Fighter Ace ® FAQ

From The Air Combat Wiki

1 General
2 Game Play
3 System
4 Account & Billing

General

How many planes can we pilot in Fighter Ace ®?

Fighter Ace ® features 107 carefully modeled and rendered WWII planes from the Air Forces and Navies of Great Britain, Germany, Japan, the Soviet Union and the United States. You can fly famous fighters, such as the Spitfire, P-51 Mustang, and Messerschmitt 109, infamous bombers, such as the B-17 Flying Fortress, IL-2 Stormovik, and Ju-87 Stuka, venerable transports, such as the C-47 and Ju-52, and rare war birds, such as the Messerschmitt 262, Seafire, and the Ki-84-1c 'Hayate". Refer to the Flight Museum for a complete list of planes in the game.

What parts of the world are featured in the game?

Historical gaming arenas include maps covering the Battle of Britain, the Battle for Central Germany, the Battle of Kursk, the Solomon Islands chain, Midway, and the Eastern Mediterranean, including the Egyptian Desert and Crete. In addition to the historical maps, fictional maps such as the Snake Canyon and Deathbowl, have been designed for fast-paced dogfighting action.

Will the events play out historic battles?

Events will vary in scope from historical re-enactments to entirely fictional engagements to variations of the standard deathmatch. If you have an idea for an event you'd like to see, please send an email to fasupport@ketsujin.com.

How are tanks and carrier ships involved in the game?

In the territorial combat arenas, tanks serve as the mechanism for capturing scenes. If you can safely escort your country's tanks to an enemy scene, they can capture it for your team. If tanks encounter other tanks, they will battle it out until one side or the other is destroyed.

Carriers serve as floating airfields used both for offensive air operations against enemy airspace and for providing air cover for cargo ships carrying the precious tanks toward the enemy coastline.

How are paratroops involved?

Paratroops are used as a fast, mobile attack force. After you drop your troopers, they will use their own weapons to fight enemy tanks and destroy enemy buildings. You will earn points for whatever your paratroops destroy or capture after you drop them.

What is the difference between Dogfight and Territorial Conquest arenas?

Dogfight rooms are designed for pure air-to-air combat and can be either team-based or "free for all". Dogfight rooms are all about straight-forward, fast-paced action. Territorial Conquest (TC) rooms are designed to simulate a complete air, sea, and ground war. The object of the game is to capture enemy territory and players use the full variety of fighters, bombers, and transports to accomplish that goal for their team. See the article here for more details on the differences.

How advanced are the advanced physics?

Every effort has been made to model the aircraft in Fighter Ace ® to perform exactly as the real aircraft performed in World War II. We verify aircraft performance data from numerous sources and use a cadre of experienced beta testers to help us ensure that the planes fly the way they should. Our flight model designer and programmer is Dr. Alexander Starykh, who not only holds a PhD in aeronautics, but is also an aerobatic pilot on the Russian competition circuit.

How do I get flight training?

First, you should refer to the game manual and use it as a guide for basic flight training using the game in offline mode. For more personal or advanced training, please contact a Fighter Ace ® Volunteer Group member, identified by the @FA at the end of their pilot names. The FAVG conducts personalized training in the FAVG Training room online. The FAVG home page can be found at http://www.favg.org

Game Play

Why does my plane keeps stalling in intermediate arenas?

Intermediate arenas introduce induced drag and high angle-of-attack stalls to the flight model. If you find yourself stalling at high speed, it means you are trying to climb or turn too steeply. Let off on the joystick until the stall starts and try not to use full deflection of the joystick for your maneuvers.

My WEP keeps cutting out.

WEP is automatically disabled when your engine temperature gets too high. Try increasing your airspeed and thereby increasing the amount of cooling air to your engine. When climbing, climb at a shallower angle and higher speed.

My plane disappears when I land/take-off on a carrier.

When you land on a carrier, your plane is automatically removed from the deck to allow other planes to land.

How do I drop torpedos?

The drop envelope for torpedoes: Speed:180 km/h (112 mph) to 480 km/h (298 mph). Altitude (above sea level): 15 m (49 ft) to 31 m (101 ft).

How can I skip bombs into the side of a ship?

The drop envelope for bouncing bombs: size: 250 kg and 500 kg only; Speed:252 km/h (157 mph) to 480 km/h (298 mph); Altitude (above sea level): 15 m (49 ft) to 31 m (101 ft).

How long can I fly with my fuel load?

Hit ALT+T to switch fuel load from LBS to TIME LEFT. Note that as your throttle setting and altitude changes, the time remaining will change accordingly.

How can I zoom the map?

Zoom the MAP with the '+' and '-' keys on keyboard (not number pad) or with the mouse wheel.

Can I scroll the map?

The MAP can be SCROLLED by holding down the LEFT Mouse button and moving the mouse. Note that you can only scroll the map when it is at the strategic level of display.

How can I see the status of scenes on the map?

Place your Cursor over a scene or tank column and see the details in the RIGHT margin of MAP. Hold down the shift with the mouse to see the details of any scene hidden underneath tanks or another scene. Note that some rooms are configured to not allow players to see the status of enemy scenes.

How can I access the in-flight menu?

Click F12 to see the In-Flight Menu. Use F12 again, or ESC, to exit.

How can I see who is in the game?

Before entering an arena, highlight the arena name and click the "Pilots" button. In the arena menus, go to the chat screen and pilots are listed in the scroll box on the right. In flight you can use the F12 menu's chat screen or can press ALT+P to get a full-screen list of pilots.

How can I change the plane tags?

Pull up the In-Flight Menu with F12, then select the VISUAL AIDS tab and select the desired tag types.

How can I check my connection?

For an in-game system report of your connection status, press LEFT-SHIFT and L simultaneously.

How can I use the hat switch to see 45 degree up views?

To show 45-degree "up" views, hold down the LEFT CTRL key while using the hat switch.

How do I send messages?

To send a message in the game, press ENTER to get a message prompt, type in your message, and press ENTER again to send the message.

I can't read the text on screen, what do I do?

You can change the screen display colors using the controls on the VISUAL AIDS tab of the In-Flight Menu (F12). You can set up to three different color configurations and can cycle between them using CTRL+8. Additionally, you can view a log of previous text messages using the L key

How do I fire the defensive guns on my plane?

Switch view to a gun position using SHIFT+F3. The gun position name and number is listed in the top right corner along with the "o'clock" heading, elevation, and number of rounds of ammunition available. You can switch between gun positions on planes with more than one position using either the / key or right mouse button for the next position and SHIFT+/ for the previous position. Use your mouse to aim the gun and the left button or CTRL+F to fire the guns. Note that while in a gun position you can still control your plane using the joystick.

How do I use the formation autopilot controls?

To join a formation, first locate and lock onto the friendly plane you wish to form on using ALT+F4 and the next/previous target keys (. and ,). Then press CTRL+A to follow that player. Lock will be broken when that player's plane gets to 100% damage, but if it flies erratically before reaching 100%, you will have to disengage the autopilot manually by pressing CTRL+A again.

How are scenes captured in the Territorial Conquest arenas?

Attack a scene using guns, bombs, and/or rockets to damage it to a point above the damage threshold specified for the room (usually 50%). This will spawn tanks to initiate an attack, if any are available. Then destroy any defensive tanks that appear while protecting your own tanks as they travel to the scene. Once they reach the scene, they will attack it until it is damaged beyond the capture threshold at which point it is captured for your team. You can also capture a scene using paratroopers by dropping them on the damaged scene. See the detailed explanation found here and in the manual for more details.

How does the supply system work?

Refer to the this article for details on how supply works.

How do I gain rank in the game?

Rank is based on a simple "X points needed to be Y rank" table. For details on the rank table as well as how points are earned and lost, refer to this article.

What do the various Levels mean?

The "Levels" refer to the relative difficulty of the physics and other settings in the room. See this article for more details on the difficult levels.

How do I create my own arena?

Use the Create Arena button on the Arenas screen. Refer to the game manual for a complete explanation of all the options for creating arenas.

How do I create a new squadron?

Click here to access the Squadron Creation form.

How do I join/leave a squadron?

Go to the Squadrons screen, select a squadron from the list, and click the "Join Squadron" button. If the squadron requires a password, you will be prompted for it before you can join. To quit a squadron, go to the Squadrons screen and click the "Quit Squadron" button.

System

I can't connect to the game, I keep getting a red screen.

Check your connection. Some people with a ping greater than 200ms to the servers are finding themselves timed out. If the worst comes to the worst, contact your ISP/phone company and ask for them to check the line and try to clean up your connection.

I am experiencing a lot of "micropauses" or even complete freezes for several seconds at a time.

This is the result of the video system getting overloaded with information. To fix this problem, you should reduce your screen resolution and/or graphical details. Additionally, you should try some of the performance tips listed in this FAQ.

I get a message about the wicket server address being wrong when I try to log in.

Please make sure that you have the latest version of the game. Updates and patches can be gotten from the downloads page. Also make sure that your firewall is not blocking your connection to our servers. If the problem persists, please contact customer support.

How I do get rid of the haze?

You cannot. The haze is used to improve frame rates and server response within the large MMP arenas.

How do I get the best system performance possible for Fighter Ace ®?

Graphics Tips:

If your motherboard uses a VIA chipset make sure that you have the latest VGARTD drivers installed, otherwise freezes or crashes are inevitable. These drivers are usually found inside the "4-in-1" package, but many OEMs also make these separately available for download on their web site.

If you are using a video card with 16mb ram or if you are using any model "Voodoo" card do not attempt to use DX8 render option in the game, use DX7 render only.

If your video card is a PCI card you need to set every graphics feature to minimum, even if you have a 32mb or 64mb card. The PCI bus is not fast enough to transfer all the information it needs.

If you have an AGP video card set the "AGP aperture size" in your system BIOS to equal half of your system memory. So if you have 128mb, set the AGP aperture to 64mb, if you have 256mb on your system, set the AGP aperture to 128mb, and if you have 512mb or more of RAM, set the aperture to 256mb.

You need to have DirectX 8.0a or DirectX 8.1 installed for the game to work. DX8.1 generally gives better frame rates, but may cause problems with some motherboards. (click here to download the latest version)

If you are using a Logitech joystick and are experiencing screen-freezes or frame rate drops , try removing the Logitech software, while leaving the drivers installed, of course.

If you are experiencing graphic glitches, try resetting the video card settings to the OEM defaults.

General Windows Tips:

If you are using Windows 98SE or Windows ME and have more than 512mb or system RAM, make sure that you follow the steps outlined at www.microsoft.com/troubleshooting in the section on "Not Enough Memory".

If you are using Windows 98SE or Windows ME, try using a permanent swap file of at least 512mb size. You may also want to try setting the "ConservativeSwapFileUsage=" entry in the [386Enh] section of the system.ini file to 1.

If you have a VIA chipset and are using a Microsoft USB joystick or if you are using the Microsoft Force Feedback 2 joystick, make sure that you use the VIA FFB2 patch, found at www.microsoft.com/sidewinder.

If you are experiencing problems with sound, try disabling the hardware sound acceleration and all other extra features of the sound driver.

What is the AGP aperture and why do I want to set it to a higher value?

The AGP (advanced graphics port) bus is a PC bus especially designed for high-speed data transfer to 3D-accelerated video cards.

Whenever any video geometry or textures do not fit into the on-board video-ram (e.g. with huge maps and many players and tanks in Fighter Ace ®) AGP memory is used first to take up the slack. If there still is need for storage of video elements, the second swapping resource is usually your system RAM, with the third and last option being the swap file on your hard drive.

The more Video memory you have on the video card, the lower the possibility that a swap method will be needed at all (note that the latest GeForce4 based cards come with 128Mb of V-RAM!). In many cases, the amount of video RAM you have on your card is more important to running Fighter Ace ® (and other graphics intensive online games) than having a fast memory, so having 64mb of SDRAM is better than having 32mb of DDR RAM.

The amount of time it takes to swap memory from AGP swap memory to the video card's memory can result in reduced frame rates (in the case of swapping from AGP ram to video ram), a "micro-pause" (in the case of swapping from main system ram to video ram) or a "freeze" lasting several seconds (in the case of swapping from a hard drive to video ram).

The AGP aperture size is the maximum amount of main system RAM that is dedicated to the video-subsystem as AGP RAM, which can be swapped to the video card the fastest of any other swap method. Even though the memory is "dedicated", it is still available to the operating system, unless the video subsystem needs it. Therefore, increasing the AGP aperture size will go a long way towards eliminating micro-pauses the dreaded "freeze". This also means that increasing your system ram, which will allow a larger AGP aperture size, is also a good idea.

I get an error coming up of D8INPUT.DLL (or similar).

Install DirectX 8.0a or 8.1.

Which video driver option should I use in the game and why would I want to use a DirectX 7 driver?

The DX8 selection will give more "eye-candy" in the form of lighting effects and other technical areas, while the DX7 selection will run with a higher frame rate.

If I use the DX7 video selection, do I still need DirectX 8.1b?

Yes, other parts of the game require features introduced in DirectX 8.1b.

If I have DX9, do I still need DirectX 8.1b?

Most probably yes and it can be found here DirectX 8.1b.

Should I upgrade to DirectX 9?

Some users have had problems upgrading to DirectX 9. Before upgrading to DirectX 9 check with your hardware manufacturers for possible problems or incompatibilities with DirectX 9. Also you should be aware that if you do install DirectX 9 and problems occur, DirectX 9 cannot be uninstalled, and you may need to reformat your hard drive. If you are in any doubt whether your system can support DirectX 9, please continue to use DirectX 8.1.

I see different video resolution options, what is this and which one should I use?

The first two numbers represent the "resolution" of the screen, or the number of pixels wide by the number of pixels high. The more pixels the sharper the image and the less jagged edges you will see in diagonal lines.

When drawing a screen, the video card must transfer and display a number of pixels equal to the horizontal resolution times the vertical resolution. So, for the common resolutions we need to process:

     640x480 = 307,200
     800x600 = 480,000
     1024x768 = 786,482

As you can see, the load on the processor and video system is over twice as high at 1024 than at 640. For video cards with 32mb or less of memory and for video cards less capable than the GeForce256 or 1st Radeon, resolutions higher than 800x600 are not recommended.

The third number is the color depth, which is the number of bits that can be used to create unique colors on screen. Although 32 bits is twice as many as 16, the number of colors allowed by each is vastly different. A 16-bit color depth allows for a little more than 65,000 different colors, while a 32-bit color depth allows for about 4.25 billion colors.

In addition to determining color depth, the third number also implies the type of Z-buffering available. With 16-bit color depth, you are limited to a 16-bit Z-buffer, but with 32-bit color depth, you can use a 24-bit or 32-bit Z-buffer, depending on the video card in question. The Z-buffer is a hardware-supported feature that determines the visibility (or invisibility) of objects, maps, etc.

Assuming a basic measurement increment of 1cm, a 16-bit Z-buffer would allow for accurate measurements out to about 655m, which is fine for indoor games, but flight games need accurate measurement much further than that. 24-bit Z-buffering allows for accuracy out to 167 km, which is plenty for a flight game, while 32-bit allows for measurement out to over 42 million km.

So what should you use? A 16-bit color depth will be about half-again as fast as 32-bit, but the 16-bit Z-buffer will serve as a bottleneck on your system and may cause some "jitter" as distance information cannot be as accurate.

In general, we recommend that you use 32-bit color depth if possible, even sacrificing some screen resolution if frame rates are unacceptable.

Some video card and monitor combinations allow the use of different frequencies. This is the scan rate of the display and relates to how often each second the screen updates. Faster update times make the display more stable, but also slow down video response.

I have a Voodoo graphics card. Why can't I get Fighter Ace ® to run?

3dfx, the maker of the Voodoo graphics cards no longer supports those graphics cards. As Microsoft updates DirectX software, new video drivers are necessary for graphics cards to take advantage of changes that have been made. In some cases the cards are no longer able to function at all once users have upgraded their version of DirectX.

It is true there are some third parties that do make device drivers for these cards. However we do not

My computer tries to update the Fighter Ace ® client, but can't. What do I do?

Sometimes other programs that are being run can interfere with the Fighter Ace ® updates. We recommend that you temporarily turn off off any anti-virus, firewall, and pop-up killer applications whenever you are updating Fighter Ace ®. Once the update is completed you should be able to restart these other programs without any problems.

Account & Billing

What are the subscription options currently available for Fighter Ace ®?

Subscriptions are for 1 month at $14.95, 3 months at $39.95, or 6 months at $74.95

When will my account be charged?

Your account will be charged when your current billing cycle ends. For instance if you initially are billed on 11/2/02 and you have a 6-month subscription, you will be charged again on 5/2/03.

I am having problems using my new account and password to log into Fighter Ace ®.

Make sure that you are entering the correct name and password. You need to remember these two pieces of information to be able to log in. If you are still having problems, contact customer support at fasupport@ketsujin.com.

What will happen when my subscription expires?

Unless you cancel your subscription, it will automatically renew at the end of each billing period. If you unsubscribe, you can continue to play until the end of your current subscription, at which point you will no longer be able to access the game online.

How do I update my account information (email address, billing address, password)?

Use the appropriate page under the Account menu.

How do I change my subscription plan?

Log into the web site, then use the account menu to goto the Change Billing Info page and go to the update billing page. There you can update your subscription plan, change your billing address and change your credit card information.

How do I change my password?

Click here to go to our Forgot Password page. Once you enter your Username and answer your challenge questions, you can reset your password.

How do I cancel my account?

Click here to unsubscribe. You will be able to continue playing until the end of your subscription period.

How secure are online credit card transactions?

They are extremely secure. All vital information is encrypted, and kept in a secure location. The billing is done separately from the game environment.

Retrieved from "http://wikipedia.ketsujin.com/index.php/Fighter_Ace_%C2%AE_FAQ"