[Pursuivant]

My pet peeve is damage models/damage textures, especially for the planes which have been around ever since the original IL-2. I find it strange that people have been squabbling over FM for the last 15+ years, but nobody seems to give a damn about realistic DM.

There might still a few outright DM errors after all these years, although I haven't had a chance to check out them out in the new 4.14.1 release.

Some of the D2 damage textures are still ugly and unrealistic (Bf-109 series in particular).

On some planes, breaking parts break in the wrong places, especially on the wings. This creates the annoying effect of planes being destroyed by wing damage which appears to be historically survivable.

In particular, tough, high-powered aircraft like the F4U, F6F, TBF, and P-47 should still be able to fly with the outer third of one wing blown away. For the UK, the Wellington airframe should be tough to break, and for the Germans, the Ju-88 series.

Effects of internal and flak explosions need to be modeled a bit better. Currently, they're modeled as blasts that emit a star-shaped pattern of fragments, rather than having concussive power which disperses uniformly as a function of distance with the power to bend or crush vital systems.

Effects of bullets, explosions, and shrapnel vs. humans don't appear to be well modeled. For example, a pilot can take a .50 cal bullet to the arm and keep flying, and a gunner can survive the explosion of a 20mm cannon shell within an enclosed tail turret and keep on shooting. (Realistically, the pilot's arm would be blown off. Assuming the shock didn't kill him, he'd rapidly bleed out and die due to massive blood loss. As for the gunner, even with some of the plexiglass in the turret removed, there'd still be enough energy and shrapnel from the explosion that he'd be stunned if he was very lucky, or shredded if he wasn't.)

Finally, while it would be a massive undertaking, IL-2's damage models ideally need to be improved to modern standards. That means taking into account things like different types of armor, aircraft construction, and self-sealing oil and fuel tanks, as well as allowing for damage to any aircraft system, with realistic malfunction options.