Zius

I kind of skipped the Jane's games, but I did play a lot of Falcon 3.0 back in the day. :) I completely hear you regarding time consumption of this hobby. I wish I had the time to 100% learn all the modules that I have... But the good thing is that also with DCS full-fidelity modules, 100% understanding of everything is not actually required to have some fun. The other good thing is that not all aircraft are equally complex. I think that for a "beginner", I would recommend the Albatros or the MiG-15 over FC3 to be honest. There is no radar to deal with and the speeds are much slower. Or if you prefer western planes / units, perhaps the Sabre. And for me, the clickable cockpit actually helps, because I don't have to remember a certain keystroke, I can just look around in the cockpit and click on something next to the correct label. :D

All the mentioned aircraft except the Saab are still in use somewhere. The Saab is also the one that is most difficult to imagine being involved in any conflict. Given the listed aircraft (and taking the F/A-18C, not the F/A-18C Lot 20), the only slightly realistic conflict involving all aircraft would a NATO vs. USSR/Russia war where Sweden would somehow also be involved. But as that would have to take place around the collapse of the USSR, such a scenario would be quite unlikely. The above table is interesting, but does not represent the absolute last out-of-service dates for the aircraft. It also depends on how strict you want to be with the exact versions. For instance, the MiG-19 / F-6 is apparently still in use in North Korea and Zambia.

Just an update: I did bite the bullet afterall. It is, after all, a close to perfect representative of modern combat flight simulation. So I finally considered it to be an essential module to have, whether it would be completely my cup of tea or not. I am for sure looking forward to it!

Thanks! But is it necessary to first deactivate all modules, or not?

Regardless of version / block, to get any F-16 is great news! A DCS: MiG-29 to match would be great, but most likely not happening unfortunately.

Presently I have installed: - 1.5 Release - 2.5 Beta I would like to remove 2.5 Beta and make a clean install of 2.5 Release, but how should I go about that? Deactivate the modules in 2.5 Beta, run the uninstaller, download 2.5 Release and install it and then reactivate the modules?

I am a bit on the fence whether or not to get the Hornet, so I thought to ask you guys whether or not to get it. So far, I have the following reasons to buy it: - Carrier ops - Very probably the most capable / modern fighter/bomber in DCS - Multi-role / swing-role aircraft - Made by ED & Belsimtek - Now a bit cheaper However, I also have a few reasons not to but it: - I generally prefer older, analogue aircraft instead of FBW - I mostly just fly around or fly very simple combat missions (e.g. 1v1 dogfight or very simple strike mission) and probably won't need it's advanced capabilities - I have still quite a few modules left to learn which I already have (e.g. MiG-21, Viggen, Mirage 2000, Gazelle, Ka-50) - The Hornet is a complicated aircraft and I fear I won't have the time to learn it properly - In general, I don't have that much time to fly in DCS, that favours simple aircraft over complicated one So, I would appreciate some thoughts... Thanks!

My condolences to all who knew him.

I believe the MiG-19 will be the perfect gun fighter. Which is something I enjoy greatly. It'll be a day one purchase for me.

Although you can fly any aircraft on any map, I guess that with the Hormuz map you'll want to have a more or less modern (meaning still or until recently in active use) aircraft. Then I think one question would be, do you want FBW or not? The Mirage is my only full-fidelity FBW module, but I keep getting amazed how different it is from a "convential" aircraft like the Viggen, which has similar specs on paper. To be honest, although FBW undoubtedly makes the plane more efficient, I find it also takes some of the fun away... Therefore, I'm not sure if I'll buy another FBW aircraft. Given that you already chose the Hawk, I'm going to recommend the Albatros. It's similar, but in the Albatros everything works. ;) And it's great fun to fly. If you want to stick with a Western plane and want a front-line fighter/bomber, I think the F5 is a great choice, even if I don't have it yet. I would recommend also the Viggen, but that doesn't make that much sense for the Hormuz scenario. And it's not the Mirage is a bad or un-interesting plane, I just find it a bit too easy to fly. The MiG-21 is a great plane and I want to love it, but the module seems to change a bit between updates. They are working on a major update, but at this point I'm not sure if I can recommend it.

The Viggen is a better dogfighter and interceptor... ;) Seriously, I think the A10 is one of the LEAST versatile combat aircraft in today's world. It can only do CAS. It can do so very well, and with a lot of different weapons for a lot of different targets, but still I wouldn't call it versatile. The Viggen on the other hand CAN do nearly all conceivable missions, including A2A, although it's clearly better in some things compared to other things. And at least Swedish is easier for English speakers than Russian...

Even though Normandy has WW2-era scenery, you can use any plane in any map, so you are not limited to flying your Spit in Normandy. You can fly the Spit in the Caucasus and the F15 in Normandy without problems. Even though it maybe kills some of the immersion there are no limits. Actually I like what-if scenario's, such as B-17 hunting in a MiG-15. :pilotfly:

For low level flying, the Viggen is fantastic! It is very stable and has a very well thought out cockpit.

Terrain works as follows: Version 1.5 supports only Caucasus map. Version 2.0 supports Nevada and Normandy, but not Caucasus. Most (all?) standard missions (e.g. training) that you get with the aircraft module require Caucasus map and therefore v1.5. However, you can easily install both v1.5 and v2.0 in parallel. Any aircraft modules you buy can be installed in both, because you get a number (I think 8?) activations per module. You'll need to buy Nevada and/or Normandy to start v2.0. So, if you want Nevada, the procedure could be: - Download and install v1.5 - Try to activate your Steam modules (no experience with Steam so no idea if this works) - Buy Nevada and/or Normandy (and any aircraft you want) - Download and install v2.0 - Activate all terrains / aircraft in v2.0 - Activate all aircraft in v1.5 I personally use a tool called DCS Updater Utility, which works very well for me.

Because of my experience with the Albatros so far. At first, I thought: "bleh, a trainer, not interesting", but after a while I got intrigued and bought it anyway. Now after actually buying and flying it, it has become one of my favourites. I suspect the same might be with the Yak. There is a good reason why actual air force pilots progress from a basic trainer (such as the Yak) to an advanced trainer (such as the Albatros) to a fighter (such as the MiG-21). In the Sim community, the progression seems to be the other way (start with F-22, then F-15, then A-10, then the more interesting aircraft :D), probably because you can't die in a Sim. IRL, the Yak seems a very popular aircraft, so I guess it would be a very pleasant aircraft to fly in DCS as well.

I have to admit, it was not the first aircraft on my wishlist, but after thinking about it, I believe the Yak-52 is a great addition to DCS. Thanks ED!

I still need to read the official (complete) report, but for now it confirms my earlier idea "poor seamanship"... On a normal cargo vessel, there is only one officer of the watch, in congested waters or poor visibility aided by one helmsman / lookout. This is usually sufficient as long as nobody does anything strange. On the John S. McCain, there were 11 people on the bridge. This is the complete crew of a moderate size cargo vessel! But it seems that there were no clear duties and responsibilities resulting in misunderstandings and mistakes.

Thanks guys, I'll have a look at those! It still seems that there is a significant gap in the current flight sim market though...

Thanks for the comments so far. Usually we do visual navigation, if necessary aided by Google Maps on the tablet! :)

Actually I haven't really considered FC3 on game mode yet... Do you consider FC3 to be easier than the MiG-15 or the Albatros? Those are also quite easy as far as avionics go and you don't need to worry about radar. Edit: looks like I forgot to read the sticky "The Discussion of other games and sims"... Sorry Mods!

I think the idea of a short time demo would be really hard to implement... I do have to say that I think that the aircraft which are now free to try don't showcase DCS very well. The Mustang is fine if you like WW2 planes, but the Su-25T is not full fidelity, which is DCS's unique selling point. I would therefore suggest another jet instead of the Su-25T to be included.

I have a five year old daughter who likes aircraft and who likes to play flight sims with me. So far, she can take off in DCS most of the time. She can also land in RoF, sometimes without killing herself and rarely without damage to the plane. :music_whistling: But realistically, both of these sims are a bit too much for her. RoF is more doable in a way than DCS because there is not a lot to manage, but the problem is that those old kites have a difficult flight model. When I was her age (slightly older), I played F-14 Tomcat on the Commodore-64 (I am looking forward to playing DCS F-14 with my dad for this reason). A bit later I played Chuck Yeager's Air Combat a lot. Both of these games had a very simple flight model and very simple systems, yet they did teach a few things about aerial combat, especially Chuck Yeager's Air Combat. And most importantly, they were very enjoyable for my age at that time. Now it would be great to find a game like that, but which actually runs on my computer... Any suggestions? It doesn't need to have the latest graphics, it just needs to run on Windows 10 64-bit. And it should be single-player.

Happy birthday dear MiG! It was also the aircraft that pulled me into DCS. I had never, in any simulation, seen something that could come close to it.

Thanks for the info guys! HMS would be great, but I'd imagine a bit more complex to integrate in real life than "only" another missile. But maybe I'm wrong...

I'd buy any WW1 aircraft in a heartbeat. As others said, I'd really like the engine management modelled properly. While I love RoF, I'm sure that DCS could improve on the FM. Which aircraft? I'd vote for: Blue: Bleriot XI (the first "real" aircraft, also in limited use at the start of WW1) SPAD XIII (the best / most "modern" fighter of the war together with the Fokker D.VII) Red: Fokker E.III (the first real fighter) Fokker D.VII (the best / most "modern" fighter of the war together with the SPAD XIII)