posted 01-19- 01:30 PM               

A Black & White 22 second avi video showing the DM in action is available at this link:
http://members.nbci.com/harman_5/Ju88 DM Demo Movie.zip

Video file size is around 4MB

If the video link above doesn't work, visit my site and see the video downloads section for it.

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To those who haven't downloaded previous versions of this DM below is a list of ALL Damage Model effects that are modelled in this download. At the end of this list, the NEW features added in this release (v6) are explained:

* First off, interior cockpit damage. If you take a few too many hits to the cockpit area (or therabouts), your cockpit panel will become damaged visually and you will also notice that some (or most) gauges such as altitude and mainfold pressure to name a few, will stop working making the rest of your flight quite challenging. Also, if you belly land and manage to survive, you will see the floor of the cockpit is damaged too. This can seen from the exterior too.

* Next on the list, wing and body damage visuals affect flight: Visual body and wing damage was introduced in version 4, but the damage was only visual, with no flight model damage. With version 5 (and now 6), if you take hits on either wingtip or the body mid section, you will notice the aircraft lurge to the damaged side and as you get more severely damaged, you will have to abort your flight to do an emergency landing no doubt because the drag generated from the damaged panels will slow you down. I wanted to add this for a long while but didn't know how until I got really determined to do so. If the plane is severely damaged now, you will find it harder to control and keep flying especially with your engines damaged. (These effects have been toned down slighty in version 5.5 and have been carried on to version 6)

* Landing gear failure: Strictly speaking, this means that if an engine or inner wing area around the gear well, takes severe damage, you can expect the landing gear to become jammed or broken. You can usually notice when this has happened when one landing gear post fails to extend. You may see the remaining broken parts of the failed gear still in the gear bay. This is sure to make returning to base and landing a damaged plane quite interesting indeed!

* Wheel brake failure. In addition to having the landing gear damaged completely, the Ju88 can also develop brake failure. Usually, minor damage to the engines or related parts will exhibit brake failures first, then complete gear damage, but sometimes, things can happen differently too. When wheel brake failures occur, you'll notice when braking because the plane will pull to the side that has the brakes remaining. Usually, the remaining braking wheel will lock under brakes and the plane will take longer to stop. Brake failures can occur on any main wheel, or both! If both main wheels fail to brake, (then consider yourself unlucky this time) you will have to find another way to stop the plane.

* Next, Tyre punctures: Thanks to some very talented members in the SDOE community, namely Raider (and any others who founded the flat tire concept if any), I have been able to learn some new concepts in OpenPlane with outstanding results. Among them, tyre punctures. In addition to the many things that can go wrong with the landing gear of the Ju88, you may find that one or both of your tyres have punctured as a result of having severe damage around the engine or inner wing area. Flat tyres aren't too much of a problem though if your tyre/s are flat, you will most likely find that you have lost braking power on that tyre too. Since version 5.5 and retained in this release, you will be able to see holes and the rubber wrinkled on your tyres when they are flat. This is achieved with a new flat tire texture.

* Improved engine damage visuals: What this means is that you'll 'see' the inner engine parts (textured) when the engine gets damaged rather than just seeing bullet holes around the engine. (NOTE: When you see these visuals, the engine power/ratio values will also be reduced/increased, respectively)

* New tachometer textures: Basically, these are more accurate rpm instruments for the cockpit with the correct rpm readings being shown by the pointer against the dial values. (improved in v6)

There are other parts too of the plane that will 'trigger' these described damage effects (if realistic enough) too for some randomness.

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NEW FEATURES IN VERSION 6:
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Here's what NEW features you'll get with version 6:

* Increased engine HP from 930 to 1350. Somehow, (I have no idea how or why) the engine power values for all my previous DM releases were 930 Horsepower per engine whereas it was in fact supposed to be 1350 per engine. This has been fixed in this release so you should get a noticable performance increase.

* Added additional engine DM. Severe engine damage now exhibits heavy loss with oil splashing on cowling and the engine seizing immediately. Yes, finally I've added this feature (I've been wanting to do it for a long time) so if your engines take severe damage, their cowlings will show oil over them and the propellers will seize (along with the engine). This also means that your props will stay put on their engines from now on instead of flying off when severely damaged.

* Reduced weights of some parts to increase performance. All this DM work it seems is having an effect on the Ju88s Flight Model (only in top speed). Its top speed has dropped in my last release (5.5) compared to the PlanePack 6 version about 40mph which is a cause for concern. I have managed to lessen the weight (or remove where nessecary) of hidden Damage Model effects and parts to regain performance. It is still not 100% like the PlanePack Ju88, it's about 80% there, but it is significantly better than my previous Ju88 DM versions and I will continue working on getting it 100%.

* Updated tachometer textures from version 5.5 to match horsepower increase in this version. The redzone (engine rpm danger zone) for the dial has been moved closer to 3000 rpm.

* Reduced engine explosion size to more reasonable levels so now the engine explosions will not rock the plane around too much.

* Also included are two training missions allowing you to try out the damage model effects.

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Get it at simFiles or at my site (FS:SDOE Online)

posted 01-19- 05:09 PM            

,,,Commando,,(He flies, Our bombers in the squadwar) he's gone love this more than anyone.

posted 01-19- 05:49 PM            

Looking forward to trying it.

posted 01-20- 02:12 PM               

As I said above, the FM still needs to be perfected (it's about 80% there). I just made a breakthrough today though. The historical weight for the Ju88A4 unladen was 17637 LBs. In SDOE, the main fuselage section ONLY was 17637. The engine and tail added a further 6000 LBs. So, I've decreased the main fuse weight to 11637 and the extra body parts' 6000 LBs make up a total weight of 17637 which is correct in my opinion, what do you guys think? In flight, it seems to achieve the historic top speeds and altitudes better. I am currently fixing up some "jagged edges" in the DM and the update to this will be available soon.

PS, Spin, after the upcoming update is released very soon, I think it will be pretty well ready for the Planepack IMO

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Visit FS:SDOE Online

[This message has been edited by Harman_5 (edited 01-20-2001).]

posted 01-20- 02:43 PM               

Yes I noticed too, however as you said, it was always like that, and I built the DM off the base Ju88 in SDOE. The update I just mentioned above will most probably make it flop around even more

If you think it can be fixed, by all means, go ahead, I'll credit you in the readme and at least the FM may be better off.

posted 01-20- 03:09 PM               

Pretty soon we are going to have damage modelling for pilots breaking a fingernail!....er actually...

So, I thought, now would be a good time to write a bit of a tutorial.

I know pretty much what I have been working on, and I know what Nat is working on ( the 2 have been pretty closely linked ) but there are other areas I know less about!

Not wishing to tread on the toes of others, but would anyone mind if I wrapped all the ideas together into a tutorial / promo article. There are so many good ideas, from brake failure to micro-modelled engines that it gets hard to remember all the cool stuff we do have!

What do I need! Simple...

Anyone with good damage model stuff working and in place, let me know what, so I can credit you, and give me an outline on how it does it's thing. I can reverse engineer the planes easy enough, it's just nicer to get it from the guy who did all the hard work.

Why do it?

Another easy one! There are plenty of people out there wanting to 'have a go' and this is an area that can be pretty daunting. Also, a lot of this stuff can be done without the need for a 3d modeller too. Not only that, but I think the SDOE PR man could make a lot of use out of something that laid out what we are able to achieve with open plane!

posted 01-21- 03:20 AM               

The tail was hit and the inner wings in this pic. For some reason i can't get the vertical stab to show damage no matter how much i hit it. after about 3 shots it comes off anyway.

Harms damage was to much, any plane with that many holes would break up in the air since there wasn't enough metal to hold it together. Most images i seen of planes with bullet holes was small or located in a area.

I can adjust this some more but i didn't put the damage in a layer and save it so i'll have to redo it all.

heres the pic...

posted 01-21- 10:53 AM               

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Brought to you by the campaign for a better Dauntless!

posted 01-21- 01:24 PM               

Jerry, what renderer are you using in SDOE? Direct 3D or Glide? Did version 5s flicker fix work for you a while back? This could be a renderer problem as it appears fine on my D3D system.

I'm currently working on a tutorial as WT suggested on how to get the described DM effects in my first post for people who want to play around with these effects on other planes.

posted 01-21- 02:34 PM               

Thanks

posted 01-22- 01:00 AM               

TS

posted 01-22- 03:40 AM               

I messed with the damage a little more today and i used a scheme yardstick did as a base. I also have my bullet holes in a layer so i can add them to any scheme. Also did some real nice oil but it doesn't show up well i game..

posted 01-22- 02:27 PM               

Jerry, will look into that issue and email you the fix soon. If anyone else has the same problem as Jerry with the Ju88, tell me.

Ground Pounder, glad you like it!

Razer, could you send me those bullet textures so I can see how you're going with them when you get a free moment? They're looking quite good so far. Thanks.