Jayhawk1971

In Vaicom Pro there is a "Clara" voice command. Never had to use it, because I've never been in that situation. Assuming that it works (might test later if I find the time), it must lead to some command, most likely Supercarrier module related.

I suppose that should be possible with direct key bindings (and by extension, Voice Attack/Vaicom): button 1 = ball, button 2= clara. Another easy interim solution could be to ask the voice actor playing Jester if he could record a couple of Tomcat ball calls and replace the the generic pilot voice with that?

As much as I would like to have a more interactive and "autonomous" Jester, I don't think it's in the cards in the foreseeable future. Sure, you could easily program Jester to automatically call the ball at 3/4, but what if the pilot does not see the ball? Or based on the weather conditions set in the mission editor, Jester automatically calls "Clara", but the player does see the ball anyway? And if the player has to tell Jester to call the ball, he could very well just cut out the middle man and do it directly. Impractical and convoluted. The whole point of the RIO doing all the comms is to reduce the pilot's workload, so he can concentrate on trapping on the boat. Having to micromanage Jester even more - especially in the groove - has the exact opposite effect. Maybe once ED implements the overhauled ATC that they're supposedly working on..... I mean HB probably could create a "landing script" where the AI automatically makes the appropriate calls based on the player's location, speed, altitude, state and so on, triggered by a player command ("call inbound" or something). But for that to work you need players that can (and want to!) fly halfway precisely and know the proper procedures....so not noob friendly, or attractive to those who just want to get on board quickly. However, mission designers could get around AI restrictions with heavy scripting. Reflected already has trigger-based comms implemented in Zone 5 and Fear the Bones (checklists, AAR banter, ATC and range controllers, for example). Very immersive, but not very flexible and I suppose a lot of work.

I played the mission again a couple of minutes ago, first time after the most recent patch. Note to self: tell Caveman to go "echelon left" before joining the airliner's wing. Because I forgot just how slow that Greek plane was going, I misjudged my approach speed, and slightly overshot his 3/9 line.....which caused Caveman to crash right into it! Instead of the Russians, it was us! Of course in debrief I claimed the Soviets shot both the Civilian and my Wingman down. Those bastards! I don't know whether ED did fiddle with the AI recently, but it sure does seem to get dumber with each new version of DCS. I mean how can you not see that airliner in front of your nose?! Just imagine if this game was like Tron and those AI pilots were all "real" digital "persons". The MCP would have disabled itself out of frustration. BTW: Does anyone know how to save track files? I always get an error message when I try.

Hi Heatblur, any update on the status of this (in my case eagerly awaited) campaign? As a SP guy, I am beginning to grow bored, because I've played every available campaign and mission for the Tomcat to death. Can we hope for a release this year (preferably before Christmas)? I guess you may be waiting for the AI Intruder to be finished to include it in the campaign (which would be fitting). So "two weeks (TM)"? Then again, we haven't heard all that much from you for a couple of weeks now, which could be an indication that your team is hard at work behind the scenes. BTW, I'm a total mission-making noob, but would it be possible for said mission-making noob to replace the Stennis with at least the Forrestal, or, even better, the SC in the stock missions? Could anyone point me in the right direction? Would spice up a lot of the missions (I'm thinking "Watching the Devil Dogs").

During night operations (that's what mission 1 is), you need to turn on all your external lights to trigger the cat shot. Ground crew would hardly be able to see your salute in the darkness. During start-up, turn on all external lights (right console), but leave master light switch (on the throttle) off. When you are hooked up to the catapult, under tension and ready to launch, turn on the master light switch, and you will be launched.

Disregard. All is fine.

Yes, sometimes I'll get "roger that" from Jester completely out of the blue. My working hypothesis so far is that the mic either picks up background noise (like from the TV), or random noises such as exasperated exhaling (through the nose; which is pretty close to the built-in mics of the Vive) are being misinterpreted as a voice commands. Checking the Voice Attack log, the most common unintentional commands for me are "south" and "navigate steerpoint 2", for whatever reason.

And miss all the "Benny Hill"-style fun? Sniper 1 and 2 parking under the roofed parking spots was a new one for me, though. I've seen the "return-spawned" Vipers do it, though. My post was supposed to be an observational anecdote about something I found quite entertaining to watch, not a bug report (far from it). I do hope that one day (soon) ED will manage to completely overhaul the AI, which I suppose dates back to LOMAC, if not Flanker.

I know. And I believe I've made it pretty clear that I was talking about AI behavior, not mission scripting. Hence why I started the post with "No complaint, just a fun little observation." That was the whole point. I thought the AI shenanigans were quite funny and entertaining.

No complaint, just a fun little observation. Event 3. I didn't leave the mission right away after parking back at Nellis, and instead watched what the different AI units where doing with the F2 key. Good God, they are weird sometimes. - One of the F5 aggressors (41) must have taken it very hard that he got blasted out of the sky by my humble self, and went straight across downtown Vegas, over the Strip, at low level. He even lit the cans as he was crossing over the Strip. On his way back (reversed the route he came) he instead opted for going super slow at high AOA. - Hammer and Dice (Dice, always Dice; now I understand why Bio keeps ragging on him ), instead of parking next to me, opted to go on a little Nellis sightseeing tour instead. He taxiied all the way down the ramp as if going back to 03. At first I thought he was going to take off again. But no, he kept going straight ahead, to probably the most obscure spot on the whole Air Base. F164. I assume Hammer and Dice have a little moonshining operation going on with some of the ground crew ("Goodbye, Mickey Mouse" reference if anyone noticed. Great book by Len Deighton about a P-51 squadron in WWII, anyone who hasn't should go read it). Watching DCS AI doing AI things can be a lot more entertaining than a lot of the crappy movies and shows these days. Edit: Sniper 1 and 2 were not parked at their usual spots, but further on the right under those with the roof. Never seen that before. Maybe new AI behavior after the recent patch?

And still no joy? Did you do the whole "update dance"? My mistake at first was that I assumed I already had the most recent update installed (it already said 2.5.11.1 when I checked, or I thought it did), but nevertheless redownloaded and reinstalled and it worked.

First try downloading the latest AIRIO version from the website and copy/paste it into your "extensions" folder. Even if it says that you are already on the latest version. That's what finally got that command working for others and myself.

I pretty much followed what's in the manual and the readme files: - Downloaded and installed most current Vaicom Pro version. - Downloaded most recent AIRIO extension (2.5.11.1)...twice. - Did the "dance": Vaicom Pro config tab: export (this creates new AIRIO profile) Voice Attack: Import new AIRIO profile Edit profile, manually copy all 9 entries to VAICOM PRO to DCS World profile Delete "temporary AIRIO" profile - Start Vaicom Pro first, then DCS. Close and restart Vaicom Pro. Press "finish" in editor tab and paste updated command list into Voice Attack. - Put the downloaded airio.dll in the extension subfolder folder of the vaicom plugin in the voice attack folder. Edit: oh, and trained the new keywords and phrases. Restarted PC. Now it works.

QWP ("track steerpoint 123") works now after copy/pasting the latest AIRIO version. Thanks.

Same

This ^^ Everything else I've tested seemed to work: "eyeballs", "look for [target]" , set map marker to steerpoint. Tried with the mission "Training Day". I now did everything again as specified in the manual. Will test later. Just to recap the procedure (in case I've missed a step): Vaicom Pro config tab: export (this creates new AIRIO profile) Voice Attack: Import new AIRIO profile Edit profile, manually copy all 9 entries to VAICOM PRO to DCS World profile Delete "temporary AIRIO" profile

I did train them, they are now correctly recognized by voice attack, however somehow not "connected" to the respective Jester action?

I can't get any of the new LANTIRN commands to work. Either Voice Attack does not understand the command (like "Track Steerpoint One"), or if it understands it, does not recognize it (like "eyeball"). I downloaded and installed the newest version, clicked on "finish" in the editor tab, copy+pasted the new commands as usual, even deleted the Vaicom entry from the export.lua. Did anyone get the new lantirn airio commands to work? Update: I downloaded the most recent AIRIO plugin again and copied the .dll in the extensions folder. Now I get voice attack to recognize the commands. Yet, as I am trying to tell him to "track steerpoint 1" (12:17:17.946 TX2 | VHF/UHF ARC-182: [ ] , [ LANTIRN Track Steerpoint 1 ] all he does is switch to waypoint 1. However he's not pointing the Pod onto that area. (come to think of it, why ARC-182 when I talk to Jester?) Edit 2: The command "Track Marker [1..10] to track a map marker also does not seem to be present. Command is not recognized, and it's also not listed under "select keywords".

Here's what I did: I'm master arm on, PH selected, TWS Auto. As the Floggers turn hot, I keep extending to either their left or their right, forcing them to keep turning into me, but still creating some offset. Once I get the launch warning, I fire the AIM-54 right into his face (in TWS), which will go pitbull shortly after launch, which gives the Flogger something to worry about while I beam his missile, drop altitude and have Jester (hopefully) put out some chaff. Simultaneously, I order my wingman to engage bandits. Usually my Phoenix takes out the first MiG while his missile gets trashed, so I aggressively reengage with Sparrows /Sidewinder if wingy failed to take number two out.

VR is not TrackIR. Head movement is 1:1, while your field of view (peripheral vision) is narrower than "real live" (unless you're using a Pimax). So you either have to live with uncomfortable head positions, or get something like Necksafer (that apparently acts more like TrackIR in translating actual head movement into exaggerated head movement - not using that myself, as using VR is my effort to make my flight sim experience more "realistic", not less). Some things that come to mind that may help: make sure you are "sitting" correctly in the cockpit (meaning your head position is where it should be; if not: re-center with the "5" key on the numpad). Also, leaning back while looking left/right helps to reach the switches that are farther back (like oxygen - which actually is the only one in the Tomcat). The F-14 pilot seat is rather "tame" compared to the Viper, where you really have to reach behind you. Using a swivel chair helps, too, IMO. Also, neck problems are realistic:

Same.

That would depend on how far you are so far, but I'd say yes, there are spoilers. There's some radio banter and "CNN news update" shortly after launch which progress the story. Didn't know you were on your first playthrough, so of course please do take your time and enjoy the campaign without skipping ahead! The issue is not that urgent. You're in for quite a ride. It's a great campaign. Maybe someone from HB will take a look at it, or someone else who's already finished the campaign

Could you check Mission 11 (Dawn Patrol) whether you too experience that everything inside the cockpit - including displays, most notably the VDI - get dim when flying under a cloud? Just to verify that it's not just me. One would think backlit gauges and especially displays should seem brighter when the outside light sources get dimmer.

No argument there. Was just sharing my experience as it was similar to what MBot experienced. Should Heatblur or ED find a solution that most can live with - without breaking immersion for the majority of users (those playing flatscreen or with better headsets/GPUs) - it would be great. If not, well, I'll adapt, as always. (echo sounding out the carrier by making clicking noises with my tongue, like a bat? Should look into that...... )