White Owl

Haven't yet watched the documentary, but I recently read Hell Hawks, a kinda lightweight history of some P-47s before and after D-Day. In one interview, a Jug pilot said they attempted to ricochet bullets into the underside of a tank, but it didn't appear to have any effect. He did say they neutralized one Tiger with .50 fire by diving vertically and focusing fire on the engine vents, after which the engine smoked and the tank came to a halt. Once. It was far from common. On the other hand, the book records several eye-witness accounts of flipping Tigers over by dropping delayed-fuse bombs immediately next to them. The bombs would imbed themselves a few feet underground before exploding, thus directing all the force upward. Imagine a bomb going off effectively underneath the Tiger's treads like a 1000 pound anti-tank mine. It'll lift the tank, sure thing. So that's where the ridiculous stories of flipping tanks with machine guns come from; a confusion of separate stories like these.

Yeah I must have been remembering incorrectly about the bomb delay in past missions, or mistaking the delayed explosion when a vehicle burns before exploding. Still, I know that many WWII bombs had delayed explosions. Was this system simply not available on the Mustang?

Simple question. Is the INST - DELAY switch supposed to change the timing for rockets, bombs, or both? I could swear I dropped bombs on a delay before, but the manual says the delay is for rockets. Currently banging my head against campaign mission #24, and the switch doesn't appear to do anything at all. Instantaneous explosions from rockets and bombs regardless of switch position. How is this system supposed to work?

I still suck very badly at air combat, but... I frequently use the range adjust, not so much to aim at somebody beyond 1000 feet, but to more accurately estimate the real distance to target. Instead of matching the ring to the enemy wingspan and read the range, I set the range at 1000 feet and make small corrections from there to judge how much closer to get before firing. I wonder if anybody ever uses the entire range of the K14, though. It seems unlikely you'd ever have use for settings beyond 1200 feet or so.

I thought RRG was making airplanes, a map, some ground equipment, and the initial missions and campaigns for the airplanes. Luthier was very clear about this project being so doable because they don't have to invent anything new. How does changing the cloud render system fit into that? Aren't the clouds handled by ED and DCS World?

Hello. I think this forum looks like the nearest to appropriate venue for talking about my problem. Apologies if I missed seeing a better place. I make gameplay videos and post them on YouTube. See my channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheWinterOwl Here's the current playlist for DCS P-51D Mustang: It's a fun hobby. I get to help spread awareness of games I like! And by allowing Youtube to place advertisements on the videos, I get a little spending money too. Thank you ED for allowing this! :thumbup: In the past, I've linked YouTube's support bots to the official ED notice of monetization rights here: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=85774 In the past, YouTube has accepted this notice and allowed the ads without any problems. BUT! YouTube is not consistent. In the latest round of messages, I received: I realize this isn't really ED/DCS' problem. You never asked me to make videos. You already went out of your way to tell everybody in the official updates that profiting from video ads is okay. I understand that. Still... is there anybody I can talk to about some other documentation? To benefit both ED/DCS and myself?

Okay, a little bit of experimentation reveals that you learn an airfield's allegiance by clicking on it. So to build up a picture of what's friendly, enemy or neutral, you have to click multiple map icons while your airplane wanders around the sky unpiloted. It's tempting to editorialize about this GUI choice... but I won't. For now. That still leaves the question: which airfields can I rearm at? Friendly only, or will neutral work?

My understanding is that RRG doesn't have anything to do with the graphics engine, so complaining about things like bullet hit decals and clouds that rotate around their center when you move your head aren't applicable. Here's something very applicable to the thread. The current stock P-51D campaign is simply terrible. RRG, please don't give us anything like that with the other planes.

Yeah, hit F2 and move the mouse works fine for me. Although the entire mouselook scheme seems backwards! Try to look up, and instead the camera looks down. Try right, it moves left. I'd love to know if there's a way to switch that around.

I just ordered this one after somebody else recommended it. Hopefully useful for somebody who knows how to fly, but not how to fight.

I'm in pretty much the same boat, although I'm still on the next to last mission. How can I order my wingman to engage specific targets? The "Comm communication menu" button does nothing at all. Using the "easy comm" options, if I tell him to engage ground targets he says no. If I tell him to engage air defenses he says unable. If I tell him to cover me, he says he'll engage targets of opportunity, and hits one AAA emplacement. :huh: If I want to rearm, how can I tell where it's possible? On the previous convoy attack mission, I thought it would be really great to have gun ammo, so I landed at the nearby airstrip, but nobody there was interested in rearming the plane. The map displays airfields scattered around... which are friendly; which are enemy? :helpsmilie:

I was assuming the rocket motor ignited and the hardpoint released at the same moment, or more likely even ignited slightly after release. But I'm completely ignorant of how the real system was set up. Did these things ignite first and then release?

Suppose I'll post a link to my whole playlist of Mustang videos: The video series so far is simply playing through the stock campaign. I'm not an expert at this plane or this sim, but I hoped that documenting a lot of the learning process would be interesting to some. :)

Try this mod: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=96116 It greatly improves the way your point of view moves around inside the cockpit; makes everything much more natural. So far it's the only mod for DCS I've installed.

Would it be possible to use this editor to expand the edges of an already existing map? I'm thinking of how much we want just a few airbases in Southern England. I'm thinking that maybe instead of creating a wholly new map, we could make the existing map larger.

Yeah, slower is better so you don't bounce. Bouncing leads quickly to loss of control in this plane. One difference I've noted over other taildraggers in other sims, is the need to be very very active with the rudder pedals throughout the entire landing roll. Other sims will let you get away with using a lot less rudder.

There's something weird going on with the Mustang tails too. I was editing some video of a fight, and while my plane was taking hits I noticed in the rearview mirror what appeared to be half an elevator departing the empennage. Later in that same fight I went to external view, and all my Mustang's control surfaces appeared intact. I'll try to get just that one section of video rendered and uploaded to share here.

I didn't say "the vert stab mostly shot away." Nor did I say "the rudder and elevators severely damaged." I said "the tail shot completely off." As in, the entire empennage removed from the airplane. Currently in DCS, an AI Dora suffering any of the damage described here will immediately grow a new tail and keep flying like nothing happened. Instead of limping home with any of the damage described, the AI will magically regenerate new parts and continue fighting with no noticeable loss of performance. Seems to me, that's a problem that needs addressed.

One point: it's perfectly possible to pledge with a Paypal debit card. That's what I did, with no difficulties. Other than that one point... I wonder how much more we can reasonably expect from the WWII flight sim community. We are a very small niche, ya know? Good thing the average WWII simmer appears to be dedicated over the long term to projects he believes in, and also must have higher than average disposable income in order to afford the gaming PC, the TrackIR, joystick, and other peripherals... but there are only so much of us to go around. In the most recent vid, Luthier made some good points about attracting the larger gaming community, and hinted at solutions to this problem. But those solutions aren't here yet. I'm just happy the base goal was met. :)

I might argue that the AI should stop flying in any controllable fashion after having the tail shot completely off.

If you think you'll be continuing this hobby and making more videos, I recommend Sony Vegas Movie Studio. I've been using the Platinum version for awhile, and it's a lot more stable and versatile than some others I looked at in the past. Nice video.

To be completely fair and honest, I have one time seen the damaged AI plane crabbing a little bit to the left.

I took the mission from the stock campaign that sets you against two opposing Mustangs, and I changed the AI planes to Doras with random skill. I can punch the entire Dora full of holes, knock pieces of airframe completely off, see vapor trails from both wings and smoke from the engine, and that FW-190 displays not the slightest change in performance. As far as I can tell, the AI opponent is never damaged; only killed outright. To kill them, you can set 'em on fire, chop a wing off, or shoot the pilot. But maybe I'm wrong or just unlucky. Has anybody ever seen a 190 with a dead engine, but not on fire? Just a stopped propeller? Or possibly a 190 with damaged/destroyed control surfaces go into a spin?

I like this attitude. :thumbup:

:doh: Methinks a Youtube manager may be needed for this project, just because YT's interface is obtuse and constantly changing.