Jayhawk1971

While this idea may certainly not be something for DCS, I admit I do miss the days when there were such "unrealistic" (by DCS standards) implementations of brand new aircraft in flight sims , like EF-2000/ TACTCOM and F-22 Air Dominance Fighter - and especially Total Air War. Even though everything about the aircraft was how the developers imagined they would work, those games were convincing enough back then, plus, they were a hell of a load of fun. They filled the niche between hard-core and arcade nicely, IMO. I really wish the whole genre would have a renaissance of sorts, with the amount of titles we had during the 80's, 90's and early 2000's. I remember when we had the luxury to not pick up a title, because there was so much competition.

Edit: I am referring to mission 2 Is there a way for the player to change the skin for Paco's bird, from low-viz to the CAG bird for this training mission set? I ask because, at least for me, spotting the "explosive seat warning triangle" on this low-viz skin with my VR headset is really hard (Vive Pro doesn't have the best resolution). This is further being complicated since the player is on the right side with the sun being on the left for most of the time, which makes it even harder to spot with lead being silhouetted against it. Formation flying is still possible, of course, and I realize that further down the road (with the Blue Lions) most Tomcats will come with low-viz anyway, but for the introduction training it would be nice if the reference points were a bit easier to spot, until the overall "sight picture" has been thoroughly imprinted onto my brain. I saw a CAG bird in the intro mission on the ramp, and that livery would make spotting so much more convenient.

Hi Greg, just finished mission 2, and after successful AAR (after I use F10-> F2 option to continue) I am told by Paco to get in a cruise formation for RTB (which I do), I get the "CNN news report", after that, lead sticks in formation with the S3 in its tanker track. I finished the mission by giving up on him and RTB'ed on my own back to Nellis (got the mission complete message after I stopped on the ramp). Presumably its our "old friend", the "AI won't detach from following another AI" bug that still hasn't been fixed by ED? Oh and BTW, you weren't kidding when you told us that this campaign will be hard as hell. Holy smokes. The only "above average" I got so far was for AAR. The rest are evenly distributed between "average" and "below average". I see myself doing a lot of reflying these missions in the next 6 months.

Hmm. That might actually have some countering effect, but then again, not nearly enough to overcome "stache power". Also, I don't think the Soviets ever could replicate Grumman's glove vane technology - it was just too awesome. (it's unclear whether even Hughes/Raytheon could have replicated this awesomeness)

I bet a Phoenix with glove vanes and frikkin' laser beams on top of it could easily kill 10 ICBM's all at once, as long as the Tomcat crew wear Cowboy hats and have proper staches.

This newsletter and the video have left me very excited and optimistic for DCS in 2023. Really looking forward to what the year will bring. Thanks.

This sounds fascinating, but also does leave me a little puzzled. Could you please elaborate a little more on that, regarding the "independent operation"? Does that mean there will be separate installs, or will campaign/mission creators have to pick whether or not to build their content with spheric or legacy maps? How will that work with MP servers? So, for example, if I play Raven One, will it load "flat PG", whereas if I start a hypothetical Raven One Part 3 mission that was made for "spherical PG", it will simply load that (spherical) map? Also, other than a proper "historic" context (like WWII or Vietnam), what would be the appeal to keep using contemporary "legacy" maps (Syria, upcoming Sinai and Kola) over the new spherical maps? Or does Spherical Earth Map quite literally mean "Earth" (as in the complete globe, similar to the other, civilian sim we shall not name)? In other words, we would get the whole globe as a single "map" - with the same or better graphic fidelity as current "dedicated maps", the only "downside" being locked into a present-day timeframe? I understand of course if it's still too early in the development process to really answer these question.

Hi, it seems myself and others have a problem getting the ground crew to remove the wheel chocks on the Tomcat using VAICOM. The feature itself works fine through the F-menu. Of note: the command itself is being recognized, and acknowledged by the crew chief ("Copy". "Wheel chocks are now removed"). He just doesn't do it. Placing the wheel chocks does work with VAICOM, though (getting both acknowledgement and actual placement of the chocks). I don't know if this is a known problem (Discord is not very research-friendly) or if this is still unreported.

HI Flappie, thanks, that worked! Mission went fine, without a hitch. Thanks again for your help.

Hi Flappie, I did a slow repair, flew the mission again, still got the exact same freezing issue, at the exact same point in the mission. Going through the log, it seems I still have those corrupted files. What I did after the slow repair is what I always do after an update: Clear metashader 2 and fxo folders Delete the VAICOM entry in the export.lua (to let the app rewrite the entry) delete the SU-27 model in SceneVR.lua (Scripts -> DemoScenes) This time I also updated VAICOM Pro to 2.8.1 before starting DCS and running the mission. dcs.logdcs.20221226-032033.crash

Thanks, will try!

Had the same (= same symptoms) freeze-crash again, when playing the "Fear the Bones" campaign, mission 8. That's the mission that always gave me troubles regarding freeze-crashes (the other missions in the campaign that I've reflown since 2.8 went without a hitch, also "Zone 5" is fine). Normally the game froze after the first engagement going feet wet, right about when a scripted radio message (and/or related event) was triggered. This time it was shortly before that first engagement, again right when a scripted radio call was triggered. Symptoms are: game freezes, and I get the SteamVR window saying "waiting....". A DCS window with a crash-log option ("send to ED") popped up. There has got be some sort of connection. Anyway, I've attached the crash log. I realize that my system is at or below the bare minimum specs, but other aircraft and other campaigns I've tried (with or without Tomcats) give me no trouble at all since 2.8. I did mess around with page file a little after the crash (set it to have windows handle it for my fastest drive, which is also the location of DCS), but have not gotten around to testing it yet. dcs.log

Thank you Chuck, what a Christmas present! Merry Christmas to you.

Do you use Vaicom or the F10 menu? I've found that when I use the Vaicom voice command to remove the wheelchocks, I get the exact same result as you describe (confirmation, but nothing happens). OTOH, using the F10 menu does work as it should (although admittedly I haven't yet tried in a shelter in Kobuleti).

Remember they didn't specify in which Universe. The Phantom could very well have been released in a couple of thousand different timelines already. It's just our crappy one that gets snubbed....

Thanks guys, really appreciate it! Happy Holidays to all of you!

I guess Reforger II is "no joy" in time for Christmas due to new AI pathfinding issues?

Thanks Greg! I bet it will! Thanks! That'll leave something else to look forward to in 2023, next to the Phantom and the Strike Eagle.

I'd say tomorrow would be the perfect day for a patch which could include the release of this campaign: a Wednesday, the week before Christmas....also my birthday! C'mon @BIGNEWY and @NineLine

DISREGARD. I suspect the "press spacebar" didn't "take" before the engagement. I'm playing in VR, and therefore hit the keyboard "blind", so it's quite possible that I didn't press the spacebar correctly or fully. So if I didn't ID the target correctly, of course they're invincible! This mission I am pretty task-saturated pre-engagement: developing the tactical situation, while scanning for the Wildcard, while also trying to ID targets....all while Jester in the back is - probably - reading the latest issue of "Big 'Uns". It's easy to take something for granted (like a keystroke) and move on. Let this be a lesson for you, kids: always check twice! I was re-flying event 6 yesterday with the latest OB patch, and noticed that Red Air AI didn't die after being hit by missiles and guns. Apparently over the course of the engagement, I happened to exclusively hit the same F-16 ("430") over again, twice with Sidewinders, and later with the gun (after I was "dead" I chased him down with the gun: a) to check if he would eventually die, and b) because I was pissed ). Nada effect on target. Friendly AI did die after being hit, and I got hit eventually and got the usual message....and would you have guessed it: I got shot by F-16 "430". Maybe the latest patch messed something up with the mission editor? Or could it be something on my end? I saved the debriefing that shows whom I shot and hit. I did save the track file as well, but it's kinda large and probably useless for the Tomcat? If you need it, let me know and I'll PM you the thing. event6.log

I'm running 2.8.0.33006 according to the DCS updater.

Hi Greg, just flew Event 5 again (2vunk + wildcard): In the break over Nellis, I gave Hammer the kiss off (text message acknowledged the kiss off and went away), yet the AI stayed on my wing (mimicking my dirtying up the aircraft) all the way to touchdown where it crashed into me and exploded (for whatever reason my right engine was on fire, despite Hammer having been on my left wing). Unfortunately I didn't save the track and I have TacView disabled due to VR performance. Could you or someone else maybe check the mission if you also run into this and - unlike me - have the presence of mind to collect data for ED in case this is reproduceable? The AI generally seems to be hit and miss, sometimes working as it should, other times going totally bonkers, so this most likely isn't related to anything mission specific, but since this is the mission it happened I figured this would also be the best place to mention it. In the previous missions everything worked absolutely fine (been coming back to Zone 5 in preparation for Speed and Angels ), so maybe (hopefully) this was just a weird AI hickup. Edit: Radio was set to button 4.

Ah, that's some unfortunate timing. If the AI bug still persists and you can't abort that refueling "mode" (haven't checked yet), probably the best solution would be to give the tanker a wide berth.