airdoc

What does the assets expansion really mean? Are all those additional bombers planned as AI like the B17? Or some of them may be flyable?

I 'm not sure it is that simple. The way I understand it is that without the "joystick-hardware-null-position-always-corresponds-to-zero-force-position-IRL" novel algorithm, we would always see a pitching up with flap lowering, and perhaps it is this that Yo-Yo refers to as "never see aircraft pitching down". With the algorithm, we would see pitching down, but we would have to apply back pressure on the joystick, which IRL would not correspond to stick movement. As far as I can tell, the question is "would you rather have unrealistic joystick movement or unrealistic aircraft behavior with flap lowering?" For this I 'd choose the first, because as I said, a pilot applying force to the stick to keep it centered, is essentially trying to pitch the plane up when lowering flaps. It sounds more intuitive to have to do this if you intend to pitch up, instead of always getting a pitch-up attitude when lowering flaps while you rest your hand on the neutral stick position. Perhaps I 'm wrong though, please correct me. As for the video comment, it's a long story, I won't get into it, because it can easily derail the thread to another aerodynamics discussion.

You may find interesting an experiment comparing the behavior of a Yak-52 to a simulated WW2 airplane. The pilot was asked to forcefully keep the stick at the same position after lowering flaps in order to check the airplane behavior (this is exactly what Yo-Yo is referring to in his question). The result was a pitching up of the airplane -something that is seen in most ww2 sims. This is essentially what happens because of our non-force feedback joysticks, as they are maintained in the hardware neutral position. In reality, the stick automatically moves forward because of flow downwash, which changes the pressure on the elevator, felt at the pilot's hand. Pilots do not oppose it, and the aircraft pitches down as a result. Maybe there are some differences among planes. There is a whole discussion in another forum about it; i ll just post the link to the video here because it maybe of help. [ame] [/ame]

This has been an issue that raised discussions in flight sim forums in the past. If I understand correctly, IRL, when flaps lower, the stick moves automatically to the new neutral position, and the aircraft pitches down a bit. Pitching down essentially happens in relation to this forward motion of the stick. In most sims, flap lowering is associated with a pitching up of the plane, and this is the result of the joystick remaining in "virtual neutral" position which is now a "pull back" position in reality, but player has no input of this, correct? If I understand the question : the "joystick's hardware neutral" is modelled in a way that it always corresponds to the "zero-force in reality" neutral position. So, Spit pilot flies trimmed with stick in neutral position, then lowers flaps, real stick moves forward a bit - joystick remains in neutral position but now its neutral corresponds to a forward position in reality, aircraft pitches slightly down and elevator trim is applied to counter for it. If IRL a pilot chooses to maintain stick in the pre-flap lowering position, he has to apply some force, and this would mean that he is attempting a pitch-up maneuver while lowering the flaps. Such an intention, in the new-simulated center position, should translate to a pull-up motion of the joystick. If the recentering algorithm works well and the input required is not very abrupt, then, yes I would prefer it. It sounds more realistic anyway. IRL, the pilot would be trying to pitch the plane up by holding the stick, so in a joystick we should be pulling back.

I too was hoping for a map like this, based on Wag's post, but there is a post by Raccoon in this thread "Normandy means Normandy, as a region of France", that made me skeptical (it's number 25). Perhaps it's time for the devs to clear any misunderstanding about the Southern England issue. It's been a really long time since the map was announced. btw, there was a thread asking for Lorentz blind landing system pics. Will this be included in Normandy for the German planes?

No precise official data up to now, but based on hints by Wags and Raccoon's post that South England will not be included, we 're probably looking into something that's about 200-250 x200 kms : Cherbourg to Dieppe on the North, up to LeMans to the south (if we' re lucky).

They can start with twin engine bombers, less work needed and it would pave the way for the heavies. A20, B25, B26, A26, Ju-88 would be great. For B17 i 'd buy it even if it was initially released at FC level, provided multi-crew functionality was modelled.

It is nice that racoon already referred to map expansions, perhaps Ardennes. If the map expansion lies in a contiguous area, would it be possible to merge maps together? Something like this could be very useful since Normandy alone is a rather limited area (about 200x200 kms) and has many potential small theaters at nearby locations (Dieppe, the Channel, etc). If, for example a 3rd party attempts to recreate a BoB scenario with the Channel, it would be a waste not to be able to use the current Normandy map to account for the southern part of the theater.

great! is it Caen?

In old il2 1946 mission designers had the option of doing this. Sometimes they placed in addition an "invisible runway" object there, sometimes they put a "generic runway" object. The problem with these runways was that if the field wasn't entirely flat, there was a mismatch in the altitude and sometimes crashes occurred (plus it didn't look good). The ideal solution about this would be the ability to place a runway object, and at the same be able to flatten the map around the airbase. But overall, it could be done without placing a runway most of the times, designers had to assign a "home base" in the field, with a radius of x meters, and reduce the friction properties of the grass/land within this radius so that aircraft could taxi/takeoff/land without problems. This option greatly enhanced the possibility of new missions, especially in maps where there was an airfield mismatch or distances were long. If developers are interested in expanding on something like this, it would be a really great feature, because it would allow for mission designers to isolate parts of any map and place era-specific runways/airbases there. For example take Nevada : 1. Mission editor has objects like "1944 german/allied runway generic". 2. Mission designers creates airbases with these runways in a part of the map away from vegas. 3. Now the mission could look something like North Africa campaign for the players. wishful thinking would be the option to remove existing airbases from a map altogether, thus allowing each map to fit to any period with appropriate handling by a mission designer. So, if you take the black sea map and remove all airbases, then it could work perfectly for a Kuban 1943 scenario. It wouldn't be that much out of place. An additional feature that would make any map work in any time period would be additionally the ability to "cut out pieces of the map" for each mission. If the designer could designate a rectangular part of the map that would be flyable, he could move entirely to the desert and leave Vegas out for example. Adds much more to the immersion.

Yep, they may have considered a way to implement both versions under a single module. Many people had already asked for it. This would affect other 3rd parties working on similar projects. Overall it would be a great feature.

thanks for sharing DGC, that's interesting

Single engine Warbirds are significantly smaller than airliners. Even an An F-16 would be detected at <10km with optimal contrast, unless your eyesight is exceptional. Have a look at these research data : http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=119885 Contrails are a very different thing though.

I agree with you gavagai, but I don't mind PTO. It's a good start, less demanding than ETO-MTO and it will give us carrier ops. At least the Stuka can fit to any time period in ETO. With a Ju-88 and a Heinkel, axis bomber set is essentially complete (ok, wishful thinking here, but it's Christmas).

great news. Happy to see more 3rd parties doing ww2