Vedexent

F-5E or ideally the CF-116 variant

For the same picture/videos that people are posting in thread, I usually load out with one kind of munition, and as "simple and cheap" as the mission dictates: 2-8 x S-13/S-8 2-8 x S-24OM for "bunker busting" 2-6 x S-13/S-8 + 2 fuel for long range hauls, or areas where we might need to loiter/hunt a long time. 2-6 x S-13/S-8 + 2 Kh-25Ml if we expect there are AAD units like an Avenger or Linebacker in the target zone, and we need stand off capability. 2-6 x S-13/S-8 + 2 S-8TsM if flying with a multiple wingmen, or mixed aircraft in the mission to mark targets. I also don't load all my hard points, unless the mission needs it. If we're tasked with taking out a single hardened target, maybe one only needs 2-4 S-24OMs. The fuel savings and maneuvering gains are worth it.

If you're still looking for helicopter wing-men, there's at least 4 of us who fly the Ka-50 in our group now, and most of our missions have slots for the Black Shark and/or Mi-8, now (no Huey slots yet). Two of us are fairly new and trying to master it, so we're on the server and flying the Ka-50 more weeknights than not, right now. Feel free to look us up.

You say you are descending rapidly, but are you pulling negative gravity in your sustained decent? The fuel system isn't designed for prolonged negative G forces, and the engine often starves for fuel when under negative G forces, or flying inverted, for extended periods. I've never really noticed a long term pitch at 700Kph, but I'm usually only going that fast during attack dives, and don't often leave it for 10 minutes in that case.

And people say religious belief is on the wane (i.e. Religious belief: a conviction without direct empirical, objectively verified, evidence; not necessarily wrong, just not supported in a Western scientific sense).

You could be right; I hope you are! But I'm a skeptic - in the sense that I want data not speculation. I'm not a cynic though - in that I am not sure that it won't work unless I have data.

A quick fix - although it will go right back to being "broken" the next time you spawn or load into an Su-25T - is to lean way in close with the TrackIR, and hit whatever you've mapped as the center button. This will mean that when you sit back, the POV will be pulled way back as well. It's a kludge work around at best, but it gets you flying quickly.

I've never played with labels - not even when I was just learning. It seemed to much like being a "psychic pilot". Starting out, I usually found things when they shot me :D

It all takes some practice :) A good key binding reference can be found here: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?p=1842245#post1842245 Also, don't neglect the PDF manual, or searching YouTube - there are some good videos out there. I'm afraid I've not used the Mercury pod much (no Shkval on the Su-25), so I can't help you there. As far as speed, altitude, and target spotting are concerned, that's something I'm only doing when I suspect there are Stingers in a target region: I know from the mission briefing, experience, or just don't know so I'm assuming there are and am trying to "bait" them so I can locate them by following their launch plume back to their position (while I climb out of missile range). Or better, my wingman can locate them while I dodge, and he kills them with Kh-25Mls If I'm attacking ground targets, I tend to be lower (closer, easier to see), or diving sharply (less horizontal movement, easier to see), but you want to be sure you've detected the SAMs first, and either eliminated them or retreated out of their range.

Overloading your plane can be a factor, yes. I see of lot of newer pilots just load everything plus the kitchen sink on a plane. Take only what you need. I almost never fly the Su-25T, preferring the original Su-25, but what works for me is to push the speed well above 600 (and I would think this should be higher for the slower, less maneuverable Su-25T), and pull steadily as far back on the stick as one can, without exceeding the maximum angle-of-attack, as shown on your AoA guage. Keep an eye on your ADI, and keep your plane from rolling left or right through the maneuver by gently nudging you ailerons. Keep an eye on your slip indicator, and keep that centered with your rudder - although if you entered the Immelman smoothly, this shouldn't be an issue. Your ADI will "flip" at some point, as you start coming back down, inverted. Stop looping at around 10-15 degrees above horizontal, and aileron roll over into upright (you'll want to use rudder control on this maneuver). Presto, you should be many hundreds of meters further off the ground. If you started at at the upper edge of the Stinger's range (somewhere higher than 2,500 meter - ideally somewhere around 3,000), this will take you out of the maximum climb altitude of the missile.

I agree that doing an Immelman while someone is firing air-to-air to you probably isn't a good idea; it would make you a big ol' slow sitting duck just hanging there at high altitude. However, in the described context of skimming the upper edge of the engagement envelope of the Stinger, it's just the vertical equivalent of doubling back on your course get out of SAM's range.

Yes - but don't think of it as losing speed. What you're doing to converting speed into altitude. Want to convert it back? Dive. You're not losing energy, you're just converting kinetic energy into potential energy, and back again. Caveat: you are losing some energy to air resistance and maneuvering, and you're pumping some energy back in with engines - so it's not a straight, zero-sum conversion.

This. I'm cautiously optimistic about OR, but I suspect that we're going to see a huge backlash against the OR once the "wow! gee whiz!" factor wears off, and the shortcomings become apparent. It won't necessarily means that the OR will be bad, or unusable, but I strongly doubt it will be as flawless as people are hoping/imagining, and that frustration and disappointment will manifest in "bitch threads". I can easily envision complaint threads about lag, lag induced nausea, low resolution, not being able to see the HOTAS controls, etc. The technology has promise, and I won't discount it yet, but I'm very skeptical that it will be as "kick-ass awesome!" as people are hoping/predicting.

OK, thanks :) I can map the keyboard outputs to hat switches on my HOTAS, so I'll go that route :) EDIT: For future reference for anyone asking, see here for a list of collective and cyclic controls which aren't clickable: http://www.pcpilot.hu/dcs/316-dcs-black-shark-hotas.html?print=1&tmpl=component

Stingers are the bane of the Su-25, Su-25T, and others. You don't get warning like you do with the RWR and radar SAMs. Tactics that work for me: Stay above 3,500 meters out of Stinger range. This might require some Su-25T support, or AI SEAD support if there are hostile mid-to-long range Radar SAM batteries in the theater. While not a great option in single player (AI Wingmen are dumb), you can do a lot better with Su-25s, when you fly in pairs or triples. If you have to stay under the 3,500 meter deck (low thick clouds in hilly or mountainous terrain, for example) do "combat spacing" and continuously scan for Stinger trails. Someone in your group will likely spot the launch. Have your brevity code and squad communication skills sharp. Both in squads, and on your own, learn to defeat SAMS - they can be out-flown. If you're close to the 3,500 meter level, and your speed is good (>600Kph) a hard Immelman turn while pumping out flares is pretty effective. At moderate heights, and high speeds, learn to drag the SAM down by diving until its motor burns out and then climbing and maneuvering hard while pumping out flares. At low speeds coupled with low altitudes, die - you probably won't have a choice. Speed is life, altitude is life insurance. As some have already suggested, if you're running in on a target way-point, assume there will be Stinger AADs, and pump out flare preemptively as you make your attack run. Multiple planes works well here too. One plane runs in, one plane orbits and watches for launches. Again: know your brevity code - "um, there's a SAM launch coming from a point where that river runs by the south end of the villi... oh, you're dead." isn't an effective warning :P You can use this setup offensively as well. If you're flying with a wingman, and at least one of you is carrying stand-off weapons like the Kh-25Ml "Karens", then you can play "bait-and-kill". One plane can buzz the target zone at 600-700 Kph @ ~2,500-3,000 meter altitude to draw Stinger fire, then Immelman out of range. The other plane stands back a kilometer or two, and notes the position of the AAD, and kills it with the Karens. If the hunter pilot is really good, you can hose down an Avenger or Chaparral with S-13s from outside its launch range, but this takes some aiming skill. To practice this all, you can set up a mission with a single Avenger, or a small group of them, and "dance" with them. You can actually bait an Avenger to fire off all its Stingers ( 8 ) Once he runs out, he's helpless and you can smack him down :D Good luck! :)

OK - here's a rookie question. I'm slowing building a joystick profile for the Black Shark, but I'm only wanting to map buttons which don't have a clickable control in the cockpit. Is there a control for weapon pylon selection (I/Y)? I searched the cockpit tooltips, but I don't see one.

Thank you very much, that looks perfect :)

I've done some searching, and I can find the excellent HD Ricardo's BS2 mod, but it is - sadly, for me - in English. I have searched, and I didn't find any HD Russian Black Shark cockpits. Does one exist? Can someone point me in its direction, if so? Thank you

I have one and have never had any issues - but I only used it for "low impact" simulation flying (docking maneuvers in Kerbal Space Program), so it's possible the build quality just doesn't lend itself to long hard use.

Indeed - I've heard good things about the Logitech Extreme 3D Pro, which can be had for under $30, although I've never used it for DCS World. It's got all the basic axis, a handful of buttons, and a throttle control.

The Su-25 throttle should scale smoothly with the keyboard - I can't speak to game controllers. ---- and ... trying to compare aircraft is semi-pointless. The A-10 doesn't fly "a lot better", or "a lot worse" - they fly differently. e.g. A-10 has higher operational ceiling, but is slower. The best you can say about any aircraft comparison is that in situation X, aircraft Y works better than aircraft Z - situations constantly turn the tables back and forth. It is true, however, that in general the "DCS" level modules are higher fidelity, so the DCS A-10C is more detailed and challenging to learn than the stock Su-25 variants.

You're welcome to check us out. We're not hardcore MilSim, but we do like large scale, integrated missions (ground command, CAS, CAP, SEAD all in the same mission). We're Russian aircraft centric, which does include the Ka-50 (in fact we've just started integrating the Ka-50 as a consistent part of our mission designs). We're still fairly small, so we know each other pretty well - and there's a small cadre that's around most nights. Our server and TS are publicly accessible - so feel free to drop in any time (we're usually on evenings EDT).

There are tons. And we'll all weigh in here, I'm sure :D Question really is - what kind of aircraft and and mission types interest you? There are groups devoted to just acrobatic flying. There are groups devoted to A-10 missions, there are laid back groups, there are hardcore MilSim groups, etc. We happen to like Russian aircraft, integrated operations (combined ground command ,SEAD,CAP, and CAS all in the same mission), with a large dose of realism without getting fanatical. We've also a fairly small core group (<10) right now, so we all know each other pretty well. If that might fit what you're looking for, check us out (see signature below). If not, good luck with your search :)

Why would this worry you? As far as aircraft performance is concerned, pilots are the weak point; you can push a fighter airframe much further than a pilot can survive, these days. Now - removing a Human's control and oversight, that I can see being worried about. Totally autonomous aircraft with weapon payloads is a recipe for disaster given the state of Artificial Stupidity - so that leaves us with remote operations, or remote oversite and large scale control with limited autonomy. The latter is how they control probes on different planets, given the speed-of-light control lag issues; give the platform high-level goals, and let the AI handle the execution: "Go to this crater. Get samples from this rock", "Fly to this zone. Identify targets with this profile. You have kill authorization on contact #4". This is about as far as I can see pushing this envelope. And, as some have already pointed out, complex communication networks can be fragile. However, there's nothing "magic" about having a human pilot on the platform; it all comes down to functionality. If a system can be put it place that performs better, works consistently, and is safe enough (that is, not more collateral and friendly casulties than one sees with Human pilots), then I don't see issues. And enough money is being thrown at this that I'm pretty sure this will happen. Of course - it's not nearly as fun to simulate, so I'd probably not get a hypothetical DCS: UAV and keep my mostly manual Su-25 or MiG-21bis, thank you.

I think it's funny. However, it did make it harder to check the forums at work as I got the occasional odd glance from nearby coworkers when I accidentally brushed the mouse pointer against bulbs... :D (yeah, I know ... mute the sound ... and get back to work ... :music_whistling:)