Northstar98

The Caucasus map has very simplistic seabed topography, it's more-or-less just linear down to 100 m. The real thing isn't quite so simple and goes quite a bit deeper. With these specfic examples however, it's less so that the ports are too shallow and rather that the vessels being used here are simply too large. The Handy Wind has a draught of about 8.4 m (though I've seen it also listed as nearly 10 m), the Seawise Giant about 24 m and the Santa Fe, 5.2 m. In DCS, the Handy Wind has a draught of 9.5 m, the Seawise Giant 29 m and the Santa Fe 6 m. The only one that's really off (though it could be that ED have defined it for full load) is the Seawise Giant, but correcting it wouldn't change anything in this case. IRL, according to this, Batumi harbour has a channel depth of 9.4-10 m, the cargo pier 6.4 - 7.6 m and the achorage and oil terminal 7.1 - 9.1 m. The port of Sochi, according to this, has a channel depth of 6.4 - 7.6 m, the cargo pier has a depth of 4.9 - 6.1 m and the achorage has a depth of 11 - 12.2 m. So in both cases, the Seawise Giant isn't getting in - it's draught is far too large when loaded (as it is in DCS). The Handy Wind isn't getting into Sochi (beyond the anchorage anyway) and is barely getting into Batumi. The Santa Fe though should mostly be good for both.

According to this, the M60A3's laser rangefinder has a maximum range of 5000 m (about 2.7 nautical miles). According to this document (approved for public release - see page 3 of the reader for the distribution statement) mentions a maximum effective range of 3000-4000 m for the primary armament, 1200-1800 m for the commander’s .50 cal MG and 900 m for the coaxial MG. (See the tables on 18-20 of the reader). For the T-55, tankograd has an article with an image of the sight (TSh2B-32P), the maximum range is 6000 m (~3.23 nmi) for HEF (ОФ) ammunition, 4000 m for AP (БР, ПОДК) ammunition, 3000 m for HEAT (БК) and 2200 m for the coaxial MG (ГТ). Note that the stadiametric rangefinder only goes out to 2800 m, for a target 2.7 m tall. For the Chieftain, first note that despite what it's called in-game, it most definitely isn't a Mk 3. If ED intended it to be based on the Mk 3, then given that we appear to have a tank that's completed Totem Pole and Sundance upgrades, that would make it a Mk 7/L. That aside, this quotes 10,000 m (~5.4 nmi) range for the Chieftain's laser rangefinder, which is backed up by a Marconi pamphlet on IFCS (though not sure if that's rule 1.16 compliant as it doesn't have a distribution statement). What the maximum effective range is I don't know, though is likely a lot less. The real thing's sight has markings for up to 3200 m (note that the sight used in game appears pre IFCS and has RMG markings despite the tank not having ranging machine gun).

Almost certainly no as this will likely be flat.

I'll certainly take a modern day map, so long as all the Cold War era airfields are present in Cold War configuration (and sites like this will help). Here, I'd much rather compromise that not do it at all, given just how much fits and how significant a theatre it is in a Cold War gone hot scenario.

Would love a 1980s north and/or central Germany map. Easily the map that makes the most sense given our current modules and assets and a very important theatre during the Cold War.

They were deleted for allegedly being offtopic. Apparently this kind of discussion is more suited to the wishlist.

It has a GCI data link, though it won't be present at early access. I assume that the AEW&C aircraft like the A-50 would feed information to the GCI network. The only hiccup here though is I thought that, at least in Soviet times, the A-50s were under the PVO? Whereas the MiG-29 is operated by the VVS.

I don't doubt it, but it is at least possible to set starting locations or have flights over areas of low detail. Especially when it comes to carrier operations. Well, I have my doubts that it would sit well that a map called the Persian Gulf has less than half of the Persian Gulf actually present, I think we've seen evidence of that already. Caucasus I can probably agree with, from a purely historical perspective, it's only really the 2008 Russo-Georgia War that's catered for (and even that's missing strategic targets, and AFAIK the map is based on 90s data). Syria though? Not sure I can agree with that, it's low-detail areas are at least relatively usable compared to Caucasus. The western end of low detail is invaluable for carrier operations and IMO the eastern end is still fairly interesting, not to mention the sliver of Iraq, which includes a historically important group of airbases (even if the wider area isn't there and probably won't be until the world map is developed).

You're comparing apples with oranges here - on the one hand you're comparing the total map area (at least at release) with just the area of the highly detailed area. Everything of interest? Do you mean all of the usable areas? Because there's plenty of areas of interest on the PG map that aren't usable, despite them fitting within the total area of the map. Personally, it should've kept the Straits of Hormuz name it had initially, because for a Persain Gulf theatre, it's rather lacking. That remark was referring to the historical context of the areas we're getting (GWOT) - not the size of the map (or rather, not directly). So no, they wouldn't, because the historical context of Afghanistan doesn't apply to the PG map.

Yep, this for me is a massive problem. I'm worried PTO is going to essentially be more of the same and that there will be very little in the way of fleshing it out. The 2024 and Beyond trailer having a WWII naval battlegroup entirely consisting of LSTs and APAs save for an aircraft carrier was already pretty concerning in and of itself. Yes and this isn't a good thing. It makes me reluctant to use those aircraft when there's very little else for them. I don't see how I can construe having an era barely fleshed out as anything other than a bad thing. Well, unless you don't pay attention to the variants that is, if you do then we really don't have many Vietnam aircraft at all, it's only the A-1H and F-8J that are (which so far don't have a carrier to operate from). And Vietnam is probably the most highly requested map going. People have different interests and desires than you do, and you find that "amazing"? Certainly an interesting take, but whatever. It also isn't true - having modules, assets and maps that are coherent with each other wouldn't prevent you from being able to make hypothetical or fictional scenarios, so even if I had that, I still wouldn't be playing DCS solely to reenact historical events. I absolutely can enjoy an aircraft without a coherent theatre, assets and modules, but I'll always be limited to scenarios that are mostly fictional (and even when they aren't a hefty amount of fudging has to be employed, though mileage will of course vary) and I'll always be lacking what I'm really interested in doing and they'll always be the nagging mile-wide, inch-deep sensation that can be quite offputting and dare I say it, even disheartening in some circumstances. If you find that "amazing" then so be it. And that's completely fine. I'm certainly not amazed by this, you can and should be free to make whatever scenario you like. But then, because of the lack of an eastern front theatre, that's practically the only thing you can do, which I find fairly ironic given you're about to type this: To which I say, how is being limited to purely fictional scenarios where even the aircraft's presence in the theatre at all (historical scenario or not) is itself fictional, any less limiting? Surely if anything, I'd be less limited with a coherent set up, because not only can I still create fictional or hypothetical scenarios like I can now (only I'd be able to have a coherent set up as a bonus), but historical re-enactments too.

This doesn't appear to be the case, as per my track. In that I was able to get the site to engage an aircraft with only the Clam Shell and Flap Lid present as far as radars are concerned. If I remove the Clam Shell from my mission, the site doesn't engage. Even if I place the Flap Lid such that the target would be within it's expected scan volume. IRL, an S-300PS battalion usually only has the Flap Lid and a Clam Shell on site, the Big Bird or Tin Shield would be located at an EWR site, providing acquisition and battle management for multiple S-300 battalions. However, you can find examples where they appear to be colocated together (I've found a few such examples on the Kola Peninsula). Of course that's more IADS like functionality which DCS doesn't really support, meaning each battalion essentially operates independently and must have its own acquisition radars. In any case, the Clam Shell, as defined in its .lua has a scan volume between -15° to +60° in elevation and ±180° azimuth, a detection range of 120 km and a minimum radial velocity of 15 m/s. In my track, the target shouldn't be within the scan volume of the Flap Lid and it engages the target, it still does if I rotate the FCR such that target is within where I'd expect the sector the Flap Lid can scan without rotating. If I remove the Clam Shell though, the target isn't engaged and the site doesn't appear to react at all. Note that the .lua sensor definitions do not tell the entire story for the scan volume of a radar. While I have seen radars that have a ±180° azimuth limits in the files (i.e. 360°) - such as the 5N63S Flap Lid B and 9S35 Fire Dome. When I've set up the latter such that it's operating completely independently (no Snow Drift) it was only able to acquire targets within a certain sector, as would be expected IRL. Definitely with you on the trailer mounted Tin Shield, which has a whole host of wrong with it (not an appropriate S-200 radar, can't be used in either of the 2 roles it has IRL, despite the ease the changes to make it so would be).

The far easier thing to do in the mean time would be to just decouple the wind speeds, because having the 1600 ft winds being locked to double the surface winds in the exact same direction in every single circumstance with no exceptions whatsoever and then have that apply across the entire map is just not realistic. In the link you provided, there's a logarithmic function for wind speed with respect to height. In that function there's a parameter, z0, for the aerodynamic roughness length. If you were to take the values in DCS and solve the equation for z0, you'd get the exact same result every single time, regardless of whether you were in open sea or in a built up area. When I've calculated the Hellmann exponent (solving for a in this equation), I get a value of approximately 0.2. The simple fact is, setting up different gradients, which can also be found in the link you provided, simply is impossible in DCS given how the wind speeds are locked together. As for operation at sea, the problem we have in DCS is if we want realistic wind speeds over land (i.e. what the current system seems to be trying to achieve, albeit with no backing or veering possible) it makes it pretty inaccurate at sea and vice versa. Even just sticking to operation at sea, if I were to set an appropriate surface speed, aircraft in the case 1 stack now have to contend with crosswinds at positions 2 and 4 that are significantly stronger than what they should be. This isn't just my opinion either as this corroborated by the links that both you and Lace have provided. At the moment, if you were to use a forecasting model (Windy provides a few, though some are only available in certain locations), which are also based in physics, you'd find it impossible to replicate what's being predicted in DCS, at least in certain locations (though in my experience it's more common than not). When you factor in the fact that we have airports at different elevations, the problem is made quite a bit worse. For an example, at 1000Z today, the ECMWF model, as provided by Windy at RAF Akrotiri (75 ft MSL) is forecasting surface winds that are 11 knots from the west. The METAR report for Akrotiri at 0950Z (found here) was reporting 13 knots from the south-west (so actual surface wind speed is ~1.2× what the ECMWF is forecasting). At 2000 ft (closest I can get to 1600 ft on Windy) the ECMWF is forecasting 14 knots from the west. If I were to set 13 knots surface winds in DCS, I would be stuck with 27 knots at 1600 ft - nearly double. At Damascus International Airport (2020 ft MSL), the ECMWF is forecasting surface winds of 6 knots from the south west. The METAR report for the airport at 1000Z was showing 10 knots from the south-west. While the ECMWF is certainly lowballing the speeds (this time actual winds is 1.67× what's forecasted), in DCS, with the 13 knot surface speed for Akrotiri, the speed at Damascus becomes nearly triple what it should be. If I try to instead set 10 knots at 2000 ft so I've got accurate speeds at Damascus, the wind speed at Akrotiri is now a third of what it should be and now all my ships have to travel faster (twice as fast in this case) in order to get an optimum wind over deck. Now that wouldn't be too much of a hassle in and of itself (though only because we lack auxiliaries which might not be able to keep up), but the ships are now travelling double the distance in the same amount of time, which is problematic for the more confined waters on the map and makes it much more of a pain to have realistic cycle times for launching and recovering aircraft. Whichever way I slice it, I'm left in a muddle; I can either choose to have one area be accurate, at the complete expense of accuracy in others, which may or may not involve having the winds at 1600 ft be overexaggerated, sometimes to a significant degree, or I can forsake accuracy entirely, which will probably involve setting a low surface wind such that the winds at 1600 ft are less extreme. All this because the speeds and directions are locked together and all while contending with the implications it has on carrier operations (affecting the distance travelled because of the speeds required to get optimum wind speed over deck and for the required launching and recovery times, as well as crosswinds in the case 1 marshal stack). If they weren't locked together I would (at least, in this case) easily be able to set up a compromise, allowing me to have much more accurate speeds in both locations while having winds at 1600 ft that are more in line with the forecasting model used and only be a few knots off here and there instead of 10-20 knots off I am with the current system. And given that the locking only makes sense for certain areas, I see very little reason for it to stay the way it is. Obviously though, a higher fidelity weather model, particularly one where it's possible to have more localised weather (such as what's possible in the weather commander program for that other F-16 orientated simulator, which would frankly be perfect for our needs) is sorely needed (especially for the Earth map in development) and is the better solution. However, we have no timeframe for either of these things. We don't even know what the new weather system will even consist or what the plans are in this area, or even if there are any at all. So far we've got new clouds, then the clouds were made to move with the wind and we got things like rainbows, glories and ice halos. Past that, all we know is that there's a new fog system in the works, new cloud types in the works (namely cumulonimbus clouds) and LOS blocking for clouds.

Not sure what's going on here, the C-17A at least appears to be in range, within the elevation limits (defined as -15°, +60° for the Clam Shell, I make the C-17A at 15°), above the minimum radial velocity (defined as 15 m/s for the Clam Shell, I make it ~40 m/s). The other targets may be beyond what the 5V55R missile is capable of intercepting. I have been able to get an S-300PS battalion to work, even when there's only a Clam Shell for acquisition (see my track below). In that case, whatever the problem is I don't think it's necessarily related to the Clam Shell. I'm not sure if DCS models it but your site is laid out quite strangely, IRL you have a group of launchers consiting of a 5P85S (TEL C) and up to 2 5P85D (TEL Ds) with up to 4 groups ber battalion. The launching group must be located within 120 m of the fire control radar and the 5P85Ds can't be located more than a few metres away from the 5P85S (the limitations come from length of the data links and cables) - see here and here. Perhaps it might be worth switching the Clam Shell for a Big Bird and seeing if you observe the same results and maybe change the other aircraft so they are approaching the site. If that doesn't work, I'd try a more real-world S-300PS layout (an example can be found below). S-300PS_clamshell_test.miz S-300PS_clamshell_test.trk

RAZBAM WIP MiG-23MLA, from Discord:

Alternatively, I think I'd rather have them just removed entirely so that players can set up the deck as they desire without worrying about them at all. We have the units so we can place them ourselves and the ability to make templates with them, but there isn't a way to remove the ones that are already there.

Wanted to bump this, it's been over 2 years since this radar released and it still cannot be used in either of the 2 main roles it has in real life. For clarity, those roles are: A general-purpose early warning radar, where it can be seen at numerous early warning radar sites, including sites covered by current and future maps. A search/acqusitition radar for the S-300, as with the case of the 40V6M mast-mounted version introduced in DCS 2.9.0.46801. Though it has largely been superceded by the 5N64 Big Bird At the moment it is limited to being a search/acquisition radar for the S-200, a system that it's completely inaccurate for (including the Syrian S-200s that our one is supposedly based on - see this post, though do note that in recent imagery the S-200 sites appear empty, so best use Google Earth Pro).

Hooray! Though personally I will be believing it when I see it. Still, definitely better than nothing!

People who care about quite literally, the goal of the game. People who care about aircraft being depicted as they were advertised. People who care about getting stuff we haven't gotten yet and is long overdue. Yes it does, you just can't imagine why. I mean HB already have a backlog, the AI A-6E and J 35 were announced over half a decade ago, the former has missed it's last deadline by what will probably be close to yet another year. If HB spends time modelling stuff that's antithetical to the very goal of the game as a whole, instead of working on items that are sought after, will better flesh out their Tomcat and Forrestal, that's going to be really annoying. Missing deadlines over and over again is one thing, not working on the stuff that's not only wanted, but planned and teased (perhaps contributing somewhat to that delay), is quite another. Because, in addition to the above, it also goes against the very goal of the game, which can quite literally be found in the 2nd line of its description. If something is going to be advertised to me as trying to offer the most realistic whatever possible, I'm going to expect exactly that. If you're instead going to go out of your way to not do that, especially if it means doing something else instead of doing that, then that's going to annoy me. See the Hornet for my primary case study, though this also applies to stuff like the S-200 and ED's decision to give it a completely unrealistic search/acquisition radar, which for years now cannot be used in the roles it's actually used for, despite how trivial making it so would be. While this applies less to the Tomcat, there are items that should be present (even if more miscellaneous items such as a lot of the tests, including OBC, the AA1 panel etc) that are documented for (even in HB's own manual) but at the moment aren't present in the module, as well stuff that's incorrect, that could use attention. I mean, even the pylon for the AIM-120 - the Tomcat has been out for half a decade now and it still doesn't have a LAU-138 model and only very recently got the rest of it's loadout (though none of it functional as of yet). Yeah, baseless nonsense. I mean, [citation very much needed] on these I'm afraid. None of the reasons I gave are illegitimate in the slightest, especially given the point of the game - indeed they are simply the logical extension of that goal. You just don't like them. While that would've been fine in and of itself (though in that case you might be playing the wrong game), you've taken to trying to poison the well and pretending to know my thoughts and motivations better than I do. It does in a game and a product that's trying to be realistic. It only doesn't if you don't care about it in the slightest. It wasn't possible and it wasn't done - operational F-14As, Bs and Ds do not have the capability to fire and launch AIM-120. So, given the goals of the product and given the goals of the module, why should developers spend any time implementing it? Ahh, this again, a true timeless classic. Just one small problem though... Where does it end? Where's the goal line of it now? Because this exact same logic can be used to justify literally anything, so long as it can be ignored by those damned puritanical elitist rivet counters. I mean, let's make the Tomcat accelerate to Mach 4. Because if you don't like it, then guess what? Just don't fly so fast. It really is that simple. Are you going to lose sleep over it? Why would anybody argue against having something that paying customers want to see in game for the aircraft they bought? There's absolutely no reason not to - realism doesn't matter and if anybody has any misgivings about this at all, then they're all illegitimate and the only real reason anybody would be against this is obviously them just wanting to sound smart with their fancy elitist aerodynamics knowledge (or just ability to do simple internet searches, as with the case above). Guess what RedTail, I am in fact aware of the mod. It's almost like the thoughts and motivations you imagine I have, have no grounding whatsoever! Because I maintain that people should be able to mod the game however they damn well like, just like what scenarios people decide to make out of what we have should be totally up to up to them, as realistic (well good luck) or as fictional as you like. None of things I brought up here apply to user mods and it's my choice whether or not they're even installed in the first place, so they doubly don't apply here. And with a mod for it, then we have a Tomcat that realistically doesn't have AIM-120 and modded Tomcat that does, so wherever you stand here both are catered for. So what's the problem?

Will do, thank you.

Definitely agree with that.

The same issue also applies to the HQ-16 (though to less of an extent), I wasn't sure whether these weapons were under ED's control or Deka, so forgive me if it's been reported in the wrong place.

It would - like I said, this would be unprecedented. I just feel it would be a shame if that work had to be done away with, if ED produce their own implementation.

Well, one thing that was nice to see is that the Mirage F1 was made compatible with RAZBAM's IFF implementation. If more 3rd parties follow suite then couldn't that be the standard? Though it would be somewhat unprecedented having a 3rd party develop what should be a core technology. I think it would be a shame if a system that basically does everything required (at least from a NATO IFF perspective, but seeing as RAZBAM is working on the MiG-23MLA, perhaps we'll see Soviet equipment too) needed to be reinvented by ED, especially when they've seemed somewhat averse to IFF in the past. This I think is the key here, even a simplistic IFF simulation* would go a long way, though we already have modules that already (at least IMO) do everything required. *

It looks like the definitions for the guns in the .lua are swapped around. Not only are the guns aiming inwards, but their firing arcs seem to be swapped as well, meaning that the port-side gun will only engage targets on the ship's starboard side and vice versa; this in turn results in the guns firing through the smokestack in order to engage targets. It also means that if for example, an anti-ship missile impacts the port side of the ship, it won't disable the gun firing at targets to port, even if the port-side gun is disabled (if that makes sense). This track mostly concerned some odd behaviour with the HQ-16, but towards the end of the track the issue with the H/PJ-12 (Type 730) guns can be observed also.