MeanJim

I suggest starting with the manual and playing through the in-game tutorial missions if you haven't already, and stay away from YouTube tutorials because they can be obsolete. The manual is located in the docs section of the game directory (i.e. for me it's G:\DCS World\Mods\aircraft\FA-18C\Doc). ED really could make it more clear to people that these are there by either installing links to them on the start menu or in the game.

What I see is the red (enemy) contact has the top half as both a caret (enemy) and circle (friendly), and the bottom half a a circle (friendly).

Are you turning the MIDS LVT switch on before you have a GPS signal? The manual's after engine start checklist states: The MIDS LVT knob should only be set to ON after the GPS receiver has been powered and the GPS timing signal has been received, indicated by “GPS SYSTEM” being displayed on the TIME DED page. You can also check the NAV status DED page (4 on the ICP keypad) and make sure SYS and GPS accuracy are high. If you start out in a hangar, this can block the GPS from getting a signal and your datalink will not work. Wait until after INS alignment, the taxi out of the hangar and wait for GPS signal status to show HIGH and then turn the MIDS LVD switch on. If you forget, you can simply turn it off and back on to get it working. This was fixed a patch or two ago, but seems to have broken again. As for your INS issues, the most common mistake I see people do is arming the jet during alignment. The movement during armament can mess up your alignment. If you're not doing that, you can post a track of your startup procedure.

I had a thought the other night. I was doing a long range strike mission on a MP server and was about to RTB. One of the first things I do when switching back to NAV mode is to make sure to press CZ on the HSD, but I got interrupted by some fighters. When I was safe, I just enabled the autopilot on NAV hold while I checked my fuel status. Shortly after that I realized I didn't cursor zero because the steerpoint in the HUD was off. That's when the thought occurred. How is the autopilot going to the correct place if the system has a offset the steerpoints due to cursor slews? Shouldn't the steerpoints and route in the HSD also be offset by the slew? I just had a quick re-read through in the manual sections on slewing and navigation, and it even has a section on doing a quick, temporary fix to INS drift by using cursor slewing.

Press TMS left (short) first to switch the to the SEAD DED page, then you can cycle targets with TMS right. You can find the details on Page 434.

I was as clean as I could get. I was still carrying my empty external wing tanks, and I think two AMRAAMs, but when I realized my fuel situation was critical I jettisoned the tanks and racks. I had a couple of unexpected events on the way in and I had forgotten about that I got the bingo fuel warning, and even then I overstayed a little bit to drop my last bomb. I knew I needed to hyper mile it to get back. I landed with just under 500lbs. of fuel. When I'm doing A-A, it's usually more of a fighter sweep or intercept, so I'm usually not cruising for long. I will take two wing tanks, and a jammer if there might be SAMs in the area. I go full burner up to 30-35,000ft then cruise if needed. That's good to know about the AOA. A while back I did a search for the F-16's best climb rate, and I remember seeing 350Kts, but the 5° AOA thing I just started doing because the jet just feels good there.

You can fly around at MIL power all you want, and you're not going to hurt the engine as long as you don't exceed 1100°C FTIT. When possible, cruise as high as possible. At higher altitudes the air is thinner, and even at full MIL you won't make full power anyway. This past Saturday I was RTBing over 200 miles and fuel was tight. I was at 38,000ft and at full MIL the RPM maxed out at 93%. I do similar to Exorcet, and climb at full MIL power maintaining 350KTS IAS. When I can no longer maintain 350KTS IAS, I climb at 2-3° until AOA gets to 5° and level off to gain airspeed, then start reducing power to maintain 5000-6500PPH fuel flow. Generally with a heavy A-G loadout, I'll make 20-25,000 ft and set 6000-6500PPH, and A-A I go for 30-35,000 and set 5000-5500PPH. One of the CRUS pages shows the optimum altitude for fuel efficiency. At that altitude, full MIL power will also give the optimum speed.

To be more specific, someone in another F-16 that is part of your flight or donor group has transmitted their selected Steerpoint, SPI, or SEAD Target over Datalink. The MKPT529 indicates that it was stored as Mark Point 529. They start at 500 (or is it 501) and increment up each time you receive one. You can select the steerpoint to see what was transmitted by pressing the STPT button on the ICP and enter the number. I take this was on a MP server. This means someone probably bound the HOTAS button assigned to "Transmit Switch - IFF IN" to something like Discord or SRS PTT and doesn't realize every time they long press it, it transmits their selected STPT, SPI, or SEAD target to all of their flight members and donors.

That will work, but you will momentarily change your active steerpoint while editing. Page 202 in the manual describes the easiest way to input a MGRS coordinate and/or add/edit a steerpoint without changing your current steerpoint. Press the LIST button on the ICP, then press 1 for DEST. The first page that comes up will be the UTM DEST page which is where you enter MGRS coordinates, and steerpoints 21 will already be selected. To edit other steerpoints, dobber right to page two, the DEST DIR page, and it's the same as editing from the STPT page. I use this a lot in MP servers with dynamic missions. I plot my waypoints out before entering the jet, but quite often, by the time I take off and are en route, things change and I will need to edit or add a waypoint, while I have the autopilot in nav hold.

I did a quick test in SP, and I get a launch warning for the SA-5 and SA-11 in both the F/A-18 and F-16. I wonder if desync in MP can cause you to not get a launch warning.

When cold starting the F-16 the laser now starts in training mode. Is it supposed to do this, and if so, when did it change? The server I regularly play on only has cold start slots, and I've never had to switch it before. It's been a couple of weeks since I've played DCS MP, and last night when I dropped my first two GBU's they missed. On the second drop, I noticed a flashing a T instead an L, looked on the laser DED page and saw it was showing TRNG for A-G. To make sure I wasn't missing a step during startup, I tried the auto start and when it's finished, it's still in training mode.

When I've had the TRP warning, the tanker just refuses to connect even though I'm in the correct position. I did notice in the first track that the TRP warning came on right as you got to the tanker. It also looked like you opened your fuel door before or just after takeoff, so I was wondering if having the fuel door open too long was causing the issue. The second track looks like you opened it just before pre-contact, so probably not. I have suspected (but had no proof) that something changed recently and/or may be bugged with AAR in the F-16. I don't do it that often and I get rusty. The last few times I've done AAR, I have had several times where the tanker refuses to connect and I don't have the TRP warning. It usually happens if I connect and take on some fuel, then get disconnected because of my fault. Sometimes after that disconnect the tanker will not hook up to me even though I'm in position and stable. I've tried aborting the request and starting over, but once it happens the tanker will clear me for contact and just refuse to make contact even though I'm in position and holding steady. It's probably worth doing more testing and reporting it as a bug if you can consistently repeat it. I'll try it if I get a chance tonight. It's too bad they merged the topic from bugs already, because there may be something going on. I wonder if that can be undone rather than start a new topic. FYI, you can attach files to your post, so you don't need to upload them to external sites.

You have a TRP Fuel warning in your HUD. I've had this happen a couple of times. Once I was able to clear the problem, the other I had to abort and land.

It's a bug. They jiggle a lot more IRL.

I didn't notice it yesterday when I was dropping LGBs on moving targets. I definitely had the box around the point track target, but maybe I didn't notice it disappear when the laser turned on. Today I was just slinging MK-82s, and not using the laser.