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[kpn.kardif]

I have all my flight sizes set at DCG default, which appears to be four for American bombers.  Haven't looked into what was done historically though... I'll try setting flight size to three and see if it helps.  Were American fighter squadrons flights of three as well?  I seem to recall seeing old pictures and video showing fighter wings of four.  Is there a way to adjust bomber squadrons and not fighter squadrons along with it? 

Actually, I discovered that a big part of the collisions were due to having delayed start times on.  I set autopilot on and actually watched a squadron of B-17's on the runway as they got their engines spun up.  They do them one at a time, and with four it takes them a while to get in the air.  Two of them managed to take off, and just as number three began to inch forward, the second flight spawned right on top of them, causing 3 to collide with 7 and 4 to collide with 8.  Having a flight of three instead of four would cut down on the chance of this happening, but still... is there a setting I could change (other than turning of delayed start times) where bomber squadrons have more time between 1st and 2nd flight spawning? 

Collisions on the runway are probably 70% of the time it happens.  Last night I had two consecutive missions with midair collisions, first one with two B-25s en route to target.  Very next mission, two guys in my own squadron (second flight, 6 and 7 i believe, flying P-39s) clipped each other on landing approach.  I know accidents happened in the real world and accounted for a significant portion of losses, so I take it in stride.  That kind of thing really happened, so it's all part of the realism. 

Planes magically appearing out of thin air on top of other planes though.... pretty sure that never happened 

[Slink]

Late US fighters should be in 4 flights of four using finger four formation, bombers in a combat box of four flights of three, see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combat_box
IL2 doesn't have this formation though, and imagine the mid-air collisions!
The DCG defaults apply to all flights unfortunately, so you can only set three or four for both fighter and bomber flights, a real pain to edit them all manually, which is  something I need to ask Paul to separate, or use a timetable for the campaign to set all the parameters for the squads automatically. Which campaign is it?

I'm afraid the mid-air collisions are fairly rampant in IL2, particularly with large formations and escorts.
Ground spawn collisions shouldn't really happen, the delayed start time is every 8 minutes + a random, so can sometimes be quite a bit earlier, but is not adjustable (I'm going to request it though).
You can check the actual delay time in the mission file to see what's going on, but it's not really practical to edit it manually for each generated mission.
Using airstarts can also help, as one flight is usually then out of the way, but often halfway to the target, so does break up the formations.

Even had the crazy situation of a squad taking off due to their airfield being overrun, only to run into the AT guns on the runway placed there by Active Front.
Sometimes you do indeed just have to put it down to accidents, which were really far more common than in IL2 take offs/landings.
109 units could often lose as many planes in accidents as in combat, but they never crash in IL2... and carrier accidents were common, but realism and fun don't always mix, but sometimes they even collide on the landing circuit.

A question though, is this with or without the AI mod (new one that is) as if the start up sequence has altered could they be taking longer than before?
Try the same mission with and without, and see if it makes a difference.

[kpn.kardif]

Mid air collisions are one reason I don't use the massed bombers setting.  Combat box formation in IL2 would be a recipe for disaster, two guys in the front clip each other and they'd end up taking out most of the rest of the squadron!  I'm flying USAAF grand campaign in the Pacific, currently just finishing up New Guinea 1942 (currently September, i believe), next map should be Burma. 

I agree that realism doesn't always equal fun.  In the defense of New Guinea, I don't think the Australians had any armor to speak of, while the Japanese had Ha-Go units on the island.  The Ausies managed to hold the Japanese back, but I don't think they took Buna airstrip, which is the DCG goal for that campaign.  Really tough to do without armor units, so I added a few Stuarts, pretending that the allies managed to land some at Port Moresby.  More fun that way!

I don't remember if AI controlled planes with multiple engines would spool them up one at a time, they certainly do with the AI mod (I'm currently still using dbw1.4, been too busy/lazy to update).  It'd be worth testing to see if without the mod how they start up.  As it is, since B-17s have four engines, it takes them forever to get spooled up one at a time and get airborn, easily five or six minutes for the first plane.  My short term fix has been to enable air starts and disable delayed starts, which makes the first flight spawn airborn and 2nd flight on the ground.  They arrive at the target at different times, but I'd rather have that than them spawning on top of each other. 

I remember a mission long ago flying the allied African campaign over Tobruk, there was a line of tanks that drove right across the runway as I was taking off.  Didn't end well for anybody! 

[Semor]

Any News about DCG & DBW? 

[sa_475th_Chaney]

cool stuff mate. I dont use DCG myself (yet) but it seems worth it...

We will soon open a new set of child boards up here for UP3, DBW and HSFX, and there will be exclusively for posting mods or adaptiations or patchies made by users and members specifically for that pack.

This will go nicely in there.

probably a dumb question and in the wrong area but what is DCG? i never could understand it.

[sa_475th_Chaney]

ok Cirx I asked you what DCG was and i'm getting it's Dynamic Campaign Generator. But it says to place all this pack into my DCG/Data folder which i don't have in my DBW. This generator as far as i understand it, sounds completely awesome. But i'm clueless where to begin. Help is requested. thanks.

[Slink]

Hi semor, the news is not really here currently, rather in the "important message" topic, I've been working on my CoE campaign in the meantime so just pop in here and there at the moment, busy busy busy, as usual. So much to do with so little IQ but there's always an idea which comes up and is new so I'll just keep on working to the ultimate end but there are meanwhile some screen shots to just make amends.

However, DBW 1.7 will begin introducing the plane merges and transfer to optional add-on packs discussed in that topic and similar but more extensive to my last class.dcg list putting all the prototype/fantasy/useless planes at the end, and although I was involved I don't know which will come first of course, but this will mean adapting the DCG files to the new plane set, including any payload merges, so the fun is not over yet.

Make no mistake, this is a very positive move removing a lot of clutter, allowing far more personal choice and customisation, a smoother game, and a shorter DCG list (!) The question for us here will be how to do the add-on packs, as having the full list of all available planes including add-ons as opposed to only core planes is possible, DCG will simply give you an error if you use a plane you don't have installed and replace it with another, but maybe a separate set of lists with all the add-ons so you can include the ones you use by editing your own lists? Makes updates tricky as you then have to do it every time, but this set is eventually meant to no longer need any updates (when I finally get it right...), but there will always be another new plane around the corner.

The plan currently is to use the existing change list to take out the planes that will no longer be core content, but the loadouts won't be certain until the merged versions actually appear in DBW, so we have to wait and see, but as soon as we have the info I'll be onto it.



Chaney, CirX supports this stuff but he doesn't write the files and has quite enough to handle anyway.

DCG is indeed awesome, replacing the stock DGEN and allowing mod planes and maps, truly dynamic campaigns simultaneously with historical scripting, any new objects like vectors etc; and even the new (stock) MDS functions in dogfight campaigns, (not UP3).

However these files are only a DBW add-on to standard DCG, which is not part of DBW, rather was written and is maintained by Paul Lowengrin at Lowengrin.com, which is where you can download the program, documentation, campaigns etc; and also ask Paul anything related to standard DCG (which is for the stock game only), but since I made this DBW compatibility pack anything related to these files themselves should be asked here, Paul doesn't have to explain my screwing up... but go there and check it out, easy to install and use, and if you're really stuck with anything we can also help here of course.

Learning to use DCG is fairly straightforward in its basics, as a user you just need good campaigns. It's only when you start designing them that it can get complex... otherwise download DCG from Paul's site and try a stock campaign first to get the feel of how it all works, you don't even need these files for that as it's stock only and DBW 1.6 still has all the stock planes unchanged although a couple may be changed in 1.7. Setting up third-party campaigns (made by other users) is also fairly simple, although some were made for UP2 so would need adapting (and this now after any DBW 1.7 and/or following changes).

Try it out, there is vast potential in DCG, I probably would have given up on IL2 long ago if not for DCG, and equally if not for DBW as UP3 is no longer compatible, so a big round of thanks to Paul and to CirX for investing their time for our pleasure.

Come join the Dark Side and fly DCG, imagine the control you will have over your campaigns and combatants, the power to manipulate entire nations, the ability to...

anyway, the world's your oyster with DCG, just read the documentation and all will be revealed.

[PA_Willy]

I probably would have given up on IL2 long ago if not for DCG, and equally if not for DBW as UP3 is no longer compatible, so a big round of thanks to Paul and to CirX for investing their time for our pleasure.

Same here. I love DBW because is our opportunity to stand with DCG in the last modded game version. I have given up UP 3 because is not compatible (and is not going to be ever).

Thank you to you too, Slink, for your updates.

[Cycle]

@Slink
The main problem for DCG are the changes in the log file! DCG is a really flexible program but that is the Achilles' heel, if it is to work with mods! Like I said, I have no UP3/HSFX5 but I suspect that it is once again the main reason!
The other problems, such as class names of objects that DCG can not handle, are easy to solve!


@sa_475th_Chaney
Here is a little help how to install DCG and 3rd party campaigns: http://allaircraftsimulations.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=94&t=29320

[PA_Willy]

@Slink
The main problem for DCG are the changes in the log file! DCG is a really flexible program but that is the Achilles' heel, if it is to work with mods! Like I said, I have no UP3/HSFX5 but I suspect that it is once again the main reason!
The other problems, such as class names of objects that DCG can not handle, are easy to solve!

You are absolutely right. The problem is the log file. The other things are easy to fix.

[sa_475th_Chaney]

I probably would have given up on IL2 long ago if not for DCG, and equally if not for DBW as UP3 is no longer compatible, so a big round of thanks to Paul and to CirX for investing their time for our pleasure.

Same here. I love DBW because is our opportunity to stand with DCG in the last modded game version. I have given up UP 3 because is not compatible (and is not going to be ever).

Thank you to you too, Slink, for your updates.

So from what I understand, this update for DBW isn't actually intended for Paul's dcg but for the one that is built within DBW(Dgen). Is that right? My problem is downloading all this and then my game goes to crap because I have no clue what I'm doing. it's still a lil fuzzy all this stuff. But DCG is where I want to go. I think I heard you saying that all the mods we have in DBW can work for DCG?

[sa_475th_Chaney]

I probably would have given up on IL2 long ago if not for DCG, and equally if not for DBW as UP3 is no longer compatible, so a big round of thanks to Paul and to CirX for investing their time for our pleasure.

Same here. I love DBW because is our opportunity to stand with DCG in the last modded game version. I have given up UP 3 because is not compatible (and is not going to be ever).

Thank you to you too, Slink, for your updates.

Ok i am getting this down and actually about to fly dcg. was a lot easier than i thought. I just want to know what is the best mode settin for dcg and is there any conflicts with dcg and regular player made campaigns(non dcg) even tho I'm sure those won't matter much to me anymore.

So from what I understand, this update for DBW isn't actually intended for Paul's dcg but for the one that is built within DBW(Dgen). Is that right? My problem is downloading all this and then my game goes to crap because I have no clue what I'm doing. it's still a lil fuzzy all this stuff. But DCG is where I want to go. I think I heard you saying that all the mods we have in DBW can work for DCG?