Hey, if anyone's still following this thread I'd like to add a bit of my input.
I have access to the F2.1 EXE and I've been messing with trying to stick data from it into the main EXE based on Harr-Nuta's findings to try and mimic F2.1 behavior more closely, but it's obviously way beyond my field of expertise so it may not be very reliable.
Other notes, citing the Playtester's Guide and other documentation, just in case it helps anyone who is still committed to toning down missile evasion behaviour or restoring F2.1 missile effectiveness:
* In Gauntlet mode, every AI is set to Ace difficulty, or at least to the highest possible setting.
* Setting Enemy Intelligence level to the highest setting does not necessarily make every opponent in the campaign an ace, it affects how much of their parameters are available to them. On lower settings, the AI can only use a fraction of their abilities.
* Based on the Playtester's Guide, rookies and veterans are more common enemies, with aces being rare or special enemies i.e. the Hammerheads, Jackals, story characters, etc.
* Even if missiles are more effective on F2.1, I've noticed they still spam chaff/flare strings. but actually IMO I don't think there's a need to correct this behaviour so much as missile effectiveness, also given that in reality multiple chaff/flares are needed to defeat modern missiles, it does make sense that they would drop strings rather than just one or two flares.
Edit 12/28/23:
Harr-Nuta's patch makes Tactical Operations Alaska 1 extremely difficult to complete. The mission involves protecting a friendly Su-27 from enemy fighters equipped with AMRAAMs, and if they get even one AMRAAM shot in, the Su-27 is incapable of defending itself and always eats it. I switched back to the non-patched version of the game and was able to complete it normally. I think it might be better to find a way to restore missile effectiveness, rather than reduce the enemy's ability to evade them, I might experiment further with the non-patched EXE and different cycles/core settings instead.
Post edited December 28, 2023 by NoelShourai
Harr-Nuta: Try these changes in campaign, make saves and play the missions again alternating between patches, focus on dogfight heavy mission and play it some times with each patch to get a feel if its better and worth uploading, I can only decide for myself that it feels like a better "game" this way. Since the file on PCGamingWiki is from July 27, 2017, I guess these changes were never uploaded?
