If implemented please make this optional. I like to leave the pointer over where the directional gyro sits at level flight for easy readout!

Oh no! The directional gyro bearing should be readable without resorting to mouse "tooltip" workaround. This should be entirely another development request on this thread. All gauges should be readable without any gamey tricks.

See 3.6 in the second list of requests to BlackSix in this post:

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showpos...6&postcount=77

In RL the Spifire and Hurricane compasses weren't so easy to see, I guess the head position seems to be hard to set up on flat screens in CoD without affecting other aspects of the view especially if you don't have TrackIR/other head tracker.

This. Very very much, in fact. In 1946 coordinating ground columns of different vehicles was a pain in the rear and without a speed setting it will be one in Clod and beyond, too.

Type of improvement:

Performance

Explanation of proposals:

Extra Shadow options, i.e. Cockpit Shadows, Aircraft Shadows, Ground Shadows.

Benefits:

Useful for all players as it allows players to improve performance without losing all shadows.

Type of Improvement: Swap the Tiger Moth Student and instructor seating on Training mode.

Explanation of Proposal: According to a former Air Force pilot friend of mine who learned to fly in the TM the Student sits in the rear and the Instructor in the front. In the Training Mission these are apparently the wrong way round.

btw, he's also not impressed with the landing which runs on too long for a tail dragger with a tailskid.

Benefits: Realism

Type of Improvement: Swap the Tiger Moth Student and instructor seating.

Explanation of Proposal: I am an experienced Tiger Moth pilot (270 hours) all as an instructor, the only time the instructor is required to sit in the rear seat is when the student is brand new to flying or is just a passenger as the full range of controls are not reproduced in the front cockpit so a new student will not know their operation, this is also the reason students 'did' sit in the back seat (whats the point of trying to learn functions of controls that are in the other cockpit, the other controls I am refering to are the slat controls, also the student is expected to solo the aircraft at some point and the aircraft is soloed from the rear, and it is a commonly known fact so I am surprised that 1C don't have this right.

Benefits: Realism

pilots sit in the back when the other guy is just a passenger.....

Type of Improvement: Enable skins folder when the skin download is disabled.

Explanation of Proposal:
If the skin download is not allowed, the program allow to load the skins from the main folder (C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\il-2 sturmovik cliffs of dover\PaintSchemes\Skins\...). (I'm not talking about the netcache folder, just the default skins folder). If you flying together with teammates, it is important to see the other aircraft painting, even if everyone else is disabled.
We send each other these skins in e-mail, copy all to my default folder, it will solve. If the file names start with the pilot's name, the skin is much easier to handle.

Other options these feature: allowed skin selection to server. Download skins from the server's webpage, copy them to the main skin folder. So you'll know what people see and what not.
If you do not copy anything, you see only the default skins, as now. And of course, that does not affect, if the skin download is enabled, then everyone can see everything.

Benefits:
- It makes it easier to identify team members when flying online.
- Plus, you can filtering the allowed skins on your own server.

#1

Type of Improvement: Introduce the re-fly button similar to old IL2

Explanation of Proposal: Currently, in online play the server has to use a script to destroy landed/abandoned planes or they will pile up over time and clutter up the airfields. We need a refly button option that will stop people from A.) hopping out of their planes before landing, crashing, dieing and B.) one that despawns the plane after being pressed and C.) one that doesn't mess with stats upon doing this. Currently with the despawn scripts, once an abandoned plane has been despawned the stats will show up as "AI has been killed by X player (when X player has put at least one bullet in that plane) thus giving that player a complete kill, which is wrong.

Benefits: The old IL2 method was perfect as explained above

#2

Type of Improvement: Server settings for clients

Explanation of Proposal: Currently a dedicated server only has the ability set netspeed and turn VAC on/off through the [Net] code, but there is no options to control the clients connected. This leaves exploitation wide open in the online environment. For instance, you could unplug your modem, go fix yourself a whiskey, come back and plug your modem back in and never be kicked from the server. Only being allowed to set server netspeed doesn't exactly cut the mustard.

For comparison here's just a few of the commands in the old IL2 confs.ini to help with this:

Benefits: To make MP a much more enjoyable and stable atmosphere.

#3

Type of Improvement: Allowing all the default skins to show when custom skins have been disabled.

Explanation of Proposal: Currently in the dedi server environment it's a must to disable custom skins online by adding the command "SkinDownload=0" to the [Net] section of the confs.ini. If these aren't disabled, MP is a terrible stuttery mess every time a custom skin has been loaded in. But with custom skins turned off, only 1 default skin will appear in game. Everyone's game comes with several different default skins based on unit, plane type, squadron etc, yet only 1 skin (the default's default I guess?) is visible to all players online. Since these default skins all come with everyone's game, they should all be able to be displayed online with out any sort of download (aka - stutter)

Benefits: Immersion / Bug fix perhaps?

#4

Type of Improvement: Custom skins online

Explanation of Proposal: Currently custom skins online cause huge stutters when loading in. Even with the 10gbps connection we have there is no stopping this problem for a dedicated server. Many of these custom skins deserve to be seen and used online.

I suggest creating another folder somewhere in the game install where the server could use that folder as an allowed skins folder. This would allow a hoster to create a downloadable skin pack that would match the allowed skins folder for the dedicated server, thus making a custom skin act like a default skin as the server would have them as well. All users without the skin pack will get default skins appearing online. While those with the custom skins should not get the bandwidth "stutter" that is cursing custom skins online atm.

Benefits: To allow all those wonderful skinners to have their work shown online.

And finally #5

Type of Improvement: Dedicated Server Files

Explanation of Proposal: We need true dedicated server files like every other Steam MP game. Currently the server connects to steam like a client (steam actually has to be running). Steam has a problem with both disconnecting at random and also people failing auth at random. Because of this we have had to create and code a few programs to A.) just keep the server running and B.) make the server restart after a certain amount of time. If the server was left running 24 hours a day, these (null) entries can not be removed from the server and that leaves players not being able to join until the server is completely restarted again as these (null) players don't show up in the player listing and therefore can't be removed. Players are essentially stuck in limbo land when this happens.

Benefits: Allowing for a real dedicated server to run that could rotate missions and actually stay up without the use of 3rd party tools to attempt to make it work.