Wildwind

It's not about "attitude". It's about learning styles and preferences. Ultimately, I'm trying to learn these skills the way real pilots learn them (except without the benefit of an instructor, unfortunately). Ultimately, what software I use to do it is less important to me than creating a learning environment that works for me is. I'm not suggesting that anyone else do it my way. My way may not work for anyone else, but it works for me. And in that regard, you can't tell me I'm "wrong", because it's a subjective thing. Your learning style isn't the same as mine, and what works for you likely will not work for me (and vice versa). There were some skills I have been able to practice effectively in DCS (for example, the F-14 is great for practicing coordinated turns because of the yaw string, for example). But for other things, it just doesn't work for me. Some of the most basic skills are just harder to learn in fast aircraft, and every aircraft I have in DCS (except the A-10, which coordinates your turns for you and thus cultivates bad habits) is too fast for training the most basic piloting skills, at least for me. DCS is an excellent simulator, but all the aircraft in it are aircraft you'd never get your hands on as a student pilot, because you aren't ready to fly them yet. This is, of course, by design; the simulator is focused on combat aircraft. And yes, this includes the trainers in the game, because they are all advanced trainers. It's not a fault of DCS, at all... DCS does what it is designed to do.

Certainly not. The reason I am flying the other sim so to get better at flying so I can be better at flying in DCS. It's merely the means I chose to this particular end, not something I'm trying to recommend. The reasons for me to fly the other sim are: 1). To fly slower, lower-performance planes, where I can more carefully evaluate what I am doing right and wrong. Nobody learns to fly in fast jets, and there's a reason for that. Even the TF-51 is vastly faster and less forgiving than a Cessna 152. 2). The maps in DCS don't really encourage one to just go fly. There's not much to explore. 3). DCS brings the constant temtpation to go fight something, because DCS is only fun when you are fighting. Right now when I am fighting I am not learning the things I need to learn. I needed to get away from fighting for a while and just focus on flying. Understand that I am talking about learning the very fundamentals of flight here. Things every pilot learns before their first solo. And yes, you absolutely can learn those things in DCS. But I personally struggle to learn those things in DCS; I needed to go somewhere else to learn them.

I think part of the problem here for us single-player types is that the AI psychically reacts to missile launches it shouldn't know about, which means it will always be maneuvering after a TWS launch. Which makes TWS pretty hard to use effectively in single-player. That's something ED needs to fix on their end, though.

I've been playing MSFS and working on my basic piloting skills while waiting for fixes. I realized somewhere along the way that my problems with low speed controllability/flying the landing pattern in the Tomcat were due to fundamental flaws in my (self-trained via sim) piloting skills. MSFS gives me a way to fly around the world and look at some nice scenery while I practice the skills from the online book Victory linked me. So, when I come back I'll be a better Tomcat pilot by virtue of being a better pilot.

Just wanted to say thank you for what you did do, and I hope that you find a way to accomplish what you wanted to accomplish here.

I'm interested. One of my favorite movie quotes is from Star Trek II, when Kirk tells Savvik, "You have to know why things work on a starship." Why? Because it reflects my philosophy on learning and understanding technical systems. Rote memorization will only get you so far; understanding the underlying logic will get you everywhere. If you know why it works, it doesn't matter if you forget the details of how it works - you can derive the how from your understanding of the why.

And yet, for those of us who play single-player, if the missile is ineffective against the AI, then it's useless. Not everyone plays multiplayer.

It may not make much difference in multiplayer, but it sure appears to make a big difference vs. the AI!

Problem 1; The F-15E is a two-seater. Pilot and WSO. This means you need a WSO to fully utilize it. Problem 2: The F-15E is substantially heavier and has more drag than the F-15C, and therefore is not as good at air-to-air (it's still no slouch, but the difference is enough to be significant, especially in BFM). I would absolutely buy both the F-15C and F-15E, even as separate full-priced modules. They're sufficiently different in role and capabiltiies.

IIRC, Phoenix chaff resistance was reduced in the last patch. I could be wrong, but it certainly seems so given the difference in performance I am seeing between before I realized Steam hadn't updated my DCS (~60^ kill probability with Phoenix vs. AI fighters at 20-25 NM) to after I actually got the update (~10% kill probability with Phoenix vs. AI fighters at 20-25NM

Yeah, unfortunately it pretty much makes the Phoenix useless against the AI because the AI pilots are like those guys in Skyrim that magically know exactly when you shoot at them even if they're 100 yards away facing the other direction, so they will almost always defeat the missile with chaff. I mean, admittedly, I only have about eight missions or so since I downloaded the update, but the pattern has been really obvious. AI spams chaff - Phoenix goes stupid and misses. It's so bad right now that if Sparrow PD-STT wasn't broken, I'd be carrying loadouts of Sparrows and Sidewinders and not bothering with Phoenix. The only thing it's good for right now is making the enemy go defensive, and I can do that with a Sparrow and save weight.

In a heartbeat. This is a "shut up and take my money!" case. There is no aircraft I want more for DCS than a full-fideltiy F-15C. Absolutely none. That even goes for impossible ones like the F-22. Probably the only thing that comes close is the F-14D (which is also in that impossible category, unfortunately, no matter how badly I want it). Just to add, I'd buy any full-fidelity F-15, but I'd really prefer an A or C rather than an E. I want the "not a pound for air to ground" version. Even if it's an F-15A and only gets Sparrow and Sidewinder, I'll take it.

And yet, in DCS I find the AIM-7 to be highly pretty reliable inside of 10 NM as long as I take good quality shots and support the missile. I don't think I've ever hit with a Phoenix inside of 10 NM. Of course, before I discovered suddenly last week that I had never downloaded the latest update (yes, I haven't tried to fly the -A yet; I'm still learning the -B, so I'm in no rush to try the more difficult Tomcat just yet. Eventually, though!) and did so, I had found Phoenix to be highly reliable between 15 and 25 NM (I hadn't gotten around to trying to fly the -A yet, I'm still learning the -B!)... and ever since then, I've had about a 10% kill probability with Phoenix at 20-25 NM vs. fighters where it used to be about 60%. Fired eight last night against MiG-23's and MiG-21's, all in near-head-on intercepts, for example - one hit. Two of them never went active for some reason (yes, I was in TWS).. In those same two missions, I fired four Sparrows at 5-10 NM against maneuvering targets and 3 of them hit. I agree the Phoenix should be the better missile, but (as long as you're in P-STT) right now, right now Sparrow is more reliable.

We can be pretty demanding, I know. But for my part at least, it's because your F-14 module is so doggone good that I don't want to fly other planes, even when something on the F-14 doesn't work the way I expect. So it makes me impatient for fixes. You should absolutely take it as a compliment. For my part... just a bit brighter on the red would be sufficient for me now, honestly, but ideally I'd like all three of them to be a somewhat brighter (especially the red). Right now, I have to fix my eyes on the indexer to see if the red is on (and if the sun is behind me, I can't see it at all), which... fixing your eyes on something inside the cockpit is not something I want to be doing in the groove. For all I know the other aircraft in DCS might be brighter than is realistic, but I don't need it to be that bright. Just enough that I can recognize it at a quick glance, which I can't now.

Heatblur F-14 manual: http://heatblur.se/F-14Manual/ Chuck's Guide: https://www.mudspike.com/chucks-guides-dcs-f-14b-tomcat/ How to get off the ground/carrier? Check Training in the menu, there are training missions for that. Also how to start it up, land it, shut it down, and how to use the weapons. They're pretty good. I don't know how to answer your aspect ratio/field of view question, but I'm sure there's someone around who does.