New planes for Flying Circus are out! :D

[J5_Hotlead]

The Dolphin and D.VII are out! Guess I know what I'll be flying in Flying Circus after Wargrounds this Thursday!  

https://il2sturmovik.com/news/460/update-3011/

[Kliegmann]

Well I was planning on flying a KMCO flight for my Virtual Airline tonight, but I guess things may have changed 

[Klaiber]

Sweet!

[Britchot]

Heck, yeah! I’m honestly excited for FC. That engine in VR is amazing!

[Razwald]

My coworkers all ready think I'm weird. If I tell them I was riding a Dolphin in VR, they will really start to wonder.

[Razwald]

Well the Dolphin if you enable all the guns is a huge weapon platform. Go into quick mission and enable all the guns you will see what I mean. My guess most people will lock them out to some extent.

 

Other than that both models look and feel good in VR. FC Dolphin is more forgiving than the RoF version. 

[J5_Gamecock]

 I will say this... The DVII is the first disappointment out of the planes that have been released thus far AFAIC.  Very sluggish on the controls, and the nose has a tendency to constantly bob up and down in level flight. It makes it very tough to get a good long shot off. 

 

  Also, just as in ROF, if a shot comes anywhere close to it (and I'm talking the entire plane here), the engine takes damage. Enemy dead on your 6?... at 2-300 meters? you will get engine damage if he fires.

 

 

  I want my Alb.

 

  GC

[Shadepiece]

Hmmmm that's not great news. I really hope they decide to make some flight model updates eventually.

[Baron]

I will say this... The DVII is the first disappointment out of the planes that have been released thus far AFAIC. Very sluggish on the controls, and the nose has a tendency to constantly bob up and down in level flight. It makes it very tough to get a good long shot off.

 

Also, just as in ROF, if a shot comes anywhere close to it (and I'm talking the entire plane here), the engine takes damage. Enemy dead on your 6?... at 2-300 meters? you will get engine damage if he fires.

 

 

I want my Alb.

 

GC

You are wrong. D. VII is much much better like in ROF. Note - we have version with Mercedes D. III and his maneuver ability is excellent. Yesterday we did fight with Pfeil against J2_Bidu - he was in Dolphin and he hag not any chance. It were fight one on one, not group fight. Final result - 4:0 for Fokker (Pfeil's score was 3:0). Fokker's FM is correct, but still not finished. He is faster like in ROF (190 km/h in horisontal flight) and when you are using rudder and ailerons altogether, Fokker is very agile. By the way later i was in fight with another pilot from the Syn squad (he was in the Camel) and was the same result - 4:0 for me in the Fokker. Last and not least - D. VII have different proccess of pilotage like for example Pfalz.

 

About your flight problems - i have not anything from thing what about you wrote. Sure, D. VII is heavy a bit on the tail, but nothing tragical. Engine is durable not like in ROF. About constantly bob up and down - have not this. Maybe issue is in your stick not in game. Honestly - i dont need any change in my control stick. Using Thrustmaster Warthog.

[Pfeil]

 Enemy dead on your 6?... at 2-300 meters? you will get engine damage if he fires.

 

If you let me park on your 6 in 200 - 300m you will be lucky if you end just with engine damage 

The aircraft is irrelevant. 

 

I can confirm everything that Baron said. In my opinion the DVII is the best aircraft currently in game.

 

The Dolphin is also very very good. If flown right it can beat the DVII.

It has just that nasty left spin that is hard to recover from, but is faster and excelent in vertical maneuvers.

[J5_Hotlead]

I did some testing myself. I flew the D.VII in Flying Circus and then went and flew it in ROF. Not to squish Gamecock’s opinion, but my conclusions line up more with Baron’s. In dogfights, it becomes sluggish less quickly and retains good handling characteristics longer. The airframe seems more durable and it is less easy to rip your wings off, although still possible. In a dive, the engine definitely has more durability, but also will still oil up on you if you don’t throttle back a bit in an extended dive. I haven’t taken many hits in the Flying Circus D.VII, so the jury is still out on the damaged engine from being shot anywhere concept.

 

I think I’ll make a review video when I have time.

[Kliegmann]

I have not flown against human pilots yet, but I set myself up against 2 groups of Vet level camels and flew 5 sorties.  Early on in my fights I experienced the bobbing, but I relaxed on the flight controls and that went away.  In all 5 sorties, I only experienced a blown engine twice, once from an over-dive, and once from an AI (and the AI was sitting on my tail for some time, punching holes in my entire air-frame while I finished off the camel in front of me).  The problem I was having was over-shooting because the acft is FAST, and I have to readjust my site-picture (If I used the radiator as my site, I continually was firing high).  My advice is have a lighter hand on the flight controls, and light feet on the rudder.  I have found the rudder is very effective in FC, which is what one should expect, they're basically big, fat sails on the ass-end of the aircraft.  I was disappointed there is no "F" model, but I'm hoping that will come soon.  We now have 6 acft (3 per side), perhaps career night can start making a shift?

[Baron]

To Kliegmann - D. VIIF is fine-tuned now.

[IRFC Hawkeye]

@ Kliegmann, before you change the position of the Numpad 5 (home) view, you might want to simply pull your FOV all the way back from where it is by default....then save it that way.  You can always zoom in if you need to.  The radiator cap is working very well for me, which is more than I can say for the Pfalz D.IIIa.  I went to the night collimator on that plane and it made a world of difference.  But the D.VII is working great for me as-is.

 

@ all, I think possibly what we have here is a difference of hardware, coupled with a more realistic flight engine.  Like Kliegmann said, I did also notice some over-sensitivity with the pitch at first, but I was able to adjust to it just as quickly; and I believe having an accurate stick really helps with that a LOT.  It has such fine control in the middle ranges that it makes compensating easy; and I have to say having really good rudder pedals also helps a lot.

 

I really like the engine.  It isn't a world beater, but it isn't so damned fragile either like it is in RoF.  I don't know where they got the idea that German engines were so darned touchy, but this engine isn't like that.  I haven't blown my engine yet....I've dived straight down after those Dolphins with the throttle fully back at idle and not had a problem, even though the Tachometer is at max, and probably more.  I don't get any message like "engine 1 damaged" either.

 

I think part of the perception that the plane "bobs" at first, is that the whole flight engine just feels more realistic to me, so when you get your plane moving hard in a direction, like when you're pulling up for a shot, it doesn't just instantly change direction, like it does in RoF.  So until you get used to that, you get this "overshoot".  You're pulling up hard, and then you're pushing down hard.  You can overcompensate and you have to anticipate the enemy's maneuvers to some extent.

 

There's a lot I like in general.  I like the way that the rudder doesn't start off being super effective; the effectiveness slowly builds with airspeed.  I like how the airspeed doesn't increase so fast either on takeoff.  And like Kliegmann seemed to say, I like how the plane doesn't just instantly slow down when you throttle back either.  It releases the energy more gradually, and that actually works to your advantage in a fight.  I like how the gauges read what they're supposed to.  I like the speed the D.VII attains....maybe not spad-like, but I can see those spads are going to have a lot tougher time diving away, and they won't get away scot-free every time either, like they do in RoF.  The D.VII's lack of wires does make it less draggy....so even though it doesn't have the absolute horsepower, you can feel the speed it can attain when it has something to help it's engine (gravity).  I like the way the engine temperature went up at continuous full power near the ground.  It will reward those who throttle back when they don't need to be a full throttle; but that issue disappears at higher altitudes, like it should.

 

Couple of questions for Baron and Peil, though.  Why did they change the fuel level selector in the pre-flight setup so that it can only use set increments (24, 33, etc.)?  I liked it before when it was infinitely variable.  Also, it would be nice if you could just highlight the field and enter a number into it directly, like you can for RoF.

Next, who chooses the standard skins, and can this change?  3 of the D.VII skins are pretty much the same thing....only a slight color variation on the camouflage; and 2 others are practically the same thing too....the red/blue of J15 with some variation of the personal emblem.  Would like to see some variety and you would think which skins they use would be pretty easy to change.  EDIT:  Oh yeah, one other thing.  The "tips" that appear, I like, at least for now, because they remind you of things you might have forgotten, like the best climb speed.  But still, sometimes what it says is in the wrong units.  If you're in a plane like the Dolphin, it doesn't help much to say "climb at 131 Kph" when the airspeed indicator in that plane reads in Mph.  See what I'm saying?  And this: why can't the default or starting position of any and all of the radiators be 100% open, instead of 100% closed?  I can see where closed would make sense if you had to warm up your engine; but NOBODY warms up their engine....and who'd want to waste time doing that?  I'd say it's almost completely universal that servers have "warmed up engines" enabled.  Radiators should start open; you can close them if need be!

 

PS, I know you're not the developers      but I figure you guys have a lot better avenue for feedback, than I do.

 

@ GC:  I can see where you're coming from, but.... if the Alb series in FC ends up being superior to the standard Fokker D.VII like it is in RoF, I'll be very disappointed.  That never should have happened.  If the Alb had been as wonderful in real life as it is in RoF, they never would have made the D.VII.  When the D.VII competed in the fighter competition, everybody there was impressed at how much Fokker had been able to "wring out of" the same old engine.  It was a big improvement in every respect, and that should include maneuverability....the wing airfoil is just plain better, and even though it did hold the top speed back....the innovation of getting rid of the wires more than made up for it.  So, even though the Alb has it's place in the mid-war era,  it should never have never been better like it was in RoF.

 

If they actually produce 2-seaters from some era of the war other than the very end, they won't seem so ridiculously better than the early war scouts and things will work better together.  That's my hope, anyway.

 

S! 

[Baron]

To Luftritter: answer on your question - i have not idea. I reported to devs the same question about % of fuel but without reply from them yet. We will see later.

[J5_Gamecock]

Perhaps you are right. Maybe I am flying it wrong, maybe I am trying to fly it like the ROF version. Maybe I expect too much or maybe I'm just a crotchety old man or all of the above 

 

  I would expect to get torn up by someone parked on my 6 at 2-300 meters, but  a short bust from that distance and the only damage taken is the engine? Happend too often in ROF, so when it happens in FC a couple of times in such a short span of time I become suspicious. I also don't think the problem is with my stick as I'm also using a warthog, it must be the way I'm flying it.  

 

  Maybe I just need to spend more time in it, but whatever the reason, I'm still disappointed for now. I felt that the all the other AC released were much improved, I could feel it right off the bat. Other than its speed, (it is faster), I just don't feel that overwhelmed with the DVII. 

 

  Doesn't make it wrong, just my opinion after 20 minutes or so of flying. 

 

  GC

[IRFC Hawkeye]

Just got another smaller update.  Get your game started early, or you're going to be delayed more than expected when you try to fly next.

[Vonrd]

So... all planes are going to need forward stick for level flight at full throttle? 

And, yes I'm aware that most planes in RL are rigged to fly level at cruise settings. The DVIII (my initial testing) fly's level at about 60% on the simple gauge.

I think that this is what gives the sensation of "bobbing" and it actually may be more realistic than what happened in ROF.

Okie dokie.

Still...

I want my curves dammit!

My main gripe.

[IRFC Hawkeye]

@ Baron, they fixed the fuel selection increments with the last little update! You can now select fuel loads in 2% increments.

 

I guess somebody saw your message! They get high marks for the quick fix.

[IRFC Hawkeye]

@ Vonrd, that sounds like a really good explanation. We don't have any real feel for the engine in sims, and no real consequences if it fails.... so we tend to run around on full throttle all of the time. In plenty of books I read, a pilot will write something like "I ran home with the engine "all out", "flat out", or "full on", as if that was unusual! Sometimes it even sounds like they were in a dogfight with it at less than full power! Also, they seem to allude to climbing at less than full throttle. I've also read clues that relate to the number of flight hours the engines would last, and it was not a lot. That was really important to those bomber pilots who had to go FAR behind the lines and back in single engine planes like the DH4. Not only did they need their engines to last, they needed their fuel to last, too.

 

I don't know about you, but I'm only now beginning to consider those aspects, and actually fly differently....at least, at times.