The A2A Simulations Community

Salutations.

I have recently purchased BoB2 (upgraded to 2.09) after playing IL-2 for a while, mainly so I could get to participate in the Battle of Britain without resorting to mods (that usually end up "faking" the BoB with the wrong maps and such), and have a few questions regarding the simulation.

Essentially, I just want to know if these issues are normal or due to some computer problem or some such:

1- While flying an IA mission in a spit (mk1A I believe), I get a strange sputtering from the engine especially at max throttle. Basically the engine sound cuts off for an instant, and the pilot's "head" is pushed foward as if there was a moment of deceleration (it's not the sound cutting off, as there is an accompanying visual effect).

Is this an accurate simulation of how the merlin behaves at max throttle or some such, or a bug/computer issue?

2- Sounds in general seem to be more "rarefied" in the cockpit than IL-2. For example, very rarely will I hear machine gun fire, or nearby aircraft engines (and as far as I can tell, all I hear is the sound of the engine zooming past).

Is that normal? A more realistic simulation of sounds a pilot might hear in a dogfight? Especialy unsettling was not hearing guns being fired at me at all, except when they hit me. Is that intentional?

3- There is this strange visual effect that happens sometimes when I get hit, where the screen basically goes crazy, with double/triple images and graphical clipping appearing everywhere and I lose all control.

Is this the pilot injury effect? And is that how it is meant to show? I can't help but think that could be a graphics issue (especially the clipping).

4- Is it just me, or is gunnery specifically more difficult in this sim than in IL-2? Target size is set to low, but I imagine that is not any different from IL-2, but I am having more difficulty landing a hit than IL-2. It's as if the rate of fire on the brownings is slower.

That said, I do of course enjoy the sim, and the opportunity to "truly" fight in the greatest air battle of WW2.

Thank you.

Itkovian

Welcome aboard, Itkovian!

The sputtering in the Spit can occur when the engine is starved of fuel. Did you happen to nose down when this stuttering occured? That sort of move will stop the flow of fuel temporarily and the engine will cut out.

Welcome aboard!
Indeed in BoBII a lot of BoB specific stuff was added that will not be easy or even impossible to add to a sim without having the source code and being able to recompile. As one example a main issue with the first merlin powered fighters was that their caruburettor would cut out under negative G#s unlike the 109/110 engines which had fuel injection. When the carburettor stopped working, the engine would just be able to use up the mixture in the pipe and when it started working again it would have to fill the pipe to the engine first. So, the fuel amount in the pipe is important in BoB and could decide between life and death for a say Spitfire or 109 pilot. So the sim engine does model not only the amount of fuel in each tank, which many sims do, but also the amount of fuel in the pipe, which I am not sure any other sim does. Comparing the Mig Alley and Battle of britain Source, I think as many changes are to make the sim engine BoB specific than to make it more modern.



See above.




Thats definitely realistic. If BoBII errs, then actually you still hear more than a RL pilot would. For example, regarding bullets hitting you, I have read both accounts where the pilot clearly hears it and where he does not at all and is suprised when suddenly his plane acts strangely. IOW this depended on circumstances. The enemy guns would have much smaller volumne in your cockpit than something hitting you.




Please supply a screenie.



Hard to say. You might want to tweak it using the bdg.txt (others will know what to tweak). It may simply be that it is a bit different and so, you being used to Il2, you of course score more in Il2.

Hi Itkovian, welcome to BOBII and the BOBII forum and community. We have many IL2 players who enjoy BOBII as well. The two sim are different as you might expect and we do approach and model things differently. remember that the BOB only covered a short period in the history of air war in WWII (about 90 days or so) and you will be flying and fighting only BOBII A/C and using the 1939 tech.



I think you are just pointing the nose of the RAF fighter (Spit or HUrri) down. In the BOB the RAF A/C had negitive-G carbs and they would cut out if pointed down. Many RAF pilots would flip upside down before attacking to avoid the issue.



The sim trys to simulate the sounds that the BOB pilots would actually hear but as always this is subject to debate.

You may not always hear the enemy's bullets fire but you should hear the bullet hit your A/C and see the tracers when there is a miss.



I think (again a guess) you are discribing a simulation of a rudder being hit and the rudder failing but that is just a guess based on my experience. It is said that the inside of the cockpit becomes very "violent" after a rudder has failed with the pilot being penned in and confused.

I guess we would need a screen shot to confirm for sure.



We think we have modelled the bullets per the specs (In BOBII we use the specs to model). The 303's will shoot per the specs very closely. Most IL2 players find deflection shooting different in BOBII and maybe even a bit harder. Most kills in the BOB were made by LUF and RAF pilots within 20 degrees of the 6 O'clock position as deflection shooting so so difficult for many of the pilots (this is from Stephen Bungay's "The Most Dangerous Enemy" which is the historic Bible for many of us around here).

Of course the 303's danage effects will be less than the 50 cal and cannon damage you may be use too but as history showed the 303's did get the job done in the hands of a experienced pilot..

If you have not found the User Manual (located in your BOBII folder in the Docs folder) please review it to understand how to control the game with its many options, keys, and features. The Key discriptions are in appendix H and the Bdg.txt parameters are in appendix A.

_________________
Buddye

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I'm pretty sure I wasn't. IL-2 does model the engine cutout at negative Gs, and I wasn't pushing the nose down or anything. The aircraft might have been pointing down, mind you, but I wasn't pushing negative Gs. It doesn't happen always, mind you, and it's more than an audio glitch (since there is a "physical" effect of the head-bobbing foward).



I will try to get one, as there is definite video glitching there, and I lose all controls.

By glitching I mean that there are several images superimposed (as if I see double), and there is a lot of graphical clipping going on.

Just what is the "pilot injury" effect meant to look like, incidentally?

The reason I theorized a pilot injury is that everything looks fine in outside view. It's only in the cockpit that everything goes crazy (though I have no control even in outside view).



It definitely felt harder to me, as if the ROF of the brownings was lower, as well as the muzzle velocity (than IL-2, of course).

And I am comparing to the 303s, I've mostly focused on flying hurris and spits in IL-2.

On another topic: is the Single Pilot Campaign Guide still valid for 2.09? I ask simply because it mentions 2.07.

Thank you.

Itkovian

Welcome Itkovian.

Could it be that you are cooking your engine? It'lll certainly cough and splutter then.
You cannot run on maximum boost once you have broken the wire for more than a couple of minutes.

Actually, you certainly *can* hear other aircraft shooting. Wait 'til you get a 109 right on your tail and firing. You'll hear the guns chattering. He has to be *really* close though.
Also, order your squadron to test their guns. It's hard to hear guns at any distance as you are sitting behind a very noisy engine, in a poorly sealed cockpit with wind noise.

I think Buddye is right on the 'shaking'. It happens when you have taken bad rudder damage (not always shown visually, which is a limitation, I guess). This concurs with an account I read a while back describing that if a Typhoon lost its tail (a fault on early models) the pilot would be shaken into unconsciousness immediately, so violent was the buffeting.

As for gunnery, the BoBII system is carefully designed as Buddye says. You really have to think about convergence range, something that seems a lot easier (to me) in IL2 where you can often merely brush an opponent and they seem to fall apart. They are just different, I guess.

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"Ah yes, Michael (Parkinson)," Bader replied, "But these particular Fockers were Messerschmitts..."

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yes, the SPC is still valid. The manual just needs a small update


I have trouble, personally speaking, reconciling the IL2 .303s with the fact that bombers regularly returned with hundreds of bullet holes. The minute you hit them, they break formation or start smoking. It's far easier to get kills. And that's before you add 20mm cannon which seem to blow the tail off a Ju88 in an instant (something I find somewhat arcady- again speaking personally, I'm sure many love these effects). They are just different... You can adjust the bullet strength in BoBII if you want to.

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"Ah yes, Michael (Parkinson)," Bader replied, "But these particular Fockers were Messerschmitts..."

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Saitek X52 Pro

I doubt muzzle velocity is much different, as there are well known sources on it. they give a range but not a big one.

However the velocity when hitting the target may be well different.
BoBII has a flight model for the bullets (they dont use the plane flight model) and BoBII's allows supersonic, transsonic and subsonic bullet flight. Actually the transsonic region is the most important, its as if the bullet hits a solid block of air, while it just cut through the air while it flew supersonic. I have no idea whether Il2 models this. I am not good at comparing to Il2, I just want BoBII to be as good as possible

I think that might have been it. The head bobbing foward/deceleration is consistent with when the engine sputters then?

That said, how do you "break the wire"? Is it simply pressing "0" and going to 100% throttle? Or is there another command to use to "break past" (similar to going 110% throttle in IL-2)?

Also, here's a question on the fine points of prop pitch (this is the first sim where I go for complex engine management, since the negative-G cutoff does not happen with simple engines):

If in the midst of dogfighting I find myself at very slow speed (150-180mph), is it useful to go for fine pitch to better accelerate for a while, or is coarse pitch really the best angle for dogfighting, period?

Another question : Is there a way to make the speed/altitude readout bigger or of a different colour? I am running at 1920x1200, and that font is bloody hard to read (though maybe I should take that as a hint to be honest and read the dials *Grin*).

Thank you.

Itkovian

Itkovian
Hello there.If you are down to that low speed,yes,put it in fine pitch,and your engine will accellerate to above 200mph,then you can put it to course pitch.
One well known BOB pilot had a routine before he did battle seconds before he attacked the e/c,was to put the engine in fine pitch,and the gunsights on.

_________________
you live and learn,and die and forget.

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One could compare ballistics of the 303 vs. 50 but as the photo suggests...but what would be the point.
Also///it would be rare indeed to hear your opponent's guns.+

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hellcat

Itkovian, how do you like the spit's and hurricanes's flight models? Personally I think Bob 's fm's just seem a bit more realistic somehow from what I have read about how they flew IRL. Surly with the 109 E I fly all the time it is.

Well, I haven't flown the hurri in BoB yet, and in IL-2 the mods I played used a spit mkV instead of Mk1 for some reason (maybe the MK1 isn't in IL-2?), so it's hard to compare the flight models.

In all, the spit seems to be much more maneuverable before losing control (I can actually pull the stick all the way sometimes), and correspondingly the effects of G are much more pronounced than in IL-2. In BoB it seems that the main limit to my maneuvering in a turning fight (which in a Spit I should have the upper hand) is the G black out effect.

Mind you, I assume the AI pilots suffer from G-load as well, so at least it's equal.

Itkovian

Thanks for the nice reply Itkovian. I believe you will find the British planes real sweethearts from the cockpit. Me, I prefer to fly "Gretchin.. Evil dragon lady" the me-109. She's captured my soul.

hellcat44
Yes i agree on one not being able to hear the opponents guns,as you are surrounded by your own engine noise,when flying in the spit(which is quite deafening as i found out)which takes out other planes noises.
According to RAFs BOB pilots stories,they only knew they were being fired at,is when they saw tracer going past them(if they were lucky)

_________________
you live and learn,and die and forget.

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