AI airspeed

[christophe]

Hi to all!

While working on some home made aircraft with custom .air .dp and .cfg files I made some test to see wether an AI aircraft is able to use the WEP or not.
My surprise was to discover that my aircraft, while flying with the AI, for example as a wingman, was even unable to use the full power. I noticed that because the wingman was unable to follow me at full power; 100% without WEP, allthough the AI setting was "ace".
First I thought that was my fault, since I've probably did something wrong with the air, cfg or DP file.
In order to validate, I made the same tests with many other planes, some addons and some stock aircraft.
The result is very strange:
- Some home made aircraft works well, some not
- Some stock aircraft (F4F4) works well, some not (F4U1A Corsair).
It seems that an AI aircraft cannot fly above something around 315-320 kts true airspeed (I made tests at 10000') or 280-285 IAS.
I looked through all the cfs 2 config and general files and unfortunately I found no way to solve this trouble

Has somebody ever noticed that?
Is there any solution ?

Regards

Christophe

 

[dvslats]

Hi christophe,
The 1st item to try is this in the DP file.

[MISC_DATA]
unit_family=1
category=1
allegiance=3
max_group_size=8
min_speed=240
cruise_speed=477
max_speed=715 <------
min_alt=50
cruise_alt=7519
max_alt=11278
entered_service=6/1/43
crew=1

The numbers are in KPH.

Dave

 

[bearcat241]

AI don't use WEP at all...may as well forget about that completely. Furthermore, when you're playing the sim at normal sim speed, even if you and your wingies are flying the exact same flight model and dp, they are governed by a different set of rules dictated by the AI engine and never seem to be able to max their top speed capability, so you can easily pull away from your flight if you maintain top speed for long if your flight model is capable of more than 350 kts. Only when you increase the sim speed are they able to match your top speed and your most aggressive maneuvers. Try fighting at 2x speed and you'll see what i mean. Even the enemy AI are quicker, faster in reaching top speeds and smarter too.

Secondly, when the player signs onto a mission as a wingman, he/she falls within the jurisdiction of the AI engine and will likewise experience some of the programming limitations of the AI engine.

 

[christophe]

Hi dvslats and bearcat 241, and thanks to both of you for replying

I already did some adjustment with the max-speed item in dp file with no result.
And by reading Bearcat 241 answer it seems that something I was suspected is confirmed: an AI aircraft is governed by some rules that have nothing to do with the aircraft performance through .air file.
What a shame!
Do you know wich file, if any, could be arranged for the AI to be be more "agressive" with the throttle?
Just an other thing: I did the tests with x4 time sim speed in order to seed up the test but with the same result, at least in level flight.

 

[bearcat241]

Do you know wich file, if any, could be arranged for the AI to be be more "agressive" with the throttle?

That would be nice if such a thing existed. The AI engine is embedded in the controlling modules which are the hard-coded, copyright property of MS. I'm afraid it is what it is, buddy--no tinkering allowed.

Just an other thing: I did the tests with x4 time sim speed in order to seed up the test but with the same result, at least in level flight.

Hmmm...that's too bad. I get different results, maybe because i don't go balls-to-the-wall so quickly with my flights. I gradually increase speed to max while watching the pace of my flight element, which seems to allow the AI engine respond in kind with my wingies. BTW, 4x speed seems a bit extreme, but i guess you gotta do what you gotta do, heh?

 

[Naismith]

On a similar subject i.e. AI speed, there used to be a small freeby file which could increase the speed at which AI taxi which worked in both FS9 and X. However it does not work under W7 64bit, all I get is a runtime error.
Anyone know of a revision or other program which acheives the same result?

Ooops I just moticed this is a CFS2 thread, still anyone with any idea?

 

[Sarg Willy]

Dvslats is on the right track ,, at least as far as enemy Ai are concerned ,, by uping the dp file max value ,, allows them faster speeds ,, But you have to revisit Mission builder before and after the dp file changes ,, You will notice after the max dp speed changes ,, that mission builder will now allow the Enemy Ai faster speed ,, So if your using a test bed mission file ,, you have to alter the enemy Ai mission file higher speed as well ,, or your observations will not show the increase speed ,,,
I,m not talking about Q-combat ,, that is a different bag of tricks ,, but rather a mission file ,,
Trying to hit a 109e at the 400 mph head on pass can certainly rattle your gun timing ,,
I haven,t tryed to make the player Ai flight faster ,, to see if the same rules apply ,, let us know how you make out ,,, Sarg

 

[christophe]

That would be nice if such a thing existed. The AI engine is embedded in the controlling modules which are the hard-coded, copyright property of MS. I'm afraid it is what it is, buddy--no tinkering allowed.

That's what I was suspecting. Thanks for confirmation.

As far as the relation between DP files and MB is concerned, specially about airspeed, I noticed some curious behaviour; did you ever noticed the following things:

1/
In MB, when you setup a speed for any aircraft, the navigation is computed as if that speed was a true speed, but while flying the mission, all the aircraft fly at the same IAS that you have entered in MB
I explain myself:
Let's say you build a mission with an AI aircraft that have to fly a 180 nm leg between 2 wpts at 18000 ft. You set the speed to 180 kt, for example. MB tell you that the fly time will be 1 hour. That's the reason why I believed at the beginning that speed in MB was TAS.
Now you launch the mission for testing: surprise, the AI is flying at 180 kts indicated airspeed and the TAS of 234 kt reduces the fly time to 46 mn.
I noticed too that cfs 2 doesn't use the real relation between IAS and TAS according to altitude, but uses the rule of thumb: TAS = IAS+10% at 6000 ft ; IAS +20% at 12000 ft and so on...
2/
Some times ago I used to reset the max_speed item in dp file to the max IAS the plane was able to fly (roughly the max speed at see level). The reason was to prevent for an inadvertently speed set up in MB above the plane could fly. But I know now that this is a wrong way. As some of you mentionned in some post, this degrade the AI performance. Now I set the max_speed to the VMO.
But that does not solve the problem concerning the AI low speed compare to the expected performance.

And last:
I tried to change the first item in "Flight Dynamics" box of .air file because I read from 1% team (and I congratulate them for their outstanding work) that this change the AI behaviour. No luck. The AI has exactly the same speed.