Developer Diary | Summer Open Beta

[C0RAX]

Funny, about the beta: loading a save game now disables Ironman, even though the very same save was made in Ironman.
For the sake of curiosity, will the next patch (whichever 1.12.x or 1.13.x) enable this save to work again in Ironman, or is it a lost cause?

I like to revisit some game saves when AI did some smart moves/caused good challenge.

View attachment 1011020

no the checksums will not match so the saves will not be ironman compatible

 

[HmJ_JP]

no the checksums will not match so the saves will not be ironman compatible

Thank you for speedy feedback! I'll delete, then.

 

[Znail]

The penalties aren’t really that historically accurate though. The game presents a huge range penalty, but the reality is Jet Aircraft never really had a range penalty compared to their Piston counterparts. Even though they burned fuel faster, the fact that they were much smaller and lighter and gave more thrust (which the game shows less which is completely wrong) meant that aircraft could carry much more fuel and thus maintain the same range. In fact modern Jets have much more of their aircraft devoted to fuel than a WW2 plane because a WW2 plane wouldn’t be able to have gotten off the ground while a modern Jet can produce much more power. This isn’t really possible to replicate in the game though because for some reason Jet Engines now have less thrust so you can’t even add enough extra fuel tanks to compensate. The point is it turned Jet engines from a reasonable choice to a novelty engine which is definitely not accurate and not a good change.

But these planes are not modern jet fighters, these are WW2 era jets and their engines did not have a lot of thrust. This even led to some developments of matching a jet engine with a rocket engine to get the thrust needed. Jets in WW2 had one singular advantage over props and that is max speed and it came with the cost of using more fuel. Modern Jets have the aditional advantage of higher thrust, but HoI is not a modern era simulator.

 

[HmJ_JP]

But these planes are not modern jet fighters, these are WW2 era jets and their engines did not have a lot of thrust. This even led to some developments of matching a jet engine with a rocket engine to get the thrust needed. Jets in WW2 had one singular advantage over props and that is max speed and it came with the cost of using more fuel. Modern Jets have the aditional advantage of higher thrust, but HoI is not a modern era simulator.

Right, and saying that range wasn't an issue with 1st gen jet fighters is awkward: Me 220 and Meteor range was lower than that of a P47 by 20% (and of P51 of course).
It wasn't an issue only when intercepting close by fighters & bombers.

 

[mursolini]

Right, and saying that range wasn't an issue with 1st gen jet fighters is awkward: Me 220 and Meteor range was lower than that of a P47 by 20% (and of P51 of course).
It wasn't an issue only when intercepting close by fighters & bombers.

P-47 - 1,290 km P-80 - 1,609 km, P-51 2,200 km
P-80 is US first gen jet fighter.
Meteor also compares ok with the range of Spitfire, and ME-262 with range of BF-109 or FW-190.
So, no, range wasn`t huge issue, comparing planes from different countries is a bad idea.
At the very least jet engine shouldn`t be useless cripple, it was the future of combat aviation, and while in 1945 piston engine planes potentially could stand up to hugely-over-armed first gen jet 4x30mm is huge load, in 1946 their chances were already nill.

 

[styroler]

Right, and saying that range wasn't an issue with 1st gen jet fighters is awkward: Me 220 and Meteor range was lower than that of a P47 by 20% (and of P51 of course).
It wasn't an issue only when intercepting close by fighters & bombers.

Me 262 and P-47 arent comparable planes. One was designed explicitly for long range combat to escort bombers and the other was designed by a country trying to gain an edge in interception over its own airspace. Theyre from two different countries and were designed for different purposes so you should be comparing the aircraft directly to the aircraft they replaced from those respective countries. Also even if that was comparable 20% range difference is less than the new in game reduction, and thats taking into account the fact that the Germans didnt care about the long range capabilities of the Me 262 while the Americans did for the P-47 so it really shows how much of a non-issue it was for the newer jet fighters.

 

[styroler]

But these planes are not modern jet fighters, these are WW2 era jets and their engines did not have a lot of thrust. This even led to some developments of matching a jet engine with a rocket engine to get the thrust needed. Jets in WW2 had one singular advantage over props and that is max speed and it came with the cost of using more fuel. Modern Jets have the aditional advantage of higher thrust, but HoI is not a modern era simulator.

I was never talking about modern planes. Jet engines arent some fad that became a thing in the 1990s. I was talking about the first generation fighters which excelled in every category over their piston counterparts and caused pistons to be out of date the year the war ended. The P-80, the U.S. first Jet fighter, had a greater combat range than the P-47, which was a plane explicitly designed as a long range fighter. The Me-262 was particularly famous for being over engineered and over armed. The aircraft carried more firepower than most combat aircraft at the time, which was soon discovered to hinder its ability to maneuver in combat. On the other hand though such issues could never have occurred on the older fighter designs because they couldnt even have taken off with the armanent a Me-262 had. There were no thrust issues, just engineering failures. These aircraft didnt only have "speed" as their advantage against the other ww2 aircraft, they were better in every way from them and made them obsolete the moment they entered combat. The piston engine was dead in 1946, not the 1950s and into the cold war, but immediately upon the first generation of jet aircraft. I proposed a solution which would allow the devs to make that change seem a little more gradual but in no unambiguous terms should it seem like a piston engine has any advantage over a jet engine at the end of the game because it does not. It doesnt have range, it doesnt have power, the first generation of jet aircraft proved that the new engines could overcome and outperform piston engine aircraft in any of these.

 

[HmJ_JP]

P-47 - 1,290 km P-80 - 1,609 km, P-51 2,200 km
P-80 is US first gen jet fighter.
Meteor also compares ok with the range of Spitfire, and ME-262 with range of BF-109 or FW-190.
So, no, range wasn`t huge issue, comparing planes from different countries is a bad idea.
At the very least jet engine shouldn`t be useless cripple, it was the future of combat aviation, and while in 1945 piston engine planes potentially could stand up to hugely-over-armed first gen jet 4x30mm is huge load, in 1946 their chances were already nill.

This is slightly bad faith. What we're saying is that the first jet operational jet fighters (hence British and German) had a range similar to that of the 1939 era fighters.
While 1943 era fighters had a 50% longer range.
Now you bring the P-80, but this one comes after, and also had additional tanks on the wings tip to offset the poor range.
Whether you call it a "problem" is different, but don't say they had the same range.

@styroler if I mention the range issue, it's because I read it from a Me 262 pilot: it was supposed to be a light bomber, but on many occasions had no choice but fly to nearby area and fight planes.
And saying that piston was dead at the moment the jet fighters rolled out is ahistorical: even the mighty Americans, for their next long range bombers, mixed propellers and jets. Skyraiders for a long time performed roles impossible to jets, because of the difficulties to protect jets from low altitude debris contamination. Nothing is perfect overnight, it took dedication and focus to eliminate the propeller technology from each field, one at a time. Doesn't mean it's not superior, but does mean a lot has to be changed, besides replacement of the propeller itself.

 

[Ossiv]

This is slightly bad faith. What we're saying is that the first jet operational jet fighters (hence British and German) had a range similar to that of the 1939 era fighters.
While 1943 era fighters had a 50% longer range.
Now you bring the P-80, but this one comes after, and also had additional tanks on the wings tip to offset the poor range.
Whether you call it a "problem" is different, but don't say they had the same range.

@styroler if I mention the range issue, it's because I read it from a Me 262 fighter: it was supposed to be a light bomber, but on many occasions had no choice but go to nearby positions.

Me 262 was designed as a fighter, more excplicitely as an interceptor. It was never meant to be a bomber, before Hitler asked if it can carry bombs. No one in Luftwaffe wanted to make it a bomber.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Me 262 was designed as a fighter, more excplicitely as an interceptor. I was never meant to be a bomber, before Hitler asked if it can carry bombs.

Then what would have done a Me 262 in France in 1940 against the UK? Same as Bf 109: poor range hence not efficient.
It performed well in the motherland because this didn't factor in the range. But that was the point of the discussion.

 

[styroler]

This is slightly bad faith. What we're saying is that the first jet operational jet fighters (hence British and German) had a range similar to that of the 1939 era fighters.
While 1943 era fighters had a 50% longer range.
Now you bring the P-80, but this one comes after, and also had additional tanks on the wings tip to offset the poor range.
Whether you call it a "problem" is different, but don't say they had the same range.

@styroler if I mention the range issue, it's because I read it from a Me 262 fighter: it was supposed to be a light bomber, but on many occasions had no choice but go to nearby positions.
And saying that piston was dead at the moment the jet fighters rolled out is a historical: even the mighty Americans, for next long range bombers, mixed propellers and jets. Skyraiders for a long time performed roles impossible to jets, because of the difficulties to immune technology from low altitude contamination. Nothing is perfect overnight, it took dedication and focus to eliminate the propeller technology from each field, one at a time. Doesn't mean it's not superior, but does mean a lot has to be changed, besides replacement of the propeller itself.

Wait, you said the P-80 doesn’t count because it’s “later” and has fuel tanks on the wings? First off the P-80 entered service in 1944 just after the Me-262 so it is clearly an WW2 plane. Second off though, the P-51 only has long range because it also has extra fuel tanks. Otherwise it would just be a mid range fighter. You’re the one being disingenuous by putting down one in order to support your argument. They’re both not fuel efficient and rely on external fuel sources to achieve their range capabilities.

Second though you’re arguing that Jet Engines didn’t make piston aircraft obsolete when bringing the Skyraider into the discussion. The whole story of the Skyraider though was an aircraft that couldn’t compete as a fighter and was transformed into a Close Air Support aircraft. It was originally designed as a fighter and immediately found that it was not suitable to compete with jet fighters so they added hard points to it and made it a attack aircraft. It’s not an example of “piston success” since it was considered anachronistic by pretty much everyone.

And as for the “piston-jet hybrid” I’m assuming you’re talking about the P-36 Peacemaker. They only tried that with one aircraft and it was not really popular. It was also not a traditional Piston engine design, and was designed purposely because traditional Piston aircraft couldn’t achieve the needs of the air force either. It was a long range aircraft with a special engine configuration which isn’t comparable to any of the engines in hoi4. It also failed to a Jet engine aircraft, and even its direct competitor the B-47 had a much more successful career than aircraft. It feels like you’re nitpicking specific examples of Piston aircraft after WW2 and acting like they were the “leading aircraft” when they were mostly relegated to secondary roles or else were not even comparable to a WW2 Piston aircraft. All the examples of the actual WW2 aircraft were outcompeted by the first generation of Jet Engine aircraft so how does it make sense that a Jet Engine in hoi4 have worse stats than a WW2 Piston engine in every category.

 

[HmJ_JP]

Again, the main point was about range: apples to apples, jet fighter technology made is backward vs. existing technology at the same time. We can't say this was a negligible issue while the Allies, at that time, were aiming as much as possible to extend their planes range.
Then, as with all technologies, continuous improvements made it definitely better than the former, especially with the advent of high bypass engines.
So: I'm not shocked to find in the game that early jet fighters aren't that attractive on all points of view. You're totally free to suggest PDX to add 2nd generation engines, improving on all fronts.

 

[styroler]

Again, the main point was about range: apples to apples, jet fighter technology made is backward vs. existing technology at the same time. We can't say this was a negligible issue while the Allies, at that time, were aiming as much as possible to extend their planes range.
Then, as with all technologies, continuous improvements made it definitely better than the former, especially with the advent of high bypass engines.
So: I'm not shocked to find in the game that early jet fighters aren't that attractive on all points of view. You're totally free to suggest PDX to add 2nd generation engines, improving on all fronts.

I literally did suggest that to PDX in my first post. That was quite literally my suggestion when you started tearing it down. But it seems pretty obvious from both a gameplay and historical perspective the nerf to Jet engines was not very popular, had very little utility, and kinda defeated the whole point of that side of the tech tree so I have no clue why defending it became your hill to die on.

 

[HmJ_JP]

I literally did suggest that to PDX in my first post. That was quite literally my suggestion when you started tearing it down. But it seems pretty obvious from both a gameplay and historical perspective the nerf to Jet engines was not very popular, had very little utility, and kinda defeated the whole point of that side of the tech tree so I have no clue why defending it became your hill to die on.

Please enlighten me what I tear down from your suggestion. I was concurring to Znail comment specifically about the range issue "Right, and saying that range wasn't an issue with 1st gen jet fighters is awkward".
Which doesn't mean I reject all your above suggestions. In general, I simply do not wish that a new tech suddenly becomes too OP in the game, because then we would just need to rush it ASAP and destroy the competition. So I do enjoy that jets engines for instance gets gradually better, but can't be perfect right away in all stats.

 

[Ossiv]

Please enlighten me what I tear down from your suggestion. I was concurring to Znail comment specifically about the range issue "Right, and saying that range wasn't an issue with 1st gen jet fighters is awkward".
Which doesn't mean I reject all your above suggestions. In general, I simply do not wish that a new tech suddenly becomes too OP in the game, because then we would just need to rush it ASAP and destroy the competition. So I do enjoy that jets engines for instance gets gradually better, but can't be perfect right away in all stats.

Jet techology was clearly superior to piston engines. Besides the Me 262 fighter the Germans had the Ar 234 light bomber that was also used as a reconnaissance plane. When Ar 234 was flying high on recon missions it was impossible for the Allied piston engined fighters to intercept. For example, during the Normandy landings Ar 234 flew recon over the beaches without being disturbed despite Allied total air superiority in the area. With Me 262 the Germans could intercept all Allied planes, including recon Mosquitos that had been very difficult for their piston engined fighters to catch.

 

[Znail]

P-47 - 1,290 km P-80 - 1,609 km, P-51 2,200 km
P-80 is US first gen jet fighter.
Meteor also compares ok with the range of Spitfire, and ME-262 with range of BF-109 or FW-190.
So, no, range wasn`t huge issue, comparing planes from different countries is a bad idea.
At the very least jet engine shouldn`t be useless cripple, it was the future of combat aviation, and while in 1945 piston engine planes potentially could stand up to hugely-over-armed first gen jet 4x30mm is huge load, in 1946 their chances were already nill.

But ME-262 and Meteor are twin engine planes so shouldn't really be compared with single engine planes. A newer twin engine plane should have more then just OK range then the older single engine fighter if you want to prove that Jets shouldn't have a range penalty.

 

[mursolini]

This is slightly bad faith. What we're saying is that the first jet operational jet fighters (hence British and German) had a range similar to that of the 1939 era fighters.
While 1943 era fighters had a 50% longer range.
Now you bring the P-80, but this one comes after, and also had additional tanks on the wings tip to offset the poor range.
Whether you call it a "problem" is different, but don't say they had the same range.

I don't really understand why you chose to double down, it's known that P-80 was introduced at best a few months later then Meteor, and external fuel tank are a tech that existed before.
You also didn't really address the point of comparison fighter planes within a nation, as opposed to comparing fighters from different nations. Because I can compare P-80 to lowest range 1944 piston fighter, probably a Yak, and conclude that jet engine is +200% range.

But ME-262 and Meteor are twin engine planes so shouldn't really be compared with single engine planes. A newer twin engine plane should have more then just OK range then the older single engine fighter if you want to prove that Jets shouldn't have a range penalty.

If you check their dimensions and weight, they should be. ME is slightly smaller then P-47. Most early fighter jets were twin engine. The 2 engine module exist for single engine fighters.

Like, come on.

 

[Znail]

I don't really understand why you chose to double down, it's known that P-80 was introduced at best a few months later then Meteor, and external fuel tank are a tech that existed before.
You also didn't really address the point of comparison fighter planes within a nation, as opposed to comparing fighters from different nations. Because I can compare P-80 to lowest range 1944 piston fighter, probably a Yak, and conclude that jet engine is +200% range.

If you check their dimensions and weight, they should be. ME is slightly smaller then P-47. Most early fighter jets were twin engine. The 2 engine module exist for single engine fighters.

Like, come on.

You do realize that the fact that ME-262 was smaller then the P-47 but still needed two Jet engines instead of one prop engine, doesn't really support your argument that Jet engines should provide more thrust?

 

[styroler]

You do realize that the fact that ME-262 was smaller then the P-47 but still needed two Jet engines instead of one prop engine, doesn't really support your argument that Jet engines should provide more thrust?

The Me-262 was just one plane though. The P-80, which had the longest range of any of them had a single engine. Furthermore the thrust argument is really easy to settle, since we actually have the specifications for each plane. It’s a little difficult to compare engine power since jet aircraft actually measure their output in a completely different way to piston engines, but we can directly compare the specifications of the aircraft themselves to compare them. In a direct comparison with a P-80 (a single engine jet fighter) and a P-51 (a single engine Piston Fighter) a P-80 has a larger weight capacity (12,100 lbs to 16,856 lbs), a higher rate of climb (16 m/s to 35 m/s), and a slightly larger standard armament (same number of guns but 2 extra HVAR rockets on the P-80 or 2x 1000 lbs bombs (P-80) to 2x 500 lbs bombs (for a p-51) in a CAS configuration) which are the main metrics thrust effects in hoi4. This pretty clearly dispels the idea that Jet engines had less thrust since even a single engine jet could carry more than an aircraft one of the most powerful piston engines built.

I did find one source from Boeing which estimated a early jet engine to produce about 15,000 horsepower, which if true would be about 10x the horsepower of the engine on a P-51 mustang (around 1,720 max hp), but that wasn’t specifically the engine used on the P-80 so it’s a really rough comparison. Modern jets are estimated to produce 50,000 to 100,000 just to highlight the scale of power difference between a Jet engine and a piston engine. The point is there was never really a point when the power produced was less or even equal to a piston engine.

It also should be noted that the reason for 2 engines was not always for power. In the case of the Me-262, the aircraft was not originally designed as a Jet engine aircraft, and when it came to adding the jet engines the designers chose to place them as modules on the wings rather than inline with the aircraft which would have costed more to transition. This meant that the two engine design was primarily due to the chassis itself and not the engines. For the Meteor, the British prototype actually had one engine, and the British ended up with two simultaneous jet aircraft designs, one with two and one with one. The designers had found on the original one engine prototype it was difficult to find places to put weapons as the entire front of the aircraft was taken up by the intake and so transitioned into a two engine design while the other design (the de Haviland Vampire) would solve the space issue to allow for the necessary weapons to be placed in a one engine design. The Meteor was ready first because it relied on more interchangeable parts with earlier aircraft but the de Havilland Vampire was a single engine aircraft which came soon after. PDX could try to recreate this by making it so only advanced chassis could have one engine, though gameplay wise I don’t see the utility and I think that would be much more of an annoyance.