies are named at 10K and enemies are named at 3K. Modifying it a bit, country icons could pop up at 6k, and plane types at 3k. However, I don't really care if it changes or it stays the same.

Radar... NOE is what I want to see. Under XXX feet, things shouldn't shouldn't show on DAR (bar or dot). Once within X miles of a enemy field it does appear (visual spotters, I guess you could say). This could include GVs within X miles too. Of course if the dar is out at the field, oh well!

Zigrat · « **Reply #40 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:47:00 AM »

funkedup is a smart man

while they did have uradar, they recieved radar updates infrequently

i think radar should stay as is when not in flight but in the air no way

eaw had good modeling of radar oin the air.. loki bundecontroller, request vector to nearest threat. then he would give you bearing, range, and altitude. that would be nicee. make it so you could only request updates every minute orso to prevent flooding.

AKSWulfe · « **Reply #41 on:** July 27, 2001, 10:49:00 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by hblair:
Are you for turning down the gunnery about 50% to make up for the inexperience of the WWII pilots as cmpared to us?

Oh dear jebus... this thread has officially gone down the sh*tter.

I have 7 years of WarBirds, Fighter Duel, and various other WWII simulation games.

This would make me experienced wouldn't it?

Okay then.
-SW

newguy · « **Reply #42 on:** July 27, 2001, 11:11:00 AM »

AKs, ASSASSINS, would you please report to the dueling arena

hblair · « **Reply #43 on:** July 27, 2001, 11:22:00 AM »

SW, Does that mean you are not for turning down the gunnery and/or damage model to put us on a level playing field with the WWII pilots? Well, why not?

You are for giving us AWACS in our planes to simulate spotters, wingmen and the like but you are not for other concessions? Why?

AKSWulfe · « **Reply #44 on:** July 27, 2001, 11:27:00 AM »

These are team work concessions. You are talking about artificially enforcing something that you can naturally improve upon.

You are just doing this to say "well if I can't have mine, I'm going to screw up yours."

I'll go a step further, you want to artificially tone down gunnery and pork the radar so you can jump more people easily..

You have to pay a start up fee of 15$ (cost of a solo in 1940), you have to sign up for an air force and can only fly what you are given for that air force and only fly planes assigned to you. If you lose the plane, you have to fly the squadron crap plane until the end of the TOD.

If you want to be rediculous, I can be equally as rediculous.
-SW