Is real world time forced in career mode?
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I would be very interested in career mode, but what if I can't fly at the scheduled times? For example, if a flight is scheduled for July 25 at 5am, can I fly it on Aug 1 at 2pm in real life? Will the program set the in sim time to match July 25 5am-ish when I start the flight in the program? Or is my career penalized if I can't fly the flights in real world time as scheduled in the program?
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In short, yes. If your schedule is set for, say, 1st July 2025 at 5:00 AM, Fly the Line will automatically set your simulator’s date and time to match. You can fly at any time in the real world - there’s no restriction there. You don't have to get up early and fly at 5am.
The only thing you can’t do is manually change your simulator’s time to something different from your scheduled time. The app relies on your sim time for all its calculations, so changing it can break things. Best to avoid that.
You can use increased sim rate (you just won’t earn the real-time bonus), and you’re free to speed up time during parking and taxiing - both before and after the flight -without any penalty.
I hope that helps.
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I don't own it, but I read as much documentation as they have on the website about it. My impression is that it will force your sim time to the date/time of the scheduled flight. I didn't see anything about penalizing you for not flying it at that real-world time, and they explicitly say that just because your flight is Monday at 5a doesn't mean you need to be at your sim at that time.
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It looks like MSFS2024 has a historical weather feature so it would likely use that if you're schedule is in the past and I think it will use live weather for anything current or in the future. Fly the Line doesnt currently interact with the weather in the sim so you can change that to whatever you like.
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While FTL creates a time based on a schedule, you can always change it in the sim to whatever time you wish.
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I am not biting yet, mostly because of this forced time. I am always interested in career apps, but I also want to fly during the day (I like seeing scenery) and in suitable weather. That forced time might make this impossible.
@qqwertzde then set your schedule for the summer months. Longer days, shorter nights.
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Hey Tamsini - I've seen a few requests around real time but I'm not quite sure how it would fit with how Fly the Line currnetly works. It's designed to give you a schedule - kind of like if you were working for an airline in that you dont get to pick your work schedule if that makes sense. The rest of the mechanics in Fly the Line kind of rely on this - especially in Career mode as everything you do is based on the schedule.
How would you envision it working? Do you want to start a flight in real time and have it logged or would you want to provide Fly the Line with an off blocks time that you set on the day and you set our schedule? The key thing is a schedule would need to be made in order for Fly the Line to track against so it could be a bit of a challenge - unless of course I've totally misunderstood?
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In retrospect, the thought of real-sim time schedules seems to defeat the purpose of the inner workings of FTL. As much as I would love to see a schedule generated for my airline solely because I'm reluctant on have an external program manipulate anything in the sim, it doesn't appear that it's possible to have this work in real time.
I'm certainly not a developer and I gotta say that I overall enjoy the app tremendously so I'll withdraw my suggestion and ask that other functions in the app get refined, such as some routes are not generated properly (i.e - an Air Canada flight having an arrival at a small airport even though medium airports are supposed to be excluded.)
There are other issues that come about as I am getting to know this app so I suppose getting all the kinks out would certainly make me a happy camper.
Enough rambling...
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It's cool, I like hearing the feedback and everything is thought about and factored in. For example, there could be more freedom in scheduled mode. Maybe there is some real time flex there. I definitely need to let things settle and see what the wider customer base says and then we can start looking at what new features/improvements can be added.
Right now, I'm just focusing on ironing out some of the initial bugs, getting the app stable and then we can go from there.
Keep the suggestions (and bugs) coming!
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To be honest the timings of the flight plan being game generated rather than real life time doesn’t bother me. If I had to fly in real life the time generated by the flight plan then it would be a pain. However, being able to fly at any time I want in real life and have FTL auto-change the game times for the flight plan is ideal.
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So, if I understand this correctly, in game time will only pass when I'm, well, in the game. There will be no penalty when I'm not playing (?)
When a 4 sector schedule starts at, say, Aug-01, and I do one flight per week, it will be Aug-02 after 4 weeks. If I pause for 3 months, all my achievements will be frozen and still available when I continue.
Correct?
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So, if I understand this correctly, in game time will only pass when I'm, well, in the game. There will be no penalty when I'm not playing (?)
When a 4 sector schedule starts at, say, Aug-01, and I do one flight per week, it will be Aug-02 after 4 weeks. If I pause for 3 months, all my achievements will be frozen and still available when I continue.
Correct?
@borisvp From my experience of playing this everyday for the past week;
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Time only passes when you're in game.
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I usually do one flight per day and the days pass according to the schedule. I had two flights in the schedule for 1 July, the outbound and return journey. I flew the outbound on 1 July, and the return the following day, 2 Jul. FTL classed both flights as happening on 1 July. So, the timings and dates in game are not based on real life.
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As far as I am aware there are no penalties for absence. Time appears to freeze when you're not playing, which, for me, is good.
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@NeoGeo78 so currently, does it matter when you conduct the flight in real world? Will FTL just adjust your in-sim time to the one needed for the flight? For example if I can only jump on the sim and do a flight at 9pm local, but FTL schedules the flight to be at 6am, will the sim time be adjusted to 5:20am (assuming you have 40 min until pushback)?
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Yes, so Fly the Line will change your sim time to match your departure time, minus your pushback time. So you can fly at whatever time you like in the real world but you must avoid changing your sim time as this will break the tracking. So if its 9pm local time where you live and your flight is at 6:00am in Fly the Line, it will change your sim time to 5:20am, as you describe above.
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After made six flights I enjoy the schedule function (the career mode is not for me, seems it is intended only for single persons; no family, no childrens, no couple relations, etc.) I'm only disappointed with the date/time: if the schedule is set to flight order instead the date (by example: Day 1 KXXX to KYYY - Day 2 KZZZ to KWWW and so on, and freedom to assign the date and time for each day, may be via Simbrief) Thus, anybody can fly at a desired date and time. I don't know the internal flux of the program, but I think it that can be done relatively easy.
Other thing that I consider an error is the touchdown site: the proper target is 1000 ft. from the threshold (independently of the runway lenght) If the landing zone is set to 2000 ft. Then, the 50% = 1000 ft. will fit the real world.
The potential of this program is very interesting. Hope with the apropiate time will improve.
Kind rgards. -
After made six flights I enjoy the schedule function (the career mode is not for me, seems it is intended only for single persons; no family, no childrens, no couple relations, etc.) I'm only disappointed with the date/time: if the schedule is set to flight order instead the date (by example: Day 1 KXXX to KYYY - Day 2 KZZZ to KWWW and so on, and freedom to assign the date and time for each day, may be via Simbrief) Thus, anybody can fly at a desired date and time. I don't know the internal flux of the program, but I think it that can be done relatively easy.
Other thing that I consider an error is the touchdown site: the proper target is 1000 ft. from the threshold (independently of the runway lenght) If the landing zone is set to 2000 ft. Then, the 50% = 1000 ft. will fit the real world.
The potential of this program is very interesting. Hope with the apropiate time will improve.
Kind rgards.@Rolo-Bach said in Is real world time forced in career mode?:
the career mode is not for me, seems it is intended only for single persons; no family, no childrens, no couple relations, etc
I really cannot see how being a parent/relations/having a job etc (something many of us have) has anything to do with it. The schedules given by FTL do not mean that is what you have to fly in real life. FTL automatically changes the in-game time for you.
If your schedule says on 1 July you have an outbound journey and a return journey to do, it does not mean that you have to fly both flights on the same day in real life. You fly it when you want. If your flight starts at 5:30 in the morning, it does not mean you have to get up in real life for 5:30. If your schedule has two flights in one game day, you can fly them whenever you want in real life. You can fly the outbound journey on one day and the return three days later in real life. The game will see it as one day.
