posted 04-19- 09:10 PM               

The idea is to limit each nations number of aircraft for Online Standard, in that I was thinking as has been mentioned, we have maney varients of a number of aircraft and this is one of the things pushing the PP size upwards.

So here's my thought, I would limit the Standard set of aircraft thus:

Each Nations limit:

3 types of fighter
2 types of bomber
1 type of multirole

Aircraft from each nation we have would be picked for partity (Historical and DM) and made Standard, aircraft with various versions would only have 1 version submitted as Online Standard, the others would become Optional Addons.

Where a Nation is short in a catagory this would be filled at a later date by any new aircraft built for it, but NOT filled by a different type as this would add a little confusion when they got replaced. i.e if you're missing a bomber for a Nation, you don't go and add another fighter cause in the future when the bomber gets built everyones wondering where the fighter went.

OK, so this would leave out alot of aircraft, so I would propose that those sites that usualy post the Plane Packs be given zip files of the aircraft removed from the pack for posting as individual downloads (optional extras)

I honestly don't know how much this would reduce the pack in number of aircraft, maybe someone "in the know" can tell us, but I suspect it would reduce the pack size by quiet an amount, and also give people the option of downloading other addon aircraft.

Opinions, thought etc please guys

~Nat~

posted 04-20- 06:54 AM               

Well, the idea (I thought) of the online standard was to eliminate the mismatches caused when flying online. If you limit the aircraft of each Nation to the numbers you suggest (or any number) people (me) will want to fly with many of the aircraft not in the pack, and then....BAMMMO!!! Mismatch City!

I guess I don't see the necessity of such a move.

posted 04-20- 11:37 AM               

Nat, there's a problem with limiting the # of aircraft each nation has.
This relates to what era you want to use.

If you lmit everything to later models, then BOB and Mediterranean
missions are out. If you limit it to earlier models then later missions
are not possible.

In addition this totally messes up missions created from one theater to
another. The reason for this is aircraft that were phased out of Europe
by the end of 42 were still being used as front line aircraft in the CBI
and other regions of the Pacific in 44.

I agree with making the plane pack available by theater with a base pack
featuring aircraft use in all theaters. Most of these aircraft would be
the Allied variants. German planes would cover west front, east front,
the med, and russia, so including them would be a good idea too.

This also allows specific variants to be released for each theater (Like
the tropical spit and 109), and missions to be built around them.

Many of the online only games have HUGE numbers of aircraft types, so I
can't understand why this is such a problem with on-line play in SDOE.
Especially when the number of models of aircraft available doesn't affect
on-line transmission rates, framerates, or memory requirements (unless
someone chooses to put all of the variants in the same mission).

I think me may want to consider this as an option- use some of the other
servers. If you want to play a Pacific mission, use the igateway server,
for western europe use cali12. This may not work because of the number of
people, but we can think about it.

I have absolutely no problem with rewriting the online tutorial on
FSCentral to explain changes we make. But I do believe limiting the
number of planes for on-line play each nation has will be more of a
detriment than a benefit, especially when new people come aboard.

posted 04-20- 11:55 AM               

Yes using theatres is certainly another way of limiting PP size, the reason I opted myself for the layout above is that it gives a good base, since we're only talking about online standard it doesn't have to mean every single aircraft and vehicle ever made, but purely a base set of aircraft that everyone has, and they way I figured it we would have a base set for each nation currently flying in the game where as dividing into Nations could still mean quiet alot of downloading different packs to get the same effect.

Eitherway, I do think this is something that needs to be thrashed out for the future because PP size realy is getting silly. When I dug up PP5.2 the other day on my site it was 9mb in size! PP6 is 34mb! at that rate PP7 will be about 100mb (given growth rate, which I think has actualy increased)

Attracting new users with a download of 34mb just to be able to fly online with the guys isn't attractive at all, but if you could say the standard pack is around 10mb with optional addonds posted at this or that site, then that would help alot more.

posted 04-20- 12:15 PM               

I hope I'm not sounding too nationalistic here, that's not my intent. I'm just trying to estimate the relative popularity of different download mixes, world wide.

Obviously, whatever the mix is, there are going to be some missions that you can't fly unless you have all the downloads.

posted 04-20- 01:29 PM               

No anyone in their right mind will go out and download the "full" pack! We just need a way for ne people (or people with little hard drive space or a connection from hell) to be able to at least start on-line.

The "Base" pack could even scimp on some sounds and hangar images, etc. Sort of a "get started with SDOE on-line" pack - a true subset of the "full" pack.

Just an idea...

posted 04-20- 01:47 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nat:
actualy Jerry you have a point there, I wasn't thinking of the size of the "Nations" part of each nation, which is quiet considerable, and infact, to meet online standard you can say it's 34mb for the PP and then a further 19mb for Nations, meaning online standard is actualy 53mb now.

So, you're idea of splitting everything up into Nations Aircraft would seem much more logical and a very good idea

---

I said it once already in another thread but let me restate it here - don't take Nations into account when you're planning size reductions in online standard in the future. The plans we have right now call for a 'Nations Compliance Pack' or NCP3 that will bring users up to O.S. compatability with a very small download. In short, they will be able to fly online even if the mission includes a country for which they do not have medals or sounds. Users can then, independently, download the remaining files for a particular nation if they choose to.

Werner

posted 04-20- 02:03 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by Sv:
Personaly I like the idea of a "base" pack that gives you about 10 good planes with Naitons support but not all the bonus stuff.

---

Please don't roll Nations "support" into the plane pack! In all likelihood the next plane pack will be ready before Nv3, which would mean that to be online standard a person would have to download the plane pack (planes + Nv2) and then Nations again (Nv3).

Thanks in advance,

Werner

posted 04-20- 02:15 PM               

I don't disagree the PlanePacks are getting large... But really, What is the big deal? Now before ya'll go and make assumptions, I only have a 56K modem and feel the pain of a download just like the majority of you.

"Download"... "walk away or go to bed".

The PlanePacks inception way to do-away with mis-matches... "period". If the PlanePack grows to a 30 meg download... so be it. If that is what it would take to ensure 100% online compatability, regardless of the content, zip it and I'll download it.

I've never understood the hoola regarding the size of planepacks... and I guess I never will.

posted 04-20- 02:32 PM            

Werner

posted 04-20- 03:23 PM               

Your TheaterPlanePack or "TPP" is an excellent idea...

(doesn't exspecially solve the over-all size for those insistant on having all these stuff)... but it would offer a solution for people like yourself who are only interested in specific theaters. I doubt however, this would solve your texture and sound issues.)

posted 04-20- 03:56 PM            

I know it sounds great to pack planes and nations together, but from the perspective of someone working on it, it is way more trouble than its worth - keeping the PPs and Nations separate is easier for the project guys (especially troubleshooters) and reduces the number of potential hang-ups for users.

Werner

posted 04-20- 04:39 PM               

Zur, were all big SDOE people here, and I know alot of people think like you do, that good ole "we don't care how big it is" attitude, and that may be all well and good for you and other, but try imagineing being a newbie or even someone with more specific interests, having to download 54mb wort of files isn't worth the trouble. I know that had I just started back flying SDOE and was looking for online games etc, and someone in the waiting room told me "oh, you can't fly with us, before you can you have to go download 54mb's worht of updates" I'd pretty much know where I'd stick SDOE.

As I always understood it the PPs are for online compatability, that DOESNT mean that every single aircraft that ever flew has to be in it, to me it means I should be able to fly online in an aircraft that will make flying fun, i.e. one that's competative in comparission to the enemy, if I want to become more diverse then I can download the extra addons, but at least I have the same base pack as everyone else and all the aircraft are on an even keel, we simply don't need every aircraft in the PP to have good online missions, infact likely the opposite is true and having fewer aircraft will make it better.

posted 04-20- 04:58 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by Sv:
Sound like great stuff Werner Molders!

---

Thanks. I didn't want to get into this too deeply, but when Nat raised Nations, as an example granted, I wanted to make sure I addressed that aspect of the discussion. As for the plane packs, what I put out there was just a suggestion, I think Nat's has a lot of merit too so maybe the ideal lies somewhere in between. I don't know, I've never worked on putting plane packs together so I don't really know what makes the most sense from that perspective, I can only speak from the Nations Project perspective.

Werner

posted 04-20- 05:50 PM               

What good "is" the plane pack if it doesn't resolve the online conflicts? I understand what your saying, but who is going to police what is played online?

Point is people use "everything"... An "all inclusive" planepack ensure it all "works".

posted 04-20- 05:56 PM               

But maybe we can set up a way that modelers can still share their progress with us and yet everyone will have the same versions to avoid mismatches. I don't know how or if we could do this-- but the thought popped in my head and I wanted to share it

I am in the 56K camp too-- and I am on Zur's side here-- I start up Get Right, go to bed, and when I wake up-- new plane pack. Granted I am offline much more than I am online-- but that's because I am always making missions Still-- I do go online every so often so that Bulldog and Karaya2 can team up and shoot my ass down

------------------

Brought to you by the campaign for a better Dauntless!

posted 04-20- 06:00 PM               

Main program 49MB
Hi res Cockpit 23MB
Lo res Cockpit 13 MB

These large file sizes are becoming the norm nowadays. IEN also offers a CD for those who are "Bandwidth Challenged". Could we find someone to make CD's for these people?

The problem that I see with dividing the planes into theatres is that there aren't that many people online today. What are the chances of having all the people that show up in the lobby all having the same set of plane packs for a specific theater? You could set this server for this theatre and that server for that theatre, but what happens is that all the people migrate to the server with the most people in it. This is what always happened in Air Warrior, Aces High and WBII. The planes and add-ons made for the other theatres essentially go to waste cus nobody flys them. My 2 cents worth.

jgro

posted 04-20- 08:43 PM               

The PP is so that if I fly a mission online and someone joins it we have a very good chance that the planes will all match up.

If we had a updater that would be ideal, but if you have BoB packs, and Africa Packs and Rhineland Packs or whatever, you would almost have to have servers for just those Packs. Because mission names would not work.

I'm all for making sure that PP planes are finished planes. i.e. shaddows, FM, etc. But who would get to make the decision on what is in and what is out, and what would the guidelines be?

Which Newbie was complaining about the size of the PP? It's seldom that more planes being available is a deterent to a game, but less often is.

As always, it's just my opinion.

posted 04-21- 01:58 AM               

What planes get left out? None, once they have been built to the standards the original planes had. (If you want to build to a higher standard great!). (Like PR has said, finished shadow, finished cockpit, FM, DM, training missions, cutaway etc.) Though I suspect a "development pack" may be a valid consideration so the FMs can be tested openly on line before final release....

PR is right, who is going be the one willing to take the heat for leaving a plane out? No one I know.

RE: CD - People have made CDs available at cost before (Spin or Spoonman if I remember correctly...THX) This will probably be done again (when I cant say). A good bet would be after the Patch, the next WWI pack and the Basic 10 are completed (this *should* happen all at about the same time...)

posted 04-23- 08:03 PM               

I mentioned that there were planes in the current PP that were short of some of my expectations in terms of FM , and such. You named one.

As to the Zero, so you don't like it, don't fly it. I don't fly them all, all the time, but who am I to deny the pleasure to someone else based on my criteria, or yours?

As always these are just my opinions.