Zychon

Late to the party as usual... I can't speak on the flight model as I have no experience with it nor any historical knowledge. Just not a grognard. But it seems right. Torque being dominant at low speeds, makes the wing dip, then the nose blocks what little air is flowing over the left wing and ...toast. Same thing was happening to me. Whatever the state of the flight model, the instructions are a little vague and I think that's the problem: At 160 Km/h, the tail needs to be coming up. By the time you hit 200 the tail should be level and *then* the A/C will lit itself off of the runway. No 3 point takeoffs. What has basically been happening to you and I is a premature takeoff with too much back pressure on the stick at too slow a speed, because we are still holding the stick back (as per instructions) as we approach 200 Km/h. Be ready for the left yaw as the tail rises, but be careful not to over correct for it. Thankfully the liftoff is pretty immediate, so you can be slipping all over the place, so long as you don't have back pressure on the stick you'll be fine. As an aid, you can first power up to 2600 with the brakes on, then release for the roll without any adverse effects. This might help to give you one less thing to keep track of. I also power through the 2600 mark as I am gaining the first few meters of alt. Hope that helps.

Labels are a factor, but that applies universally across every match up. As of yet, we don't know what parts are in their completed states and what is unfinished. Is the 15's FM as it is intended? Are the performance differences between the A/C realistic? No one is certain about that yet. What we do know is that the MiG is the lighter of the two with more thrust, so to some degree, you will always be in this position in the energy race. We also know that even against an identical twin A/C, if you are constantly pulling for lead pursuit you will lose energy much faster than your opponent. Even in pure pursuit, you are in a reactive position and the delay between observation and action will bring you out of line and therefore cost you more energy per maneuver than your opponent. Most people are familiar with energy fighting from an altitude standpoint, but less so from an angle of attack perspective. You need to trade position (not merely altitude) for energy, and vice-versa. With more inherent wing loading and less thrust, you're going to have to sacrifice position quite a bit and make your move only when you can capitalize from it. I've also noticed in a few videos people electing not to climb at all. This is a mistake. You may not be able to keep up with the MiG in a climb, but hanging out below him will put you at an energy deficit that you will never recover from. There's a space you can occupy in between pulling around on someone's six o'clock and being on the defensive. In that place you can maintain pressure on the bandit and force it to commit to a position where you can go to guns. You just have to find that groove. The AI might fly beautifully, but it makes a lot of tactical blunders. Make your energy state a high priority and you'll have the E to put yourself in a kill position when that happens.

I got most of my "fighting skills" (in other words, "bad habits") from the old Red Baron series. Later on, there was Jane's USNF but most of that was missile engagements. I didn't come back to "dogfighting" until I played Rise of Flight. I played a ton of single player and got my gunnery up to snuff, but Mplayer was where I really wanted to be from the beginning. I started watching this: https://www.youtube.com/user/Requiem10NS/playlists After getting shot out of the sky a hundred or so times, I got enough skill to learn how to not die, and eventually to get a few kills. I talked to a friend of mine, and he told me about this: http://pilotpress.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/inpursuit.pdf Since then I have collected and read all the books and docs I could find online. Every document out there has value, but for me personally the greatest jump from "I know how the thing works now" to "I know how to hunt and kill now" was In Pursuit. It's geared toward WW2 flight sims, but the aspects of the book on the mental game and mental preparedness really helped me.

This happened to me once as well. I assumed I was in some way abusing the engine. Of course I could have actually been grazed by enemy fire, but that's just crazy talk! :music_whistling:

This was my assumption too. Reducing any "residual" lift.

Ah-hah! Yeah, it's a teeny little antenna. Makes sense for its limited purpose. I just didn't know where they were in reducing the weight and size of things this early in the game. Thanks for doing the leg work. I don't know all of the specific gold mines of data on stuff like this, but the one certainty is that I fail at Google. Thanks again.

Concerned with sales/maintenance contracts with smaller nations where is it still a front line fighter, perhaps? Just a guess. The russian military is not a place I'd instinctively associate with transparency. "Share your information with us, please." "Do we have to?" "Not really." "Okay, then No."

BST also recommend fully retracting the flaps before braking. Also braking very early on and gently... which makes for an interesting dance number right after touching down. :) For me it gets hairy if I'm misaligned at touchdown. The rudder is not very responsive even at cruising speeds, so I'm tempted to engage the NWS. But at 145 KIAS, you've got to be very *very* careful. :D FYI: Had some hydraulics system damage the other night and only the nose wheel would drop. I don't think the hyd emer release has been modeled yet. I came in set to no flaps, no airbrake, and setting her down tail-dragger stlye. She did fine.

Wow, thanks El Hadji for the insight! I got as far as Wikipedia, but from there it seemed that it was largely experimental until the Vietnam era. At least for smaller A/C. Still I had no idea it was even attempted with WW1 area stuff ...with a freaking hose and a hand pump! Fascinating stuff. Looking at the nose here has got me wondering: just where the hell is the radar in the Sabre? I know it's not some sophisticated phased array job (it's essentially a simple range finder), but it had to be very small, right?

Insane. Steadier hand than mine! In both of these examples it makes me wonder about heat resistance in the canopy. Obviously, in these cases we are dealing with little or no throttle. But it seems even the radiant heat off the cooling engine would be very intense. I guess up there at altitude things cool off pretty quick. Awesome stuff, though.

The issue here is the way the hardware works many switches have an "off" position. On other words, swith up = button 25, switch down = button 26, switch in the middle = nothing. In order for the switch to do something in the middle, you need to set an "onRelease" macro. When you stop pressing button 25, do <this>. If you don't like the T.A.R.G.E.T. software, there are third party applications like pinnacle game pro.

The shots land right on the dot for me. This may be obvious, but just in case: 1) Keep in mind the gyroscopic sight only works when you track. That is to say: when you manipulate the nose of your A/C to hold the pipper on the target. It is oblivious to the bandits trajectory and speed, you need to help it by holding it on the bandit. 2) The shots will fall right on the dot. Do not lead. You might not think you are, but it's a natural instinct to lead the target with the sight. 3) If your sight is jumping, it's because your radar range rheostat is set to long. The radar is getting reflections from the ground/water and the reflection from the bandit is getting lost in the noise. Decreasing it will help by masking off the ground clutter. Think of it as a flashlight that you can control the length of the beam on. Unfortunately, there is no key binding for this that I know of, and you have to reach up and do it with the mouse. I know of a lot of players who cage the gyro on the P-51 and the F-86 because it helps in lead shots. If you are performing a high deflection shot such as a lead shot, the sight will not come to rest at center until you unload the wings, and even then there seems to be a good deal of lag in its response. This robs you of a nice hard reference point while you are setting up the shot. I use the gyro though, because it greatly extends the reach of your guns. At ranges which would otherwise be very hard or impossible to gauge lead, your shots are right on the money. That's what made it such a deadly piece of technology. Others have to walk the stream of bullets onto the target, getting hits only where the paths converge. With the gyro, squeeze the trigger and they all hit home. In the P-51D, you can set the sight to "fixed & gyro" so you get both. In the Sabre, you have to make do with the cage button.

The F-86 doing this, I can imagine. An F-4 pushing an F-4 is much harder for me to imagine. :joystick:

Makes sense to me. I can use my NVGs in my P-51, after all.

I remember that clip, but don't remember him mentioning any aerial refueling. It was done back then, but I don't think it was common. I'm nowhere near as versed in this as most here, though. It might be best to wait for one of the Grognards to answer. :D As for DCS itself, yes. Planes equipped to receive fuel in flight can do so.

Some poeple might look at this cockpit and laugh. I'm looking at that G940 and Drooling. ...you lucky dog!

On my stock TM Warthog, I set the pitch axis Y Saturation to about 70. Pitch only. I don't even need a curve because even under the most extreme circumstances I can still overload my AoA before the stick bottoms out. I like the other axes to be real responsive though, so I leave those alone. This tweak is only to keep me from exceeding my AoA. If the saturation is at 100, I find myself bouncing from one extreme to the other. To the OP: I have no difference in sensitivity with altitude. When you are at this low altitude, are you at high speeds? This will definitely make the controls more sensitive. Also when you are up around 30,000 ft. and traveling at a good clip, she likes to be handled very gently. Any kind of aggressive moves will do all sorts of craziness. Other than that I don't know what is up. About the brakes: The little documentation we have so far mentions that the brakes should be handled lightly, but early. The screeching sound seems to play when you apply some force, and continues to play even if the brakes do not lock up. I don't own the Saitek combat rudder pedals, but from the looks of them there is not much total travel in the toe. That would make them more sensitive.

I have had the best luck with shots that at least have some AoT. If I'm lined up for a tracking shot (wing loading and keeping the pipper on the bandit) it's ideal for me to have maybe 20 degrees AoT, so I can "saw" the bandit and hit something up front. Alternately, if the pipper is out ahead of the nose, I back off the stick pressure some so he flies through the sight, and the hits walk into the forward half of the aircraft. Almost like a lead shot, but with some actual tracking. Straight up six o'clock shots have yielded pretty crummy results for me. A lot of smoke, not much else. There just doesn't seem to be much back there worth shooting at. The wing root area is a real sweet spot, as well as the fuselage all around that spot -so if you can see some of his flank, that's promising. If you are at high six staring right down the spine, however; you're gonna have to walk the shots up to the canopy. If your line is off to one wing, I wouldn't even waste the ammo. Don't shoot the wings unless you can hit into the root. I suppose any hits on him are better than no hits, but so far it has only made pretty smoke trails for me. The MiG will, however, have little trouble chopping your wing off with a few hits from the cannons regardless of where. One thing that might help is to take a slightly offset position on his six instead of right on his tail. If he pulls to your side, you'll raise your nose to hit his flank. If he pulls away from you, you'll get the high six "spine" shot as you follow. Sometimes they seem to be asleep at the controls and don't do anything. A burst from dead six probably wont be lethal, but it should get him moving around. As might be expected, lead shots and snap shots are actually pretty lethal because they are front oriented shots. Here your little .50 calibers are actually advantageous, as the high rate of fire increases the chance of a hit up front in what is a very short firing window. I've had a few head-ons so far where the pipper was buried in the nose and I shot anyway. I was pleasantly surprised to turn my head and see I had flamed him. Conversely, I have maybe twice been hit by a MiG-15 in a merge, not affecting the performance of my A/C. So don't waste those merge opportunities where he disappears under the nose. Give a short burst and hope for the best. Hope that helps, now for the sight thing... Without the wingspan set correctly, you would be unable to tell if the bandit is at the range you have set for the sight to be true ...unless of course you have a radar to find that range for you. ;) So the ring won't be the correct size, but that's it. The only reasons for setting the wingspan are so you can tell when the bandit is at the range that you have manually set into the sight, or so you can "find" his range by sliding the range dial until the inner ring matches the size of the wingspan. With radar ranging none of that matters. The center dot (where your shots land) will be in the exact same place regardless of the size of the ring. One might even want to purposefully set the wingspan too big to make it more visible. I hate smashing my face into the glass to find it when I'm loading the wings.

Ack. ...been off the forums for a while. Thanks for all of the replies!

So it's a matter of prioritizing then? More weight is given to maneuvers that are on the "match up list"? I took a break from fighting the MiG-15 yesterday and switched to fighting against Sabres. It gave me a little more insight into the AI. Going up against the MiG has gotten me into the habit of hanging on to every drop of E like it was my last, and going up against the Sabre like that revealed ...wow! The AI is just god awful at vertical fighting in the Sabre! I had to snap the brakes almost every time. A few times I watched him literally fall out of the sky sideways. If I go up against the excellent AI in Mustang v. Mustang, I never see this happen. So apparently the AI does have to be "taught" (as in specific instructions) to fly a given A/C, and this part of the project is not yet complete. I always assumed it just used a portion the the FM data. Got me interested now. I guess I have some reading to do.

Sounds great to me as a concept, only I don't think it will be that straightforward (if I understand you correctly -not a programmer here). The choice of a maneuver is much more dependent on the relative positions of the combatants than the performance envelopes. Also, the essence of the dogfight is pretty much pilot "a" trying to trick his opponent into a position where he thinks he should do "x", and then closing the door on him after he has committed, instead putting him somewhere where "a" can leverage all of his advantages while nullifying the enemy's. Of course this is obvious, but think about it. The choice of a maneuver wouldn't be simply picking from a list, but a careful "filtering out" of existing choices (angles, paths, etc). These filters would have to slide based on immediate positional data. How often would this check be made? Constantly? If so, then the AI would be essentially thinking zero maneuvers ahead. How do you avoid it falling for the same old trick every time? At least from a unenlightened "game user's" perspective, programming AI seems to be a very tenuous job. Every choice you give it seems to be be another place where it could simply chose to flop around in the corner attempting to gnaw off its own tongue like some half finished homunculus. Adding these calls may not be making it smarter, but simply demanding it be smarter than it actually is. The idea seems like a good starting point. Just playing Devil's advocate here.

The rudder in the F-86 is the thing getting me. I'm used to "cheating" my shots in the P-51. The rudder in the Sabre doesn't have the same authority.

Here's one from this morning. This is a really protracted fight because of all the mistakes I made. All of you born killers out there will probably spot a ton of other mistakes too, but that goes to prove my point. I'm not really terrific at this and I can beat the AI MiG-15 on Excellent ...eventually anyway. :D They can't climb forever, nor are they bullet-proof. So if you are having trouble, maybe something in this clip will help. My first thought it that you are constantly chasing the pipper instead of conserving E, only because that's how I used to fly. http://youtu.be/cVliS8lTITA

I was dying for the Sabre, now I'm dying for the MiG. ...I think the 15 is my favorite MiG. :D Yeah, I think it's the same AI in the seat regardless of the plane. At least it seems that way. We can say we want that or this from the AI, but I personally have no idea what the cost is in terms of processor. At the end of the day, though; I can't think of any AI that I went up against in any game that you couldn't maneuver into a predictable pattern. It's just a matter of time figuring it out. If they didn't have sniper vision and super E management, you could just kick 'em over like cardboard cutouts. To have these two A/C which were so alike, but with significant differences that change the dimension of the fight. ...in MPlayer?! Yes, please.

Just my .02 here. Been flying the F-86 today vs. the MiG-15. I have had pretty good results in 1v1 against excellent AI. That isn't to say that the AI / Flight model doesn't have problems. The 15 is still beatable, though. I'm not a great pilot, but maybe if I share what worked for me, it might help those here still having trouble. The trouble here as far as I see it is not exclusively in the climb rate, nor the flawless energy management of the AI, but the combination of the two. That said, you can go vertical against the 15, as long as you play it conservative. For most people, I think the instinct is to use all that smash built up in the dive, cut the circle, and close for the kill as the MiG climbs. For me, this doesn't work at all against the MiG-15. When the fight goes vertical, I find that it's best to stay in lag pursuit ...as in waay lag. Just be patient and don't chase the pipper. Especially do not rapidly change attitude in the vertical chase when the MiG does (and he will). Just come over the top easy, don't try to pull lead as you'll quickly find yourself out of airspeed. Watch him roll over as you come out to inverted, and make your changes in the dive down -not pulling over the top. The Sabre does not seem to like "flopping" over the top with a change in direction. If he immediately goes up again, do not follow. Flatten out. From there you can still stay in the circle fight if you like, just turn easy. This will let you build up airspeed, and should also extend you a bit so he can't just dive down on you. You may not come out on his six, but he shouldn't be on yours either. If you do find yourself hanging at the top, extend and reset the fight. At the very least, your next dive should be longish -do not try to grab lead pursuit. Otherwise, you get stuck in this bad cycle of being at 250Kts at the bottom and 100Kts (or worse) up top, and you are unable to maneuver well. You can screw up magnificently and as long as you are conservative afterwards, you can still stay behind his 3-9 line. As far as finishing it, you need to wait for the AI to make a mistake in the tactical fight. I think this applies to all fighting against AI in DCS (at least where the A/C are evenly matched). The AI may build up energy perfectly, but it makes huge tactical errors. Here are a few: -It never seems to hang on to the altitude advantage, blowing massive chunks of E just as easily as it gains it. -Understandably, it also seems to be limited to reacting to its environment. It doesn't do much proactive maneuvering (none at all as far as I can tell), and it never seems to think a maneuver ahead. -It is incapable of any "sentiment du fer". It can react to its immediate perception of conditions, but it cannot gauge intent. It easily falls for ruses. To be honest, it's horrible at anything except flat scissors and turn/vertical fighting. Lag rolls and rolling scissors seem to drive it bonkers, and every time its in a fight like that, the best it can do is try to squirt out, whereupon it will try to engage in flat scissors fight. Every time. You can pretty much set your watch to it. This isn't a dig on the programming. It's just the nature of AI as far as I can tell. If x, then y. So it will always eventually screw up. Many times, you wont be in a position to capitalize from it, though. Pushing something that isn't going to happen usually means falling down a few rungs on the ladder and having to climb back up. The key is identifying the instances where you can make him pay for a mistake, and then executing. This can be hard too. If I had a nickel for every time I screwed up my own guns solution on an absolute kill shot. ...Grrr. Finally, the damage model. I don't know much about this either, but from my experience wing root hits and front fuselage hits do okay, while wing hits and tail hits just make pretty streamers. The deadliest kill positions seem to be lead shots with moderate deflection and even snap shots. Tracking shots take a lot of rounds to produce anything meaningful, and then only if you "saw" across the fuselage. Unfortunately, you cannot "fan" the rudder with the Sabre like you can with the Mustang. So that was a lot of words which amount to a bunch of conjecture and half guesses. Again, I'm not really a good pilot and I don't know about the inner workings of DCS. This is just what I think has been giving me success. Admittedly, there is a lot of stalemating in my MiG-15 fights, but I can and do kill them, and so far the only times I have been killed (or even hit) have been two "sniping" shots where apparently the pilot was struck. They have never been able to "saddle up" on me. Hope some of this helps.