Grundar

You probably know it from other names - Hammerhead or Wing Over. It is a vertical maneuver where your aim is to quickly switch your heading 180 degrees (from going up to going down) and come out at the same altitude and airspeed you entered on. Essentially you climb into the vertical, trim it up to hold vertical. As you near the stall you want to apply rudder to one side, not abruptly and not at the stall but before you reach the stall. Your nose should then drift over and start to head to the ground, keep rudder applied until gravity takes over and starts pulling you to the ground in the opposite direction. Then you smoothly pull out to the altitude you came from. Edit: Hmm I may be wrong on that and thinking of something else (like a wingover or hammerhead lmao). Maybe it is instead the maneuver where you throw in rudder when an enemy is close behind you and the idea is that you pull G vertical and immediately throw in top rudder and it will effectively use your wings to greatly reduce your airspeed (works better with large wing surface areas). This will throw you vertical and then quickly flip you onto your back and then you keep rudder in and you will come up behind the enemy aircraft - presuming they haven't reacted to the maneuver. You will be very slow after this and you will need to get speed up quickly. Ideally it places you behind your enemy in a gun kill or missile kill position. Don't bother attempting the maneuver at low speeds. So it's like a rapid wingover maneuver at much higher speeds.

If there are multiple targets I believe you have to first do a short press followed by a longer press for the Jester context option. If they are visual try using Auto Acquisition mode - mapped to the nose steering button on your joystick (or assign it if not assigned). Also if you are trying use CAGE you need to have your nose on the target to affect a lock - 5 degrees I believe is the area you have. Edit: I should add double quick of the Jester Context button resets targets.

She's glorious! Engine procedures are that lengthy time between starting up the WW2 birds and the latest aircraft, I fully expected in the quick start up for Jester to ask me if Jupiter was in the house of Saturn before starting the ignition at one point lol. I am really enjoying all the other immersive aspects - they don't directly contribute to gameplay but they certainly make everything much more fleshed out and involved, everything from putting your helmet on (and the sound changes with that) and things like actually having hoses connected to your aircraft. I have turned off Jester mouse wheel interaction due to laggy jester menu access.

I think for 3rd party development, access to an SDK as you have described is excellent, but it is also a big boon for DCS players. There are so many multicrew aircraft out there (some DCS appearing already and many many more which have not) that would benefit. Jester, for example, certainly makes the single player experience a lot better and I am all for airframe accurate simulated systems that can fail (or behave) as it adds that bit more complexity to an already studious game.

I think the forums will be positive soon enough, as soon as we get our hands on the F4. People are eager to play and disappointed with setbacks so very close to the finish line. Heatblur have continued to raise the bar with each module and the F4 is a long desired aircraft, it looks like they have delivered big time from all the media reports very recently. Honestly, I for one look forward to wielding a combat 'stache and cackling manically as I skim the terrain looking at my two pixel radar display to discern a target while the WSO hangs out of the cockpit waving a coathanger to try and get some better reception for the radar, all while keeping his smoke lit.

Yeah mate I got mine on the day of purchase from the Heatblur store - it was in the email they sent me on that day. I was able to activate the module today with it via the ED page.

Yeah it will be with the regular DCS release cycle which is usually very late at night/early morning for me iirc

It's already 1535hrs here on the 21st and still waiting lol Edit: I have the next 5 days off work so going to be enjoying the Phantom experience.

While the F-14 Tomcat certainly came in A, B or D models there was also a bit of crossover between variants so some F-14B's were F-14A+ upgrades and then some were built as F-14B's only, then later on in the B cycles (in the 1990's) we had the F-14B (upgrade) variant. Some of the F-14 D's were F-14A's rebuilt and were designated F-14D(R). So it can be a little difficult to establish clarity between the various versions of the Tomcat. That all said, if I was talking to someone playing DCS and they said they were learning to fly the A Cat, it would be easy enough to discern what they were flying.

Fighter Jet is not in the Webster's dictionary I just checked it lol, neither is Jet Fighter. Fighter-Bomber is though, it is, as of yet, to be changed to Fighter Jet-Bomber Jet. I guess because aviation has had so much innovation over such a relatively short space of time that new areas of development (space for example) subvert some of the previous terms and became more widely adopted. Though as you point out, sometimes it's use is in a somewhat nonsensical use, or at least has it's definition diluted and more broadly applied.

I had this exact same problem with MIssion 12 as well as of the latest patch (Currently 8/5/24). The work around is using the hotkey shortcut for saluting when launching from the carrier (Shift-U). I know that it shouldn't work (and maybe it is confirmation bias) but if I used the radio menu to select salute, I would launch no problem but then Paco would circle at approximately 240 feet and circle the boat then slowly (very slowly) stagger to near 25000 and when I formed up on him nothing ever progressed it somehow is influencing or delaying the trigger (I have no idea i'm not a mission nor campaign creator). I did a slow repair (DCS loads much faster but no change to the mission), I have absolutely no mods or addons that I use, so nothing to change there. I did notice that when I salute with the hotkey (Shift-U) the glove appears in the saluting motion(like when you give the thumbs up), If I salute via the radio menu, no glove and bugged mission. I absolutely love this campaign it is a lot of fun and has been challenging so far, all Reflected's campaigns are really, really good - you really get involved with the aircraft and they are very fun. I just wish ED would fix the core AI problems.

That release trailer *chef's kiss* well done Heatblur.

Some great feedback and info in this thread. Looks like i'm going to have to be more cautious in combat maneuvers, which adds a new challenge, especially in heated dogfights. More realism is better imo, especially for the WW2 stuff which I enjoy greatly. Also going to have to upgrade my quite old graphics card so I see these same effects lol.

Wasn't trying to imply you didn't know the Spit, sorry if it came across that way, not my intention. Also, there is a new patch I was unaware of. I will update, check it out and let you know, will compare it to the F-16 as well. Seems like it is an unintended change though, perhaps as part of that change to g-loc effect in the F-16. Edit: Yep the Spitfire still does the usual snap roll straight to blackout that is fine. You are correct in that it now does a slight grey hazing of the FOV and then straight to blackout, occurred with the same speed yours did which is quite the big change from the update prior (I took it up for a quick spin before I tried the new update and there is definitely a difference). Edit 2: The F-16 does the initial fov change graying in as opposed to the black fov tunneling it used to be for g effects, but it also has a further stage of where the colours start to also fade to grey, this was a missed stage when i tried it on the Spit. Is this option missing from the WW2 birds? Perhaps g-suit modeling is what provides this further stage (if g-suits are modeled, or at least factored in).

That was graduated in the video, just less time in that grey out area than the F-16 or modern fighters where, I believe, G-suits are modeled or at least incorporated into the G-loc parameters. At high speed and in a dive in the Spit it is very easy to flip it instantly on it's back and force an instantaneous blackout. The graduation is present as I spent a fair bit of time learning to ride it in the Big Show campaign

I was incorrect, I read an earlier post saying it was like Normandy 2.0 in how it would manage it. That has been rementioned by NIneline as similar to how Normandy 1.0 -> 2.0 occurs, but not the same. I'm guessing that refers to maybe if you only buy one high resolution area and then purchase a seperate one. Thank you for the clarification.

The absolute worst thing about this map is that I'm probably going to end up buying even more flight modules than a sane person can reasonably be expected to manage. I do very much look forward to flying the A-10 around there though. I will be throwing the F-14 around there as well, and the F/A-18 (albeit not from carriers) and of course the F-16. What happens when I have to pick up the modules I have been finding reasons to avoid? (like the Harrier, or any of the choppers!). So to sum it up; DCS Afghanistan is much cheaper to buy in the pre-sale, will be less discounted in early access and then heads up to full price on release. Southwest is to be released first in high detail and you can just choose to buy that area as high detail only at a further discounted price (and in the future the other areas will also be offered in a similar fashion). Regardless everyone gets the full map expanse they may just have differing areas of high detail (the areas they purchased or the full map). The tech is based on Normandy 2.0 which means terrain will be the same (elevations, distances) between all the versions. The finer detail will be different - ie citys may lack textures and a refined appearance but still have major features/buildings in low resolution areas - can still have a SAM site, depot etcetera.

Yeah game mode/assists are counter productive for when you are trying to do things right. For the longest time I always had rough Spitfire takeoffs and it was puzzling. Then one day I was browsing the settings and noticed take off assist was on and at max. Turned it off and took off like a dream every time since. The Mossie I trim nose down and after lifting the tail I push forward a little to keep the nose down, the thing wants to lift at 100 - 110 but that will give you a left wing dive and into the ground you go, at 120 I will ease off forward stick and it will gently lift off. Shorter runways, i'm running the engines up to 18 boost at 3000RPM, standing on the brakes and then letting it loose to get up -> you can do a little brake dancing initially but i find the rudder effect comes in quite quickly.

Thanks for the update and the information, I'm sure it will help alleviate the concerns that some people have exhibited on these forums. Props to offering an extension of the pre-order discount for those who wish to cancel their pre-order at this stage. I think we would all rather have a functioning game than one that potentially could just not work at all for some players. Heatblur have made the right choice here. Yeah I would love the F4 now so that I can fumble my way through court-martial worthy displays of navigation and weapons delivery, but there is plenty else to do in the meantime.

Yes very much this. ED also have final say on release so they need to test it and a big module like the F4 will require that extended time to test I imagine. Heatblur have always been upfront about things (that they can be upfront with), they have yet to disappoint with any module. The Viggen and the F-14 are incredible modules, I play them regularly to this day (even the Mig-21 when they were Leatherneck, I still enjoy to fire up). Each of their module releases has always raised the bar for the DCS experience. Heatblur aren't a scam developer, they freely offer refunds if people so desire, just remember when it does see release, that pre-order discount does go away and you will be paying full price to get the module again Well: If you cancel, you will be given a pre-order window discount extension of two-weeks for when you buy it anyway.

The spitfires collimator gunsight illumination rheostat switch does only offer limited differences of gunsight illumination (off, day, night) with the optional filter you can apply when you are in bright sun light, so that being reflected (pun mildly intended) is accurate at least. Now did it actually have a better degree between graduation? that is much harder to find. That said I seem to have a better range of graduation than I can see on that gif above re: the Spitfire. In my Spit, hovering over the illumination rheostat and using the mouse wheel; I wheel down to flick it off completely and with one click up I get a faint gunsight that doesn't overpower me in lower light conditions.

Make a habit of advancing RPM before you move boost forward so you aren't killing your engine, you will see your temps and pressure shoot right up and then the catastrophic failure will occur otherwise. It helps to make sure that you also have the engine warmed up a little before take-off (if you are doing cold starts), 3000RPM is strictly reserved for emergency power in combat (and take off) and I wouldn't push a boost past 14 except in dire circumstances and you will want to throttle it back ASAP. Combat at 2850 with 12 boost is more than feasible for most parts, if you go more, just watch your temps. Normal flight - fuel conservation you can sit at 2200 RPM and 2 boost, combat cruising, 2650 and 6 boost you can sit there all day (Spitfire all day that is lol). Take off is 3000 RPM and 6-8 boost for me (more if carrying bombs).

If you hit Ctrl-Alt-Del and access the task manager does it show any instances of DCS running? If so terminate them with End Task. Open Beta is no longer a thing as well so you may possibly need to force a manual update with the updater in the DCS main folder as the two branches; Open Beta and Release have merged.

The AI is rather terrible in DCS, it is improved over what it used to be ( I started playing in 2013 or so with the A-10), but it is still quite lacking. The Kurfurst is a UFO in the hands of the AI, seemingly non-stop MW-50 use and climbing for eternity. The Anton seems to be less affected and the Dora sits in between in terms of AI use. All the AI seems to be defeated by sustained turn fights, in the Spitfire if I just sit behind them and turn and turn, eventually they just level and fly straight - though this doesn't always occur. In the after action information you often see it as AI Abort and if you follow that entity's actions you see it has no hits/damage.. To fly these things, the Kurfurst isn't particular UFO like, neither is the Dora. I don't have the Anton so cannot comment on that. The Spit and the Stang also seem pretty good and don't offer the player the UFO experience. The Mosquito though has some issues it seems, some inconsistency in it's low speed flight parameters maybe - I find I can turn it very quickly, at very low speed, without being overly concerned about altitude. Of all the modules I fly, that seems the most UFO like. Perhaps it is similar to it's real life function, but I'm not convinced. ED don't seem to be particularly focused on WW2 stuff for quite a while now, but I think an AI fix in general assists all the modules. There are some amazing campaigns out there, ones like Reflected's are fantastic, but they are still at the mercy of DCS AI at times.

If you navigate to the module manager, ignore the tickbox pop up menu, click on terrains and find Normandy 2.0 does it offer the Install option? Sometimes the tick box section doesn't seem to update for a little bit. Also DCS had a patch today, have you upgraded the base install yet?