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Next Changelog will be pretty big, i'm still developing a few things, big necessary changes and stuff, when i get there i will release a new video, still some features missing id like to implement before. Meanwhile, just a quick video showing a bit of standoff attack, range is about 1nm and height about 300ft. Digital Combat Simulator Black Shark 2025.01.21 - 18.25.32.01 - Trim2.mp4

This needs to be sorted ASAP please. I spent 3 weeks making 5 realistic skins for my upcoming Red Flag 81-2 campaign. After the remaster I found that they don't work with the new version. Now we got the template, so I could potentially spend another month redoing them from scratch, except we can't see it in the model viewer, we can't check existing remastered skins because it's all encrypted. So it's basically impossible. Even if ED 'declassifies' the 3D model and I redo these skins from scratch, they won't work for those who didn't pay for the remaster. If I don't update, they won't work for those who upgraded. Lose-lose situation. Alternatively I could rework all my missions to use the F-5E FC version, so everybody would see the skins (it still uses the old version), but who knows if and when that will be updated model-wise. I never understood all the negativity around the F-5E upgrade, for 10 bucks it's a steal and I'm so happy that module got some attention. However, from a content creator point of view I can't imagine a worse, more destructive way of implementing it. Makes me think twice before hoping for other modules to get the 'remastered' treatment.

So an update for everyone, rest assured the project isn't dead and I'm being peer pressured by my DCS squadron to hurry up with it . I am currently having my usual headache of doing animations (for the 6th time since starting this project) however I am working on it. I do hope to have the aircraft released for AI this year for you all. I will share more news when I have it

How about this NineLine: For all these encrypted assets provide the following in a new forum section called "MISC PAINTKIT DATA". It could be further organized into LAND/SEA/AIR/STATIC subsets. 1 - Default Description.lua 2 - Complete ARG list PDF 3 - Default asset livery folder name for Saved Games 4 - Unencrypted default textures set This still protects the 3D model IP and gives livery makers the ability to access the info they need to make new liveries. I would gladly volunteer to assist in this effort, and I am sure so would many others.

Hello. I don`t understand why we don`t have such capable heli in DCS. It can be used for all types of scenario: anti ship and usual army variant. It will be great addition to South Atlantic, Persian Gulf, Iraq and Europe maps. But the most important it will give us unique gameplay. Why don`t we have anti ship helicopters in DCS yet? In my opinion its a great mistake. So with Lynx we can have army version equipped with 8 ATGMs (HOT, TOW, Hellfire) and naval version with anti ship torpedos and rockets. Also I think it will be super fun to fly with bro (CP/G or side gunner). +1 more thing: this heli has speed record of 400 km/h and can do loops and rolls.

Thanks for the reply 9. Its good to know that y'all are working on some kind of solution. I do understand about the need to protect your property. Personally, I don't feel that we were overreacting due to having little to no information from ED about this issue and I hope that you understand our concerns. Please do what you can to regularly keep us informed about possible solutions, even if it's "we're still working on it guys, no news yet".

Regarding new F-5E Template -- Does it give you the normals? Pilot helmet? Flight suit? G suit? Glass textures? internal pilot textures? There's a whole host of reasons why encrypting the all the textures is bad for community morale. Especially if you've purchased it. I understand (somewhat) if you haven't.

So.... I was able to to create a "new" Exocet MM38 Block 1 anti-ship missile using Admiral189's Exocet MM40 Block 3 from his Normandie FREMM Frigate as the source code. I was also able to access the Exocet model in the DCS main install so no new model or other mods will be needed. Now while I've been known to bend the specs a little in the name of "game play" I do try and keep in mind for many DCS is a hardcore "real world" simulator. So I lowered the the range to the surprisingly low 42km for the ship launched Exocet of the Type 21's time frame. I also used the correct "MM38" designation for the map name (I like short map names, less clutter). I was pleasantly surprise that the new missile worked in the first test . But... I was a bit disappointed when I saw how the ED "Air Launched" Exocet model is textured . I hope to have the files. back to Oban by the end of the week for testing. But then again I'm not sure I've ever seen a Sea Cat missile that can actually hit anything so....

Hello there, currently the grass / clutter option at max is at 1500 distance value, would it be posible to change this distance to be 3 to 4km? Because even at the current max value there is this very weird effect where you can see the grass and rocks literally growing as you get closer to them, its very visible when you are flying helicopters at low altitude. Checks this video: https://streamable.com/tfrdd9 Trackfile (just in case)grass weird effect.trk Game options image: null

No, I very much am NOT willing to do that. And once you try, you'll realize that it's not really practical to use for a substitute tool. That's not even the biggest issue. The issue is load times. It takes me like 3-5 mins to load the sim each time. Vs a single button press to reload a texture - 1 second.. at minimum that's 180 to 300x longer. Just to see a change. It's not worth the time. I click that button at least 45x times a session while doing alignments or adjusting Roughmets or normals. I don't think people understand what that actually means. I spend up to 60 real hours on a high quality livery with custom everything, before it's complete. Just clicking the button replacing it with opening the full sim -- If I did that 45x in a session that's 180 seconds x 45. 8100 seconds or 2.25 hours of straight waiting. No thanks. I have better things I could be doing with my life. That's why this is such a big deal. Now realistically I prob click that button way more than that. But If I cut it down to like even 30x in a session. That's way too much waiting; and it makes it impractical for me to paint with such slow progress.

Turbo mode is a gigantic hack around the OpenXR interface (meaning it purposely misuses OpenXR) that bypasses artificial frame timing limitations introduced by platform developers. It was originally introduced as a workaround to a bug on the now defunct WMR platform (HP Reverb), but it (accidentally) turned out to expose the same issue on nearly all platforms. Quest Link is one of the worst offender and Meta is purposely capping your performance. (source: I am the guy who wrote Turbo mode) Why is Quest purposely slowing down your game? I honestly don't know. What I know for sure is that Quest is not a platform for PCVR gaming, because Meta does not care about this scenario and will not solve such flagrant issues. It isn't the responsibility of app developers (DCS) to workaround inherent deficiencies of the VR platforms that the platform vendor refuses to fix for >2 years. Tl;dr: don't count on Meta to give you a good PCVR experience.

Hello everyone, once again the chain of friendship has worked. A big thank you to our friend Pastrana, who gave us permission to use part of the codes of its magnificent PUCARA for our new project, repair the MQ_9 Predator mod and incorporate a new drone. The Bayraktar_TB2_S an improved and naval version of the TB2 capable of taking off and landing from an aircraft carrier. "see video" the rest is in progress. The mod "2.9.12 CLASS CLEMENCEAU and SUPER ETENDARD" and of course the RAFALE Pack will be repaired. See you soon. DOWNLOAD : https://www.mediafire.com/file/kwzv7q5b0d48fkw/DRONES+PACK+2.8.7+++2.9.12.7z/file VIDEO : https://youtu.be/2b4N2jBJ Press download several times no need to pay Mediafire Salut a tous, une fois de plus la chaine de l'amitié a fonctionné. Un grand merci a notre ami Pastrana , qui nous a donné l'autorisation d'utiliser une partie des codes de son magnifique PUCARA pour notre nouveau projet, réparer le mod MQ_9 Prédator et incorporer un nouveau drone. Le Bayraktar_TB2_S une version améliorée et navale du TB2 capable de décoller et d'apponter a partir d'un porte avion. "voir video" la suite est en cours. Seront reparés le mod "2.9.12 CLASS CLEMENCEAU et SUPER ETENDARD" et bien sûr le RAFALE Pack . A bientôt Eric et Patrick Cuesta

There has to be another way tho. I mean, it wouldnt seem unrealistic to sue people who do it. Just giving us textures and a lua file will not cut it for livery making. My suggestion would be: Include the ModelViewer as a function into the game. This would be a perfect use for the Encyclopedia tab. However, that would pose the question of how you can add in the functions we have in MV. Let me show you which tabs I have open when working on something, and give a general overview of the modelviewer and its important functions: Just to explain why we make such a big deal out if it. (this ended up being a bit longer than I thought) i added some color help to make it easier to understand: LiveriesToolPlugin With this tool we select the liveries we are working on. It gives us a list of all liveries, for all units in the game that have liveries in the first place. CONNECTOR_TOOL_PLUGIN With this tool we cal select the connectors on the aircraft, which is how we usally put on Fuel Tanks, to see how they look on the plane. Scene Window Here we can select the object we are viewing. If you add an Object with the Connector Tool (lets say a Fuel Tank), we can go to the Scene Tab and select it. After this, we can click on the livery in the Livery tool to change the texture we are viewing. This is where the abilities on the Mission Editor ends. Argument Viewer With this tool we can see all the arguments (aka animations and Blendshapes) We use this to extend the gear, open the canopy, move the ailerons and flaps, so we can texture in more detail. Without it, we would have to load into a mission, and then fly and maneuver in certain ways, just to see the flaps fully extended. On some planes (like the flanker for example) The arguments also change the visual shape of the pylon. While on other planes (like the F-16) it controls where or how the Bortnumbers look, aswell as the number they display. Overall, this is one of the most important tools we have, as it saves an excessive amount of time. Texture Viewer Here we can see (most) textures that are being loaded. We can use it to navigate to the folder that has the texture in it, we can view the UV layout, and we can view the texture in detail. Here it shows both the Default, but also the modified textures the livery has loaded. This tool is EXTREMELY useful, as not all textures are located where you would expect them to be (F-16 Fuel tanks are a great example with them being in Bazar, and not in the F-16 Core Mods folder) Reload Textures As you might guess, this button reloads the textures. If you would use the game to look at your changes, you would have to re-launch the game each time you make a change. Obviously, having this button is 500x times faster, which obviously is going to be better than waiting 5 minutes to start the game and load into a mission, just to see that you need to move the camo by a few pixels to make it align across different textures. Environment/Lighting This here lets us view the loaded object in different Lighting conditions. From Dusk, night, cloudy, desert, or Woodland, its a good thing to have, as this way we can get a reference how the skin will look with certain weather options and maps. Generate Lua File This button lets us generate a Lua file, that has all the texture-names and lines for the Description.lua on the aircraft/object we are viewing. Other Notable Tools: FOV tool: Lets us zoom into the aircraft to view areas with more focus Free Camera movement: We can rotate and move the model to get better lighting angles and such, which is very important and irreplacable for making camos, especially when they have smooth, gradients as edges. F1-F12 keys: They let us view the textures in different overlays, those being the following: F1 Regular Lighting F2 Wireframe F3 Base Color (with no lighting, just shows the diffuse textures how they are with no reflections) F4 Normal map (shows the normal maps in a special color view, that helps to see the effect of the normals) F5 Roughness (shows the Green Color Channel of the RoughMets in greyscale, this controls how Rough (matte) or smooth (shiny) the surface is) F6 Metallic (shows the Blue Color Channel fo the RoughMets in greyscale, this controls wether a surface is Metal or not) F7 Emissive (shows areas that emit light (Formation lights, F-15E Afterburner Cans, etc) F8 Material Errors (honestly, i still have no actual understanding what this does specifically) F9 Ambient Occlusion (shows the Red Color Channel of the RoughMets in greyscale, this shows where a surface has a shadow (in simple terms)) F10 Cavity Maps (shows the Alpha/transparency Channel of the RoughMets in greyscale, this adds some extra shade for seams and screws) F11 Combined View (shows all the previous views, has been broken for a few years now) F12 Cockpit Global Illumination (not sure if im correct, but it shows how and where exactly shadows are being applied on the model Shift+F11 Diffuse Light (technically shows how much light is being applied on each area of the model, can be used to see the normal maps better than F4 view) This is a basic overview of the tools we have in Model Viewer, and as you see, most tools we NEED to make skins, are only avialable in the ModelViewer Sorry for the giant message, but i feel like ED/the community mods dont fully realize the importance of the tool, and why we need what we are asking for. I hope this helps with understanding, have a nice day!

Guys, you need to settle down a little, I have asked about a solution to the model editor issue, but we need to protect our models, blame those who like to steal them. But I have asked for a solution that will work here. We have asked for the description.lua example and helmet and pilot textures. But please, let's not blow this out of proportion give us time to look into it, piling on will not help here.

I haven't participated and replied to all threads as such... This question is the most often debated in addition to the never ending "when will it be released" and "is there any news" questions. Argueably they are first and foremost inflationary raised on HB's official Discord, but have been raised here several times. That being said, True Grit is still involved, but mainly for the licences with ED and NETMA etc. and as SMEs. They apparently underestimated the effort and have reached an agreement with HB to take over the development part. HB agreed, but has it's own projects going and priorities. TG was solely founded to bring the Eurofighter to DCS, HB had the F-4E as it next priority when it took over in addition to the further development and support for its existing modules. Unsurprisingly this meant development of the Eurofighter would take longer and got a slot in the cue after the F-4E. That's the reason why it's taking so long. It was TG to announce the Eurofighter, HB wouldn't have made that at that point in time. People often complain, but never bother to check the facts. Concerning the "it's oh so modern bla bla", the Eurofighter is actually one of the better documented aircraft compared to many others and it's not that much more advanced than evolved F-16s or F/A-18s either, it's doable and when there is also support from the operators/manufacturers (True Grit manages the licences and agreements and consists of a bunch of former GAF pilots) there is no reason why they shouldn't be able to produce a believeable, authentic representation of the real aircraft. Yes there will be omissions, but that's actually true for all aircraft, even older. Furthermore many people talk about in-service aircraft, guess what many modern aircraft incl. JF-17, A-10C, F-16C and F/A-18C are all "still in service" and even they aren't 100% accurate on all accounts. Most people can't even tell the difference, but babble about it all day long and fill forum pages, chats etc. with their unqualified nonsense and wikipedia "knowledge". Let them do their job and be patient.

You nor any other ED representative has said anything about any changes that will make community-made liveries possible again after this well understood decision to destroy it. No one has even directly responded to our concerns about the end of livery making. This is as close as anyone from ED has gotten, an offhand remark to put me in my place. If there is something, tell us what it is like we've been asking from the beginning of this thread.

9L, I think there's a misunderstanding here. It's not possible to paint the model at all. The file structure doesn't exist, and the LUA code is unavailable. That's the biggest issue. We can't make anything - not even the hard way, even if we wanted to.

I agree, doing missions with Combined Arms in DCS with this grass is really frustrating. They’ve already managed to implement grass movement based on the jet's speed, so why not increase the draw distance?

Please, increase the range! It's very annoying to see the grass and rocks literally growing 250 meters from your vehicle!

Hello there, while its imposible to know the angular accuracy of the systems in real life because they are classified, there are some OSINT information that indicates what the accuracy of those systems might be (an approximation of course), based on the techniques that they use to find the direction of a threat, i can send you the link of this document in DM. The F-16C, F/A-18C, F-15C RWR, and basically every RWR modelled in DCS uses amplitude comparison to determine the direction of a threat, the accuracy of those systems can be at around 3 to 10 degrees RMS. In DCS both the RWR in the F/A-18 and F-16 are ultra precise, there are simply no innacuracies on it, they give the exact angle of the threat, which is very unrealistic. The only way to have the precision that we have in DCS is by using a phased interferometer system, which will give 1 to 0.1° angular accuracy. But we don't have any system like this in DCS, although you said that you will model this for the apache. We already have a module in DCS that simulates the limitations in direction finding that these systems using amplitude comparsion face, the F-14 Tomcat by heatblur, the HB ALR-67 simulation in DCS has an angular accuracy of 10-15 degree RMS. I will link the forum threads below so you can see how they modelled it. Furthermore, RWRs in DCS are way too perfect in discriminating who is being shot at, while in real life a single threat may trigger the rwr's of an entire squadron, even if only one aircraft of said squadron is being shot at. See this video, an F-15E SME who has been shot by an SA-3 in real life talking about how his entire squadron rwr was triggered by an sa-3 shot despite the jets being several miles apart (video is timestamped): You probably know this, because you coded the AI to react the same way these guys did when they have been shot at. The F-14 RWR in DCS simulates this problem, to some extent. So, is it possible to implement these limitations to the player RWR? 1. Reduced angular accuracy (way too perfect in DCS right now) 2. False alarms - triggering a spike / launch warning even if your aircraft is not being shot at, but the rwr is picking the signal of the enemy rwr either because your jet is near the jet being launched at or because the rwr is detecting the sidelobe emissions of the radar guiding the missile -. Check this comment by IronMike and these two other threads to see how Heatblur modelled their RWR: Some highlights of their modelling: The direction is reconstructed in the 2D plane (the local aircraft frame of reference). For threats significantly outside that plane, their reconstructed direction may be inaccurate, and it usually shifts towards the 12, 3, 6, or 9 o’clock from the true position. The direction reconstruction accuracy improves as the distance from the emitter decreases. For the scan modes of the emitter (RWS/TWS), it’s somewhere around 10-15° RMS. For the emitters in scan modes, a misassociation of a known-threat with a new signal can happen, and it occurs quite often, especially at long ranges. It can result in: ghosts (fake threats) appearing on the display – more probable if you or the threat do some manoeuvres; merging a group of two or more threats of the same type into one threat. For example, a group of two Su-27 flying in close formation, both scanning with their radars, can appear on the screen as one ’29’ until they get closer. IronMike comment

Also a fair argument. I think this will be the most interesting map we get so far though. Definitely the era of military aviation I am most interested in, so this truly feels like a gift made for me specifically.

... too. The new Model Viewer 2 is i must and I think everyone will agree with that. If some DRM option appeared, ok, but it should be followed by an MV update. Please update, TY !

That's it. Afaik ED only uses additional sounds in their promo vids but the visuals are all straight from the Game engine (apart from some color filters perhaps which I also happen to use via reshade from time to time. Also sthe change in gamma makes a huge difference). I think the main reason the game looks so "different" in the promo video is that it doesn't represent actual gameplay. You spend 99% of your flying time in the F1 aka cockpit view. The videos however have 90% footage from 3rd person view angles, landscape shots, fly-bys...etc. Edit: And i might add, that by now they are masterfully set up, cut and edited. GA has become impressively good at it.

Beyond transport flights there wasn't much going on with mil fix wings. We had 3 airfields operating in West Berlin: Tegel (TXL-EDDT) was obviously best known for being the civilian airport of West Berlin. Being located in the French sector, French military made some use of it, though nothing noteworthy. The military apron later was handed over to the Bundeswehr for use of the Flugbereitschaft of the DoD (government/state flights) Gatow (GWW-EDBG) was located in the British sector and 100% operated by the RAF. Tempelhof (THF-EDDI) in the American sector was operated by the U.S. military, yet allowing regional civilian flights most of the time. Naturally, U.S. activities were much more noticeable. In the British and French sector (I lived in the French sector until 1985) you could see the occasional patrol of an Alouette (F) or Gazelle (UK). In the American sector, the situation was remarkably different (had moved into the American sector in 1985). I remember vividly how it felt like there was almost always a U.S. Huey not too far away. The Americans certainly did several patrols a day with Hueys sometimes, a stark difference to what I was used to when being in the British or French sectors, where you didn't notice that much military presence at all. I can still remember almost daily battle sounds coming from the Grunewald training ranges, sometimes even tanks did some practicing. Good old times...

Уважаемый Андрей, пожалуйста не пишите того, чего не знаете. Сейчас такого нет от слова СОВСЕМ и тому есть 3 веских причины. Я конкретно про НИОКР и испытания новых изделий.

I certainly hope not...I love making liveries and textures and custom things, and have been for decades in all flight sims...it's a major love I have of this hobby. IMHO This would be a 1000% misread of the room by ED if this was in fact the direction they were going. I would not buy single livery. No offense. And I would be just as put off if they somehow tied them to these "rewards" or like career mode or whatever, that you can earn as play as Wags eluded to in the recent QA video that they had in mind. No user liveries makes a stale product. Fast. Because you know that ED certainly won't be making any of those custom jobs everyone likes. It would be a LOSE/LOSE situation IMHO.

Better than flying into the sea!!

This is little to no help when a skin in the midst of development when pixels needs to line up and so many other things to come together. In addition, as mentioned by others, there needs to be access to default texture files. Without those, quality of work will suffer. This is all bad news for skin creators in particular, and users of those skins and DCS in general.

I got the Sea Cat launcher tracking targets and firing missiles, but there is a problem. The missiles are actually hitting the targets

The Core Game Sea-Cats lua's are horrendous, to the point they actually are innefective, have a shocking launch pattern, it would maybe be better to use another surface to air missile code, but have it less effective than say the SM.2's I actually forgot that I revamped the Type 21 recently, I've got that many personal projects on the go. I'm trying to trace a decent model of the HQ-6 missile tubes... not so easy, they look like the Sea Sparrow launchers, so might have to use those ...

I'd rather not support this kind of action with my talent. I'm not wasting my life when a better method exits and has existed for years. This is a massive step backwards. With all due respect, they can do what they want it's their company. I do think it's the wrong decision.

I will go with this launcher, it's a close to the Chinese Version

We understand the concerns regarding piracy and the need to implement necessary precautions. However, the current approach has left us with only a template, without any supporting elements,no arguments to work with, no file structure, and no clear direction. It feels like receiving a car without an engine. While i don’t mind launching the game repeatedly if needed, at this stage, we simply lack the essential tools to move forward. Would it be possible for you to provide a sample folder along with an argument list? This would enable us to create liveries content.

By that logic, a determined hacker can probably break the EDCE cypher too. So what's the point?

This answer and the excuses given do not actually answer any of the communities questions and it certainly does not solve any of the problems related to painting the F-5 or any of the new AI assets. You cannot "old school paint" if you don't even know the file structure or the LUA descriptions. Also spending several hours opening and closing DCS itself to see a microscopic misalignment is absolutely ridiculous. We are aware of the fact that ED wants to protect it's models and such, it's old news but then why release a template if it is utterly and completely useless to the community, rather just acknowledge that in the future we will be unable to make skins or that at some point in the future there will exist a way to be able to use the template. Anyhow thank you for trying anyway.

I understood it more as a joint-venture between HB and TG. I don't think TG is "out" at all.

I would be interested in hearing how that is different from any other for profit company.

The nth user, the nth thread the nth repetition of the same doubts, concerns... Boring

I'm hoping we get some more cold war BW ground assets like an Iltis or a MAN Kati. Run off the mill T72A would be nice as well.

If it comes down the line that we would have to pay for skins, (hopefully it won't) then I'd just do without... the fact that there is no official word on this makes me think they may have a problem in this regard... the information void at the moment is not helping skin makers and campaign makers that help and enhance the DCS product. Hopefully, our fears are unfounded and a solution will soon be forthcoming

Until now the DCS ecosytem has lived in the 1-5m2 Radar cross section limit for the purpose of detection by radars. F-35 has, if you are willing to accept the data provided, an rcs three decimal points to the right of that, which render most of the existing in game air radars blind. We dont model the birds and the bees, but this is what an F-35 is, in size. The 90's SAM's in game will be useless, as far as I understand. The Airborne radars, are at least disadvantaged to the point where weapons first launch are a total surprise. In fact, BVR is a bit pointless in F-35 vs anything in DCS currently. DCS is an ecosystem where we want to do more than be a cockpit simulator. I do not accept that it is, currently. Those that like to learn a sequence, thats your game. However, there are thousands, that enjoy having some kind of match, or dare I say it, a 'game', scenario or structured event that goes beyond process. My ask is that ED consider the tools needed in which we can incorporate a module like F-35 seriously now and reserve developer cycles for that in the months ahead. Specifically: Dynamic RCS that exposes F-35 bay doors, gear, aspect to less favourable conditions. Some kind of air AI adversary(s) that can also behave more stealthily, and not just detect, tunnel and fire. (Preferably Russian origin) A suite of 2-3 Surface to Air Missile systems of more current technology that have a better detection chance (Preferably Russian origin) Red Coalition AWACS/GCI networks and systems with up to date detection capabilities. It doesn't have to be a completely seperate two-tiered game, but it will need something more to bridge that gap. The F-14 was an interesting example showing how a module could perform in a mixed technology environment, but the gap between 1m2 RCS and 0.0001 RCS and an AESA is a void that ED needs to fill else the F-35 module won't be able to "play a game" with anyone except the pilot and the systems.

If you want to get one early for MSRP, you need to watch out for relatively small quantities getting dropped and snatch one up right away. For example, by following the GPU Drops or StockDrops discord, or whatever discords, telegrams or other trackers exist for your local market. This is true in particular if you want an FE model, which are produced in limited quantity and sold for a limited time, so you can't necessarily wait for supply to catch up to demand, because by that time the FE cards may no longer be sold new. Telling falsehoods that the MSRP is fake, when the reality is that MSRP supply is very low at first and obviously sells out faster than the more expensive cards, doesn't really help anyone. Note that scalpers worsen this issue, as they buy up stock and hang on to it a bit, creating fake demand early on, even if many of these cards never get sold on. Once the prices start to stabilize, the scalpers return the cards to the stores, so supply can suddenly shoot up at that time. We had reports of huge numbers of 4080's being returned to stores by scalpers during the last release cycle. Note that scalping is worse for stores or countries where there is a generous right to return, since scalpers can just speculate on high demand with almost no risk, as they can just get a refund if they cannot sell the card for the inflated price. However, given that scalping didn't work so well for the 4080, I suspect that there will be fewer scalpers this time around (although we might see plenty for the 5090). That was during the mining boom when demand shot up enormously, and supply was not even close to catching up. Back then most MSRPs were set just before the mining boom reignited again, so they were far too low for the supply/demand situation for the next few years, and thus it is logical that prices never stabilized until Ethereum going to proof of stake ended the mining boom. It is quite irrelevant for the current situation, where we are not in a mining boom. However, we are in an AI boom, but in contrast to the mining boom that impacted all cards, the AI boom primarily impacts the top cards, but the impact is still way lower than the mining boom. I consider it the most uncertain when the 5090 pricing will stabilize. For the 4090 it only took a few months, and the supply of professional AI cards is better than back then, so it's probably going to last a few months again, unless a country like China starts buying 5090s up en mass. But for the other cards, it makes most sense to expect a fairly standard pattern or better than that, where the MSRP-models will be in very low supply at first, and stores may ask inflated prices for the first months. Then again, the 5080 in particular seems to give a very poor increase in performance, so there is a good chance that the demand is particularly low. Rumor has it that the initial supply of cards is very low, and that is of course a major factor. You cannot buy cards that are not supplied to stores. In general the rule with new products is that demand is the highest and supply the lowest just after release. Different things happened in the past and you do not seem to understand what the actual causes were for various price changes and supply issues in the past, and because of that, not able to make a good educated guess based on the information that we have. Anyway, my advice in general is to either be willing to spend some effort to get a card for a good price early, or be willing to wait a bit for prices and supply to stabilize. If you don't give in to the FOMO and just wait for the pricing to stabilize, it is a lot easier. Especially for the 5080, I expect that it doesn't take that long.

Do you know how overflight rights were handled? Was there a corridor that was generally open for NATO aviation, or were permissions needed per flight? Berlin in "ongoing conflict" would have been a heap of rubble after a few hours, so i don't think that Ugra are aiming for that. I also doubt that the death strip would have gone dark in times of heightened tension. Speaking of lights: In the 2000s you could still clearly spot the borders of old west Berlin from the air, because of difference in street lighting. I wonder what the situation would have been in the 80s. If street light apartheid was a thing back then, then Ugra should also try to replicate that. *edit* I assume that both West and East used gas lamps, but Western ones were just cooler/brighter (?).

On another note, what do you think of potentially adding the F-111 Aardvark? Several 3D models out there might look the part, such as this F-111E, which might have seen some action in the years immediately before the US withdrew from the theater. This model is also quite expensive at 200 USD; it's not rigged or game-ready, although it does appear to have separable components. https://free3d.com/3d-model/general-dynamics-f-111-aardvark-tactical-fighter-aircraft-3577.html I am aware there are numerous F-111 variants out there, including the carrier-capable F-111B (that never really took off) and the (rather unreliable) F-111D, in addition to whatever upgrades and modifications each airframe may have received throughout their service lives. There is also an entire line of F-111 aircraft exported to the Royal Australian Air Force, the FB-111 series of strategic bombers, and the EF-111 Spark-Vark, although these may be out of your scope for aircraft that took part in the Vietnam War.

lol, thats not fair when you're one of the greats already I really do not hope for a "Paid livery" DLC down the road, just a broken mindset that not even other sims would stoop to

Not when I can make a better product myself.

Well said. It's not just about the ModelViewer. It's also having access to the core texture files which thusfar we've had access to, and enabled us to do so much in terms of livery creation. I am wondering about ED's direction going forward. If we lose this access and capability, then DCS will lose a lot of its appeal and therefore success.

I have made CapeFrameX captures for DCS 2.9.10.4160 - 11.12.2024 and DCS 2.9.12.5336 - 20.01.2025 for both, the trees issue and the F-5E stutter issue. I know the latter is fixed already but for the trees I'm going to load up a comparison tomorrow. EDIT: Basically, no difference at all. I guess ED is still investigating.

You can, when the model is not encrypted. The new F-5E is currently unviewable in model viewer.

Ok I’ll engage cynical mode for a bit: Don't overanalyse what you see too much. It’s all just marketing B$ and PR designed to hype us up and create excitement for something we think DCS is going to be but what will actually never happen, with the goal of keeping us engaged and coming back. Think of their slogans “thank you for your passion and support” and “thank you for making our dreams come true” and what that actually means. ED is a company that will do what it does irregardless of what we want, as long as they can attract enough people who spend enough on modules to keep them in business. They are not interested in making *our* dreams come true: instead they want us to make *their* dreams come true. Latest Q&A by Wags emphasised them listening to their customers and implementing our desires. That is actually only true as a means to keep them in business. That is all they care about. DCS will never be what we want it to be. But it can be partially, enough of what we want to keep us entertained. ”Don’t ask questions. Just consume product and then get excited about next product!” Ok cynical mode off again. There is still a lot in DCS to enjoy. Take it for what it is.