Bearfoot

Huh. In the same way, I suppose, an aging 1918 fighter jock would have thought the Spitfire with its weird single deck wings and horrible closed canopy (there was an ace or a fighter designer or someone saying that a fighter pilot cannot be effective if he cannot feel the wind on his face to gauge airspeed) looks fugly! New paradigm of fighter design: F-22, F-35, PAK-FA, J-20, even the future Tempest all have the same aesthetics (which, of course, follows from function). Anyway, little known fact but the Galactic Time Lords in Charge of Judging Aviation Aesthetics have published an official proclamation of the "Best Looking Jet Fighters of the 20th Century" based on objective analysis and evidence and is infallible and indisputable (after acknowledging that the 20th Century jet fighters are the best looking of all jet fighters of all time) . In order: (1) Su-27 (2) F-4 (3) F-14 (4) everything else

And yet, here we are

These words are true.

But ... but ... 18 is bigger than 16!!! j/k The correct answer to all these "Which ..." questions is, of course, "F-14".

"For everything else, it really is a wash, given, as with all discussion of aircraft effectiveness, reasonably competent pilots who know how to fly the aircraft to its particular strengths" (Though the second bit could have been assumed, but I guess I should have spelled it out!)

For BFM. And contrived "dueling"/practice BFM at that (where you start off in WVR). And that's a maybe at best. For everything else, it really is a wash.

For one particular class of A2G --- loitering / CAS in highly-permissive pre-sanitized environments with no air threats at all. On the other side of the spectrum, for deep strikes in extremely dangerous high-threat environments, you have the other specialist: Viggen. I consider both aircraft niche specalists, and in that sense limited. The Hornet and Viper on the other hand certainly address a broader range of the spectrum spanning both ends. And handle air cover / enemy interceptors in the target area. Not to mention, probably the most fun type of AG --- wild weasel. To the OP: personally, I don't bother with what is "better" any more. I just go with what I prefer. The emotional choice makes you want to investment the time and energy and yes, love, into learning the aircraft. And you will end up doing better in an aircraft you love rather than one that is is technically "better". This perspective actually makes even more sense with the F-16/F-18 issue because honestly, they are both very similar in terms of A2G capability. They just do things a bit differently (ergonomics, switchology, philosophy, and some details in type of weapon deliveries). Another difference in style: air-to-air refueling, boom vs drogue. The one thing the Hornet can do that the Viper cannot: operate off a boat! You need to figure out what style you prefer. Or you can pick the aircraft whose looks or history appeals to you and make it's style your style! You cannot go wrong with either. Apart from all that, you have to bear in mind the development stage --- the F/A-18 is generally mission capable right now. The F-16 is another from 1-6 months or more away. Not a big deal in the latter, as you can use the time to learn to fly that thing.

So my top center screen is intact. And no caution lights are on. But the horizon is definitely tilted. I did check the backup attitude indicator and this seems OK, so it makes sense that I have broken or misaligned something. I guess there is no in-air fix (like recalibraton)?

How is this done??

Sometimes after a dogfight (assuming I survive!), I find that the horizon indicator is tilted (banked) quite a bit. Did I break something? This happens even if I take no damage. One possibility is that I pulled too much G --- would this be a result? I would post a track, but, as we know, F-14 tracks are totally borked at replicating anything with the F-14. Every replay has me firing into empty space randomly while twisting and turing, and then eventually either getting shot down or driving into the side of a mountain or the ground!

We are in the VHS vs BetaMax days of VR. What settled the VHS vs BetaMax war in favor of VHS was pornography producers picking VHS as their format, rather than any inherent advantage of any of the formats. Who will win the VR market remains to be seen. I suspect Steam's open VR SDK is the way of the future. It allows game/applicaiton developers all code to a single common standard on the one hand, and hardware manufacturers to focus on hardware design and manufacture supporting this standard. It makes sense from a division of labor/specialization perspective, and a market gain perspective. This allowing of third-party manufacturer's to get into the game is what led to the numerical success of the PC over Macs, and may apply to the VR arena as well. As it is we are seeing many more options for the Steam VR API. On the other hand, Facebook, odious as it is, is huge and may have money to keep offering great VR products at much cheaper prices. So, as I said, this remains to be seen.

WHOAH! Thank you for letting me know about Open Composite!

What sustained turn rate speeds do you aim for in a BFM config? And how do you fly it while keeping your eye on the bandit? How do you practice flying it? TacView?

Thanks, Miles! Appreciate the thought and consideration that has gone into the design, as well as you taking the time to answer questions. Looking forward to receiving my PointCTRL!

I think it actually depends (more, at least) on whether or not you have a machine capable of running the Reverb to full capacity. If you can, then get the Reverb. If you cannot, then get the Rift S. The Reverb is definitely better from a resolution perspective (though not from a software, setup, controller, or headset ergonomic one), but you really will not notice the difference in resolution too much. The Reverb is GREATER but the Rift S is "GREAT ENOUGH": you can read all your instruments comfortably (and the bigger sweet spot helps with this), track bandits well enough in BFM. and you can still savor the awesome art and beauty of the world. (As a side note, while living with the CV1, whenever I used to see screenshots especially from devs hyping their work on modules I always used to feel a little twinge of regret because I knew when I got to see it it would be through globs of vaseline. No more! Now I rejoice at the eye-popping detail. I have spent a couple of hours revisiting many cockpits that were gathering dust and places I have not been in the DCS world for the long time to relish what I've been missing. Comparing the Rift S and Reverb, really they are so much, much, much closer to each other in experience/perception than the jump from CV1 ). I still have both units here with me. Switching back and forth between one and another, I feel no (emotional) "pain" with the apparent lower resolution in the Rift S. The difference is very subtle. I do however feel the pain of the atrocious frame rates I get with the Reverb. What's the point of a beautiful world in crisp higher resolution if its shaky and wobbly or induces nausea due to bad frame rates? The Reverb is probably going back unless I can commit to upgrading my machine in the immediate future (I told myself I am going to with till the 3080-series graphics cards come out before I do this ....)

Folks, this whole discussion about the best controllers in VR is obsolete. The correct answer is: HOTSAS + PointCTRL

But with your beefy machine specs you will probably be able to run the Reverb at eye-wateringly good levels though

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks!

:megalol:

The increase in resolution may be greater on a linear scale, but human vision/perception is demonstrably non-linear. It is, in fact, logarithmic: it takes even more resolution to make a difference at higher levels of resolution than lower. I stand by my statement: the perceived difference between the Reverb and the Rift S is MUCH, MUCH less than that between the Rift S and the Rift CV1. In any case, even so, I still would without a doubt go for the Reverb ... if I could actually satisfactorily run it at that resolution!

So I ordered the Reverb to try it out and compare to the Rift S First, some background: I run i7-4790K @4Ghz, 16GB RAM, 1080Ti 16GB. (Yes, once this was a state of the art unit. Now, it's middle-aged dad-bode.). I've been using the Rift CV1 for many years, and thought I would see if I could upgrade the VR set while holding on to the machine for another year or two. I got the Rift S and the Reverb. The Rift S was like magically wiping the vaseline off the my lenses. Things just popped into crystal clarity. I could read instruments. What used to be smudges now actually let me know what was going on without me having to lean in. And guess what? NO discernible performance hit whatsoever. Ok, on to the Reverb. Followed the setup and tweaking instructions found here: https://vr4dcs.com/2019/08/08/moving-from-oculus-to-reverb/ . Default settings (without tweaking) were actually worse than the Rift S. I upscaled to 150%. And then I saw what the fuss was about. CLEARLY better than the Rift S. Not as much as a jump as from the Rift to the Rift S, but still noticeable. If going from the Rifht to the Rift S was like wiping vaseline away from my eyes, going from the Rift S to the Reverb was more like before and after a rain shower --- things are just a little bit more contrasty. But here's the thing: performance with the Reverb SUCKED. As in nauseating. After years of using VR on an almost daily basis, for the first time I got a twinge of VR sickness. And horrible artifacts -- juddering, ghosting, smearing, etc. especially if I look to the side while flying through dense terrain (e.g., downtown Dubai). Yes, with reprojection on and off. So I dialed things back. And back. And back. And back. And back, And back. Finally got to the point where I could fly through Dubai and look to the side without the juddering/smearing/ghosting artifacts being too annoying (though still a little VR-queasiness seemed to be just around the corner). Here's the thing though --- by this time, the quality of the image was not really distinguishingly better than the Rift S! In fact, one might argue that it might even look a little bit worse. And while I had reduced the juddering/smearing etc., it really was still noticeably worse than with the Rift S. So, to answer my own question earlier in this thread. Yes, I can run the Reverb fine. But to do so, I have to run it at settings so that it really looks the same (or maybe even worse) than the Rift S. I think if I had the horsepower to run it like it was intended, the Reverb would be a no brainer. This truly brings the visuals of VR back to being on par to where I was in the old days with 2D in a 4K screen. I cannot afford a new machine right now, and need to squeeze the current one for little while longer. As such, it seems like the Rift S is the way to go for me. And to be honest, it is actually not just good, but great enough. Going back to the Rift S after a couple of hours in the Reverb did not feel like I was back in world where I had vision problems or anything. There was just this every so slight loss of crispiness that I forgot about in minutes. But maybe that is just the joyous relief at not feeling even a tiny bit nauseous as buildings flashed by me at M2 talking!

I have a TM warthog throttle with a third-party afterburner detent. I cannot remember if I modified my curves or not, but at the current setting the afterburner kicks in perfectly and exactly as I clear the detent. Love it! What I am not sure about is how to control the various afterburner stages (stage 1 through 5). I take it that IRL these are discrete bumps? Or is it just continuous. For me afterburner is an all or nothing thing right now -- either I am in full burn or no burn at all.

I've mentioned this before in another thread, and was told that it could be an issue with memory less that 12GB. However, I have 16GB. It occurs in all maps. It occurs in a number of missions (including e.g. the Case I training missions). But is very difficult to replicate --- I cannot pin down the circumstances. However, almost always a simple restart fixes things.

Put a worse pilot than you into the F-16 .... j/k of course. (But also, speaking as a really clumsy BFM'er, true) Anyway, more seriously, do you mean: (1) guns only (2) guns + missiles, not including the Aim-9X (3) guns + missiles, including the Aim-9X I imagine each of this would demand a different gameplan. I leave it to better pilots than I to contribute useful answers. But If missiles are allowed and you are carrying Phoenix's, then I think the answer is Phoenix before the merge!

Thanks for the quick response, Miles. No additional functionality. It's just that with the regular mouse the time out takes so long and the blue cross is distracting especially in critical moments that I often just switch it off instead of waiting it out. Now this relates just to the regular mouse --- not sure how things will work with PointCTRL as I am not yet one of the lucky ones to have received mine! I guess if returning my hands to their resting positions on the HOTAS will take the FCU's out of view than it will work perfectly. I suspect though that I may still need to LALT-C or double click the mouse middle button to effect this. Or just get used to waiting out the time out!