WytchCrypt

I figured that. My point was why make a thread (and poll) that affects every DCS user to ever purchase a module appear under a title that seems to only affect those that purchased the AV-8B :smilewink:

Logged in this morning to check on this thread and found it has been moved from, "Eagle Dynamics New DRM Expiration Period Limit" to "AV-8B COPY PROTECTION CHANGE" and I'm curious why? Seems to me since this thread has mentioned several times that ED plans to retroactively convert existing modules to this new DRM approach, that this thread should be titled in a way to reach as many current module owners as possible, not imply that it only affects those purchasing the AV-8B module :huh: A plan to change the DRM approach for all module owners should invite all module owners to learn and comment :smilewink:

My experience of statistical analysis in a manufacturing arena simply showed ignoring data cost a company $$$. I would believe the lesson learned would apply to any company that ignores adverse quality results or direct customer feedback. As far as the current poll, I would agree that the number of people voting for 90 days is not directly representative of the general population of DCS users. Why? Because I would bet everyone who voted 90 days actually did so only because the "never" option was not present :smilewink:

Wow! Thanks for this flashback to 1984 as a QA statistician at Apple in the early days of the Fremont CA Mac factory...and yes, Apple actually did all their manufacturing in the US once upon a time :lol: Constant arguments with the manufacturing guys. I'd tell them our sample inspection and reliability analysis showed there was a 95% probability we were shipping at least 10% defective Macs out to the field that would fail within the first 1000 hours of use. Their response was always the same: unless you can tell me it's 100% true, I'm not doing anything about it. So they didn't...and 20% of the early Macs came streaming back with heating failures :doh: Of course, that had absolutely nothing with the fact that a certain Mr Jobs completely refused to put cooling fans in his beautiful Mac :smartass: The moral of the story? Ignore statistics at your peril :music_whistling:

Very clever...thanks for the tip :thumbup:

Hi Monnie, at the time of the incident I described we were running our credit cards through Intuit Merchant Processing. I'd physically run the cards myself, but it would be through the Intuit online portal or as part of a Quickbooks entry. We've recently moved on to Elavon for a much lower merchant processing fee and luckily have not had another "chargeback". I really can't complain though, 12 years running cards and only 1 fraudulent charge makes for a pretty good average :smilewink: I think I see what you're getting at. Perhaps if we were paying a third party to do our processing, that the contract would be written that they would take the hit on fraudulent charges? Dennis

Wishful thinking my friend :smilewink: I handle the accounting for my wife's marketing biz. For the first time in 12 years, we had a client that paid with a stolen credit card last year. Here's what actually happened: 1) Client signed a contract and paid $699 for services with a credit card. The $699 was deposited to our merchant account (less ~3% merchant fee). 2) We provided the services as promised. 3) A month later, Visa contacted us to report the owner of the card was disputing the charge and that they had taken back the $699 from our merchant account. We had 30 days to present our side of the case of why the charge was valid and if we proved our case, they would return the $699. In the merchant processing world, this is known as the dreaded, "chargeback". 4) I believed the client was trying to claim we didn't do the work as defined in the contract, so I presented Visa with the signed contract and emails proving the work was completed as promised. 5) Visa denied my claim saying that once again, the owner of the credit card still disputed the charge. 6) At that point, I realized what had actually happened. The client paid for our services with a stolen card. When the actual card holder received the bill, he rightfully disputed the charge so Visa took it back from us and we were SOL. It would be nice to believe that as a vendor who did everything correct with a signed contract and followed the credit card companies own rules for validating cards, that the credit card company would eat the fraudulent charge and not hold us accountable, no such luck. Credit card companies are not in the business of giving away money...if so they wouldn't have an exception in the US tax code allowing them to violate the usury laws everyone else is held to...but that's another story :mad: The fact is, when people pay with a stolen card, it's the vendor who accepted that card that is ultimately out both the funds and the product/service they provided...regardless of how diligent they were in validating the card. It's part of the cost of doing business :doh:

As someone who only flies offline single player, this strategy would be perfect and would insure I continue to purchase modules :smilewink:

Seems to me the problem would be even if he did add that option, many of us who would choose that have already voted for 90 days because it was the closest choice. I believe a new poll would be necessary :smilewink:

Exactly. One of my concerns is that as DCS grows and evolves that I will be automatically upgraded to a point where my rig no longer runs at the detail level I like had I been able to stay at 1.5.7 or whatever. Also, once I get a configuration and driver setup I like that runs great with the current DCS, I don't want to be forced to reconfigure due to an automatic update I don't really want or need :smilewink:

My use of the term "renting" is a metaphor for the fact that I don't control the installation and use of the game on my system or other systems I may later own in future years. Somehow I find it quite unlikely Ubisoft will come knocking to collect their LOMAC CD :smilewink:

I think ED could offer a 2 tiered solution: 1) A standard low cost version for those who have no issue with the current DRM arrangement. This could use the current model of DCSW free d'load + module purchase with periodic verification of whatever time period is appropriate. This could serve both online and offline players who don't want to invest heavily in the DCSW "sandbox" and have no problem with periodic verification. 2) A significantly higher priced version (~$100?) for those wanting a true stand-alone, non-internet dependent purchase. This option would allow outright purchase of both DCSW and modules for local offline use only. The purchaser would have a stable program that will run indefinitely without requiring future internet connectivity. ED could also charge for DCSW updates as an additional revenue stream. Since DCSW is currently free, they could determine a purchase price that would offset whatever risk they think selling a non DRM product might expose them to. After discovering this thread yesterday and sleeping on it, I've decided that I'm going back to LOMAC; the whole DRM and periodic online re-verification thing is a deal breaker for me. I'm not going to continue investing serious time and effort into a game I'm essentially only renting; however, I'm going to keep an eye on this and if ED were to make an option available to purchase a truly standalone, offline DCSW and Su33 module, that I'll be first in line, credit card in hand :-)

This thread is quite eye-opening and I guess shows how naive I can be with today's gaming environments. I've only been flying DCSW for about a month now and thought that since I could open the program and fly locally without an internet connection, that I somehow could stay with this version indefinitely even if I never connected to the internet again. Apparently, I was wrong :-( I've been flying since the Flanker DOS days when you bought a game, loaded it on your system and it was yours. Period. When LOMAC evolved to Flaming Cliffs and introduced Starforce I bailed. Why? Well, because of what eventually happened. Now, anyone that has used up their Starforce install licenses is SOL because the author (Ubisoft?) isn't issuing any new digital keys. That's not software...it's ransomware. The thought that I could invest a significant amount of hours into DCSW creating missions and recording tracks which could all be made worthless if ED goes out of business or later requires me to upgrade to something else beyond my system capabilities is disturbing to say the least. I was a software developer for 14 years (not gaming, but corporate finance packages) so I completely understand that the massive work in development should and must be compensated. However, when I "purchase" a game, I want to own the game, not rent access to it! I love what I've seen so far in DCSW and would welcome the option to purchase the program for $100 to own a standalone, local only version that I had complete control over. The fact that I don't really own DCSW, but am just renting it could be a deal breaker and drive me back to LOMAC. No, it's not as cool as DCSW, but at least I'll be able to play it on my current gaming system until they pry my joystick out of my cold dead hands :-)

Was just flying the Su33 (single plane addon, not Flaming Cliffs) and ejected while landing on the Kuznetsov. When the parachuting pilot reached the deck, I was expecting him to land...instead the fun began as the pilot sank right through to the water. The first shot looks like I was in the Philadelphia Experiment or something :lol: The rest show the pilot as he sinks through the carrier decks to the water.

I'm not sure about that, but I know more today than I knew yesterday and that's always a good thing :book::smilewink:

ILS bars work on approaching Kuznetsov Very happy to report that the ILS bars were activated and operating when landing on the Kuznetsov!!! At 14 Km out the inverted "L" appeared on the HUD and at 4Km the ILS bars activated. Of course I blew up on a deck strike anyway, but hey, practice makes perfect :thumbup:

Thanks Ironhand. Watched both vids and d'loaded Chuck's L-39 guide which has an excellent and highly detailed section on "Navigation & ILS Landing" :thumbup:

Thanks :smilewink:

Got it...I've just gotten the bars to work for Mozdok & Krymsk. Guess I was spoiled in LOMAC where the bars showed up on the HUD for every airfield & Kuznetsov :doh: Thanks! Additional: Very odd but no matter how I try I can't get the inverted L lock on and ILS bars for Krasnodar-Central & Maykop, only Mozdok & Krymsk :huh:

I found what I think is another bug in the canopy seal. When opening/closing the canopy it looks like the texture which forms the canopy seal is missing giving that random colored square pattern I see when a description.lua points to a non-existent *.dds file.

I've been trying landings at Mozdok and I'm not getting any movement on the ILS bars. I've gone through the ATC Tower/Mozdok/Inbound comms to request landing and have been successfully told to land, yet the ILS bars still don't move on final approach. Here's a couple screenshots showing me off course in NOC mode within 4.8 Km. Shouldn't the ILS bars be showing how far off I am? Also I'm curious why the Su33 DCS NOC mode doesn't show the ILS bars on the HUD like the old LOMAC/FC NOC mode below? I'm guessing it's more in line with the actual way the Su33 operates?

Yes, not to mention the inoperable lamp for the airbrake :( I have to pull back my view to the throttle to see if the switch is pushed forward or back...

Ironhand? Wow, I remember you from the old Flanker mailing list days in the '90's. I learned a lot over the years reading your posts...glad to see you're here :smilewink: 1) The Su-33 manual HUD section calls it both a "Navigation Mark" and "Director circle" so, yes we're both talking about the same circle. 2) Lixma provided the screen shots which are exactly the same thing's I'm seeing. 3) That explains my ILS bar question. I was flying a mission into Gelendzhik which doesn't have a beacon. I'll try flying into a fully equipped airfield. Thanks! Yes! Your screenshots are exactly what I'm seeing :thumbup: I've been flying Flanker since the DOS days (though DCS only about a month.) With the super high cockpit resolution I now get, I wanted to see if I could complete a simple flight (hopping from one airfield to another) only looking down at my instrument panel - taking no visual clues from the front windscreen. Another tougher version of this mission would be flying at night with a malfunctioning HDD. These instrument inconsistencies make me wonder if it's really possible to complete that type of mission? Is that something others have tried successfully? Thanks :pilotfly:

Hi all, as I'm getting more hours flying the Su33 I've been paying close attention to the coordination of instruments in following the waypoints. Specifically I'm watching the syncing of the Attitude Direction Indicator, Horizontal Situation Indicator and the HUD Navigation Mark. Sometimes it seems the HUD Navigation Mark doesn't point me in the same direction as the other 2 when I'm flying waypoints, so they seem out of sync. If I only fly to the HUD Nav Mark I don't remain nearly on course. Also, it looks like the ILS bars on the Horizontal Situation Indicator don't move as the manual says they should. I'm wondering if this is because the Su33 module is still a beta release or am I misunderstanding the instruments, which is entirely possible :helpsmilie:

Fantastic! Just what I was looking for. FYI to anyone else looking for this, download the most recent version of the mission file on pg 5 of the thread not pg 1 ;)