DarkFire

Under most conditions the AOA / G limiter will not allow you to achieve maximum G for your current configuration. It has a built-in margin of safety (as does the airframe) and can also be slow to respond to large stick inputs. Being able to permanently disable the limiter allows a skilled pilot to get closer to the edge but comes at the price of having to be aware and careful of your current G load. Edited to add: as I understand it the Flanker ACS comes with the option of disabling the limiter via a switch anyway, so this mod actually adds to realism. 238thFalcon - thanks very much for developing this mod, it'll be most useful :thumbup:

A point worth remembering when using RBK cluster bombs is that the RBK bombs don't function at a set altitude but operate on a simple timer, so the lower you release them the more concentrated the submunition coverage will be. Similarly if you want wider but less dense coverage release from a higher altitude.

It may be worth noting that this was exactly the tactic employed by everyone and their dog while playing Janes' F-18 in multiplayer back in the day. Hopefully we'll see some more diverse tactics when the bug gets the full DCS treatment.

Or better still, official TacView examples of various combat techniques. I know TacView has increasingly integrated with DCS World, but I think it's time that it was brought on board and fully integrated as a standard DCS World feature, in the same way that TAW had an ACMI system back in the day.

Hmm true. Maybe some large-ish high quality gifs would do.

Excellent idea! Maybe that area of the encyclopedia should feature example videos.

That's probably a bug in that case. The IFF system uses different antennae to the actual radar, so with only the IFF system emitting an R-27ER would have no reflected radar energy for guidance. That being said, it might be complicated by the fact that the real Su-27 EOS has a feature whereby if it's tracking a target that it then loses due to for example the target flying in to cloud, it will activate the radar to maintain a lock. Just to complicate things further, in a heavy ECM environment the EOS can be used to direct the radar in missile guidance mode in order to enable launch of a SARH missile even if the radar itself can't achieve a lock by the normal method.

If you're carrying a war load then the trim authority limit is something that you're unlikely to run in to unless you're at low altitude (<1,000m) at maximum throttle. Even then, with a full compliment of missiles or some A-G ordnance you're maximum speed is likely to be under the point at which you run out of trim authority.

I agree entirely with the 'good way' you described. My original comments are relevant to any feature on any aircraft. As for aircraft variants, personally I'd like to see the most modern and advanced variants for which there's sufficient data to build an accurate simulation, and/or the most recent variant for which significant features aren't so secret that introducing the aircraft as a whole would be merely guesswork, e.g. the F-22, F-35 and T-50.

There is, but I'd advise against using it in the Su-27. Unless the mod has been updated recently it causes the mach meter to misread.

This has been a thing for a while, though the speed at which you run in to the trim limit increases as altitude increases. I'm guessing that the limit is proportional to air density and maximum hydraulic pressure, i.e. maximum hydraulic actuator force.

As everyone else has mentioned, the Su-27 doesn't have a missile launch warning system so to detect incoming IR missiles you'll have to rely on Mk.1 eyeball. That being said, with experience you'll be able to recognise when an enemy aircraft is entering the launch window for a heater and you'll be able to preemptively dispense flares to deny the enemy a successful heater launch. Providing you can see the enemy of course, so in a WVR situation maintaining visual lock is imperative.

If the real-life version of the DCS F-15C has or had the JHMCS then yes, we should have it in DCS. If it didn't then our F-15C shouldn't either. DCS should reflect reality, "balance" is meaningless in a sim like this and should have no place whatsoever in the development process. Simple as that.

Home-on-jam works passively, doesn't require any emissions from your radar. Missiles can be launched in HOJ mode by both the F-15C and the Su-27 on the Russian side (might apply to other Russian fighters such as the MiG-29, but I don't fly it so can't be sure). The problem is that acquiring a target in HOJ mode gives you no range information, so you have no idea if your missile will have enough energy to reach the target. When fighting ECM-emitting aircraft you're much better off using your radar, in both the F-15C and the Su-27. Why? Your radar will achieve burn-through against an ECM emitter long before you reach an acceptable launch range for your missiles. ECM has many uses in DCS, but paradoxically preventing enemy aircraft from launching against you is not one of them.

Fair enough. What little I do know about modelling that sort of thing on a PC is 20+ years out of date. I guess there are ways to approximate some EM behaviours, after all the relevant mathematics has been a known thing since at least the 60's. If it can be simulated to an extent that balances computational performance with realism, then hopefully it's something that ED will consider at some point.

This would be the dream solution I guess, though things would become even more complicated with the eventual introduction of the F-18 and Typhoon since any modelled ECM environment would then have to take in to consideration the likes of the ADM 141/160, towed decoys and even chaff replacement actives like BriteCloud. My opinion has always been that I don't think our desktop PC rigs have enough horsepower to properly model an entire electronic warfare environment, especially not for theatre-wide combined arms operations. Realistically speaking I think we may be stuck with the current chaff-as-flares situation until the point is reached where EW can be sensibly modelled using limited compute resources.

In fairness a "has landed" test is relatively simple. Try using combinations: 1) Time more than x (so it doesn't trigger on mission start) and 1) Unit speed less than 10 Km/h. and 2) Unit altitude less than (airfield altitude + 5m) and 3) Unit in zone. There's also a way to return values for cockpit control settings, e.g. if a throttle is set to zero, but understanding the various codes for cockpit items is well beyond my lua abilities.

Another +1 for Audacity. Relatively easy to use and powerful enough for everything except the most esoteric audio processing. It's more than good enough to record audio for missions and to mix voice overs with sound effects etc.

Yep, if aircraft are waiting in a CAP orbit they generally check in with AWACS and/or GCI and state their availability for tasking. On-call CAS will also check in but with either JSTARS (haven't heard anything about the E-8 since Gulf War 1, anyone know what happened to the project?) or some sort of FAC. Edited to add: turns out the E-8C JSTARS is due for replacement by 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_E-8_Joint_STARS

Could well be the case. I also agree with Ironhand that the situation for the 3rd wave is so chaotic that anything could be happening. Probably nowhere near controlled enough by that point to be able to draw valid conclusions.

That's probably a pretty good summary :thumbup:

Hmm, indeed it was. I re-watched the videos & manually counted all the missiles & got the same figures. Some more observations: 1) It appears that when the AI cranks, it really cranks, and it doesn't appear to adequately react to a target that turns away from the crank direction, therefore resulting in a dropped lock. 2) Other than stated sources such as USAF / USN reports from GW1 and anecdotes about admittedly still-classified British SARH missile testing at White Sands, I have no hard evidence with which to back this up, but I suspect that the Pk for missiles launched within parameters (including kinematic and geometrical considerations) should probably be somewhat higher, where no chaff is used. 3) I'm not entirely surprised that so many of the short range shots missed, particularly as the off-axis angle increased. I suspect that because both the R-27ER and Super-530 have huge boost motors that the necessary intercept paths went outside of the Gmax rating of the missile. 4) This is pure supposition on my part, but I suspect that both the R-27ER and Super-530 were designed with an intercept-the-long-range-bombers mindset, whether intended or otherwise, hence the very high top speed and acceleration values but somewhat lower Gmax performance; as opposed to something like the AIM-120 which was clearly designed as a more general air superiority missile. 5) I may have been wrong about the out-of-beam chaff illumination issue. Assuming a 3-degree half-power main lobe for the N-001, I'm not sure that any of the launched chaff in the videos would have been outside the illumination of the parent aircraft radar. What doesn't appear to be modelled (if it exists in reality, I don't know) is the ability of a missile to turn in again if the parent radar is able to re-acquire a target. I suspect that it may be possible while a missile is still under mid-course guidance, but possibly not after it turns on its SARH receiver. I'm starting to realise just how complex a problem calculating Pk really is, and how many different factors can effect it right up to the point of impact / proximity fuse activation. I'm also starting to suspect that the necessary solution to perceived DCS missile guidance issue (separate from the range problem) is a gentle tweak rather than a radical change.

IIRC there's a story by a viper pilot in the original (early 2000's, cant remember the exact year) Falcon 4.0 manual in which he describes a DACT mission against an F-15C. Pretty sure the story specifically mentions that the Eagle in question had the -229's.

Very interesting. I'm left wondering what caused the misses where no chaff was expended. I suspect some of the launches may have been outside of or on the border line of acceptable launch parameters, but I was surprised to see a couple of the closer range shots miss completely. I'm guessing a few more were probably equivalent to maneuver defeats due to the angles. A very rough visual inspection of the number of ER shots that missed would give a Pk in the region of <5% when chaff is being used. That's a pretty poor performance.