Dragon1-1

He explicitly said so, the only phase of the approach where you might use the DLC is a high ball close. If there's no high ball, you don't touch the DLC other than to turn it on. It was Victory's in notes on landing the Tomcat. He took it down pending FM changes, but I've got an old version. He told it the way he did it. All corrections are done with stick and throttle, except for one, and even that shouldn't happen if you're flying the ball correctly. If you don't mess up earlier in the pattern, slow reacting engines won't bother you.

This is another mission that doesn't play well in the current version. Running in from the back works (so say this in the briefing!), but rockets are random by nature, and Colt flight doesn't seem to do much against the MiGs. The wingman just gets shot down, but then, AI can't really do high speed low level attacks that are the only way of surviving a run here. Either way, the way DCS calculates damage, 50% on a convoy this big seems excessive. As it stands, you get two passes max before the MiGs get you. If it wasn't for that, it'd still have been a painstaking effort of picking off all gun trucks with rockets or cannons. Also the Strela-10 is not "MANPADS". It's a light IR SAM that's somewhat more capable than your average shoulder launched missile. Not by much, considering the Igla that we have is anachronistic, but it's something that would have been good to know. Also they do have onboard reloads, I saw them shoot at least three times each, though there's a delay after two launches (the crew has to pull out the spare missiles out of the trunk and load them).

It should be engaged for carrier ops, because of the aforementioned hook-eye distance thing, if you leave it off, it'll not be in proper landing configuration. You do not have to use it. As in, the advice I saw about it is (from a real pilot) "if you are high in close, bang twice on the DLC". Nothing more. Stick and throttle, sure, rudder in turns, to stay coordinated, but you should not need the DLC most of the time.

You don't need to use the DLC to trap. It's perfectly possible, and in fact recommended, to land using just the throttle. DLC makes it easier by giving you an option to raise or lower your aircraft without adjusting its attitude. The airbrake is needed because the F-14 has such low drag that without it, it'd come in way too shallow. You do not use it to control the jet.

You could always try to get added to SecDef's Signal channel to get more accurate information...

I'd rather have the Mary-2 airbase, so that we could get a Soviet Top Gun campaign. It would be a perfect spot for the upcoming MiG-29.

All of those things contribute. The problem is sheer difficulty and randomness of the mission. The R-60M turns the Su-25 into something that can put up a fight against the F-5 down low, and they outnumber your flight two to one. The Igla bushwacks you and your wingmen when you least expect it, and it's hard to avoid overflying that particular patch of ground when trying to stay on top in the dogfight. It's also smack-dab in the middle of the area when the merge happens, and it's hard to see that there's anything in that area until they start shooting. AI Phantoms also get mixed in with the MiGs too close to the big SAMs, which proceed to take potshots at them, making their fight with MiGs take a long time, sometimes allowing the MiGs to win. Either of those elements individually would have made the outwardly simple task at the heart of the mission difficult (even with the old R-60 the Su-25 is no easy target), but would not have been too bad on its own. Together, they make it extremely frustrating and luck-based. If you're lucky, the AI can clean the area almost on its own. If you're not, Su-25s will kill your wingmen and mob you, or one of them will drag you over the Igla. As it's impossible to control who the AIs will attack, it more often than not devolves into a furball, and the R-60M makes extending from a Su-25 armed with them a risky proposition. QC should focus on the general playability of the missions. Ideally, the player would get in the briefing all the information needed to accomplish the mission, it should require neither trial and error nor luck, just good tactics. Also, a good idea would be to have SAM FCRs shut down, and only waking up when the player gets close. That would preserve the SAM threat and their area denial role, while not interfering with AI that might wander into its WEZ. In this mission in particular, the Phantoms come in very fast, making the SAMs think they have a shot, which is thrashed the moment the AI starts maneuvering and loses speed, but this disrupts their formation. It would also be realistic, an FCR wouldn't be turned without the EWR tracking anything that could be engaged.

If something in the cockpit wears out long before the rest of the panel, and there's no good way to fix it without outright replacement, then it's a design issue.

OK, what's the reason for them having the R-60M anyway? Are you trying to make the mission pointlessly frustrating? Because if so, you've succeeded. Between the Russian forces in the area (who have an Igla, just in case you blunder into them), the big SAMs disrupting the AI, and the Su-25s being way too good at air to air, this is yet another mission that plays really bad. It seems to be down to luck and DCS AI. Seriously, I suggest you go through the campaign with someone who hasn't played it before. Several of those missions are dice rolls with either DCS AI or with flares. It's beyond changes to DCS messing up the "balance", it needs serious QC, and from someone other than you, who didn't already fly all the missions a million times when making them.

That is for an "Alert 5" aircraft with pilot sitting in the cockpit, in case of a carrier, right on the cat. If the pilot has to run to the aircraft and start it up cold, it's longer.

Maybe, but you only notice when you're flying it. Even when taxiing next to it, the difference in quality is minor. I wonder if the pulldown could be done procedurally by the engine. "Extreme" textures will everything in full res, and "Very High" settings with non-diffuse maps downscaled. Won't help storage consumption, but should help VRAM.

You sure those Iraqi mods weren't indigenous additions? Because they did not, in fact, get any better gear from the Soviets than any other 3rd world country, MiG-29 included. They didn't even get the R-27T and R-73, which miffed them somewhat. They did figure out how to mod the MiGs that they did get, though. No, they might have demanded good gear, but they actually got the same monkey models the rest of the Middle East got. If they didn't, the Gulf War would not have been quite the cakewalk it was (assuming they knew how to use the fancier tech, their big problem was training).

The Viper doesn't like high altitudes very much, but it helps if you can keep your speed up when climbing. Generally, climbing to high altitudes with any kind of load, such as a pair of bags, is not always a good idea, and if you get slow up there, your only recourse is to drop the nose. The Viper has small wings and will never be particularly snappy in thin air.

Having DLC on is actually very important in the Tomcat. That's because it opens spoilers, those little things are not speedbrakes. Spoilers "spoil" the airflow, decreasing lift. With DLC in "neutral", the spoilers are partially extended, thus the lift is noticeably less than without them. What does this mean? More AoA for the same speed. Remember that in the Tomcat, you fly on speed AoA? Well, without DLC, your "on-speed" AoA really isn't, because what on-speed AoA does is put the jet at such an angle that the hook catches the wire just as the wheels slam down. If you mess with your lift, you mess with your hook-eye distance, which is critical for trapping. If you fly the way you normally do with DLC, but you forget to extend it, you're pretty much guaranteed to bolter. Either your pitch will be off, or your rate of decent will be. It's possible for a human pilot to compensate for this (say, if the DLC quits), but the computer is not that smart. Accordingly, ACL will only engage when it senses the jet is configured the way it knows how to land it.

Actually, the first Su-25 squadron was formed February 1981, and they've been in production for three years before that. They were also being produced in Georgia, so seeing them two years early wasn't too bad. The R-60M was a nasty surprise, though, especially since there was no warning in the briefing to expect Soviet attackers to suddenly have all-aspect heaters (would have made more sense on fighters, though in '79 it definitely would have warranted a briefing mention either way).

Just a little anachronism I noticed. The R-60M was introduced in 1982, which means it shouldn't exist at the campaign's timeframe, yet the Su-25s have it. It probably makes them a little too good at shooting down fighters. Also, the Phantoms seem to be SAM magnets in that mission. I think they either fly too high or are getting too far east.

It's well written, but the LGB mission in particular is badly designed, there's zero room for error and not enough time even for the conversation to play out.

There's the old Combat Ready Panel in the pic as well. So that's not even indicative of it coming back as a standalone product. It looks like just a render, anyway, it's not a pic of a real rig (though someone at Winwing probably flies with a rig like that).

It's just an Orion with an extended switch panel. Not a Super Taurus.

This mission plays far better with the fuel tank instead of rockets. No tricks, pop up, one pass, haul ass. If you line up right, you can shack both targets in sequence and pull off before overflying either. Ordering the wingmates to engage mission and rejoin helps, but is not necessary. One thing, for some reason the Hydras are the HEAT version, which makes no sense, against soft targets like that, they should be HE.

Well, I made it, by using a rather cheesy tactic of sending the wingmen way ahead of me to soak up AA-7s, while I waited a while and went after the bombers. Worth noting, I shot both of my Sidewinders, chased down the remaining bomber with guns (no easy matter due to the turret) and then, the MiGs caught me. Thankfully, they were out of AA-7s at this point, but I got launched at twice before a friendly MANPADS took them out. Wingmen all died relatively fast (except one, who couldn't occupy the whole pack by himself), scored no kills, but they distracted the escorts for (barely) long enough. One suggestion that probably had not come up: change the formation. I noticed that by default, they're in echelon right, which is just about the worst formation you can have them in, since it puts them all on the outside of every single enroute turn, and puts you closest to the MiGs. If you swap sides, they're better positioning for baiting Apexes mutual fire support. They should be set up in echelon left by default.

MiG-23s are definitely a bit smarter than they used to be. Shortly after the wingmen engage (on their own, at some point they'll just split by themselves), they just get cut up. Even if they dodge the radar guided AA-7, they usually eat an IR guided one. I have yet to see them down a even single one. Any other intercept geometry gets me shot at by a SAM. I can see the smoke trails, if I keep notching the MiGs, I'll fly into the SAM, and if I try to dodge the SAM, the MiGs get me. As it stands now, realistic tactics are not getting me anywhere. It doesn't really matter if I keep the flight together or not, they're picked off just the same. I might try sending them out ahead instead, and bouncing the bombers once they leave the furball behind.

Closure is not based on IAS. IAS tells you about aerodynamic forces, not about how fast either of you is physically moving through the airspace. Since that's the point of the closure readout, it should be using GS.

Use the mouse for everything that's not on the switch panel. For things that are, you can easily feel them out.

Iraqi were not WP, though, they were vastly inferior models for the 3rd world. The only difference between Soviet and WP version was the IFF.