TheJay15

That might explain why I had trouble finding the F-16s as I had a very large scan zone and they have a very small cross section head on. Yes that was when I was scanning a very large area at somewhere between 80 and 100 nmi.

Yes I did intend to put a thousand after those numbers and I am aware what they represent. I was however unaware that the radar only had an 80nmi range. Still this does not explain why targets do not seem to appear on my radar until they are very close. Far closer than 80nmi.

It may be that the AI aircraft are flying very slowly as I have boticed that they tend to fly around at high AoA a lot of the time. My problem isn't getting too close, it's that the aircraft don't seem to show up on radar until they are around 15nmi even if I set my scan range to 100nmi and have a search cone going from -15ft to 57ft. I usually just keep my radar in the standard search mode.

So I have been playing the stock missions which come with the Mirage and I have noticed that my 530's seem to struggle in the range department compared to what I have seen on YouTube. I theorize that this may be due to the general low altitude nature of most of the missions but It always seems like people on the interwebs are getting rMax of something like 15nmi even at low alt whereas on the deck I am getting rMax of around 7nmi. Obviously I am using the RAZBAM missiles... Maybe I am just paranoid and need to climb more. edit: I have also noticed that my radar does not seem to detect targets very well at all. I am aware that there are issues with losing locks but does that include targets not appearing on the radar at all? Seems the worst over water. I know that radars have issues looking down into water. Is that what is causing my problem?

The problem was fixed by tech support

Its not the gunsnake as it does not move when i move and it remains there whether or not the guns are activated.

So I just got the Mirage 2000 and everytime I do a cold start the HUD has a weird sort of grid at the top of it just under the heading tape. Ive looked through Chucks guide and he makes no mention of it and I am following his startup to a T. I would just like to know its signifigance and how to get rid of it.

Im surprised they make you go through the command prompt to update and change to beta.

I currently have the 1.5 release version and I want it to be beta 1.5 so that the Mirage will have its most recent updates. Is there a way to change to beta without reinstalling DCS?

I used my Debit.

I purchased the Mirage 2000 and the purchase completed just fine. However, I never recieved the e mail with the activation code and when I checked my profile page the module did show up until the page was reloaded at which point it had dissapeared.

I guess I am just trying to make the point here that we shouldn't disparage the Spit just because it isn't exactly up to snuff with the Luftwaffe's dream machine. If spit pilots just fly smart and never fight fair, always have a dirty trick, they can still be successful fighters even though they aren't in the fastest thing around (being the prettiest makes up for this I suppose). I just worry that this whole attitude will make it so people who want to fly a Spit will complain that it is underpowered and that they need something better thus leading to some goofy power creep effect where no one will actually be flying proper WWII aircraft, rather they will all be flying some wonder plains just for the sake of "fairness". I suppose that I should probably reserve my worries for when the aircraft is actually released.

The Spitfire IX restored parity in speed; the Spitfire had an 8 mph advantage at 8,000 ft; 5 mph faster at 15,000 ft; and a 5 to 7 mph advantage at 25,000 ft. The Fw 190 retained speed advantages at 2,000 ft and 18,000 ft where it held a lead of 7 to 8 and 3 mph respectively. In the climb, they were equal, the Spitfire being slightly faster. However, once the 22,000 ft mark was reached, the Spitfire climbing rate increased, while the Fw 190s rapidly fell away. (Price 2009, p. 49.) As you can see here neither aircraft ever held any appreciable speed advantage but more often than not the Spitfire had a small advantage that would give almost no advantage in combat. Just because one aircraft is faster than another does not mean that the faster aircraft is objectively better. If the Foke Wulf is so monstrously fast at low altitudes even against the P-51 then why have I seen it get killed time and time again trying to run away from enemies? Good performance will only carry you so far no matter how good an aircraft is. May I remind you that the hoplessly outclassed F4F wildcat maintained a kill to death ratio of nearly 6:1 against the objectively superior Zero-sen.

Could not the same be said for any pilot who knows how to effectively fly the Spitfire? If a Spitfire pilot obtains advantages before a fight he will still stand a good chance against a lower energy Dora especially if the Spit has a friend or two. I also see many Doras who attempt to turn fight which I suspect will change once the Spitfire is released (although I don't necessarily garentee that because I have seen many a Mustang pilot try to out turn a 109 at low altitudes). Also most sources I have seen cite the Mk IX at around 410 mph which is no where near 40 mph slower than the Dora?

The Anton and the Spit MkIX were a fairly even match which many would even argue the spitfire was the superior aircraft. The spit had an overall higher top speed but the Fw was able to accellerate faster (especially in a dive). The Spit held the advantage in turn radius but lost out in a roll and in general "maneuverability" (this term is used often and it is incredibly vague but I digress). The conclusion was the Spitfire IX compared favourably with the Fw 190 provided the Spitfire had the initiative, it had "undoubtedly a good chance of shooting the Fw 190 down". (Price 2009, p. 51.) It is with this information that I would conclude that the Spitfire and the Dora would still, in the MP arena at least, be competitive against one another. I say this because the Dora simply represents a slightly faster Anton (408mph vs. 426mph) *note the speeds may not be perfect as sources seem to conflict* and since most people in an online arena fail to ever reach the top speed of any aircraft (most often they don't even manage to fly it to its strengths) I doubt that any of the advantages the engine upgrade the Dora offers will make much of a difference in combat especially considering that most of our combat will be taking place at lower altitudes where the Dora was not intended to operate. Now to be clear I have no intention of picking on you or any such thing I simply am getting tired of people stipulating that the Spitfire will not be competitive against the Dora or the Kurfurst (the K is a discussion for another day). I just don't believe that this assessment is fair especially considering how poorly the online environment represents actual historical air combat. If anyone finds any flaws in my points please point them out. I would love to see what I may be perceiving incorrectly.

So what I'm gathering here is that both the late war 109's and 51's had many small changes, none of which resulted in any massive performance increase from their 44 variants. Also sorry if I seem like some idiot asking all these simple questions. I swear I know more about the early war aircraft. I just know next to nothing about late war aircraft performance (especially the lufwaffe and RAF aircraft) as every book I read on it usually devolves into "By 1944 the P-51 destroyed every aircraft in the sky and that is why it is basically airplane Jesus" lol. Actually I once was reading a book specifically about the Fw-190 and when they talked about it's late war performance against the 51 they actually used quotes from P-51 pilots to talk about luftwaffe tactics which I thought was funny. I assume this is because many pilots who flew the 190 late in the war didn't live to pass on the tactics but it still gave me a chuckle.

Kurfurst you make a joke about the P-51D block 30. Is that the variant we have in sim? I thought this was supposed to be 1944 not 45. If they want to simulate 45 they should basically have no lufwaffe presence at all.

I think a large problem here is that it is so difficult to compare late war 109's to each other simply due to the wide array of variations present in production. It's nearly impossible to discuss the performance of an airframe when there could be any number of confounding variables influencing it's performance. From what I have been reading recently it seems to me that the K4 is a fairly good, if not a little optomistic, representation of a 1944-45 bf-109. Also the wern't the germans forced to use poor quality fuel towards the end? Is this represented in the sim right now?

Well the LF Mk IX is a low fighter version hence the LF so it is not too surprising that it suffers at high altitudes. Most combat in DCS is low down so this isn't too worrying. I just want to make sure it wont be suicidal to fly it in MP. I heard VAEO is making a Spit Mk.XIV which unfortunately means it may still take an eternity to get released.

Yeah I should have been more clear there. I meant isn't that an unlikely/optomistic range. I'm sure it is possible to do it would just require you to be very high and very fast and head on.

Isn't the case with missile range that it is often over the missiles actual effective range? For instance the AIM 120 has a listed range on Wikipedia of 80nm or something like that even though that is a near impossible range.

Ya gotta love the late war 109's. It's literally a grab bag of random parts and features. I was actually curious about its performance in relation to the other G's because the K4 is more of a 1945 aircraft but the sim says it is focusing on 44 so I wanted to know if the Luftwaffe had some goofy advantage over the more common G series 109's by virtue of the K4. Also I want to know if the Spit mk ix will be a competetive aircraft (It was used up until 1945 so I assume it was competetive or else they would have replaced it.)

As far as I am aware the K4 is simply an attempt at standardizing the late war G model production but still retains the same engine and handling characteristics of the G's. Am I correct in this?

Hopefully the Mirages new missile advantages will cause members of the community to put some pressure on ED to get the other missiles working the way they should. I suspect some F-15 pilots may be a little NaCl (hehe chemistry joke) that some French 80's SARH missile is competitve with their modern MERICAN Aim-120C.

I don't think anyone was suggesting that and I doubt that RAZBAM will try to "equalize" their missiles with the others.