1.2 and AI.

[Itkovian]

Salutations.

 

I am returning to Black Shark after about a year's hiatus, and I was wondering if any work was done on wingman AI in 1.2?

 

I have fond memories of my wingmen, from the last time I flew. :)

 

That said, regardless of the answer, can anyone point me to some good posts on how to properly handle wingmen in single player campaigns?

 

Thank you.

 

Itkovian

[sweinhart3]

they got broken some more

[connos]

they got broken some more

 

Thats unfortunately true :(

[Insanatrix]

I have to agree they have become quite useless in a battle situation. I have only had one good sortie with an AI wingman where he actually did a slow run in on some targets and used vikhr's. after 3-4 he would run out and repeat until he was out of ammo. Usually you tell them to attack and they fly in and don't attack and then run over enemy sam's and AAA and die basicly. I've even singled out targets and datalinked them and they do the same thing.

[andysim]

Yea its seems like the blackshark has been forgotten. I guess the devs are all busy on the A-10 but the AI are very bad right now.

 

If you set the AI to Good or above in the editor they seem to do a little better but still cannot fly to a DL point or hold position, they just carry on flying on their own and will not rejoin formation.

Edited August 15, 2010 by andysim

[Itkovian]

Hum, well that's dissapointing.

 

What is the solution then? uninstalling and re-installing with 1.01c? Because I do remember the AI wingmen actually working in 1.01a (the patch I had at the tiem). You just had to manage them tightly with the datalink, and keep in mind that they would often rush in when attacking (so you had to make sure the anti air defenses were dealt with beforehand). But when employed with that in mind (don't send them in a AAA nest), they did their job rather well.

 

Are the single player missions even feasible without functional wingmen?

 

I recall some of the deployment campaign missions requiring you to hit a number of targets that you couldn't possibly destroy with your own ammo.

 

Anyway, I guess I'll have to uninstall and re-install and play with 1.01c, assuming wingmen AI wasn't broken between 1.01a and 1.01c.

 

Thank you.

 

Itkovian

Edited August 15, 2010 by Itkovian

[Itkovian]

Well, anyway. I think given this I will reinstall with 1.01c, unless someone tells me all these replies were a prank. :)

 

That said, if I uninstall/reinstall on the same machine, will it cost me one of my activations/deactivations?

 

OR, can I just use the "uninstall patch 1.02" feature, and then install 1.01c on top?

 

Itkovian

[topdog]

I recently moved my 1.0.2 install to a different folder name then just re-installed the game to the location I used originally, and no issues with activations/deactivations occurred (as EtherealN advised me it wouldn't).

 

Incidentally the reason I did that had nothing to do with AI and I patched back up to 1.0.2 again, it was just to test a fault I was/am having with the game crashing to desktop. I'm only really playing multiplayer or self-training stuff at the moment.

[Itkovian]

Well, In just uninstalled 1.02 and installed 1.01c. Everything seems to be working well.

 

By now, I hope the AI really IS borked in 1.02. :)

 

Itkovian

[slug88]

Itkovian, the wingman AI is no worse in 1.02 than it was in any version of 1.01. In fact, it was the 1.01 patch that introduced bugs to the wingman AI: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=54035

 

So if you want the best wingman AI, you need to go all the way back to v1.00. Personally, I do a lot of singeplayer flying, and even though some of the AI functions are bugged in v1.02/v1.01 (as per the thread linked above), they're still very useful if managed carefully. Here I've posted a track of a difficult v1.02 singleplayer mission, in which I relied on the assistance of an AI wingman to pull it off: http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=956670&postcount=4

[Itkovian]

*Grumble* So I didn't have to rollback?

 

Well, I'll stick with 1.01c for now, I don't do multiplayer anyway.

 

Still, good to know that "ttack ground targets" works fine. I've used both before, I think, and as I recall the proper way to play it is to take care of AA threats yourself, and then have your wingmen attack.

 

That said, how good is the AI in 1.0? And what am I giving up that's important if I go back to 1.0?

 

Thank you for the info.

 

Itkovian

[slug88]

*Grumble* So I didn't have to rollback?

 

Well, I'll stick with 1.01c for now, I don't do multiplayer anyway.

 

Still, good to know that "ttack ground targets" works fine. I've used both before, I think, and as I recall the proper way to play it is to take care of AA threats yourself, and then have your wingmen attack.

 

That said, how good is the AI in 1.0? And what am I giving up that's important if I go back to 1.0?

 

Thank you for the info.

 

Itkovian

 

Itkovian, check the first thread I linked in my previous post; it describes all the wingman bugs in 1.01/1.02 (as far as I know). Basically you're missing out on commanding the AI via datalink. You can still give them individual targets via "Attack My Target", and as you noted "Attack Ground Targets" and similar functions still work well. In fact, in most cases I've found the wingman AI can care of A/D targets by themselves as well, but with this one you have to be a but more attentive to make sure they're using their Vikhrs from stand-off range.

 

Also, I strongly, strongly recommend that you upgrade to 1.02, even if you don't plan on touching multiplayer. The new sound engine alone is easily worth the effort, and I'm sure many others on these forums will agree. Furthermore you'll be missing out on graphics upgrades, and various other minor improvements if you don't upgrade to 1.02.

Edited August 16, 2010 by slug88

[Itkovian]

Itkovian, check the first thread I linked in my previous post; it describes all the wingman bugs in 1.01/1.02 (as far as I know). Basically you're missing out on commanding the AI via datalink. You can still give them individual targets via "Attack My Target", and as you noted "Attack Ground Targets" and similar functions still work well. In fact, in most cases I've found the wingman AI can care of A/D targets by themselves as well, but with this one you have to be a but more attentive to make sure they're using their Vikhrs from stand-off range.

 

Also, I strongly, strongly recommend that you upgrade to 1.02, even if you don't plan on touching multiplayer. The new sound engine alone is easily worth the effort, and I'm sure many others on these forums will agree. Furthermore you'll be missing out on graphics upgrades, and various other minor improvements if you don't upgrade to 1.02.

 

Well, my issue is I'd then have to uninstall and re-install, since 1.02 needs a clean install. Given that I already installed 1.2, reverted it, then installed 1.01c, it's getting annoying. :)

 

Is there an easy way to backup my control setup?

 

Itkovian

[Sarge55]

Copy the "Aircrafts" folder, it will have your settings.

 

X:\Blackshark\Config\Input\Aircrafts

[slug88]

Well, my issue is I'd then have to uninstall and re-install, since 1.02 needs a clean install. Given that I already installed 1.2, reverted it, then installed 1.01c, it's getting annoying. :)

 

Is there an easy way to backup my control setup?

 

Itkovian

 

 

You don't really need a v1.00 install to install 1.02. Based on my own experience and on what I've read from a few users on these forums, you can install over any version of 1.01. I've done this twice and haven't experienced any problems whatsoever.

 

I believe the important thing is to make sure you have no mods installed prior to installing the patch. And my theory is that the only reason everyone started saying you need to install over 1.00 is because when 1.01 was released, many people experienced issues because they couldn't follow the simple step of uninstalling all their mods (and undoing all their LUA tweaks and such). Therefore, to make things simpler with this release, they simply told everyone to start from a fresh install. Of course all this is just a theory, but note how when the patch was first released, the patch instructions didn't say anything about incompatibility with 1.01, it was only in the subsequent posts that users began making this recommendation.

[Itkovian]

Allright then, I'm back up to 1.0.2. :)

 

A question about the "attack my target" command:

 

How is "my target" determined? I'm guessing it is determined by what you have locked on with the Shkval, but I'm like confirmation. :)

 

Also, when you use attack my target, does the wingman/wingmen just attack that specific target and then reform, or do they continue attacking similar targets in that area?

 

And another question:

 

When you order them to attack ground targets, will they attack every ground target in sight, or are there some restrictions involved?

 

Finally, a question about campaigns:

 

Does anyone know a good single player campaign I should try? Or should I just stick with the Deployment and Georgian Oil War campaigns?

 

Thank you. :)

 

Itkovian

[slug88]

Allright then, I'm back up to 1.0.2. :)

How is "my target" determined? I'm guessing it is determined by what you have locked on with the Shkval, but I'm like confirmation. :)

 

Your intuition is correct; that is indeed how it works.

 

Also, when you use attack my target, does the wingman/wingmen just attack that specific target and then reform, or do they continue attacking similar targets in that area?

 

They'll attack just the one target, then reform.

 

When you order them to attack ground targets, will they attack every ground target in sight, or are there some restrictions involved?

 

I believe they'll attack every ground target in sight, which works out to about a 5-10km radius from their current position. They'll prioritize units that are closest to them.

 

 

Does anyone know a good single player campaign I should try? Or should I just stick with the Deployment and Georgian Oil War campaigns?

 

Click my sig pic to go to the thread for the Group Vergeev campaign. This one's 20 missions long and is very professionally made, and it costs $4. There's a free 3 mission demo for it in the thread.

 

Also, I see you've already found the thread for IgorMK's Georgian Havoc :D. That is an excellent free campaign, and is already quite playable and quite polished in the current release, imho no need to wait for v1.1.

[FifthColumnist]

I have had some success with datalinking a single target from around 8 or 9 km to all then commanding them to attack "targets by type" (option 4 iirc). Most of them seem to attack from a standoff of 5 or 6km with vikhr although some of them will inevitably fly around near the target getting shot up.