BattleField 1942 DEMO (Wake Island)

[Draft] Tips: Dealing With Enemy AA-guns (Aircraft Maneuvering)

2008-09-07T22:17:00.025+09:00

You sometimes get shot down when enjoying the glory of flying with a plane.

There are mainly 7 factors which can be threats to your cuddly plane, i.e. enemy planes, AA-guns on the ground, AA-guns on the carrier (=Shokaku), assault rifles (=Bar, StG44), machine guns on the towers, and machine guns on the destroyer (=Hatsuzuki).

Most likely the ones which threaten the safety of your plane the most are those AA-guns.
Because of the fine effective range and accuracy, AA-guns certainly are eligible to be called "bad boys".

The best way to destroy those bad boys is to destroy them before the enemies notice the presence of your plane in the sky. It takes a while for an AA-gun to re-spawn after getting destroyed. Meanwhile you can have the pleasure to sweep out those groundlings freely without any fear.

However, it is possible that the enemies are standing by AA-guns and waiting for some naughty flying beauties. So you might have to deal with several AA-guns that are actually active.

Even though some pilots might already know the difficulty in destroying active AA-guns, I've come to realize that any single active AA-gun can't ever be a threat to a pilot as long as the pilot knows the presence of it. In fact, I can destroy enemy AA-guns without getting shot in most cases. Well, let's see the trick.

First of all, you must know where AA-guns are located at.
In the normal map, there are 6 AA-guns and their positions in the island are as you can see in the following map.

AA-gun map

Click the links below to see how they actually are placed.

AA1
AA2
AA3
AA4
AA5
AA6

As you can see they are all placed at the edge of the island, and this fact reveals the crucial shortcomings of them.

AA-guns can shoot almost any visible position unlike machine guns which can't shoot planes which are attempting to dive-bomb because of the angle restriction .

However, AA-guns can't shoot targets which are located at lower altitude than of AA-guns. Let's have a look at the following image.

This image is showing the area an AA-gun can shoot and the area it cannot shoot. The red area in the image is the danger zone, and the blue area is the safety zone where the AA-gun can never shoot.

As you might have already noticed, an AA-gun being placed at the edge of the island gives attacking pilots great chances to approach it to attack without getting shot. You never get shot if you just go through the safety zone.

The remaining problem is the way to destroy it. Even if you can approach a target AA-gun, it woudln't be a useful method for you to attack it at all if you haven't got any means to destroy it.

To solve this tricky problem, you might need to take a look at another image below.

This image is showing an important fact to us, i.e. the head of the AA shooter is located at a higher point than the barrel of the AA-gun. The shooter can't shoot the person who is having this view (=you) with the AA-gun while you can shoot the shooter dead with your weapon.

The same thing could be said about attacking an AA-gun with a plane. You go through the aforementioned safety zone horizontally, and strafe the enemy shooter out when the head of the shooter turns out to look clear enough for you to aim at.

I just can't say it's easy, but at least I can finish enemy AA-gunners off without getting damaged 80% of the time in this way. (Or using the past tense 'could' may be more appropriate since I haven't played this Demo seriously for quite a while.)

---After Missing Your Shoots---

You've already learnt the way to attack an enemy AA-gun by going through the safe zone.
One remaining problem is the action after missing the target. The Enemy shooter is observing your move quite carefully and keeping shooting, so you can't make an easy decision about this.

Concerning the horizontal direction, there are mainly 2 options, to go forward, or to go backward. If you are really good at controlling a plane, going backward wouldn't be a bad option, but it sometimes gets tough to survive undamaged by going backward. Especially the moment before you put yourself in the safe zone could be quite a chance for the enemy shooter to shoot down your plane. After all, my recommendation is to go forward.

Once you decide the horizontal direction, you need decide the vertical direction, to go up, or to go down. But there's an absolute answer to this question since it's obviously suicidal to go up if the target AA-gun is still alive.

The right decision is to go down and get to the "safety zone" where the target AA-gun can't shoot. It's inevitable to get into the "danger zone" once you miss your shoots, but there's no reason for staying there. Overall, you should move like the ○ Zero-fighter in the following image and get back to the safety zone immediately.

I'll post (some) video(s) regarding this later on.... [I hope(TM)]

[Draft] Aircraft Maneuvering (Updated 20080913)

2008-01-28T01:35:00.007+09:00

You see there're some drafts in this blog.
But never mind. I, for now, would rather post many drafts than post a few finished ones.
----------------

This article is to be concomitant with the article describing dogfight.

To control -not to be controlled- aircrafts, you have to know the variety of their movement.
In this BattleField 1942, the most difficult factor, damage by gravity, is not simulated. Therefore things that should be complicated sometimes appear rather simple.

Anyhow, what I'd like to show you in this article is videos uploaded to YouTube. Every video is to be short but long enough to see a feature. Hope you'll find something new.

1. Standard Position
This term might not tell you what exactly it is. However this is the thing which should be regarded as basic of basic. Yes, this is just horizontal flight.
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XLGSF0xhTM

2. Roll
Roll, or spin.
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFD_SHwDO0U
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aileron_roll
2.1 Barrel Roll
Similar to Roll. The most remarkable difference between Roll and Barrel Roll is the change in the axis of your plane. Roll is an important feature of aircraft maneuvering, but it is easy for an enemy plane to shoot down your plane while your plane is Rolling since the axis of your plane doesn't change while you're doing it. In that case, the enemy plane just needs to shoot at the direction of the axis of your plane. To avoid getting shot down in this way, you may perhaps use Barrel Roll unconsciously. While you are doing Barrel Roll, the axis of your plane changes constantly and this certainly makes enemy pilots have less chance to shoot down your plane in a short time. But I've found Barrel Roll even more effective as a means to evade shoots from the ground, like from an APC or a tank. One certain thing is that you'd better not rely too much on this technique.
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMMLylJ7DxI
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrel_roll

3. Loop
Loop. The circle your plane would draw in the sky can't be a perfect circle because of the simulated gravity (it should be an ellipse which is vertically long).
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzcdW_GhJVY

4. Immelmann Turn
A technique on dogfight.
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4aUxzL_mnI
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immelmann_turn
4.1 Immelmann Usage On Ground Strafing
Most certainly, you sometimes fail in destroying ground objects in a single stroke of strafe. In this case, a trick using Immelmann Turn might help you give the survived ground objects the second wave of strafe in a quick motion. As you can see in the following video, after missing the objects, you must fly straightly for a few seconds since Immelmann Turn itself takes a certain distance horizontally to turn back. If you don't take this action, you would fly over the objects vainly and miss them again. You can choose at which point of the stroke you get back to the Stanard Position, but my recommendation is at the point when you finish strafing, since it's hard to aim at objects while getting back to the position. But note that you might get hit by those AA guns while turning IF THERE'S ANY OF THEM AROUND. So the absolute condition to do this should be "there's no active enemy anti air weapon around".
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2r8-YR-MpQ

5. Split S
Another technique on dogfight. Immenmann turn is used to go up and change the direction, Split S is used to go down and change the direction. Split S is slightly more dangerous than Immelmann turn, especially when you haven't got enough altitude.
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt7qmIq5v6A
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_S

Let me continue this later on (again this cliche!).

Bug?: Twisted Clothes

2008-01-13T11:03:00.001+09:00

This game is just a demo. The final version of the fullversion is 1.6+ and this demo is 1.1.

So there should be some glitches and bugs and there really are.

I have no idea if this is a bug kind of thing. But it's just weird to see clothes twisted.

I should check up the fullversion to see if this bug? remains in version 1.6, but I'm just lazy to do that.

Special thanks to the AT lover in the picture (20071220/why the heck is he holding a wrench?? traitor!).

[Draft] Tips: Tips On Dogfight

2008-01-13T01:52:00.000+09:00

Planes (fighters and bombers) are quite powerful vehicles in Wake island. They can strafe, bomb, run over soldiers. And even the most reliable antiaircraft weapons, the aa-guns, don't bother them, as far as there isn't any in-flight enemy plane.

However, once an enemy plane becomes airbone, you might have to fight fircely against both the enemy plane and the antiaircraft weapons and vehicles on the ground since you can't fly the limited area which the ground weapons can't hit you while being chased by the enemy plane. The possibility to go through the attack decreases if you choose the option unless the enemy pilot using the plane is unskilled. So as I mentioned the above, planes are quite powerful, reliable vehicles in the island for us, and for enemies.

So you must get familiar with dogfight strategies which would make your fight slightly easy. If you think you don't have to fear the enemy planes because you can destroy all of them while they are on the ground, that's a huge mistake. At least there should be 2-3 enemy planes up in the sky right after a game begins, you never can destroy then while they are on the ground because they are located to the positions to be like that.

There are several factors which show the degree of risks of getting shot down by an enemy plane when you are being chased by it. The following is the list of possible factors.

The visible surface area of your plane (from the enemy pilot's view).
The performance of your plane and the enemy plane.
The current speed of your plane and the enemy plane.
The current altitude of your plane and the enemy plane.
The amount of left ammo of the enemy plane.
The current damage on your plane.
Variability in your movement.
Your and the enemy's skill in controlling planes.

As you can see there're many factors to be considered.
So let's define the risk quantitatively. It might help us understand the situation intuitively.

BUT

I'm just sleepy, let me continue this later.

[Draft] Notable Players

2008-01-06T01:15:00.000+09:00

Obviously, some players don't regard this DEMO as a game they play to decide whether they should buy the full version or not. And the same thing goes for me, I regard this game as something rivals other games. I've got the full version of BattleField 1942 (with the extention pack "Road to Rome"), but still have a great urge to play this DEMO regularly. Actually it's because I don't really love the full version since there has been some changes in sound and such. I've no idea why those players who have the full version are still playing this demo, but my reason for doing that is as I mentioned above. I don't intend to disparage those DEMO players, but just notice that there're some fine DEMO players with some kind of "experience" at the sacrifice of playing the full version.

Anyhow, in this article, I'd enumerate some of those fine DEMO players. It's quite difficult to do such thing on this game since a player name doesn't belong to anyone (in other words, you don't have to register your player name to the service). I.e., there is a possibility to find another player playing the game using the same player name as yours. Nevertheless, those legendary (a bit exaggerated) players with legendary playter names are still legendary. And I'd love to leave a note about the players not to forget them.
-20080106

(The list shall come in a few days (you know, however, the sense of "a few" depends on the person who takes the words :P) )

FUW: Frequently Used Words (updated 20080203)

2007-12-16T01:10:00.000+09:00

In Wake island, you might see some acronyms, or abbreviated words. Some are obvious and some aren't, it might depend on how much time you have spent on the evil internet. One clear thing is that not knowing those words doesn't make your "stay" in Wake comfortable. Therefore I give you ideas of the meanings.

1) When you bombed a tank with your plane after an air reinforcement request from a fellow on the ground, you might get a word of his appreciation like ty, or thx. Yes, you can easily figure out what those two words mean. But I'd show the answer to those who still don't have any idea.

ty: Talos on Your back!
thx: Terminated by Hanging on Xmas
(Frequently seen on Advent)

So easy that you might have skipped the explanation. But that's what smarties always do, now you know you gotta beware when you see those words!

--------------------NothingButAJoke-------------------

Here we go, you joke haters.
Note that not all the players know the meanings.

--Greetings--
sup: What's up? (Ex.: Sup guys.)
cu, cya: See You (Ex.: Cya all.)

--Regret--
sry: Sorry (Ex.: Sry, it wasn't on purpose.)

--Appreciation--
ty : Thank You (Ex.: Ty for the repairs.)
thx: Thanks (Ex.: Thx dude.)

--Strong feelings--
ftw: For The Win (Ex.: DD camping ftw!)
ffs: For the Fucking Sake (Ex.: Get a flag ffs.)
omg: Oh My God! (Oh My Gosh!) (Ex.: Omg, that guy rules!)
plz: Please (Ex.: Cure me, plz.)

--Praise--
gj : Good Job! (Ex.: Gj! You rock!)
wd : Well Done! (Ex.: Wd! You've saved us all!)
gg : Good Game! (Ex.: Gg.)

--Swearing (not recommended to use frequently)--
fy: Fuck You! (EX.: Fy cheater!)
su: Shut Up! (Ex.: Su you damn bastard!)
stfu: Shut The Fuck Up (Ex.: Stfu, moron!)
bs: Bullshit (Ex.: Bs, I've hit you like 100 times!)
gtfo: Get The Fuck Out (+of) (Ex.: You suck, gtfo the tank now!)
wtf: What The Fuck (Ex.: Wtf are you doing?)
wth: What The Hell (What The Heck) (Ex.: Wth, are you cheating or something?)
noob, newb, noobie, newbie: Players without any skill. (Ex.: You noob!)

--Laughter--
lol: Laughing Out Loud (Ex.: Lol, you blew up your own plane.)
lmao: Laughing My Ass Out (Ex.: Lmao, you'd better learn to shoot.)
rofl: Rolling On the Floor Laughing (Ex.: Rofl, you've got killed by me 14 times in a row!)

--Vehicles--
DD: Defense Destroyer (In this DEMO, Hatsuduki is the one.)
CV: Carrier Vessel (In this DEMO, Shokaku is the one.)
LC: Landing Craft (In this DEMO, Daihatsu is the one.)
APC: Armed Personnel Carrier (In this DEMO, Hanomag(Axis) and M3(Allies) are the ones)

--Bases--
VL: the Village
NB: the North Base
AF: the AirField
LB: the Landing Beach
SB: the South Base

--Some other words--
btw: By The Way (Ex.: I never use grenades btw.)
AA: Antiaircraft (Ex.: I need AA backup.)
AAA: Antiaircraft Artillery (Ex.: Somebody get the AAA and shoot down the fighters!)
AFK: Away From Keyboard (Ex.: That guy seems to be AFK.)
ATM: At The Moment (Ex.: I'm engaging on another target atm.)
IM(H)O: In My (Humble) Opinion (Ex.: He isn't using any tools imo.)
AFAIK: As Far As I Know (Ex.: Afaik, the nose cam is disabled in this server.)
IIRC: If I Recall Correctly (Ex.: Iirc, you must stick to the flag to capture it in this server.)

Wake-Blog Links (updated 20080907)

2007-12-04T01:13:00.007+09:00

A liar
http://sakadati-thomper.blogspot.com/
Language: Japanese
A Wake-Blog.

雑兵記-BF1942DEMO- (Zouhyouki -BF1942DEMO-)
http://blog.livedoor.jp/tera_f15/
Language: Japanese
A Wake-Blog.
He seems to be playing mainly at Hokkaido.jpn .

ブラックの平凡な日記 (Black no heibon na nikki)
http://aaaa1803.blog87.fc2.com/
Language: Japanese
A Wake-Blog written by a member of a clan called DELTA FORCE.
There's also the website of the clan itself. : http://bf1942delta.bake-neko.net/index.html

☆WAKEランド☆ (WAKE LAND)
http://xbbs.knacks.biz/risa
Language: Japanese
A semi-Wake-Blog written mainly by a rifle lover.
It actually is a BB, so you can also post a comment or an article there.

鹿の踊り場第二幕(Shika no odoriba dai ni maku)
http://sikadayo.exblog.jp/
Language:Japanese
A Wake-Blog written by a ... deer?

GRS
http://seacross.exblog.jp/
Language:Japanese
A Wake-Blog written by a member of a clan called GRS.
There's also the website of the clan itself. : http://www.geocities.jp/sea_across/hp.htm

八玉備忘録 (Hachitama Bibo-o Roku?)
Language:Japanese
http://blog.livedoor.jp/eightball1942/
A Wake-Blog written by an assault.

fueru-wakew@kame
http://wakame984.blog39.fc2.com/
Language:Japanese
A Wake-Blog written by a dedicated engineer-fan.

Wanted: Any information about BattleField 1942 DEMO blogs/websites.

Tips: How Fast Can Medics Cure Wounds?

2007-12-02T07:38:00.000+09:00

In the game, BattleField 1942 Demo (Wake Island), wounds can be cured by fellow medics or by first-aid boxes.
But how fast can a wound be cured?

It frequently happens that an enemy follows after us and we don't have enough time to cure ourselves. But if you know the weapon the enemy uses, how good he is, and how fast you can cure yourself, you'll be able to grab a chance to survive the situation.

A medic can cure a wounded fellow at the speed of 15.3 [%/s] .
And a first-aid box can cure wound at the speed of 14.3 [%/s] .

These are rough approximation but I think the accuracy is well enought to us. Since we can't know how much life exactly is left to us, and also because we can't count time that precisely.

Perhaps not many players know this fact, but this knowledge is quite handy.
When you are a medic, wounded, and fighting against a handgunner, look at the life-gauge, and then think quickly how good the opponent can be. If you think the opponent can shoot your body (not head, nor leg) 1 time per magazine, you should have 2-magazine-worth life. According to this article, a shot on body by handgun reduces your life by 34 [%], so your life has to be at least more than 69 [%]. So if you've only got 10[%] of life, you should cure yourself for (69-10)/15.3 ≒3.86≒4 [s] with your medic kit. See, isn't it a bit handy?! (say yes nevertheless how you actually think!)

Oh, yes, perhaps you know this already, but if 2 medics are curing a wounded fellow at the same time, the curing speed will be twice.

The calculation doesn't have to be accurate.
"Rough'n'Quick" is always the key to defeat your enemy!

Tips: Effect of Weapons on Infantry

2007-12-02T04:39:00.000+09:00

This article shows how much damage infantry get from a shot by a weapon.

Perhaps this could be a surprise to you but it is true that there's no power difference between the weapons of the Allies and of the Axis.

But note that what I show you in this article only refers to the power of weapons, i.e., damage by a SINGLE shot. The information on this article doesn't contain other sides of the strength of weapons like the accuracy rates. Moreover, the data is according to the default configuration, the data can be different in those modded servers.

In addition to that, there're some other weapons in the game, including vehicles. Hopefully I'll add the data of those weapons to this article in the near future.

There're 3 types of a direct shot, headshot, bodyshot, legshot.
Here I define a headshot as a shot which hits the red part of infantry, and a bodyshot = yellow part, a legshot = blue part (Picture 2).
This might be helpful to know which part of an enemy you should shoot. The effect of a shot differs a lot, so having strategies on this matter would bring you some nice effects like score improvements.

Table 1. Infantry Graphic (U.S. Medic)
Picture 1	Picture 2

Table 2. Weapon Effects
Name of Weapon	The Size of A Maga- zine (The Number of Maga- zines)	Damage by a Head- shot [%]	Damage by a Body- shot [%]	Damage by a Leg- shot [%]
Allies' Assault Rifle: BAR(Browning)	20(6)	74	47	30
Axis' Assault Rifle: StG44	30(5)	60	37	24
Submachine Gun (Allies: Thompson M1928 Axis: Bergman MP18)	M1928 :30(5) MP18 :32(5)	40	27	17
Rifle (Allies: Lee-Enfield No.4Mk 1 Axis:Kar98K)	6(5)	100	77	34
Handgun (Allies:Colt 1911, Axis:Walther P38)	8(4)	40	27	17
Anti-tank weapon (Allies:M1A1 Bazooka, Axis:Panzerschreck)	1(6)	100	100	100
Knife	∞(∞)	100	47	30

*Anti-tank weapons can do things on infantry not only by direct shots. This means you can damage enemy infantry by shooting around them. The damage by an indirect AT shot varies, like 0%-30% (Of course the damage depends on how near you could shoot, approximately a shot about the full length of a jeep away from the enemy can do no damage to him.)

What shall we do in this place?

2007-12-01T01:48:00.001+09:00

Great things come from above, nothing special is expected in the sense of vacancy.

This blog is for writing down something silly, something that comes from the cyber space disguised as a real world.
Great records we can notice in the real world exist because of the people who officially recorded them. No matter how silly a record is, it doesn't really matter.
I have no idea how long this passion for taking records would last, but if one of you Wake-dudes happens to call by this place, please feel free to take part in my attempt not to put out the fire on the mysterious island called Wake.
We adore the greatest game of all, Battle Field 1942 DEMO (Wake Island).

About Me

2007-11-11T04:11:00.005+09:00

Hi.
I'm the one who's posting some silliness on this blog.
This is the place where I write what I want to write.
But I restrict myself to articles aboout BattleField 1942 DEMO only.
So any article in this blog should follow the rule, and I'm pretty sure you will not understand any of those if you've never played the game.
The game, which is only for Windows, is free and you can get the installer from the official page. And the link to the official page is on the article "Related Links" where you can go by clicking "Links" on the Label menu of the side contents.

I've played this game for almost 4 or 5 years as a whole with a blank period between 2005 and 2006 (2003-2005,2006-2008).
At first I was a fine medic who was to cure any wounded fellows. And after the blank period, I came back as a pilot and I kind of mastered the steering. Particularly I was good at shooting ground objects. But since I sticked only to Planes and was good at controlling it, some silly people started to complain about it and even called me a cheater (which is slightly normal in these days). Therefore I've quit using planes "serisously" (which means I still do fun-play kind of things with planes) and chose Bazooka as my weapon, which is just mighty and superb.
Additionally, I've never belonged to any clans.

I don't use grenades nor vehicle weapons (except up-side-down strafe with planes) since I don't get any joy from getting killed nor from killing people with those. This is in my policy to play this game, and not killing any mates, including teamkillers, is in my policy as well. So point out when you find me not following my policy, and I will appreciate it.

THOUGH, I play as a normal player when my player name is NOT Master.B/obs, e.g., Master.S. I don't play normally that often, but please bear this in your mind.

My two different player names stand for the different game settings. It's completely systematic and I choose my player name mechanically every time I play the game.
My name being Master.* means I'm playing the game on fullscreen mode.
And being obs means I'm playing the game on window mode.
I usually do some other things on my pc while playing the game, so I don't play the game with the previous name that often, but I should be better when I am playing on fullscreen mode :).

Oh yes, I like having quarrels with people. So stay away from me if you don't like quarrels. I can ensure your stressful stay in the island if you don't follow that.

Now you know what kind of player I am. Cya in the island!

---------------------
Just for reference, the following is my (main) environment to play this game.
OS: Windows XP Professional SP3
CPU: Athlon64X2 5600+
Memory: DDR2 800 2GB
VGA: Radeon HD4670
Sound Device: None