RocketmanAL

BLUF: With the addition of more modern modules, I believe the flare implementation in DCS should be expanded to represent both threats and counter-measures better. This could be done rather simply by adding another flare type and changing how IR missiles react based on which of the flares is being presented to them. Changes would be needed to how flare programming is done, both in how they are loaded on the bird and how they are dispensed on activation. The Nerdy Stuff The current flare implementation appears to represent pyrotechnic flares, similar to the US's M206 flare. These flares were developed after the introduction of the first IR missiles. These early missiles were optimized to track hot metal components of aircraft, like engines and tailpipes. Correspondingly, these flares burn at temperatures mimicking those components, but with much higher intensity. This would cause the missiles to track the flares over the aircraft, as they are set up to track the highest intensity target. These are the flares that everyone associates with "flares". They are a giant ball of light with a thick white smoke plume behind them. To counter these pyrotechnic flares, IR missile designers started to design their missiles with counter-countermeasures. There are multiple ways to do this, but I'm going to focus on the Russian implementation, as most modern modules are US aircraft. Starting with the Igla (SA-18), the Russians began to incorporate more than one detector in the seeker, with each seeker operating in a different band of the IR spectrum. This was done to both improve tracking capability and counter IR flares. I won't go into too much detail as the intricacies can't be modeled in DCS anyway. To summarize, the system uses the two detectors to compare the IR signal of the aircraft and a potential decoy to determine which is the aircraft. Since the only flare at the time was the hot pyrotechnic flare, that's what the systems were designed to defeat. To counter this technique, multiple methods were developed to defeat it. One was the development of new flares, called pyrophoric flares. These flares burn differently from the pyrotechnic flares and give off a different IR signature, notably in the IR band of the engine plume that these newer missiles use to track aircraft. They also have a distinctly different visual signature, looking more like a glitter bomb in an IR camera and almost no visual signature. It also has a different trajectory. One example of these is the M211 flare of the US. The Proposal I would like to see these pyrophoric flares incorporated into DCS. The current implementation of a simple percent chance to decoy on a flare can be kept, with a simple modification. Each missile will now have two percent chance values, based on the flare type being presented. An older generation missile will have a high chance of decoying on the pyrotechnic flares designed to defeat them, with a lower decoy chance on the pyrophoric flares that don't burn as intensely. The inverse would be valid for the more advanced missiles that have different flares tailored to defeat them. You could expand this even further to other flare types, such as kinematic flares or even IR jammers. This doesn't require an in-depth rework of the IR missiles, but significantly improves the authenticity of the threat environment and adds another gameplay element for players. Pilots will need to consider the type of threat in the area (older IR vs newer IR) and decide how to counter those threats best. It's no longer just spamming flares because they are all the same, and all missiles react the same. Consideration will need to be given to what flares are being brought, how many of each type, and what pattern will be deployed with each dispense. The Hard Part There would need to be some interface to allow pilots to load up customized configurations of flares. The data cartridge makes this easier, and perhaps the multi-rocket type implementation in the Apache can be leveraged as a framework. At the very least, pilots need to be able to select the number of each flare type to be loaded. A full implementation would allow pilots to change the loadout per flare dispenser. In the same way, pilots would need more control over how the flares are dispensed from the aircraft. I'm not sure if the current onboard systems of any aircraft are capable of this without a data cartridge implementation. Was that a lot? Yep. Check my post history if you enjoyed for more. I'm not gonna plead, the developer will do what they think they can in the areas they believe need improvement. Hopefully, they will decide this is one of those areas. Some sources: SA-18 Overview Thesis Discussing IR Missile Design JPEO Flare Overview Flare Discussion

Ah, that would be the answer! Thanks for the clarification.

I checked multiple different aircraft as part of testing I'm doing. Same altitude, same speed, same mission. The SU-25T was the only one to have a different TAS at M= .8.

The Mach number portion of the speedometer appears to be off. It is showing a higher Mach number than the aircraft is actually flying according to TAS. Steps to replicate: Add SU-25T and set it to start at M= .8, 20kft, TAS should be 496 kts. Jumping in the plane it shows the plane at M= .92. Indicated M=.8 occurs around 432 kts.

I've updated this report to V2.0, adding AGM-88C, Kh-58U, and Kh-25MPU information. Guide Download Also produced a YouTube video going over the guide and a couple of applications YouTube Overview

Ok, just so I understand. The problem is that the missile is acquiring the sun through the clouds. This was a complete overcast weather scenario. Is this a problem with the WIP clouds? I know the air-to-air missile still has the ability to lock on and track through clouds. Also doesn't explain the behavior I was seeing where the missiles were showing similar wild misses when facing the opposite direction of the sun. I know you weren't able to replicate it, but I can provide a video showing as such. Side note: Will the SA-13 ever get its photo contrast mode?

Noticed since this most recent patch that the SA-13 is having problems with targets that are near head-on/tail-on aspect. Previously it had problems with tail-on. The system seems to track behind the aircraft as it approaches/departs from the system. Not close enough that I think it's tracking the aircraft, nor the plume from the engine, and it just loses track during launch. It's far enough away that the AI should know there's nothing in the seeker FOV, yet they continue to fire. There isn't anything in the area for the missile to acquire either, completely overcast, and it makes no attempt to maneuver toward the aircraft. Prior to this patch, the system had no problem acquiring and engaging from the head-on aspect but now appears to have lots of problems. The missile also appears to be fuzing early, while the motor is still burning. It just self-destructs around the altitude of the aircraft or slightly above despite being far enough away that it should not fuze. When passing the system on a beam aspect it, and the missile, appear to have no problems. Attached track file with a relevant example from 5:30-6:00. SEAD Strike.trk

SA-17 Search Callout As the title says, the SNOW DRIFT appears to be listed under the SA-11 and SA-17 in the Apache RWR database. Seems to indicate we may be getting an SA-17 at some point, which would be a significant improvement over the SA-11. SA-17 Details

Was testing out a mission and had an interesting bug. Instead turning to taxi it continued to taxi across the ramp and through the grass in a straight line. It was going by buildings and stuff. There was also a graphical bug where if you zoom in the aircraft is non-visible. If you zoom out it becomes visible again. I'm attaching the trk file but it shows it taxing properly when I reviewed it. When I re-ran the mission the same aircraft taxi'd properly, so not very repeatable. Quam F-15.trk

Yea, that is a work around. I'd still rather have dedicated PP points to keep waypoints clean.

I'd like to try and do a mission with multiple player JF-17's in a flight. However, I haven't been able to figure out if you can actually assign different PP points to each aircraft in the flight and they all appear to get the same four that I've put in. Is this possible? Couple of work arounds I know of are making each aircraft it's own flight and/or using the F10 map and having each person put in their own PP points to ingestion into the DTC. However, doing it in the ME for the same flight would be ideal.

Have a MP mission that appears to be crashing due to the AI MI-24P for some reason. The MI-24Ps are uncontrolled on the ramp. Loading in SP the mission runs fine, but when running it on a dedicated server causes client crashes when joining the server. After a lot of isolating removing the Hinds appears to fix the problem. Sending a link to a folder with one mission with the Hinds, and one where the only change is taking them out. Including .trk file. Don't have log file but can redo the error if requested. Mission files and track file

Put this guide together for mission planning purposes. Provides employment range and time of flight for the various stand-off weapons in DCS at different altitudes. Ranges represent max employment range as calculated by the aircraft at the speed and altitudes listed. TOF was measured in-game, but only used single runs. So some variance can be expected. Also the SLAM-ER appears to be a bit bugged right now, and when using the HIGH flight profile will cause the missile to fly low instead. Guide reflects current behavior in game. DCS Standoff Weapons Ranges_V1.0.pdf

Version 1.2 now available. Changelog: Added SA-5 Modified the Patriot to reflect new radar behavior Moved quick reference cards to front of packet

I've updated the guide to V1.1. Added the NASAMS, corrected a few deployment layouts, and retested some capabilities against PGMs and updated relevant systems.

First, thanks for the addition of a solid new SAM for Blue side. Always nice to get new units and this is an interesting one. My initial impressions, for all that they are worth, are very positive. I appreciate the work that went into getting this system added. Having said that, I hope that this is not the end of the development of the system as it has some cool potential that could be used. I will admit I'm not sure what year of NASAMS this is supposed to represent, so some of these capabilities might not actually be applicable. Multiple missiles It's well documented that this system can use the AIM-9X in addition to the AIM-120, and has been tested with IRIS-T and Sea Sparrow missiles that I'm immediately aware of. This is a unique wrinkle that this system possesses and I'd love to see it represented in game some how. The solution now of having separate launchers with AIM-120B and AIM-120C is certainly an easy solution, but not really ideal as I believe the intent is to have different missiles on the same launcher. Perhaps for the launcher vehicles there is a rearm window where you select which missile goes in each canister. I think that would be a great tool for mission designers. EO/IR Sight In a few articles I've seen mention of an EO/IR sight functionality for the system. I'm not sure if this is a add-on for a later variant, or has always been a part of the system. However, right now the system is very vulnerable to destruction of the TAR. Having the EO/IR sight makes a lot of sense as a back-up acquisition capability, and enables passive targeting of aircraft up until missile launch. CA Integration This lends back to a previous post I made about improving CA integration into SAMs, I think this would be a prime candidate to set the base. This has a dedicated C2 vehicle with an offboard radar. Perfect chance to set the groundwork for operating SAMs with separate vehicles. The especially nice thing is that the missiles are fire and forget, so we just need to point them in the right direction and once they acquire they take care of themselves. So the basic idea is that a player would command from the C2 vehicle. The irl NASAMS has a really nice digital display with maps and data linked targets in the air space. But even a simpler PPI would do. The player would need the radar feed from the radar, or if using the more modern displays just display of target tracks. Then the player selects which target(s) they want engaged. This system can automatically select a launcher to engage the target, and notify when launch parameters are met. Then the player presses a button to launch a missile, or the system can if there is an automatic mode. This framework could then be used for most of the other SAMs in DCS, making more controllable SAMs for players.

Thanks uboats! Looking forward to the final campaign

So I tried this mission several months ago and while I questioned the mission concept (albeit innovative and nice idea), it was pretty straight forward jump in the cockpit and fly. Last week I went back and tried it again and found that a bunch of cinematic elements had been added. Watching aircraft do aerobatics from a ground view is very cool in concept, and I'm sure works well on a monitor. However, in VR it can be VERY disorientating and probably for some painful. Having the view forcefully moved while in VR is a recipe for vertigo and I had to quit out before actually jumping in the jet because I felt the dizziness coming on. Not to mention that the POV when in VR is below ground level, which spoils the cinematic effect that was being sought. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE adding the atmosphere through this cinematic. In fact, if you have a tutorial on how to do it I've wanted to do it for my missions for a long time. I also appreciate the added guidance on how to run the course, as that was my biggest struggle attempting this the first time. It just doesn't work with VR though. So if it's possible to have an option to skip the intro it would save a lot of headache (literally) for VR users.

In testing a mission I put together I have an enemy flight entering an area where friendlies have been operating. I have the enemy flight set to active the en route task "CAP" if blue forces are still in an area, then deactivate it with the"CAP-x" task if they leave the area. I've done this successfully before in other missions, and I went back to double-check the scripting was correct. Now, the "CAP" task doesn't seem to cancel. Even after leaving the area, the enemy aircraft continues to follow and attempt to shoot me down. I have messages letting me know when the enemy plane changes state. I've also tried with the "Search and Engage in Zone" en route task, as well as a different airframe, with the same result. I also added the "Weapons Hold" ROE task and it ignores that as well. So it seems the "CAP" task is overriding the others and doesn't want to cancel out. Mission attached for reference, and latest log file. Syrian Campaign Mission 2_V1_test.miz dcs.log

Object type name change messing up old saves; also causing crashing See my thread below where I had a mission using the Type 54 that I could not load into the ME. Turns out that the object type names were changed by Deka at some point. This changed caused the ME to look for an object type that didn't exist, and delete the unit. In my case I had a helo landing on the ship, so DCS got hung-up trying to figure out what to do. All old missions will have this issue I think. https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=287771 Manually changing the object type name fixed the issue, but you have to manually open the mission lua to do so. Not sure how far the issue goes, but it might go beyond the ships depending on what Deka renamed.

Sounds like I'll be manually editing at least a couple of missions. As I had them carefully scripted as part of the mission.

Thanks man! Really appreciate it. I have a few more missions with Deka ships, though I don't think any involve helos landing on them. Do I need to go in a manually change the name? Or is a patch for this expected?

I have a mission I'm working on as part of a campaign. I re-visited it after a few months and now I'm unable to load it into the ME, or into it as a mission. It appears to get stuck on the loading screen and never gets into the mission or ME screen. When attempting to close DCS it gives me the "Do you want to save" window, but if I try and save it under a new name it doesn't actually save it. I have multiple versions of the missions that I saved as I progressed, but all of them have the same behavior. The missions immediately before and after work fine. Something specific with this mission. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I had to do a lot of tweaking on this mission and I'd rather not have to start from scratch. dcs.log Mission13_V1_3.miz

Sorry for the delayed response, wasn't really watching this thred after the first week or so. You can create your own templates. It's the bottom section of the templates window. Just set-up a site like I have in the guide, or in your own style, and save it to have it avaliable for future uses.

Sorry for the late reply, honestly stopped paying attention to this thread. In my experience adding the BIG BIRD significantly improves the SA-10's ability to engage higher altitude and longer range targets. The CLAM SHELL is better for low-altitude, but if you put it's detection range next to the BIG BIRD it's significantly outclassed.