Worrazen

Allright, it's not Russian, it's Soviet then, right right ... :P

I think if the first design goes by the orange-brown color theme of the DCS A-10C, it would be a great start for everyone that doesn't necessairly want that look eventually, it would calm the whole community and provide a good base to build more themes up, if necessary, but I think folks would expect newer things on a newer forum. This is very similar to the old color theme, but not quite the same, less red coloring, exactly the same is probably not necessary, we could make it better while we're at it, it's not a must if there's anything in the works already then that should be finished and we'll see from there, so it's just a suggestion if possible. There could be custom DCS-type icons from actual real textures from DCS being used as replacements for default forum icons. The default forum thread "chatbox" icon could be replaced by the big A-10C UHF Radio OFF/MAIN/BOTH/ADF knob (without text) The default forum thread buttons could be made to look like A-10C UFC or CDU buttons. The avatar outter borders could be made to look like MFDs for example. The number of posts and font in general could be font from A-10C's HUD for example, or the MFDs ... but that's a harder sell, we need forum readability more than style. There could be a server load indicator, displayed as a modified A-10C Percent RPM analog gauge, with the text indication renamed to "% Server Load" Explaining the layout idea in detail is actually a lot of work and time to write down or draw drafts, I'd do it already, I'm just too busy right now.

Seems like the old forum was fully wide on 1440p and it looked fine, I had no problems glancing eyes, it may be well down to size of elements, so across the board they would need to be upped a bit.

DCS has 3 icons in FUI, those are greeish, blueish and browish, these could be the 3 base themes and it's darker versions for example, at first I'd pick the browish theme, the one that the old forum resembled, but more red-color to it to look like the icon looks, would be so cool! I got bigger ideas but I can't write myself out because I'm too busy with the new PC build right about now, oh well, keep up the good feedback people, keep thinking!

Go to last post is a very very small ">>" icon I mean, I do like things to be traditional on desktop, but on 1440p and 32" is IMO too small to pintpoint the mouse cursor, the wholesome design and proportions matter, some things should be sized over others.

So much for the PC Master Race :(

Hmm, I can't find how to edit signatures ... even with the small font the signature is taller than it should be IMO, the space between lines is ridicolously big right now, signatures are fine if they're not too big. Actually the font seems to visually be smaller but the borders are still big ... tho it could be browser specific, I'll do more tests, but I'm currently so busy with other stuff again, pulled the trigger on a new PC this week, but DCS for me is still months away. We need to get some serious community effort into this, especially the themes, should be as if we're developing a module or something, so I would say that the staff should not rush out some fixes only for it to not be enough and milktoast so let's just sit down and do it right no need to run around in circles, I don't want to dramatize, but I want to say right now sooner rather than later that it definitely has a big effect on how much I'll be tempted to visit the site IMO, it's a huge psychological factor the way the site navigates and feels, flows and all that. I would be fine taking the time helping this place get sorted out before I get back into DCS in a couple of months, probably past january 2021 because I'll wait to see how ZEN3 prices go, I didn't pull the trigger on a proper CPU just yet, if prices fall maybe I'll get a 16 core, we'll see.

On the account page the Password and Email fields are auto-filled as per browser behavior ... but it doesn't fill both email field to change the email, and then throws an error "email must match" when I'm not even trying to edit the email so it's best to disable auto-fill on these fields please.

Lovely, 1800 pixels wide seems about ride, any wider would probably be too much. Round 2 Suggestions: -WIP Relax, it was destined to happen, I think it brushed my mind 3-4 times in the past 2 years how long until my most visited forum would "drop da bomb" and once again just 2-3 weeks ago, probably some kind of sixth-sense action going on there haha, so I was already pschologically preparing for it. But it's not just about GUI, it's probably the systems on the back for more than just asthetics reasons, I don't want to speculate about those right now, I'm not that familiar with forum software, but I do have another website job this winter. The forum was probably put up ASAP with some settings not finalized so that it doesn't create too big of a downtime, infact it's better if the community is involved in real-time as these changes are rolled out. Ofcourse what could be made into an option, without too much hassle for the backend infrastructure, it should so that we don't force some of our tastes on everyone. About external content and services: The way forum software works it may require some code stuff from googleapis.com as many things on the web do but if what is required is not part of any forum critical component, but part of social-plugin features and ads then I don't think it has to be enabled, but usually connection to one domain, has some scripts with connect you to another one and so on, so this isn't the DCS site doing it on purpose most likely, is what I meant, in my opinion. For example BitBucket offers you to login with a Google Account without warning as if you visited a google site or youtube and already connects and preloads the login, feels so intrusive IMO, has the nose everywhere. Why I'm picky about login? Well, if you login it gives google okay to do much more, because you agree to all the snooping in the license agreement, that's I guess fine for things like youtube, they already know what videos you would watch without login anyway, but it's not fair to do some random sites on the web that aren't related to the slightest, like some forum here. Tho in fairness the old forum might have had some of these connections, I just didn't take a look back then.

So the first new version is up, and the suggestion I have in this round are: I would really like to have a Strikethrough text option Signatures are missing ... hopefully that's not intended, I don't have a backup on my end. Presets options for toggling site width, or raising the max if it's automatic, currently it's quite narrow for me on 2560x1440, it's 1200 pixells wide. (fixed, this is a case where one would use a strikethrough text option now in this list line) Themes for the DCS-specific look and feel, colors, icons, etc. Perhaps even community assisted solution so it goes through a process before it's finalized, no rush needed, I don't mind if it takes a month. I would make the profile picture in posts a bit bigger, I think at the current size they become more of pixelated smilefaces with complex avatars. Privacy options, disable external social networks: By default I guess, currently this forum page without any embedded external media, links to google-analytics, google advertisments (doubleclick), youtube, facebook, twitter and yandex sharing some kind of activity with them or just pinging those sites for no reason & without consent, not that the whole web doesn't do that pretty much, but we don't need to do it here, right? EDIT: Site has been updated, end of round 1.

I hope the new redesign isn't hugely crazy with huge buttons and monotonic colors for touch devices and totally different layout, might take getting used to but we'll see. Hopefully it's flexible and it can go through fine tuning, I hate to say it but sometimes the way forums look and work makes quite a big influence on how much I'll visit it, it can't be an eyesore, and I have a 1440p at 32 inches screen and well I've seen redesigns on other gaming sites and honestly I never liked them, took a year to get over it.

Barely breaking even with AC/C-130 ... hmmm yah, I guess we need reinforcements! Hopefully the interest grows as time goes. It's hard to justify I totally understand ... there's no combat use to a lot of usecases to it.

Right But shouldn't we also have the option to have the exterior also be factory-fresh, as we have option with the cockpit ?!?! I don't have DCS installed so I'm wondering, will do soon, or so, finished some seasonal jobs here, will see in a week if I'll go ahead and pull out for a new PC, or I'll wait a few months or even a year.

I've thought about it too, well it's surely a big deal, ... how would change it, well let's see: It may help with stuttering if that's the cause for some people, but my tests didn't show the texture streamign to be the source of stutters in my cases so what it would do it would just show the LODs much faster (instantly) It may alleviate the pressure of those I/O threads which are indirectly (unless optimized) fighting for CPU time with the main thread and causing indirect stutering that way (when the main thread is close to bottleneck for it's own reasons) But the main thing right now would me much less VRAM and RAM usage as a cache. For the future in terms of new stuff it would simply allow for crazy texture fidelity (resolution, quality, etc) and bigger maps, big big big everything, because it doesn't need to rely so much on RAM/VRAM to keep nearby data at-the-ready ("cache/preload"). At least that's the current idea on my mind, probably there's something ore I can't think of right now.

With all the damage model buzz, the ground unit upgrade should also come with solid preparation, deployment, setup animations, along with reloading and refueling. «Neboj-M» radar calculations during air defense and RTV training in the Urals Perhaps not the kind of premium animations in paid modules like Super Carrier, perhaps human figures assisting deployment aren't that necessary here to lower the complexity given the amount of ground units, but I wouldn't mind if it's done 100% accurately either, reloading of ammo is also one of those things that can get complicated if human figures are involved, probably refueling too, but I'd really love to see those radar dishes extend and deploy nicely with all the stages timed right, with the spot on sound effects. I would be fine with human figures standing beside and possibly be physical objects that can be damaged (with their own damage model) so perhaps deployment would be interrupted temporairly of they get sniped, but I'm not asking for some sophisticated animations like the person in the 0:15 minute mark in the "Neboj-M" video above. If they stand around, walk a bit here or there, that's enough for me, for example for refueling, the fuel truck would approach a unit requesting fuel and the human figures jump out and perhaps do some key animations but otherwise stand around and watch the refueling process, probably no need to do animations how they jump ontop of the fuel-needing vehicle and attach hoses, etc. Then again, I'm not against a paid ground unit module either, I would pay a bit for top notch animations, sound and missile launch effects of various ground units IMHO. The deployment stuff affects gameplay too, it's a delay before you can transport a radar antenna, there's a delay before you can get it up and running even if you get to the location you want, naturally, so it's not just a visual gimmick. I'll talk more in this thread when I find cool deployment videos going forward.

That's been a long time annoyance tbh. Menus need some internal limits, they run at full-speed something, probably FPS, I can't recall now. Same for Pause I think.

Let's point out for those that would dare to wonder ... no it's probably not the little loading screen it self :smilewink: Sometimes programs get tangled in some kind of "thinkering" loop where they churn longer than they should, longer than it needs to be considering hardware's capabilities, it happens.

You're making it sound as if we wouldn't want Ka-50 or something else for the sake of diversity and choices if something else got done first.:huh: Popularity and sales is all relative and biased anyway, plus the userbase of the sim, if the world events turned differently it would be the other way around.

You are kinda thinking into that direction about the F10 map having big potential to improvement, however my idea is quite a bit different as the improvement idea of the F10 Map is suitable more for a different kind of use than a pilot him self, to be more realistic, because yeah, all of this is infact a cheat, any kind of use of the F10 map. But it's a bit of a wall of text so it'll take time for me to write it out and post it in the wishlist section. However no my idea does not involve disallowing F10 map, perhaps as an extension to just be more indicated that it is a bonus thing but that becomes a separate topic.

Heh, right, I didn't start off by making it a big deal, but that did brush my mind for a second, may not matter at the end of the day (tho it could depending on who's module it is, 3rd-party or not) but I also didn't apply the miles on this one.

Yeah, please option to disable rollover.

A while back we didn't even knew for sure a new A-10C upgrade is coming ... all due to lucky turn of events that the US Congress and Airforce decided to keep A-10C programme running, history would have not been the same :pilotfly: So I don't want to complain about anything at this point, until we get to some specifics down the line. I'm still on my toes for the A-10C engine upgrade haha, and B-52 engine upgrade too darn it!

Kinda agree with the OP, just not with the conclusion because it most likely won't be practically possible. Here's a way: Paid missions/campaigns could have a requirement by ED to come with cold-start or both flavors, as part of the 3rd-party license. ED should make this easier by providing as part of the ME and mission system overhaul a new feature to support such flavors more easily by adding support for mission modifier system which would enable a Mission Designer to modify part of a mission without needing to create two separate missions. The User would select the modifier/flavor (cold or hot start, etc) before loading the mission (at mission planner screen makes sense, planner waypoints and imagery would change accordingly). ED would provide the Mission Designer-s (public info / docs) average estimated time of how long it takes to complete a cold-start procedure for all user pilotable aircraft. Perhaps even time estimates for Beginner, Average and Expert levels as well. DCS could further use these fixed estimations together with a new system that would calculate in real-time in ME how long would a parked cold-start aircraft in a particular airfield slot take time to start rolling down the runway, taking taxiing and traffic and other predictable factors into account, it's a bit complicated of a feature but it should be really helpful with that. Then the Mission Designer would be able to use these estimations however he pleases, perhaps put his own extra delay on top of that to make the mission easier for beginners in the beginning, or none. This whole thing may actually be one part of a new mission difficulty system, time crunch, among other things like ammo, fuel, AI difficulty, customizable separately, again using the mission modifier system without the User needing to edit the mission and without the Mission Designer needing to produce a separate mission file. For example you could as a User, customize, multiple difficulty settings (modifiers) that the Mission Designer has sprinkled into the mission, controlling whether you want hot or cold start, how much ammo will your buddy have at this or that point, how much enemies will attack you when enemy's reinforcements come, etc, the possibilities are endless. What a great opportunity really.

Multiplayer is a science on it's own, don't expect MP to not have such visual glitches ... forever. Other games with "perfect" netcode also have things, perhaps less noticable, or they use tricks to make it less noticable or unnoticable, many of them questionable, and affect gameplay in weird ways. For example some kind of timeshift or correction stuff, that means if you're missile would hit the enemy aircraft, he would be damaged in your version, but he didn't get that packet so your entity on your version of his aircraft on your screen would have to magically respawn or heal-up a few moments later with the explosion and animations being cut short and abruptly disappearing, and then your missile would have to reappear and continue flying as a miss even tho it exploded a moment earlier. This is the reality of multi-milisecond multiplayer and unstable unreliable connections, remember, singleplayer this is happening at a nanosecond-microsecond level, but fundamentally it's different, it's about syncing up two separate pieces of hardware, it's something like SLI or AMD CrossfireX ... it doesn't really work like people would expect in practice, it doesn't give you two GPUs as if it were a one bigger one. And it happens to work in a way that is not useful for gaming, hence, complete removal recently and only supported for workstation and enterprise from now on.

Yes, the closer you get to the ground the more details/clutter/trees the game will render, that's normal and expected. Unfortunately the effect may be exaggerated, draw calls is one (CPU stuff), but partially due to DCS not appearing to support occlussion culling, that means, but so far I haven't tested this specific case (should still apply AFAIK), that all the trees that get created according to your flying altitude and graphics settings have to be rendered even if they're occluded behind the first line of trees which you can see, wasting a lot of GPU resources. There is a chance it may be impacting you a lot more than others, in which case it's some kind of an extra bug that could be alleviated, but don't expect miracles.