Stearmandriver

Well what I mean is, AA TACANs and datalink both typically work fine in these missions, in this configuration, so it seems like AA TACAN channel assignment really doesn't matter.

Interesting... is this modeled? It seems my Liberation missions always assign tanker TACANs sequentially starting at 1.

I love when video gamers try to critique the person flying an actual airplane.

Interesting points. That definitely wasn't the case in my most recent occurrence of it, it was at the beginning of a mission and aircraft were just launching. But it might have been worthwhile to try to call inbound and then abort inbound and see if that resets them.

There is an option in the menu, to be used after you trap, to switch the deck crew from recovery mode back to launch mode. This bug doesn't respond to that; it's a seemingly random (but not rare) occurrence of a single cat crew not responding to an approaching plane, while the crew on the other cats do.

Just wondering if this is a known bug already; I've found other mentions of it but not seen ED confirm that they're aware of it. Occasionally (most of my missions run in a dedicated server instance; not sure if that's relevant), the cat crew just refuses to interact with an aircraft. I've seen it on bow and waist cats. When it happens to a player it's just an annoyance as they can taxi clear and go to another cat. But when it happens to AI, they're stuck there for the duration of the mission. The AI aircraft just sits there, and the deck crew just stares at him. If it happens on a waist cat, the deck is now fouled for the entire mission. Last night, my wingman was still sitting short of cat 2 when I trapped 1.2 hours after launch lol.

I tank from an S-3 almost every mission I fly; works fine. I'm not sure what the problem was supposed to be. Now, does the S-3 need a visual upgrade? Oh god yes. Could DCS basket physics overall be improved? Definitely. But the Viking tanker works fine.

All good suggestions. I think I lean on the "stick with the Hornet" fence as well, because you've already got a foundation and muscle memory to lean on with it. Learning something else means starting from scratch. Keep in mind that just because the aircraft has all this capability and flexibility, that doesn't mean you're obligated to use it. What drew me to DCS and the Hornet initially was carrier aviation; the combat aspect was really just an excuse to launch off the boat, go do something, then tank and trap haha. Thus, all I knew about ground attack or CAS missions for the longest time were dumb bombs. Simple, reliable, and I got good results for months, before deciding to occasionally learn a new weapon. A/A with 120s and sidewinders makes you plenty capable. Believe me, I sympathize with the limited time issue!

Nicely done! I've found that when it's time to run, getting low-level causes the AI bandits to lose you and turn cold quickly. Many times, I've silenced my radar (they DEFINITELY respond to being lit up with radar), and turned back in visually and driven in close enough to un-silence and immediately lock (with HMD long range HACQ) and shoot. Can't remember which aircraft types... but yeah, extending and diving to low level can cause them to give up quickly!

Good stuff, thanks. I'm bummed that the Intruder is so far down the list in the development order; I can't wait! But credit to Heatblur for being honest about it, and I know I may be in the minority, to want the Intruder before the others. All the upcoming modules sound awesome. I've just always had a soft spot for the Intruder...

I notice that that was posted 1 hour ago, which is why I thought there was a hotfix. Are you saying that's the current version, and they just updated the next update date? Disappointing. Yeah I guess it depends what style of gameplay you like. I don't love sending poorly armed AI off to die, I like seeing a bunch come back from missions and fly around the boat with me. Plus Hornets aren't cheap in Liberation haha. But really, it's the immersion-breaking issue that gets me. You just can't do this realistically right now. I don't know why it might be, but the last several months I've probably been averaging less than 50% on getting my own wingman to refuel. It's just difficult to understand why devs seem to just be ok with the current level of AI brokenness. If you're gonna brand yourselves as concerned with realism...

Annnddd... I'll be darned. I just checked the patch status for the heck of it, and I see a hotfix dropped 1 hour ago. No patch notes published for it yet, that I can find. Can anyone report if they've fixed the Hornet AI? I won't be able to try till Friday ;).

You can't make the AI refuel, other than MAYBE your own wingman, and that's extremely unreliable. Typically he just heads off on a heading after you tell him to hit the tanker, until he flames out and ejects. You can't make other AI flights refuel at all. Yes, you can probably script a single mission where you can set up some AI flights that work, if you micromanage everything from carrier position to existing air defenses enroute to the target, to the position of the target, to the fact that they're guaranteed not to face any enemy air etc. But that's not particularly fun. Trying to use naval air in a more dynamic environment right now - for instance, in a Liberation campaign - is impossible. You can't use block 20 Hornets because of the takeoff drag bug. You can't use Tomcats because of the taxiing and refusal-to-launch bugs. And you can't use the normal, non-block 20 hornets because they're affected by the same bug as the Tomcats. The entirety of naval aviation is currently hard broke in the beta, for any kind of mission or campaign that uses any naval AI at all. I really do wonder if the devs understand this. It's not just a Hornet bug, or a "minor" AI quirk or inconvenience. Naval air AI currently does not exist. Personally, I haven't used DCS since this became apparent, I've been spending my limited sim time in the civilian sim. I'm genuinely surprised this hasn't been deemed worthy of a hotfix, but I'm sure hoping it gets addressed on the next update, and I'm hoping that's tomorrow lol.

Interesting... I was sure I'd read somewhere that even a momentary press of the switch to the "retract" position commands full retraction, which is how it works for me in DCS too. I'll have to look that up.

Gotcha, thanks. If encrypted, I guess there's no replacing or modifying the files though huh?

Could you point me to the locations of these files? I was going to try a quick replacement, but I'm only able to find two different FA-18C.lua files, and no FA-18A.lua or FA-18C_Hornet.lua at all. Where are these located? Thanks...

Excellent analysis! The question now is... can the current SFM be easily replaced by the old one (from the current stable build)?

Huh. Wonder if there's anything else that makes it work on that mission, or if it was some kind of fluke. They sure won't go with that kind of loadout if you create a new mission.

Interesting. Just curious, is that with the Stennis or Supercarrier? I haven't thought to try the Stennis.

How? I've seen literally dozens of aircraft loaded much lighter than that crash, with no successes at all!

The only ones I've ever seen survive have a light CAP loadout; even one bag plus any A/G stores is too much. It basically makes carrier-based aircraft useless in a campaign.

I have actually shelved DCS for now due to this issue. I like flying liberation missions off the carrier, and that simply can't be done right now unless you're going either all MP, or single ship (I've realized that switching from block 20 Hornets to the default fixes the cat end speed, but invariably one will lock up on the cat and gridlock the whole deck.) Between these issues and the Tomcat problems, the entirety of naval aviation using any AI in the beta is currently hard broke. I would think this would warrant a hotfix...

As far as I know, the last time I tried the A-4 with the Supercarrier it WAS compatible. I'm not sure every external visual animation, like hooking up the holdback etc, worked perfectly... but you got marshaled onto the cat, given the runup signal, and launched.

Ok, tested something I saw on another thread: I changed all my non-client "F/A-18C Block 20" aircraft to the basic AI Hornet, the "F/A-18C", in the mission editor. Even with heavy bomb loads, the basic AI hornets can get off the deck without a problem. So this issue is specific to the complex modules being used as AI. A bit of annoyance to go change their types and then re-arm them in the mission editor, but using the units list filtered by aircraft type, and creating basic saved payloads for them, makes it quick enough. Only workaround I've found so far.

This is my concern as well. The moderators are locking all the bug threads about this, and thus preventing people from sharing this information. Even with light CAP loadouts, they usually don't make it. You can forget about any AI hauling any kind of bomb load off the boat at all. No matter what, they always get a cat end speed of 120kts. Basically, any kind of coordinated naval air ops is completely broken in DCS right now, unless a multiplayer mission with zero AI. Shame, I was hoping to get a couple Liberation missions in this weekend. I don't suppose anyone has figured out where the cat end speed value for AI is located (in a .lua etc.) and this could be easily fixed??