Art-J

@Smith132 I haven't flown the -21 in ages, but just checked in the latest game version and the pipper moves down with second sight mode switch set to "B" as expected. Both with realistic and gamey option. Maybe there was something wrong with v. 2.9.10.3948? Try again in the current one.

Airframes are not that much of a problem in the current age of "dataplate restorations", where most of flying examples nowadays are ground-up rebuilds from a bucket of crash relics, with only a handful of components (plus sacred dataplate) being historic and original. That's why we're seeing illogical trend of rare airworthy warbirds number increasing since the '90s rather than decreasing as one might expect. Not that I'm complaining - keep the real originals in museums while flying rebuilds as much as possible so that everyone can enjoy them. Engine overhauls are more problematic, 'cause scratch-rebuilding their parts, albeit possible nowadays, is much more difficult and costly. As for the younger generations of pilots, I don't think it's a question of older guys gatekeeping, but rather diminishing interest of younger ones, combined with awareness of how huge moneypit every involvement in warbird activity is.

Yes, they renamed that option a while ago.

Defender removed that dll file you showed in your screenshot, so module cannot work without it. Run DCS repair to restore it. BTW turning defender and firewall off completely is a rather drastic and dangerous approach. You don't have to do that. Just adding DCS-related folders to exclusion list is sufficient.

Flickering was there in 2D as well, so fix should affect both modes I reckon? I haven't tested the latest version yet.

Yes, it's a reported bug, together with reduced transparency of windscreen, which was also introduced together with the former issue in September patch. Allegedly NL mentioned on Discord that some sort of a fix was in the making, but not being a Discord user I haven't read that myself, and it's anyone's guess when the fix is going to be implemented (plus what the scope of the fix is).

Duplicated layer + flickering issue or transparency issue? These are separate things (albeit I wouldn't be surprised if latter was related to former).

Not a Steam DCS user myself, but I think you can't connect accounts they way you probably intend to do. What you can do is transfer license keys purchased on Steam to ED store version, NOT the other way around however! More details can be found in FAQ in Steam section of the forum:

I understand it I can clearly see where cfrag is coming from. 3/4 of Tango's post is indeed a meaningless word salad without any relevance to the map and real value for players. For anyone who hasn't bought the map yet (I haven't) and comes here to read something about quality of it in its current state, there's not much to learn from that post. If his post was made only to clickbait people to his YT channel, that's fine and dandy, but he should simply be honest about it. As of now, it seems to be just that - a sleazy businessman lot's-of-words-no-substance talk and a clickbait. That's why I appreciate other postsers who do offer actual useful info, related to texture details and transitions, draw distance, RAM consumption, overall performance, screenshots etc. You know, things that matter for consumer, especially after somewhat rough relase of Afghanistan.

DCS manual pretty much copied real wartime manual procedure word by word so there's nothing to add or adjust really. Restored warbirds are often started (and operated in general) little different, 'cause durability, reliability and overhaul costs are prevailing considerations nowadays (not talking about unlimited class Reno racers, which are a peculiar exception). Not to mention modern modifications (e.g. pre-oiling systems) which were not there on these engines during wartime. Following alternative startup procedures is a bit pointless anyway, as DCS engine modelling is not THAT deep and some aspects (like engine "catching" on startup or backfires on shutdown) are scripted and always happen the same way. I remember Yo-Yo explaining that coding in extra intricate details (which would make engine startups more random and finnicky) is useless in combat sim, where most players would want to skip it anyway after short honeymoon period of novelty fasctination. I understand where he's coming from. That kind of detail (coupled with persisting systems state simulation) will always be more apprieciated by civilian flight sims crowd. Nothing wrong about doing it for immersion, though, so if you want to crank six blades etc., go for it.

Is it still recommended to temporarily disable all modules before components "swap" to avoid authorization issues later, or am I misremembering things?

A couple of ideas popped up here already:

I'm in similar situation, not even owning these aircraft. Shame about the mod, I used it in 1.5.xx-2.5 era, but haven't tried using it in a loooong time, probably because of aforementioned encryption limitation .

There used to be a couple of GSh-23 sound mods for MiG back in the old days. They never got very popular, though, because apparently external sound is hardcoded to be shared with one of FC-3 planes and Gazelle I think (?). Thus, if you mod the sound sample in MiG by simple file replacement method, you will mess up the cannon sound in these other aircraft.

MeanJim, can't you "charge" your Paypal account with certain fixed amount of money via bank transfer, and use that to pay for modules afterwards? I've been doing it for 10+ years to avoid giving Paypal my card number. All my DCS purchases were done this way and I've never had any issues. It might be slower and complicated method, but that is one extra advantage in itself - it forces you use your brain + commont sense and transfer only the amount needed for chosen aircraft/map module rather than impulse buy with credit card (followed inevitably by financial "post-nut-clarity").

Speaking strictly about this aspect, I'd say there's option 3 -company should set the price of product according to its actual value. If 2nd "incarnation" of A-10C and 3rd of Ka-50 didn't exist, I guess the whole drama about F-5E remaster cost would not exist either (maybe with exception of these couple of, shall we say, "special" people, who indeed expect eternal software upgrades for free). These two remasters were released however, and we can see that for that 10$ each, they simply brought many times more features than F-5 one. Compared to them, this remaster, with the same 3D mesh of cockpit and only external model redone ("7000" hours? Yeah.... rrrrright), just offers poor value for the same upgrade price. There's no denying that. I know inflation is a thing, but it hasn't increased THAT much in recent years. On the other hand though, one cannot ignore that when A-10CII and Ka-50 v3 came out, they got their base prices jacked up quite a bit compared to their legacy versions. Remastered F-5E still stays a 60$. So some of existing owners of all these modules might feel taken advantage of, but for new DCS customers, it all kind of balances out.

Official one? They published it last year, didn't they? It's probably not as good as custom Doughguy's one, but it's there.

As mentioned by BN in the other thread, they have to wait for the Steam sale to end later today before remaster becomes available.

Only map module texture updates require huge volume of files to download. This patch doesn't have any, so it's much smaller. Nothing unusual here.

No edits necessary. You just unzip 3 folders to DCS root folder, or, preferrably, "inject" them using any mod manager of your choice. Keep in mind expected weather changes in upcoming patch will render the mod incompatible (until bandit648 updates it), but until that happens, you can still use the current version. More details here:

^ What was oil temp when it happened? I've noticed that when oil gets hot in flight for whichever reason, it's very dfficult to make it cool down during and after landing. Sometimes it even gets hotter and goes beyond temp redline after engine shutdown, almost like automotive turbochargers which were not cooled properly. I understand that idling / low RPM engine doesn't provide much airflow through cylinders and oil coolers, on the other hand though, it doesn't produce much power either.

I don't see the point of fighting one set of silly exaggerations with opposite, equally silly set of exaggerations. Neither A-10 nor Ka-50 nor F-5E were "refreshed, rebuilt, remade couple times times", unless one counts every minor bug fix or texture tweak as "remake". In such case, one should say MiG-21 also got remade a couple of times, because that's what actually happened with both cockpit and external 3D models and texturing. That's why none of oldest custom skins and cockpit mods are compatible with MiG now. Ancient giant hitbox-based damage model (and related flight model shenanigans) applies to all DCS aircraft but warbirds and maybe Heatblur products, so flying happily without a wing is not only a MiG-21 issue. "Realizing there's a problem" - M3 devs themselves know it all too well, that's why they've been hinting about more thorough refresh for last few years. Granted, the fact that they don't seem to have sufficent manpower and financial resources to pull it off in near future, if ever, is a separate problem. ED shouldn't and couldn't "put M3 on notice" either. First, because they struggle with maintenance and updating of their own oldest modules, so they're hardly an authority here. Second, because module IP and source code belongs to M3, so it's not up to ED to tell anyone what and when to do with it further. Last but not least, there's a more general problem of what DCS players should realistically expect as a "shelf-life" of digital product and what level of support one should expect for free. MiG, being the very first 3rd party module ever, developed from a private mod, is just a very outdated product compared to today's standards. But since closing this gap nowadays would most probably require a complete re-write of its systems and flight model, it's stupid to expect such endeavout being done for anything less than half of new module price - at least. The only thing I agree with naysayers is - MiG should still be available for sale "as is", but for discounted price reflecting its current all-around state. At least that's what ED used to do with all aging modules back before 2017-ish (?) when they decided to bring all prices up to comparable level without considering if products represented the same fidelity. The current pricing policy is rather anti-consumer in this regard, but hey, it's their business and their rules.

Yes, it's been a relatively new bug and apparently it's reported:

All of these were Avia S-199s based on G-14 airframes so irrelevant to this discussion indeed.

Ouch, can't imagine fiddling with a bloody crowbar when there's a fire from fuselage tank blowing in yer face!