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#4494648 - 10/26/19 11:10 AM About fuselage hits  
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Does the fuselage hitbox "stop" bullets in WOFF and prevent them from hitting other hitboxes?

I have noticed on many occasions that when shooting at an enemy plane from behind at very close distance there seems to be very little damage. I'm close enough to see that the tracers are entering the fuselage and supposedly they should be hitting the pilot or engine.

In worst cases I have scored 60 to 90 such raking hits on a single aircraft and in the end it's often the wing that snaps first rather than the pilot or engine being hit. I find it's actually faster to bring down the enemy by purposely aiming at the wing or the head of the pilot.

Last edited by mvp7; 10/26/19 11:13 AM.
#4494651 - 10/26/19 11:31 AM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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There are many pass through areas in the granular DM. You will sometimes find 1 or 2 shots you kill a pilot and others it will take 900 bullets to down sometrhing as Manfred vR once did.


Regards,

Polovski,
OBD Software, developers of immersive flight sims;
Wings Over Flanders Fields and Wings Over The Reich
http://www.overflandersfields.com
http://www.wingsoverthereich.com
#4494656 - 10/26/19 12:12 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Nice. As usual it seems with this sim.

#4494665 - 10/26/19 12:38 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Ok thanks. So there's no one big box in the rear fuselage of planes that prevents most "raking" hits from hitting something important in the front of the plane? Can you estimate the rough odds of a bullet entering and flying through the fuselage then hitting the pilot/engine rather than being caught on the way?

I have read of the sometimes unbelievable numbers of hits or at least shots that it could take to bring down an aircraft. Max Immelman's first victory took 450 rounds from his Eindecker's synchronized gun and even that just scratched the pilot's arm and cut the engine.

I wonder how large factor evading was to the lethality of actual hits. When a Nieuport is being hit directly from behind and on level it seems impossible for most of the round not to hit the pilot or engine: Some rounds would outright miss, few would ricochet but the others should have nowhere else to go than back of the pilot and the engine block. When the target is evading and shooting angles much larger the odds would quickly turn around with the pilot and engine being only small part of the possible area of hits with most bullets hitting nothing but canvas and wood. In the latter case I can see how it could take excessive amount of "hits" to bring down a plane but in the former it simply seems physically impossible not to kill the pilot directly in the line of fire.

I have reduced the forward firing gun accuracy from Workshop to less accurate but even then I just started flying closer to the targets before opening fire. Still I usually feel like a henchman shooting at the main character, seemingly scoring incredible amount of direct hits on everything other than the target. You know those scenes in action movies where the hero is running on a catwalk and the hip-firing goon somehow manages to land every single shot on the thin railing with a lot of sparks flying around but can't use that superhuman precision to hit the hero even once biggrin.

There are also times when a plane loses control and falls just from couple hits. There's no problem with that since all it takes is the one bullet that hits something really important. However those quick kills seem far more common with planes where the pilot is "exposed" like the Eindeckers for example. It feels like the wood and canvas fuselage is giving much better protection than it should.

On the other hand wings do seem too fragile in the game. Sometimes I get tired of prolonged fights with shots aimed at the pilot and engine through the fuselage doing nothing and shoot a couple burst at a wing instead. Even if the hits are spread on fairly large area of the wing, and should intuitively do very little, the wing usually snaps with relatively small amount of hits. When I was flying a F.E.2 campaigns I would fly the plane under Aviatiks and the gunner would pepper the bottom of the plane. Intuitively that should kill the pilot and hit the engine but instead 4 times out of 5 a wing would come off instead.

#4494666 - 10/26/19 12:52 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Originally Posted by mvp7
Intuitively that should kill the pilot and hit the engine but instead 4 times out of 5 a wing would come off instead.


I believe that this can be accomplished by applying a simple edit to the airplane's damage model file (xdp).

#4494668 - 10/26/19 01:26 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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I must disagree about the idea that, when firing at an enemy plane from directly behind, there isn't a fair amount of items that can absorb, deflect, or stop a bullet from reaching the back of the pilot. Using the Nieuport example mentioned above:

[Linked Image]

There is quite a bit there between the back of the pilot and the attackers guns, not to mention the fact that both planes are being bounced up and down and side-to-side by the wind.

.

#4494671 - 10/26/19 01:40 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Just like my favorite period pic I post when these discussions pop up.
It’s a photo of s N28 minus the fabric.
Not too much there generally speaking especially with a full bore FMJ round in play.

#4494672 - 10/26/19 01:45 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Unless you're looking at it straight on from the back Duke, then you see a whole lot more wood than you do empty spaces. And it doesn't take much to deflect one of those relatively light WWI .303 rounds.

.

#4494673 - 10/26/19 01:47 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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The OP is also referring to wings breaking off due to structural damage from bullet hits. Was it common for that to happen or did most hits just go through the wing's fabric? If it's the later, then that can be fixed in the plane's damage model file.

Last edited by orbyxP; 10/26/19 01:47 PM.
#4494674 - 10/26/19 01:51 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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orby, in mvp7's original post he said he found it easier to get a kill by aiming at the pilot's head or the wing of the plane, which I agree with. In RL, aiming for pilot, engine, and/or wing roots was your best bet of bringing down the enemy. Blast a few holes in a wing main spar and it is very likely going to snap off. Of course, meat or metal are still your best targets.

My post concerned his statement that there isn't much to protect the back of the pilot or the engine when firing straight on from behind, which I disagree with.


.

#4494677 - 10/26/19 02:07 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: RAF_Louvert]  
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Originally Posted by RAF_Louvert
.
I must disagree about the idea that, when firing at an enemy plane from directly behind, there isn't a fair amount of items that can absorb, deflect, or stop a bullet from reaching the back of the pilot. Using the Nieuport example mentioned above:

[Linked Image]

There is quite a bit there between the back of the pilot and the attackers guns, not to mention the fact that both planes are being bounced up and down and side-to-side by the wind.

I have to still disagree with that. The metal, wood and wire parts of the fuselage cover relatively small area if you think of the silhouette from behind the Nieuport. The only part that covers significant area of the silhouette is the wooden strengthening near the tail but even that is narrow in coverage and not really thick enough to consistently deflect a rifle bullet and nowhere near sturdy enough to stop a bullet in anything but the rarest outlier cases.

Most of the bullets would continue through with little deviation. Some would deflect away from the pilot and engine, some would deflect towards the pilot and engine. There's isn't a single piece of wood or metal (other than the engine) in that plane that could stop a rifle bullet fired from less than 100 meters with more than 1 in 100 odds (or likely far worse). It's far more likely that a bullets entering the fuselage from good angle hits the "vitals" than it doesn't.

The planes bouncing and angle aren't a major factor here, and unrelated to the damage model in any case. I have flown at extremely close distance, almost shaving off the elevator of the enemy plane, flying straight and level with zero turbulence, shooting dozens of shots straight through the fuselage to no effect. The fuselage should provide some small protection but it's not an armor that could deflect bullets with decent probability, that's what armor plates behind pilots were later added for.

I think the historical high amounts of shots and hits for kills are due to better and more desperate evasion and less accurate average gunnery than what we have in WOFF, rather than flimsy wood and fabric somehow deflecting 80% of all the bullets entering the largely hollow fuselage.

Last edited by mvp7; 10/26/19 02:09 PM.
#4494678 - 10/26/19 02:20 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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An Albatros with its semi-monoque construction is pretty much just a tube. Nothing much but air behind the pilot. Same with Fokker Dr.I, DVII, yadda. Planes like SPADs have much more framework, but still LOTS of space between. Guess it depends on the particular airplane, the bullet trajectory (is the attacker firing from six o'clock even? Six high? Six low? 4 o'clock high/low? Etc.), and distance from the plane being targeted.

Regarding MvR firing 900 rounds (presumable the Hawker fight), I'm going to speculate all 900 rounds did NOT hit the airplane.

Edit: 899 rounds. One hit Hawker's head.

Last edited by JFM; 10/26/19 02:21 PM. Reason: Explained
#4494679 - 10/26/19 02:30 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Interesting conversation. So, if I were to reduce the odds of damaging the fuselage and increase the odds of hitting the pilot and engine, it would make for a very bloody dogfight for both the player and opponent.

#4494680 - 10/26/19 02:35 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Folks, I am not saying that all the wood and wires are going to act as armor plating, and again my only point was when shooting at an enemy plane from directly behind. Obviously, if you are on his high six your rounds are more likely to have a clear shot at the back of the pilot's head. But even that is one small target from 50 yards or more out, and one you are trying to hit while also occupied with other tasks. As to the statement that there is more open space when looking straight on through the back of that Nieuport I can tell you that is not correct. I had the chance to examine an N11 replica being built and if you get back 50 feet or so and look straight on into the fuselage structure there is very little open space to be seen, due in large part to the taper of the fuselage. Each ring of ribs comes close to visually meeting the next ring forward as you look along through it. And as I've also mentioned, those light 215 grain rounds used by the bulk of the air services could be deflected by something as light as even a bracing wire, of which there is also yards of inside that N11 fuselage. Again, I am not saying this was all some magic armor, but it would definitely screw up a truly clear shot at your target.

.

#4494681 - 10/26/19 02:39 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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I'd imagine that the semi monoque planes would have the highest average odds of bouncing a bullet and even then it would not be that significant and mostly happened in cases where the bullet was missing important parts anyway. A full on ricochet is very unlikely at anything but the most extreme angles. Even at extreme angles the bullet might get deviated towards the pilot rather than in safe direction. After the wooden fuselage has been penetrated the odds of bullet getting significantly deviated drop drastically.

My personal very rough estimate would be that the total protective effect of even the "ideal" ww1 fuselage would not be more than 20% of the total shots that would have hit the pilot/engine if there were nothing in between. Even that seems very generous.

#4494682 - 10/26/19 02:40 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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I'd also like to add that there very likely is room for improvement of some of the damage boxes in WOFF, but I don't think they are radically out of whack. Of course things can always be made better.

.

#4494683 - 10/26/19 02:56 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: RAF_Louvert]  
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Originally Posted by RAF_Louvert
.And as I've also mentioned, those light 215 grain rounds used by the bulk of the air services could be deflected by something as light as even a bracing wire, of which there is also yards of inside that N11 fuselage. Again, I am not saying this was all some magic armor, but it would definitely screw up a truly clear shot at your target.

But at the same time for every two shots that it bounces away from pilot it might end up bouncing one missing shot at the pilot. Some bullets can deviate a lot even from hitting a wire but majority will not deviate much even after penetrating a heavier part (considering it happens just couple meters away from the pilot).

The air gunnery isn't generally precise enough that majority of the shots would be flying directly towards the target and any deviation would make them miss. You would be far more likely to hit the pilot by shooting through the fuselage in their general area than by specifically trying to hit them in the head which only makes something like 10-15% of the total pilot silhouette.

In almost every detailed description of an air battle where an aircraft is being shot from behind at close range it quickly goes down. In most stories where excessive amount of ammo is used, most of it likely missed or hit harmless area of the plane causing no more than couple 8 mm holes in fabric. When accounts tell of shooting at the enemy pilot, is there any indication that they would be talking only about the visible part rather than the pilot in general?

#4494687 - 10/26/19 03:12 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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mvp7, I agree about bullet deflection going in any direction, and thus a shot that would not have hit the pilot suddenly does because of deflection. I also agree that shooting through the fuselage gives you a better likelihood of hitting the pilot then trying strictly for a head shot, however we also need to consider that just because you hit the pilot it doesn't mean the plane is suddenly going to fall OOC. Pilots who got hit in RL quite often kept right on flying, either because the hit was not on a vital organ, or because it took them a while to bleed out.

As to getting right up behind them and firing at close range, my experiences in both OFF and WOFF have been that they likely will fall in that situation, provided you are able to get very close, (under 30 yards), and provided your target doesn't suddenly realize you are there and takes evasive action at the last second.

.

#4494688 - 10/26/19 03:21 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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Originally Posted by mvp7
When accounts tell of shooting at the enemy pilot, is there any indication that they would be talking only about the visible part rather than the pilot in general?


Nearly all I've read over the years have simply indicated they shot into the cockpit, either from behind or with a raking volley along the sides, top, or bottom.

.

#4494689 - 10/26/19 03:21 PM Re: About fuselage hits [Re: mvp7]  
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So, I'm that dog with a bone....

The xdp shows....



There seems to be only one damage box for the whole pilot.

The probability to hit the pilot is the same as the fuel tank, fuselage, ailerons, rudder, stabilizer... 50%

The probability to hit the wing is 100% ... hence why they snap off so easily. The engine is 80%

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