More realistic AI opponents

[Temetre]

Its been a long term issue that enemy AI planes overperform in certain areas to a significant degree. Specifically the ability to retain energy, for example while rating or climbing causes a lot of gameplay/realism/simulation issues.

This is very apparent when flying mid and early cold war planes, which are more reliant on dogfighting and maneuvering to bring missiles or guns to bear.

For example, I was just in combat flying a clean F4 against a rookie Mig-21. In reality, this F4E variant slightly outrates and strongly outclimbs the Mig-21, yet due to the AIs overperformance, it was basically impossible to combat. The Mig would outrate the Phantom as if it was an F16, easily keep up during an aggressive climb where the real plane would fail to keep up, and even show a level of high altitude agility which certainly shouldnt be in a Mig-21s featureset. When it wanted to get into a shooting position for its gun, the Mig just pulled even harder without losing a notable amount of speed.

These issues dont just affect the Mig-21, but seemingly most AI planes; the AI Mig-15 is an even bigger offender, it has been outperforming F16s in some tests. Keeping 7g at 700 knots while rating and during aggressive climbs.

With earlier cold war planes this is the most problematic, often it becomes near impossible to actually fight PVE dogfights, wich is the primary way to fight for many planes.

Edited January 18 by Temetre

[irisono]

In fact, with the current state of DCS, it is not advisable to engage in a dogfight with your F-4E, Mirage F-1 or even F/A-18C against UFO aircraft. The AI flight models of some DCS modules are unsophisticated and completely unrealistic. Measured by their real technical parameters (power- and wing loading, G limits, etc.), these DCS modules can rise into the sky like rockets, and they hardly lose any energy during high G-maneuvers. They can fly abrupt turns without being damaged. In reality they would lose their wings. The UFO behavior of modules such as the Mig-21Bis, Mig-19, Mig-15, F-86F must be corrected as soon as possible. The best solution to address this problem is the introduction the long-promised General Flight Model Program (GFM) announced by DCS in Dez. 2021.

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/news/newsletters/a134f231fe8269e1c78dd6d0dd8c3c9d/

Before the introduction of the F-4E module, I warned about exactly the problems you describe here. Apart from a lot of support in the relevant forums, not much has happened in the 3+ years since the DCS announcement. Perhaps small FM corrections have been made to some WWII AI aircraft.

The whole AI dilemma is not just limited to AI opponents. Your own AI wingmen perform strange maneuvers and mostly behave completely unrealistically. I wonder how the announced dynamic campaign is supposed to work with such an AI. Unfortunately, the "2025 and beyond" video did not give us any answers to this serious and urgent problem.

[MiG21bisFishbedL]

 

2 hours ago, irisono said:

. They can fly abrupt turns without being damaged. In reality they would lose their wings. The UFO behavior of modules such as the Mig-21Bis, Mig-19, Mig-15, F-86F must be corrected as soon as possible. The best solution to address this problem is the introduction the long-promised General Flight Model Program (GFM) announced by DCS in Dez. 2021.

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/news/newsletters/a134f231fe8269e1c78dd6d0dd8c3c9d/

Before the introduction of the F-4E module, I warned about exactly the problems you describe here. Apart from a lot of support in the relevant forums, not much has happened in the 3+ years since the DCS announcement. Perhaps small FM corrections have been made to some WWII AI aircraft.

The whole AI dilemma is not just limited to AI opponents. Your own AI wingmen perform strange maneuvers and mostly behave completely unrealistically. I wonder how the announced dynamic campaign is supposed to work with such an AI. Unfortunately, the "2025 and beyond" video did not give us any answers to this serious and urgent problem.

I've never seen UFO behavior vs. the MiG-19. Plenty vs. the MiG-15 and -21, though.

For the 21, I just give them 1600kg simulated additional weight via script. It feels like a decent sweet spot for a more realistic AI Fishbed.

[diego999]

6 hours ago, MiG21bisFishbedL said:

 

I've never seen UFO behavior vs. the MiG-19. Plenty vs. the MiG-15 and -21, though.

For the 21, I just give them 1600kg simulated additional weight via script. It feels like a decent sweet spot for a more realistic AI Fishbed.

 

This.

The MiG-19 is not a serious offender. It might be a little too good compared to the real thing but it's manageable. 15 and 21 are out of this world, and I would add the F-5 too.

Another serious issue with AI planes is their perfect control at near stall speeds. Try this with the Mirage F1, for example. It can keep its nose pointed at will at 200kts, while you flying the plane in the same situation would drop like a brick. 

Edited January 18 by diego999

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

GFM is 3 years behind schedule, and nothing's been said whatsoever about the AI's sensor abilities, and their godlike SA. Those should be addressed too.
When they are, DCS is truly ready for an immersive PvE experience   (and would cause far fewer headaches for campaign makers too).

[MiG21bisFishbedL]

10 hours ago, Raven (Elysian Angel) said:

GFM is 3 years behind schedule, and nothing's been said whatsoever about the AI's sensor abilities, and their godlike SA. Those should be addressed too.
When they are, DCS is truly ready for an immersive PvE experience   (and would cause far fewer headaches for campaign makers too).

I imagine GFM's delays are tied to the lengthy development of the dynamic campaign.

Those two are inextricable.

[twistking]

12 hours ago, Raven (Elysian Angel) said:

GFM is 3 years behind schedule, and nothing's been said whatsoever about the AI's sensor abilities, and their godlike SA. Those should be addressed too.
When they are, DCS is truly ready for an immersive PvE experience   (and would cause far fewer headaches for campaign makers too).

I agree wholeheartedly. The AI has godlike radars (even early cold war jets) and if they hadn't they could still pinpoint other aircraft's position through their RWR alone, which seems equally ridiculous. A lot of "basic" PvE A2A scenarios are just not possible to recreate without heavy scripting. It's frustrating.

[metzger]

I imagine GFM's delays are tied to the lengthy development of the dynamic campaign.

Those two are inextricable.

I don't quite understand how they are connected technically.
And also why ED can not adjust the current AI flight parameters to more plausible levels as a workaround until the mighty DC, GFM is ready, which might be after another decade if at all. It's clearly possible considering that not all AI are ufo, but important ones like mig15 and 21 are.

It's beyond me why ED ignores those obvious issues for years while they keep being discussed in forums for years. Doesn't seem ED cares for anything that won't bring immediate cash flow.

Sent from my SM-G985F using Tapatalk

[Snappy]

1 hour ago, MiG21bisFishbedL said:

I imagine GFM's delays are tied to the lengthy development of the dynamic campaign.

Those two are inextricable.

I really don’t see why. Even the current sim without Dynamic campaign would benefit hugely from GFM, single player experience would be massively improved. And they projected GFM release for 2022 , they would’ve known they never manage the complete DC that early.

[atomsic]

Oh my God, the AI flies so unrealistically that it’s the only thing stopping me from buying the World War II content.

The way it maneuvers is just completely off — it’s obvious even to the naked eye that it’s not behaving like a real aircraft would.

Why hasn’t anything been done to improve this system after all this time?

I really want to switch from IL-2 Sturmovik: Great Battles to DCS, because I actually like DCS more.

But this one issue is what keeps me from investing in the WWII module.

[609_Relentov]

Adding a reply to support this wish list item, to have the AI fighters fly more realistically (meaning tone down their BFM abilities a bit).