RedTiger

Good idea, but: Are you sure that would be so easy? ;)

There's you problem. Worry if you're flying at 40k feet over the middle of the Crimea and you get terrible frame rates. You shouldn't worry about them being bad over cities. Cities will MURDER your frame rate. Absolutely kill it!! This is a poor measure of your computer's ability to run Lock On. Just for the hell of it...fly low over Krasnodar.

Are you amending what you've said previously and saying you CAN in fact snipe with rockets? :D

Ah, ok, so these Fulcrums aren't the first thing you fight. Didn't know that, sorry.

How many Aim-120s do you have vs. Aim-7s? Here's a thought: 1. Have your wing man pincer right or left, doesn't matter. You pincer the other direction. So both of you should be heading away from each other. If you were on a course due north head-on to those bandits, you are now going northeast and your wing man is going northwest. Keep those jamming strobes on the edge of your VSD so you can keep and eye on them. Also, watch your RWR. Often times you can tell more about the bandits behavior there than the VSD when they are jamming. 2. This should cause them to split their attack. Try your best to determine which one is going after you and which one is going after your wing man. Again, your RWR is your friend! The radar returns should be split up and you might be able to tell which one is making a bee-line for you. Lock onto the jamming strobe of the guy going after wingy, order wingy to attack him. Now you lock up your guy and turn back towards him. *Keep your wing man's radar on! It can provide you with valuable SA on what that idiot is up to!* *Keep your ECM off. Turn it on when they lock onto you* 3. As soon as you get the steady chirp meaning that they've managed to get close enough for a lock, turn off your ECM. At this point it will only cause you to be an easier target. 4. Either at burn-through or based on range provided by AWACS, select an Aim-7 and fire! Now crank and dive like crazy to get below him. The purpose of this missile isn't to kill him, just to throw him off. You want to get below him for the next part. Keep a steady, even stream of chaff going here, just in case. Moving around a bit in attempt to drag the missile and bleed its energy isn't such a bad idea. You're betting that he'll flinch before you do. Because he's the AI, he will. :doh: 5. If you haven't been killed by his missile, great! Your chances of living through this are pretty good. At some point, the bandit will turn away from you in an attempt to notch, only it won't work because you are now below him! ;) This is where you go for the kill. Turn back towards him, fly to intercept him, and launch an Aim-120. The objective now is to keep him defensive by firing Aim-120s every near the TTA or TTI of the previous one until one of your missiles gets him. He might try to turn back towards you and fire another missile, but it will soon go ballistic because he'll have to break lock again to notch. Eventually, one of your slammers should kill him. If needed, select an Aim-9 and try to fire before he can launch his own heater. 6. Now you'll either have to turn back towards wingy and help him or maybe even do his job for him if he was shot down. With any luck, he'll still be alive and both of you can keep the pressure on the bandit until one of you kills him. If he's dead, you want to do handle it similar to the way you handle the previous MiG.

Flop (just to name a few): - Warhammer Online: total flop. Absolutely no question. Three million box sales and a year later you have like 30,000 subscribers? (correct my numbers if I'm off here) Yeah, you failed. I'm not even sure if they're turning a profit. And that's with EA pulling the strings. ;) - Age of Conan: flopped, but bounced back and got better but....still a flop. The quitting came when everyone got out of Tortage, to my understanding. They've never really recovered. Still profitable, from what I understand, and has a niche player base, but still a flop. - Everquest 2: flopped, and flopped hard. Made to run on a super-fast single core processor that was never invented. Had 1999-style DIKU game play and was in the uneviable position of directly competing with with the launch of WoW. Also DIKU, but with the Blizzard polish. Its much better now, but it never really recovered. I never played AoC, but I have played both WAR and EQ2 at various points in time. Also play/played WoW, no surprise there since everyone and their mother has at some point. :D If the game you play is EVE, well, EVE is in a strange category. I wouldn't call it a flop, but perhaps that's just being a hypocrit because I've named games that had rocky starts as "flops". EVE is certainly growing. Maybe this benchmark for "flop" isn't fair. WoW has set the bar so high, and was in such the right place at the right time, its hard to call any MMO developer with delusions of grandeur that thinks it can compete with it, only to fail, but then holds onto a tiny slice of market share as anything but a flop, no matter if they're profitable or not. If those MMOs had decided to not try to "out-WoW WoW", I'd be more inclined to look on them as successes. This is all just my opinion, of course.

No, you're using it as just a regular multiplayer game. An MMO for Lock On would look something like this: 1. Dedicated servers for online play run by ED. All pilot info is stored server-side. There would also be some more robust anti-cheating, again, server-side. 2. A large-scale, real-time, persistant play environment that doesn't end when you log off and go to bed. The world persists and 24 hours a day (except for server maintenance down-time) people can fly missions that *hopefully* have an actual impact on the game world to some extent. What this would probably look like is something like Falcon's dynamic campaign, but with players being able to have more roles on either side. Despite the fact that the challenge would be in head to head and the fun would be in co-op, there would be and *should* be some AI for the sake of immerssion, even if its just the equivalent of the civilian automobiles and trains in Lock On. The challenge here would be to have enough roles for everyone to play. If you want a Lock On MMOG to work as best as possible, you really would need player controlled AWACS/GCI and air defenses -- *plenty* of different roles for each player and *plenty* to do during the lull in the action, because you're looking at hundreds of people per server. This would be hard to accomplish in a real-world simulation. In a MMO with a fully realized fantasy world, there is always a task the developer can "invent" for the player, even if its just a solo player. Much of this would be out of scope or just goofy for Lock On -- "lets go kill NPC MiGs over and over for money so I can buy that Aim-120C upgrade I need!" :doh: If you're starting to wonder "what's the point?", you're not alone, I wonder than myself. Much of this you can already do with Lock On, just with no persistance and a lot less "game" -- but there's also a ton more effort needed on the player's part: 3. You would probably be paying, either a subscription or some sort of monetary transaction, for a service. ED would need to provide in-game customer support around the clock. There would be an understanding that, barring maitenance or emergency, the servers would be up and at 100% playable condition at all times. New maps/planes/units and other content would also probably be expected. You'd be paying for ED to do all the work. 4. If ED wants to really be with the times, they're going to have to have some sort of match-making system or something to separate the casual lone wolves from the squads that are all on teamspeak. This isn't a requirement for a working game, but almost a necessity if they want to attract any sort of substantial audience and keep their subscriptions. Summary: it would be a REALLY bad idea for ED to attempt this. The list of successful MMOs is about 3 or 4 names long and list of failures is about a mile long. It is enormously expensive, time intensive, and a soul-sucking, thankless task. I would personally recommend that ED NEVER do this, simply for their own well-being. Even with the best of intentions and most extreme efforts, most MMOs are un-user friendly, bug-ridden, unstable piles of dog crap. ED should stick with those awesome sims and military contracts. ;)

That'd be one heck of an job. There are plenty of small-scale MMOs out there. Many are free to play, but either have a cash shop (you pay real money for in-game currency to buy stuff) or they are straight RMT (real money transaction, you just pay straight-up cash for stuff in-game). Free to play, but you are given heavy incentives to buy stuff to make the game easier or more fun. The challenge would be the infrastructure ED would need to maintain to keep it up and running PLUS the amount of time and research their products take to develope. I don't think that's something they'd even consider. Its one thing when your game is an unrealistic FPS or fantasy hack-and-slash, but a DCS level sim is another!

I don't know about that...if you can put up with the "Falcon-ish" things about FreeFalcon, and realize that its a fan-made conversion for a 13 year old game, I'd highly recommend it.

Seriously...paying to play is fine, nothing wrong with that at all. I'm just guessing the LOMAC boards aren't exactly a bastion of MMO gamers, huh? :P I've actually played some F2P games and wished that a credit card was needed just to filter out some of the irritating kiddies and so the developer could justify a steady stream of content and updates and actually provide rock-solid servers. Pay to play is fine, as long as the game isn't dumbed down unapologetic console port like MW2 is and if it isn't a total flop like every other MMOG besides World of Warcraft is. The problem is that CoD with a subscription will be exactly that -- another MW2 debacle AND a totally inefficient and amateurish operation with crappy lag and crappy customer support. Console gamers will probably eat it up, but for PC I'd probably say they shouldn't even bother. I see a million plus copies sold, but less than 10,000 subs after the first month.

I'm quoting myself from earlier in the thread. The R-27 wasn't a huge threat because of the fact that it is SARH - notch = lost lock = missile goes ballistic. Couple this with the fact that you have Aim-120s, and in a sterile test environment you have a high success rate. In the campaign, success at anything was NEVER assured. The first day is a killer. The R-77? Death incarnate if the launching aircraft had ECM. The MiG-29S AI made good use of their ECM and, realistically or not, had TWS capability. And boy did they ever use it. I'd think I would have the first shot and then SURPRISE! R-77 goes active...the bastards had me bugged the whole time. I could never assure success unless I was *very sneaky* - flying low, keeping them on the beam, then coming back at them from the side or behind outside of their radar's scanning ability trying to use AWACS to locate them. I could never do this 100% of the time. This tactic would be pointless in the campaign.

A.S., I have a feeling there's a communication problem here. You boasted about flight sim AI on the LOMAC forum. Forget Falcon for a second. "Artificial Intelligence" is a dirty word around here. Boasting about it here is like boasting about how awesome your Honda Goldwing motorcycle is on a Harley-Davidson forum. This is just my observation Like I said..."good luck with that". I didn't say that I disagree with you. You may ignore my rant about AI if you want, it was off-topic, but I still stand by what I said. ^^^^^ This could be interpreted as "Hey RedTiger, you probably couldn't beat the MiG-29 or EF2000 in AF!" I have no idea why you'd just randomly trash talk, so maybe you meant "I doubt anyone could just easily beat the MiG and EF AI in those sims". I agree, the MiG-29, EF2000 and F-22 are certainly harder to best than anything LOMAC has to offer. Bro, I own F4AF, and played it plenty. I also played RedViper/FF. The only reason why I didn't play OF is because I couldn't get the damn thing to stop crashing. As for the dogfight AI in AF...once you realize that it will always pull lead, all day long, total G for brains, instead of just easing off the stick and going lag pursuit to get in the saddle, you can exploit that 100% of the time. If you don't, then its more fair. The MiG-29, EF, and Raptor can be difficult. For the record, I've beat them before fair and square on Ace. I'd be lying if I said I "trashed" them though except for the times that I got lucky. Most of my time on Falcon was spent dogfighting these particular planes. Hours and hours, not just fighting but also watching the ACMI.

I sincerely hope that wasn't an attempt at trash talking me, and that maybe you intended something else. Don't attack someone who's on your side. And no, I don't know who you are, and if you're trying to insult I probably won't care. Yet another gunzo tournament winner or perhaps another authority on virtual ACM/BFM, right? :P If I misunderstand, then I apologize. And I agree, the individual AI is better in Falcon. The campaign as a simulation of a battlefield...we can agree to disagree. ;)

:yawn: Good luck with arguing that around here. Lots of opinions about AI from people who apparently spend all their time playing flight sims against humans. Does their AI-playing experience include anything besides AI lemming rushes? You can't get challenge from AI with the same method you'd try with a human player, nor will you get the same type of challenge. If you're comparing 1 vs. 1 gunzo deathmatch to be a challenge with the AI, you're doing it wrong. Its about unit density and creative unit placement, and creative use of triggers if you have that capability. Its a completely different ball game. If the social element and competition is part of the challenge, knowing you beat "someone" who has a name and face, AI can't help you there. Not everyone cares about that, though.

I don't think anyone in this thread said it was. However, I did assume that FC 2.0 would address the radar elevation problem that Yoda's server-side program fixed. The F-15's radar elevation should automatically move to keep a locked or bugged target in the scan area.

This is a small part why I asked for a synopsis. Rather than leaving it up to people to go off on tangents. Not only are these the LO boards, but there's a very heavy preference for head-to-head multiplayer...and you know how that goes. ;) Falcon already has 2 strikes against it. Tell us what you've determined. A simple "F4 missles do this, LO missles do that" would have sufficed. Never leave leading the dicussion up to the peanut gallery. :P For me, the "time" is installing tac view. I don't even have Lock On installed at the moment, so no tac view either. I've never played OF, only FF and AF. My take-away was that R-27s were similar to LO in ability to defeat, but AMRAAMs and R-77s were way, way, WAY tougher due to the way AI MiG-29S will actually use TWS.

I wasn't referring so much to how Lock On models the concept, more that all playable fighters are still using legacy code from Flanker. The radar on the F-15, MiG-29, and the Su-27 are using the same radar model, albeit with information displayed differently and tweaked for each plane. Unless I've missed some new info while I've been away from here...

Yes, the challenge is to launch high and then get below them before they start to notch you. This is all very predictable after a while. Note that the *second* that slammer goes pitbull, the bandit quickly turns away and notches. If it seems like the AI has a gods-eye view of the action and knows exactly where that missile is, well, I'm not so sure that isn't exactly what the AI has. The main problem with him notching you at this point is that he'll turn back toward you, lock up, and launch immediately. There's the super AI again, they seem to not have to fiddle with their radar like we do, its all instantaneous. Chances are it might be quicker than you can do the same. Now you're forced to go defensive! Not only that, chances are you're above him and can't notch him. Dive, spew chaff, maneuver to hopefully drag that missile around a bit and hope for the best. After awhile, in a sterile 1v1 vs. you in an F-15 and the AI in a MiG-29A, you should practically never lose. You will force the poor MiG defensive and keep him there, all of his missiles will sail harmlessly past you because he can't keep a lock, and eventually one of your Aim-120s or Aim-9s will find its mark. This is why as someone who likes to play singleplayer, practically the only plane I would fly before my hiatus was the MiG-29A or MiG-29G. The F-15C was reserved for some very "busy" missions I created with the old LO mission randomizer and the later random mission generator someone around here created.

That's correct except for one thing...notching involves being below the aircraft that is emitting the radar to track you. Here's quick quote from wikipedia: Basically, this is the price you pay for having look-down, shoot-down capability. You get to see targets that are below you, but not if they're moving perpendicular to you. There's a lot more to it than this. A modern FC radar's computer interpreting the data is just as important as the radar itself, maybe moreso. There's some pretty fancy stuff going on "under the hood" that make some aircraft like the F-15C less susceptible to being notched, none of which are really modeled in LOMAC AFAIK. What a modern AESA radar can do is pretty amazing, some of it seems like magic.

Its been a while since I've played at all, and I cannot remember if I ever did the F-15 campaign, I was never really a fan of those. So excuse me if I give you some information here that doesn't work so well with however that mission is set up. In addition to what Yoda contributed, consider this: 1. Giving your wingman the "pincer right/left" command is a pretty standard way to separate bandits for an easier sort. It should also force them to split up and each to focus on one of you. Once in a rare occassion the AI seems to ignore this and just double team you or the AI. If they double team you, you can play some aggressive defense and hopefully put them on the defensive enough while you order your wingman to swing back towards you and attack them. If they double team the AI, be aggressive and use their distraction to your advantage. I like to keep my F-15 wingman's radar on throughout because the F-15s RWR provides such good situational awareness. 2. If those MiGs are using R-27s, keep in mind that if they try to notch you, their missiles become expensive lawn darts. And they will...oh boy, will they ever! The AI in LO has super-human notching capability. The problem is that this is the only trick they know. With a little practice, you can keep them on the defensive the entire time. Even if they fire back, they'll go back to notch and lose the lock. They key is that you must stay below them so their notching doesn't work! As soon as you launch you should start making your way down below them. 3. Keep the other part of this in mind too; if YOU notch THEM, their missiles go dumb as soon as they lose their lock. The idea here is that if you are armed with Aim-120s, you can launch, crank and hit the deck, and then as soon as it goes active -- notch the bandit. Now he can't see you, can't shoot at you, AND he has a missile to evade. This can become so routine that it is boring (hence the draw of multiplayer). A good mission, however, shouldn't be so sterile and give you other things to worry about. I'm not sure what exactly is in this mission your playing, but keep that in mind. "Hitting the deck" maybe isn't such a good idea if you happen to be flying over a tank battle or a well defended town full of guys armed with Iglas, for example ;) That can make things a little more dicey.

For those of us without the benefit of tac view or the time to use it, can you explain the major differences? I'm interested. :)

Very Nice A.S. :D

This tactic can actually be recreated in LOMAC. "By the book", I've wondered what the counter tactic is to this -- you have crafty SARH birds denying the first shot until they can get close enough for a decent PK. The ARH guy still can shoot his missile and probably have pitbull immediately, but thats still like playing chicken and being in a situation you never want to be in. This is probably so "by the book" that it isn't likely to happen.

You can have whatever opinion you like about GGTharos, but this is just kinda goofy now. He's an ED tester. Guys, Eagle Dynamics doesn't ask people to become testers because of their roguish good looks. Are you arguing because you're trying to learn something or because you want R-27TEs to stay the way they are.

Yes, keeping what potentially is the majority of players happy? Yes, good call. I've played LOMAC. I've played online games head to head and coop. I've gone out and made friends with real people. I can see how combining all of this is probably a blast, but its just not something that interests me. The main appeal to me in multiplayer is the fact that I'm testing myself against a real person. The secondary appeal is that I am accomplishing something satisfying that I couldn't do by myself. Thats IT. I'm not interested in making friends and I really don't care to put a name and face to the guy I'm virtually shooting dead. The only exception I make for this is real-life friends, all of which aren't new; they're people I've known for years. I like to be quickly matched against someone and get on with it, all with the freedom to stop for days at a time if real life calls without any obligation. Frankly, modern big budget multiplayer games trump LOMAC at this, and understandably so. To put it another way: If someone told me that I had a choice between playing against a human OR I could play against a very advanced AI that is 1:1 vs. a human in quality, I'd choose the AI in a heartbeat. AI is available 24 hours a day. It doesn't act like an uncivilized jackass when it proceeds to hand me my ass, and it doesn't cry and whine when it gets beaten by me. In addition, the types of kicks I get from multiplayer games and the types of kicks I get from flight sims are *completely* different. Its like the difference between enjoying a purely entertainment action movie vs. a serious historical documentary. Call of Duty/WoW is the action movie, flight sims are the documentary. I don't care to mix my Pearl Harbor and my Tora! Tora! Tora! ;) I put up with spotty AI to experience the aspect of simulations I enjoy. A lot of the problems with AI can be aided if you use a moderate amount of unit saturation in the mission and discipline yourself to play realistically. I'm not saying you'd be good enough to beat a human, I'm saying that you might actually have enough challenge to have fun. TL: DR version; missions and campaigns matter to ME, and I'm certainly not alone. I'm looking forward to whatever campaign ED is cooking up for the F-15C.