Pandacat

It'll be great if someone can check and find out how many things got porked by HSFX in DCG. It's gonna be a giant task. But I have a gut feeling that except some minor things, most stuff has very little effect.

Hey Jaus, you might want to try deselect squadron management in the list of options. Squadron management allows you to be the leader regardless of your rank in the squadron. With that unchecked, your position returns to normal. As your career progresses, your position in a flight also advances.

Or +100/200 meters. I am afraid that -100/200 would force stupid AI to fly into ground. lol. I'll try the 2 flight per squadron solution. That kinda makes sense.

Both Tarawa and Normandy that I played are default campaigns that come with DCG, not a third party product. Also, I have seen Allied column march off from the beach towards the objective, but stop short of it. There was no opposition whatsoever between them and the objective, but they just stop there, not moving. Then the next mission, the same thing happens; marching off from the beach and stopping short of the objective. For #3 about factoring in a bigger vertical separation. Is that something doable? It's always between the 2nd and 3rd flight. If they can be separated then the friendly midair can be avoided a lot.

I can talk from my experience. Expert mode works fine with DCG. I haven't experienced anything like CTD. It is stable. However there are a few things I would complain about. Some of them may be inherent stock game issues, not due to DCG: 1. Unending compaigns. I just feel some of the campaigns never end. Chiefly among these are Tarawa, Normandy. Both campaigns I flew 50+ missions and never ended. For Tarawa one, both Japanese air and ground forces were completely knocked out.(There is only one tiny island after all) I flew tedious and noneventful escort missions everyday and bombers often brought their loads back due to lack of targets. However the US ground forces never seemed to advance to the airport. They always stopped a little short of the base. Since I never tested the same campaign under stock verions, I am not sure whether it was due to the HSFX or faulty campaign logics. 2. Waypoint problem. I believe DCG always generate a bit zig zag waypoint pattern after takeoff. However the system would also force the escort fighters to stay with bombers in transit, so the fighters after taking off would skip the first few waypoints to stay with the bombers. Then when the package run into the enemy, the fighters would suddenly "remember" those waypoints. As a result, instead of stay with bombers to fight off enemy, they would turn tail and run back to the waypoint 1. I believe this is a stock issue. Not sure how to resolve it. Maybe have DCG generate exactly same set of waypoints for both bombers and escorts? Or don't generate that zig zag pattern at the beginning? Not sure. 2. Frequent friendly mid-air collision. No matter how often you order your squadron to fly loosely. They still ram into each other like headless flies. This problem I believe is from stock, not a DCG one. I also tested it under dgen mod. There is a way to manually fix it under dgen mod. That is to make lot of vertical separation between 2nd and third flight in the mission file under \missions\campaign\. I usually use at least 200 meters. That way even though they overlap horizontally, but vertically they are separate. However I don't know how to do the same thing under DCG. Maybe Paul and his team can put something in the DCG engine to always make sure there is enough vertical separation between 2nd and 3rd flight elements, (i.e. white and yellow flights?) 3. Stupid AI behaviors. Sometimes you will see a fighter ram into its enemy after its gun fire has already heavily damaged the target. This once again I have seen in both DCG and Dgen, so not sure if it's a DCG specific problem. 4. AI wingman won't detach to land on its own when player's intention is clear to land and will follow the player until its speed gets too low and crashes. That once again may not be a DCG problem. Otherwise. Playing expert mode under DCG is fun. I especially like the part that axis starts with a strong force with many aces in. And as attrition reduces the force, the opposition becomes weaker. Under dgen on the other hand, every mission is unrelated to the last. It feels that you are not really fighting in a war. Also, when you shoot down an enemy ace, DCG records it for u. So if Paul and his folks can find a way to at least fix the unending campaign issue, I think DCG is golden.

You can fire up a quick mission to test different levels of AI. Ace AI and rookie feel about the same. Whenever you put piper on an in-range target, it will performance some kinda of manuver to throw you off regardless of the energy state that the target is in.

Sadly, while introducing some great features for AI, DT has brought back some old AI issues such as eyes on the back of their heads, flying outside each plane's prescribed performance parameters.

I got the feeling that this issue is caused by stock AI. I am playing stock dgen now. It seems the problem is there. May not have anything to do with DCG.

Hi, I am trying to learn some of the syntax in those dgen files. This may not be relevant to DCG, but I am pretty sure some of the DCG experts know what I am talking about. In an Ops file for one of my campaigns, I see the following lines: oRuBombAF VVS 24HB, 12U Lw 4F, 8F, 4F To translate this line into plain English is an allied(red) airfield bombing mission with 24 heavy bombers and 12 escort fighters (player squadron) and German(Blue) has 3 flights of fighters of 4, 8 and 4 planes each respectively. Is my translation correct? If the player is on Blue side for the same mission, it would be instead like this: oDeDefendAF vvs 24HB, 12F Lw 4Y, 8F, 4F Is my understanding of the codes correct? Thanks

That's weird. Under my pair, I have 9 as navigation. Then there is RTB under it. Well it may be cuz of old HSFX. I thought I fully deactivated all mods. Well that's not important. What is important is we need 3.48. LOL

Oh, another quick note. I really like the flexibility of DCG. Especially, when I shot down an enemy ace and got recorded. Such a sense of accomplishment. LOL However, the winning criteria for some of the DCG campaigns are really buggy. You can test USN tarawa map. It just won't end. It makes the campaign long and tedious. I would say for next generation of DCG, probably we can set time limit instead of hard "capture point" criteria for some of the campaigns. For instance, battle of coral sea. If the time reaches 5/8/42 then the battle ends and advance to the next one. Because the battle was historically an inconclusive one anyway. Also another note. Shift-F2(enemy external view) would allow you to see the mission target in dgen. But in DCG, it would sometimes only show empty patch of land or sea.

You can do by pairs. I use dgen mod, there is an option called pairs. You order pair rtb then the wingman will leave you and rtb. But anyway, I was just saying the current version of DCG is a bit outdated.

Having played both 3.47 and recent dgen mod, I feel 3.47 is somewhat outdated when matching with 4.12. Although it's playable under 4.12, it still misses a bit. For instance, 3.47 is still using old radio menu, where you can't order your wingman home directly.(you can only do by flight) New dgen mod allows you to do that. Feels 4.12 is very different from 4.11, a lot need be updated in next DCG. But, the flexibility and dynamic features of DCG are nonexistent in Dgen.

I just realized that many people, after the first mission, tab out to desktop and generate next mission thru DCG panel. I always clicked apply have system generat the next mission. What are the pro and cons for manual generation? People are doing this for a reason, right?

I see. The only problem for me is for some escort mission off the carriers, the initial waypoints (1-3) are set away from the direction of the target. When the strike aircraft airborne (they usually take off after fighters), the fighters would immediate jump to escort them instead of going thru the first few waypoints. When the package encounters enemy CAPs, the fighters would reverse course back to the initial waypoints instead of fending off the enemy. Many of my escort missions got screwed up that way. It seems the AI logics has going thru the waypoints as their first priority. It may have been prolly caused by the new AI in 4.12. But not sure.

Where can I find columns.dcg? I looked through my Data folder. It's not there. Also, I didn't see template mission file.

I just would like to learn a bit more about how waypoints are generated by DCG in individual missions. For some missions, the default waypoints generated by the system are really awkard.

Just another twist to this post. What about deleting a column? What would be the best to delete a column from order of battle? Another question, I have been playing USN grand camp starting from Tulagi. Everything works fine up to Tarawa subcampaign. As usual, I deactivate static guns and add new allied column. I and my squadron defeated Japanese air (there are only 2 squadrons, one bomber and one fighter). However, the camp can't seem to be won. Allied columns seem to march from the beachhead to a location near the airfield, but stop there. All Japanese ground columns have been blasted away. There seems to be no more opposition anywhere, air, ground, sea or static. But the allied forces just wont advance to capture the field and end the campaign. I have flown 30+ cap missions because there is no opposition anyway to fire upon. Is there anyway that I can force the camp to end?

Congratz on the new site. Really like it so far. Happy new year to everyone.

So once you set it once at the beginning of the campaign, it stays the same for the entire campaign right? I don't have set and reset every mission right?

I need some advice here. You may also know some of the aircraft have pretty bad performance if fuel load is 100%. Examples are P51 and F4u. However the default fuel load is 100% for all aircraft in game. I know you can change the fuel load for your unit, but not for other units. Now my sister units equipped with 100%loaded p51s are getting shot out of sky like no tomorrow. Is there any way to change the default load by aircraft?

Is there gonna be a new http address for the forum?

Yeah, that's the strange part. There is no [Normandy44] header in that file. I thought I was mistaken, but I checked it line by line, no such header and somehow my campaign mission still runs fine. Also, another question. Say the new columns that I added got eliminated on the battlefield by panzers, do I need go back to add more or the column once added will auto replenish and come back to the battlefield.

I do have airstart checked. But part of the squadron started in air and part start on the ground. But I definitely don't have 8 on the ground because I limited 12planes per squadron per mission max. So there would 6 on the ground at most. I use hsfx. Not sure if that has anything to do with it.

Just want to report a strange thing. B-24s having hard time to take off from the base in English Channel. Even the big, long main runway. They all crash into the sea without being able to lift off. It may have been caused by revised FM in 4.12, but not 100% sure. You might want to investigate.