My thoughts on CFS simming

[LuseKofte]

Try to imagine that this is not whining, I do not claim to have many with me on this opinion either. But flying online since internet allowed have made me observe many things.

I have a historical approach on my interest for aviation and swimming, I was fascinated by Norwegian pilots flying sub missions with Northrop and Sunderlands. Broken to tears of the sacrifice of Squadron #12 flying Battles agains bridges over meuse as a six years old. I daydream flying Battles, Swordfish in convoyduty or SBDś on Midway.
Old IL 2 hey days allowed you to do some of it, great numbers in servers allowed people like me flying slow obsolete planes, always some fighter pilots to help.
Less people in servers both in COD and BOX (latter due to limitations in number and few people in other) And DCS make that a repeatable suicide today.
And by not having dedicated bomber pilots in number that matters make all of these servers a hollow experience.
I understand why people fly fighters, it is the branch allowing for progression and constant developing skills. This is why the small growth almost entirely with the help of fighter pilots . For people like me (or just me) fighters bore me to death. Dogfights too. It simply do not rock my boat.
And the ones walking away are us slow plane flyers. And honestly I do not think it is anyones failure, nor anything to do about it, it is just an observation

[ATAG_Torian]

Agree it can be very frustrating for bomber jocks. Do u get on TeamSpeak and ask if any1 can escort u ? Lone wolfing in a bomber is almost a suicide mission as Tab 7 - 1 will be your undoing every time.
Hope that all that read this will make an effort to support any1 trying to take out objectives in a bomber.

[Artist]

The FG28 flies on ATAG every Sunday morning (9-13 CET/CEST) with 3-4 red bombers and 1-3 red fighters. At that time ATAG is usually quite empty - until some Australians and New Zealanders chime in on the blue side and increase the fun factor. Involving the few fighters in dogfights, we sometimes get some of the bombers through and back. Even roll the map once in a while.

But I see your point: With 10+ opposite players on the server we're happy if the bombers at least reach the targets.

Torian is right, too: Ask for cover in TS or in chat (but switch to friendly, first!).

[DerDa]

As part time bomber jockey I definitely feel your pain.

If you want to recreate historical bomber raids, I'm afraid that this will not be possible online. Online never really can really reproduce the conditions of WWII. Not the numbers, not the discipline and orders every pilot had to obey, not the weather, not the intelligence available and so on.
This can never be the case on a server due to technical reasons and issues of gameplay (in reality you would prefer a most unbalanced situation and even try to create it, a server must be balanced etc.)

That said sometimes there were multiplayer events, that came pretty close. I remember one of the famous bomber events organised by Boo and DRock I believe. We were about 30 Blennies racing to the french coast, kissing the wave tops.
Absolutely wonderful experience.
Naturally it was not realistic as well. The Blue side knew that we were coming and they knew when we were coming and there was a very limited number of targets. The losses were tremendous, but so was the fun.

At other times the defending side was not able to organise itself and this resulted in high losses of single attackers and maps quickly rolled.

At the beginning of the first TWC campaign there was a similar experience. Quite a lot of people started to coordinate their efforts, both bombers and fighter escorts and the results were most remarkable. The problem was that this happened only on one side and the other one became frustrated.
Such long campaings seem to be a very, very difficult thing to set up and run succesfully.

So the answer to the problem seems pretty obvious to me: organised events.
ATAG is on a good thing there with the Tiger Moth Shoot Outs and Flare is planning a race, as far as I know.
The numbers of players will raise, whenever something like this is on.
It just needs people who have the time, the dedication, the will and the ability to do it.

[ATAG_Vampire]

".........ATAG is on a good thing there with the Tiger Moth Shoot Outs and Flare is planning a race, as far as I know.

Don,t forget the Highseas Tours which are not only great fun but give everybody, both old and new pilots, the chance to see the detail and graphical beauty of this great sim without the combat scenario.

07

[DerDa]

Don,t forget the Highseas Tours which are not only great fun but give everybody, both old and new pilots, the chance to see the detail and graphical beauty of this great sim without the combat scenario.

07

How could I ever forget a Highseas Tours?
Each and everyone is a treasured memory

[No.119_Squidly (VK-D)]

Blitz's gorgeous terrain could have been made expressly for close air support or low level bombing missions.

I also enjoy moving mud, but yet again it's down to the server owners to give people the targets they need - and a lot of work for them to do so.

Have you tried the TWC Campaign server ? it has a LOT of ground targets, with even convoys trundling around the roads for you to shoot up.

[RAF74_Buzzsaw]

Hello LuseKofte

You may have missed the various posts where I mentioned this, but for TF 5.0 we are looking at improving the durability of the bomber types as well as reducing the effectiveness of the weapons against them.

It has been obvious for a long time the game panders to Fighter-Jocks and it is far too easy to shoot down these larger types.

We made a lot of changes for TF 4.312/TF 4.5 to reduce the effectiveness of the Fighters, but it is clear, from looking at combat reports, casualties, etc. we needed to do more.

Even at the worst moments for the German bombers in the BoB, the loss rates were nowhere near what is commonly seen on the CoD servers... and that can be applied equally to Allied type losses during the same time period as well as later in the war. 10% losses were unusual... 20% losses were rare.

Some players like to argue they are much better pilots and shots than the historical participants, but they are actually flattering themselves when they assert this.... and even if they were more accurate, it was still not the case that a few 20mm rounds could knock of the wing of a medium bomber types. The strength of a medium bomber structure was considerably more than a fighter. Most bombers were shot down as a result of engine damage, fuel tank damage, and/or pilots being killed.

We are also introducing historically accurate armour plating in bombers for TF 5.0, (including retro-fitted armour for those 4.5 types which should have it) as well as historically accurate self sealing tanks, etc.

So I think you will find that flying a bomber in TF 5.0 will be a less hazardous occupation than it was previously.

We do very much appreciate our dedicated community of Ground Pounders and we want to make sure they have a fair chance when they fly.

[IIJG27Rich]

I always liked the idea of pilot rescues with flying boats. I recall that pilots floated in 1946..Big points could be added in missions for a pilot rescue no?




This one is even in the patches area