Tirak

Um, I just want to put this point up here. The moment you start charging full price for a product, you don't get to run back to the Modder standby of "It's not our real job!" If you're charging money like it's a real business, expect to get treated like one. And if you can't handle that, well then you're not cut out to sell things. I'm not interested in getting involved in any drama with AvioDev, I haven't dropped any money on what they're selling, but you've got to stop telling people, who dropped cash on a product, that they're not allowed to get concerned a year and a half down the line with what they think is very little to show for it. All you do is poison the well for people considering their product in the future. A toxic fanbase in both directions isn't good, try not the be the cause of that toxicity on the other side of the equation.

You mean like IVC? Um, hell yeah. At some point, DCS is going to need its own integrated VoIP system, even if it's just a side by side launcher like IVC is for That Which Cannot Be Named.

I just had a thought, maybe Cobra can clear this up. There was a Tomcat update scheduled for Mid/Late March... is this it? Just wondering.

You're more than welcome to buy more than one module for other people who don't feel the same way. Pricing people out of the hobby is not a way to go...

Um, but can't the F-16 outclimb, out accelerate and out sustained turn the F-18? Wouldn't your airforce buddy laugh at the fact that the Navy took the tablescraps the Air Force didn't even want? :megalol:

Ah, now I see your reasoning, I suppose I folded CHDT's post in with yours and applied the reasoning incorrectly. In that case, I agree, a company jumping headlong into a multicrew aircraft would definitely be trying to run before walking, though I think that somewhat discounts RAZBAM's strides with the Mirage 2000. Granted, there's a ways to go on that module, but I'm of the opinion by the time it gets down to coding the Intruder, the Mirage will be in a similar place as the MiG-21 was when LN announced their Tomcat. As for PR, it always attracted a slightly different crowd than the regular BF2 lemmings, and had the advantage of a built in VoIP, but a few years ago before I stopped playing, pretty much everyone was on Mumble. Multicrew isn't going to work if most people are stuck using text chat for comms.

I don't foresee this being as much of a problem as you seem to think. If you're not part of a squadron or a clan or guild or whatever you call it, most of the major servers have a TS you can get onto. Finding pilots/RIOs isn't going to be a problem. It's no different than say, Project Reality, where most major servers had a mumble or TS, and in very short order the entire team would be on, even if they weren't part of a clan.

Lasers have been proposed for the F-35 and Darpa is already working on integration. CFTs are not used on the F-18s, I don't care about potentialities, they are flat out not used on them. Period. Any discussion of including them in a comparison against the F-35 is as disingenuous as me attempting to assert Lasers as a viable weapon for the F-35. Hyperbole? A bit, but hyperbole makes a hell of a point.

So No Block III "Ultra" Hornet, no CFTs. Got it.

The only Hornets that I know of on the DoD's purchase list, was just under 20 Growlers, which was part of the unfunded mandate. Boeing's been talking about the "Ultra Hornet" for years, got any figures or sources indicating the Navy is actually buying them? @Hummingbird: Frankly it's the same comparison. The F-18 in service today does not have CFTs. The F-35 in service today does not have lasers. CFTs have been demonstrated on experimental testing aircraft. Lasers have been demonstrated on experimental testing aircraft. Neither are pertinent to a comparison of the F-18 and F-35 since neither of them are actually used by a military fielding the aircraft.

1. Yes they have mounted and used those lasers. Furthermore, directly from that research, laser weaponry is being mounted on US Navy ships to operate in the point defense role. 2. I don't know if you know this, but the pic you linked is the Boeing Demonstrator aircraft. It is not in active service with the military of any nation. It is not a full production aircraft as no one has bought it. Allow me to reiterate this loud and clear since you have some difficulty understanding this. THERE IS NO F-18 HORNET IN THE INVENTORY OF ANY NATION'S MILITARY THAT USES CONFORMAL FUEL TANKS.

This'll shake up multiplayer greatly, an excellent alternative to the A-10, I greatly look forward to the progress on this module, and given RAZBAM's excellent progress on the Mirage despite the shakey start, I feel confident we're going to get an excellently well done aircraft!

True, except both the Super Hornet and Eurofighter will not have DAS, or an integrated targeting pod. Therefore, both aircraft do not have as good sensors as the F-35. Again, very true, for the Eurofighter, however extreme range shots have a lower chance of actually hitting the target, and increasing range of missile technology is much easier than coming up with an airborne radar capable of locking a stealth aircraft to take advantage of that range capability. Additionally, the F-35 will also have Meteor, meaning at best, this puts them on parity, but in reality, the F-35 maintains a BVR advantage, though still being at a disadvantage in WVR combat. While stealth is certainly not a binary concept, saying that the Super Hornets 'low rcs value' is of any real advantage in a fight between two technologically advanced nations is a laughable claim. At no point do I say this, I merely point out the advantages that a stealth aircraft with the most advanced sensor fusion on a fighter has. Time will tell :smilewink:

The Navy is looking at using the V-22 for its tanker needs going forward if I recall correctly.

Based on his statement, I'm going to assume Hummingbird is Canadian, in which case, the F-35 will be the front line fighter for all roles. With that in mind, Canada's fighter procurement needs to balance capability and cost. The F-35 is currently falling in price, with program estimates that the cost will be 80-85 million in the year 2020. The Eurofighter is much more expensive, lacks stealth, and lacks the advanced senor systems that the F-35 has. While the Eurofighter performs better in a dogfight, it does not choose the fight like the F-35 can. For high speed supersonic dash it beats the F-35 flat out, but that is required only for bomber interception. The Gripen is... a mass of conflicting and shifting information and something I nolonger feel confident giving accurate information on for the time being. What SAAB claims and what the aircraft has demonstrated are wildly out of sync, and I would hesitate to push for it. The Super Hornet suffers from many of the shortcomings of the Eurofighter, being non stealthy, and no DAS, but also has short legs, very limited weapons carrying capacity, and furthermore drasitic aerodynamic shortcomings the moment you place weapons on the plane due to an... odd pylon arrangement. A flat dash the F-18 can outrun an F-35 over distance, but again, it suffers from very poor range, and the moment you put wing tanks on it, the speed advantage disappears entirely. To add to this, the Super Hornet line needs to produce 12 aircraft a year to maintain an affordability point below the F-35, something that is only going to happen for another 2 years thanks to the Kuwait order., meaning if Canada doesn't buy them now then they'll be paying more for them than they would the F-35, and that once a line stops, price for replacement parts surges.

Further down the page is where you start running into trouble, when you start declaring characteristics of the F-35's wing and body design based on... well nothing. Emphasis mine. The fact is, you don't know that, and stating it in the imperative form indicates you make the claim as a statement of fact, and that's where you run into trouble.

No, they are not. There is no F-18 in military service today that is operating with conformal fuel tanks. The only F-18 that does is the boeing demonstrator, therefore, CFTs on F-18s is a completely irrelevant point, lest I bring up the ABL to equal your demonstrator status. You are writing your statements in the imperative form. "The F-35 will be at a disadvantage" ect. This is a statement of fact in the English language. Your "information" is air show pictures with no context as to atmospheric conditions, altitude, speed or actual AoA of the maneuver. Your "information" is worthless to make comparisons on maneuverability. Explain where I stated this. I make no such claim, I am criticizing your claims of fact by stating that you do not have complete information, nor can you given your position, and I point out that to attempt to claim legitimacy is disingenuous at best.

Lockheed and Raytheon have suggested Laser integration on the F-35. That has just as much relevance to this conversation. Please point out my unsubstantiated claims. I've been waiting for you to make this argument. When the US was attempting to create its first supersonic interceptor, they started running into a problem. Their engine was powerful enough, their plane made with swept wings, but no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't quite get past the transonic barrier. It was a huge conundrum because everything they thought matched up properly with what they understood about aerodynamics at the time. But then one of the engineers had an epiphany, and redesigned the aircraft in a more 'coke bottle' shape. The reason for this, was something known as the Area Rule, it had been preventing them from breaking the transonic barrier due to the drag spike that occurs in that region. By redesigning the aircraft, they took advantage of aerodynamic reactions that occur at higher speeds, to help slip their plane past the transonic barrier. My point in this little reminder is, you can't judge an aircraft by glancing at an air show picture. The math behind this is extremely complex, and even if you think you understand what you're looking at, like the engineers designing that interceptor, it is entirely possible that forces are at work that you don't understand. Show someone who only knows little about aerodynamics an aircraft made with the area rule in mind and he will question as to why it is so lumpy, after all, an elementary understanding of aerodynamics without knowledge of the area rule leads one to believe that the best shape is a cone and cylinder, but this is rather obviously not the case now, since we understand the phenomena at work. So please, stop assuming you understand about these plains from pictures with no context, it's getting rather annoying when you do.

This is for you Hummingbird, since you don't seem to understand what actually went into the F-16N http://www.defensemedianetwork.com/stories/v-1600-the-carrier-capable-f-16-that-wasnt/

Conformal Fuel Tanks are not supported on the F-18 used by the US Navy, nor from a very brief search, on the F-18s of any other country. Therefore, they are not relevant to this conversation. Once again I believe you're confusing the F-16 with the F-18, as there are currently several countries who fly F-16s with conformal fuel tanks. Then please clearly state that your statements are your opinions based solely on your uninformed feelings, and not based on any sort of real critical analysis of the aircraft, as you make many claims and state them as fact, and not the opinionated assumptions that they are.

Given the lead in time for producing aircraft for DCS, isn't it way premature to be talking about a project that won't even start until the F-18C gets included in the game?

This is incorrect. The F-18 has 2 hip stations and 2 wintip sidewinder rails. The wintip rails cannot carry the AMRAAM. Compared to the Block V F-35, which has 6 internal amraam stowage, this is a severe disadvantage. A proposal not seriously entertained by the US Navy for the same reason the US Air Force doesn't use them on their F-16s. If we want to go with fantasy considerations, the F-35 will carry lasers. You base this assumption on which models? As far as I can tell, you have an awful lot of confidence for someone judging aerodynamics based on airshow pictures. Do you have some computer models to back up these claims?

I have a similar question about you posting images of aircarft performing different manuvers in different atmospheric conditions and claiming you can understand the vortex interaction from that. I'm having a hard time figuring out how an F-18 is supposed to fight without pylons... So are we comparing like configurations or no? An F-18 without bags is an F-18 not going far, so to maintain comparison, an F-35 would fight at less than a full tank, which only improves its TWR, allowing it to accelerate faster, further improving its combat performance given its "Turn Burn Turn" combat style.

Yeah but... paratroopers aren't used tactically. Like, you'd never see them drop onto a battlefield, that's just not how they're used. Sure in ArmA people do it all the time because using the paratroop spawn flag is the fastest way to get into the fight, but in terms of real life it's completely unrealistic.

Bah, no need, trim it out, you'll be fine. :P