Extranajero

Unless you fly one of those technothriller jets with a targeting pod and standoff weapons you pretty much have no choice other than to enter the enemy weapons envelope. People who use the Hornet and the F-16, plinking tanks from 20K feet probably wonder what the all the fuss about AI air defence being way too good is about - but anyone who flies WW2, helos other than the Apache and cold war jets knows all about it. Quite apart from the accuracy of things like Dooshka's mounted on tanks, and the BMP gunners etc is the AI's omniscience. They always know where you are, they know you are coming and they have 360 degree awareness. I'll never forget catching a SAM in the face while flying a Viggen at 30 feet, at around M2.0 - I later figured out that the mobile SAM - which was hidden in a fold in the ground - had less than 4 seconds to see me, acquire me and fire before I was out of their line of sight. I don't know what ED's current position is on this, whether it's :- 1) Not a problem , what's wrong with you ? correct-as-is 2) It's too difficult to change 3) Be patient, improvements are coming in two weeks 4) Have you seen our shiny new module ? pre-order it now for 20% off ! It'll be one or all of those

That sounds like a perfect solution, that way the users have a choice if he gets to amaze us all with his sparkling wit and repartee

The reason I don't stop him talking is that there's a lot of vital or at least useful information coming from him. But the jokes and silliness grate on me enough now to have parked the F-14 in the hangar. I personally think that Jester AI is an amazing achievement that is without any precedent in flight sims, but at the same time he often makes me want to strangle him. I'd like to "fly" the F-4 - I've got a connection with the real jet ( the UK versions anyway ) - but if it's going to come with lame jokes in the back seat that can't be dialled down, then I honestly won't buy it and that will be a shame.

The only reason I fly the F-14 so little is that Jester annoys the hell out of me. Is Jester II for the F-4 going to be a bit more professional, or is he going to have the same personality ? - similar to a 6 year old that has eaten too much sugar or a character in a Hollyweird action movie I know that I can shut him up, but he's needed to operate the jet, so if Jester II is going to be a bit more like George or Petrovich in terms of keeping his comments relevant then that's going to be a real bonus. Maybe it could be an option, like the boring Jester that was never implemented.

If you want a Jag-like aircraft then I'd say Aerges Mirage F1 is a pretty good fit, much better than the Hornet. It looks fairly like the Jag, it's got an unremarkable turn rate like the Jag and it's quite fast once it gets wound up - same as the Jag. It's got a few handling traits that the 'pilot' needs to stay on top of, but it doesn't depart nastily like the Jag. Obviously you only have the single engine and it's not horribly underpowered, but that might be a feature instead of a 'bug' - like the more benign accelerated stall behaviour. The avionics don't have the same capabilities, you have a ground mapping radar mode, but no moving map. The HUD symbology for air to ground weapons delivery isn't much more than a depressible pipper, nothing like the Jags Ferranti HUD-WAS. You do get an INS on the E models and the M model -when it arrives - is a dedicated ground attack aircraft although I've got no idea what features it has. Many of the existing weapons are already a very good fit for cold war RAF style missions. Aerges have a great work rate, so maybe the M model isn't too far away ? Interestingly - I don't know if you are aware of this - the MOD took a look at the Viggen as being a replacement for the Bucc, but I have a very strong feeling it was just one of those typical civil service type arse covering exercises where they pretend to have considered other options before going ahead with whatever it was they wanted all along. I doubt that it would have shared the same avionics or engine either, they would have fitted a RR engine and used Ferranti and Marconi to provide all the wiggly amp bits. Probably they'd have made a complete pigs ear out of the development and it would have been twice as expensive as the original and half as capable

i think they are still working on making it useless, once it's either showing no improvement or renders distant contacts as giant blobs that take up half the screen then we'll see it released.

The relevant manuals for the Lightning are no longer restricted, and haven't been for years. The weapons and radar employment manual is also available for the Sea Harrier FRS 1, to anyone who is willing to pay for a couple of hours of a researchers time and visit the BAE archives in person. The flight manual has been scanned and is available online, so it's just a click away. Note that I'm not talking about the FA2, which used the Blue Vixen radar - that radar was regarded as so sensitive by the MOD that everything related to it was tracked down and destroyed when the aircraft left service. If a developer is saying that they can't produce either of these aircraft then they either haven't tried hard enough to get the information or are just making excuses. Anyone who is asking for an early Jag might want to know that the first INS system fitted had one single button for waypoint numeric data entry. This was a genius idea that meant to input latitude and longitude numbers you pressed the button twice for a '2' and eight times for an '8' etc - just think about that for a moment - well played Marconi and Ferranti, you really excelled there...

I have, pretty much. I just came back when I found out that Reflected's campaigns were so good, and then did some MP. But I probably won't stay, too many things about the core game disappoint and\or frustrate me. There's no point listing them, they are all the usual things that have been debated for years - but nothing's altered and I doubt it ever will.

After over 10 years of being a customer of theirs - who has bought maybe 90% of the modules and maps, I've now reached the point where if ED told me the sky was blue I'd go outside and look up to make sure. I have no confidence remaining in their good faith or motivation to make core improvements.

I feel like a world weary demon, once again summoned from hell by a black magician - what is it that thou wishest, mortal ? Anyway, that's exactly what they don't have on the " super realism historical hardcore, I'm a real fighter pilot, honest " servers. No external views usually goes right along with not having the users aircraft shown on the map. You can use F10, zoom in and get an idea of the fields layout, but you still won't know where you are on it. It's more of an issue with modern bases with complex layouts. There's an option to restrict the user to only being able to view his own aircraft with F2, but that rarely gets used for some reason. I don't really know how a third person view is going to help anyone during combat, I'd find it completely disorienting, which is the reason I've never flown an RC plane. I think it just gets seen as a problem because everyone associates it with arcade games. Players in that other WWII sim-lite run into friendly aircraft on the ground that are completely visible to them, let alone ones that aren't you should see it sometime, it's a clown show The other, other WWII sim-lite doesn't ever have more than 3 people in MP at any time, so it's a lot less of an issue there

Well you dragged me back into it by quoting me and now I've patiently explained to you that I think you are mistaken, - and provided a little evidence - you decide that the whole discussion is pointless. OK, fair enough

You obviously never did any in depth testing of how the visuals in DCS work, if you think that it's more difficult to spot with your view zoomed out. It's a demonstrable fact that being completely zoomed out increases your visibility range versus an air target. Try it on a monitor. I don't know why it's that way, but it is. The issues with objects appearing and disappearing dependant on zoom has been reported forever and nothing has been done. Why would I bother adding to the reports ? You obviously take the opinion that if everything is right for you, then it's automatically right for everyone else.

How do you know what FOV settings they use ? are you looking over their shoulders ? that's a bit creepy, I just checked behind me for a guy with a mustache and a pilots cap Getting the view zoomed all the way out is the only way to pick up other aircraft at "long" range due to the way the DCS visual system works on flat screens. It actually works exactly the opposite to how you claim it does. Reduce the FOV and they will disappear. The effect of zoom\FOV in DCS is another can of worms, for example there's a sweet spot where you can see contrails and either side of that they just vanish. Objects appear and disappear according to where your zoom is at. It sounds like you use VR. You can't really compare the VR experience to the flat screen one. I have never used VR because I don't want to wear a bucket of sweat on my head and halve my frame rates, but my VR using friends report that they can see aircraft at distances I could only dream about. However, once in gun range they can't tell the difference between a Mustang and a Mig-29, so then I become their eyes, just like they were mine at long range.

It's an order of magnitude more diifficult to pick up an aircraft on a flat screen when you haven't got the real life cues available to you - like binocular vison, reflections from the sun and countless other little things that human vision evolved to track prey back when we were hunter gatherers. That's why scaling, or some other aid becomes important. And yes, I used to fly in real life, and still do now and again. I know how hard or otherwise it is to see another aircraft. What I don't appreciate is being lectured on realism by people who have only ever looked out of an airliners window. I'm not saying that's you, but it's true for a lot of these characters. I don't know what WoW is, but please don't bother explaining.

These restrictions have got little to do with realism, that's one of my main problems with them. In DCS we don't have any way for a WW2 aircraft to taxi safely unless there is access to the F2 or F4 views. In reality you'd have ground crew watching out for you and often a guy actually lying on your wing giving you directions. Open canopies and weaving help a bit, but they aren't the whole solution. I got t-boned while taxi-ing by a Spitfire a few days ago, and there was no way I could blame him, because he couldn't see over or around the nose. We don't have ATC either - or at least we don't have ATC that does anything useful, so the use of F2 helps prevent runway confliction accidents. And not least of all it helps you find your way around the field. What if I'm coming home with a shot up aircraft and get a red light when I try to lower my gear ? is it down or isn't it ? in the real world you'd do a tower flyby and they'd tell you. In DCS that's what F2 is for. If I know my gear is unsafe I'm going to try to land on the grass so that I don't close the runway for the people on my side with a flaming wreck. The restrictions just make your life and everyone elses harder without adding a scrap of realism. The rationale behind them is warped. The dot neutral labels aren't what you think they are. Once you are in cold war or WW2 gun ranges the dot is very rarely visible because it's a fraction of the size of your opponents plane. It will rarely help you once you are in a fight. The dot is visible through your aircrafts structure but trying to track a few moving dark grey pixels against the background of a cockpit that's mostly black is counter productive, even if you can see it at all. You have to concentrate so hard that you'll be a sitting target for the other guys wingman or a random opposition aircraft. If there's one in front of you, there's ALWAYS one behind you, or there will be soon. Yet again it's got nothing to do with game VS simulator. And if you are flying a P-47 and get in a fight with a 109 there are more options available to you than hoping to hide and run. You are probably in a lot of trouble, but you aren't neccessarily toast.

I don't do BVR, to me it seems a bit less interesting than watching paint dry, but if you like staring at MFD's and pushing buttons then who am I to tell you that you are wrong ? I'm not imagining the cheating, I saw it many times in another flight sim. I can't spell out what's going on without giving away how it's done. You wouldn't want me to do that, with you being so concerned about cheats would you ? " Full real " isn't popular with me - I find it a complete pain in the arse and I think it's another major reason why there aren't more people getting into MP. I don't enjoy trying to find my way around an unfamiliar airbase without an external view and all the other " hey everybody, please look at me, I'm a real fighter pilot " nonsense they inflict on you. Labels don't remove the element of surprise, at least dot neutral ones don't. They aren't a perfect solution, probably not even a very good one, but they are still better than being blind. You think spotting is fine, but I think recent events have shown that makes you part of a tiny minority. Every other combat flight sim uses a variation of scaling, I have to ask myself why DCS doesn't.

I don't wonder why. But if I did then I'd say that a major reason is because a new user often flies around without seeing anything for 40 minutes and then some smartarse like me sneaks up on him, shoots him in the back and runs away. He's not even sure what happened most of the time. Not everyone is willing to put up with several weeks of that happening before they begin to get things figured out, and therefore participation becomes self limiting. It's a very steep learning curve. Of course one other reason people don't do multiplayer is BECAUSE THEY CAN'T SPOT OTHER AIRCRAFT EXCEPT BY USING MINECRAFT RESOLUTION and the server admins won't turn labels on because of the 1080p mafia wailing about realism.

As as far as I - or anyone else knows - the mod hasn't been abused. What did happen was that a " won't somebody please think of the children " character on Reddit made his own alteration to the mod which replaced the dots with massive green triangles and then posted a screenshot of it. Meanwhile, the people who really are cheating - no need for any interpretations of what's a cheat and whats just quality of life with this technique - use a different method and almost no-one seems to pick up on it...fortunately they just turn up, cause havoc for ten minutes and then get bored and go back to pulling the wings off flies.

I bought the P-47 on day one, flew it around a bit and decided it was a heap of junk, i.e it isn't a Spitfire But I tried it again recently and it's now possibly my favourite DCS warbird. 1) It's easy to fly, you have 3 axises of trim and it doesn't try to kill you every time you land or take off 2) The engine management isn't anywhere near as bad as it seems and the engine is very robust if you treat it right 3) It can carry a huge amount of ordnance for a single engine warbird and delivers it well 4) It can take a lot of damage and keep on flying 5) It isn't outclassed by the two FW's and a good pilot can hold his own with a K4 with the right tactics. As I usually find out to my cost when flying Luftwaffe 6) The view over the nose is good by the standards of the day - for shooting in a turn - and the gyro gunsight is actually helpful up to a point

Remember kids, having a more user friendly canopy in your flight sim is exactly the same as taking steroids, or using something I've never heard of to cheat in a sport that only Americans care about. Just Say No

New drinking game - every time someone mentions the word 'cheating' you have a shot of Tequila.... I don't drink, so it'll be a can of Monster for me....

Unless someone has got access to a time machine we'll never know what a piece of 1940's perspex is like to look through. Even if it's new old stock that's been kept on a shelf the material degrades, and then when it's fitted to a frame there's a right way and a wrong way to do it, to avoid stresses creating micro cracks. What I can say with a degree of certainty is that some canopies in DCS look like they've been fitted to gate guards and have 70 years of UV and weather damage, while others look like they've just been fitted in 1944 by a conscientious ground crew. The Spitfire ( which I hardly fly these days ) is one of the worst offenders, the canopy on that has a lot of character, but it's horrible for the pilots vision. That just wouldn't have been allowed by the quality control systems in place at the time. I'd prefer it if the Spitfires canopy was painted black, because they are very difficult to kill But the BF109K4's armoured screen seems a bit at odds with reports on how poorly manufactured German glass was at that stage of the war. Maybe it's a bit too clear and needs some tinting ? I don't know, it's difficult enough to even find a grainy black and white photo of a K4 If all you ever fly is the Jug then you'd wonder what all the damn fuss is about, you'd think that canopies are just fine as they are. Then there is the issue of lighting - that was all altered in DCS a couple of years ago and some canopies worked with the new system just fine, while others picked up truly awful reflections from cockpit lights with the new rendering system. The FW190A8 suffers badly from those in low ambient light, and the indicators can't be dimmed in the sim, although they can in the real aircraft. One long term solution would be to have a consistent set of ( 3DS ? ) materials for perspex and for armoured glass, that get used in all modules unless there's good evidence that a particular aircraft had better or worse visibility. That way, if the rendering system alters again it'll be a lot simpler to tweak things back to where they should be. Until then, this mod removes the issues of the worst offending modules. You've got a very broad definition of cheating, haven't you ? But meanwhile I've never, ever seen anyone complain about the real cheaters, maybe they just don't notice what's happening right in front of them....

Have you had a sarcasm bypass ?

Then shall we ask for ED to have the FW190A8 turn like a Spitfire, instead of lurching from one accelerated stall to the next, pulled by it's asthmatic but indestructible engine ? that's hardly fair. Or maybe the Spitfire should get the A8's armament, which shreds anything the pilot can get in front of him ( fat chance of that ) with one mighty burst ? I don't want to play a game at all. That's half the problem here, gamers and the gaming mentality. As far as I'm concerned I've " won " if I get to land after a sortie.

They could download and apply the mod, that way everyone gets to operate in a level playing field. Takes a couple of minutes. This whole thing is all about the gaming types who obsess over their kill\death ratios not wanting to give up their advantage, nothing else. They have an influence which is completely disproportionate to their tiny numbers. I'd like servers to stop tracking kill stats completely, then they might all go to somewhere like Fortnite, where they belong. If people want to keep a record of how amazing they are, then they can write it down on a piece of paper.