DFW CV Campaign, Questions

[James "Taffy" Jones]

Starting a DFW CV campaign in April 1917. I made myself Hauptmann so I am flying lead in my flights. I noticed that my wingmen refuse to stay with me as I gain altitude. They are consistently 3 or 4 thousand feet below me no matter how many times I pound the rejoin key. These are observers, of course, so shouldn't they seek altitude instead of hugging the ground at 2000 feet? When I switch to player target view, it sounds like they are not using full RPM's and thus don't have enough power to climb with me. Is this related to the AI loiter bug or something different? I have set player flight to 10,000 feet but would hate to have to set it lower for a bomber/recon campaign.

Also, in the mission replay more than a dozen planes a few mile from my patrol area were reported to have crashed without any hostile action. I believe they were reported to be Spads and Albatross III's but they were not fighting each other.

Finally, the game crashed back to the OFF manager after about 45 minutes of flying time. This happened in OFF 2 so is probably specific to my machine.

Still, thanks for a great sim! Best thing since my old RBII 3D days.

 

[rockmedic109]

My flight is always a few hundred feet below me. I am thinking it is because I usually have my throttle wide open and in a climb. They are probably throttled back and unable to maintain my rate of climb.

 

[James "Taffy" Jones]

Even at 85-90% throttle I am able to easily out climb them.

I noticed something else that may be related to this. When I switch to the gunner position and the autopilot engages, the HUD display shows the throttle does not stay at a consistent level (say, 90%). Instead, it fluctuates so wildly that you cannot even read the single digit counter! Furthermore, the tens counter also seems to rapidly fluctuate between 4 and 7, in other words, between 40 and 70%! The AI throttle never seems to go above this range. Perhaps this is only a graphics glitch and does not effect AI performance. However, it sure sounds like the AI does not use enough of their throttle.

Devs, please don't think I am very upset at this. Indeed, this is probably only a tiny problem that doesn't take too much away from my overall enjoyment of the game. If this bug has been squashed, great! If not, I hope my report may help you to identify the source of the problem. All in all, I am really enjoying the sim and think it is very well done, especially considering the limitations of the original CFS3 game engine. Thanks.

 

[Rickitycrate]

To get your wingies to form up at yor altitude maybe try a short warp. My experience is that they form up when I do this, I have not done this with DFW's but works with all others so far. Just a little coaxing.