Digitalvole

Phew!

Oh pants, this is disappointing news

I’ve got a day off tomorrow, please please please Razbam! Edit. The question is, do I wait to see what performance is like in VR or just buy it and hope for the best? #firstworldproblems

And it was good! Is it going to be today?

And by the sounds of it being a WSO, unlike a Tomcat RIO, doesn’t need to be a full time occupation as you can learn most of the systems as the pilot in single player. I don’t have the time to learn all a RIO needs to know, and I’d rather be flying the plane anyway. But this sounds like it’s much easier to take turns in each role. Good news indeed! Now all I need is a friend…

Thanks @Notso Sounds fine for sp DCS then, woop woop!

I’m afraid I wouldn’t know how, also there is a pretty high chance it’s user error. I’m about to leave to go camping for four days with the wife and kids, predictably we’re all at various stages of a virus our youngest bought back from nursery and all have conjunctivitis Wish me luck!

I promise you it wasn’t, I could see 4 contrails and 4 black dots flying line abreast. They were completely oblivious to my existence. They were cold though which sounds like it’s a factor.

I didn’t get any kind of warning at all, I just suddenly went BooM!. I’m pretty sure it said R 77 but it was late and I was tired so maybe it was an R 27. Gave me a fright haha. Ah right, I was under the impression that hot or cold shouldn’t affect detection range due to the Doppler effect where as flanking does, hence the notch. Also I find detection range is the same in both but in the hornet as soon as it’s detected I can lock it, not so in the Viper. But because launch ranges are pretty much the same I suppose this is only really an issue if you have multiple targets that you need to fire on. I think I’m going to focus on SEAD/DEAD when I fly the Viper, that seems like what it’s best at. I find myself wanting to go back to the Harrier for AG stuff (though I’m beginning to get excited about the F15 E) and I suppose I’ll wait for the Eurofighter for AA stuff. I’m a mud mover at heart anyway.

After a bit more buffoonery last night I’d have to agree with you @Exocet on the gas guzzling front, Hornet can carry more but uses more. I think I’m just used to seeing 6k gallons and thinking “oh pants, it’s home time.” But though it takes the Hornet a bit longer to do it, it can get up to a decent speed. On the radar though, even in RWS I couldn’t lock a Mig 29 (who was about 5k above me cold) till 20miles. In the Hornet, though the Mig 29 was hot this time, it locked at 40 miles which was a bit of a surprise in its self. Doesn’t that 20 mile difference negate some of that speed advantage? Talking of surprises, the mig I locked at 40 miles in the Hornet had an unexpected surprise for me. I shot an Amram at it from about 25 miles, watched it defend (could see the contrails and the little black dot that is strangely gets smaller the closer you get) and then got hit. I carried on flying straight and level towards where he had been before going defensive and I suddenly blew up! Turns out he fired an R77 Adder that flew around for 18 seconds before scoring him a posthumous kill, well played sir! I really need to do some research on what my enemy carry, I didn’t know their missiles could wait in ambush for unsuspecting buffoons such as myself to fly into.

Thank you @Aquorys @SCPandaand @Exocet for the advice and info. My mistake appears to be my reliance on TWS when there are better options, DTT is what I should be using by the sounds of it. This is just the kind of info I was after! I feel the need to stand up for the Hornet a bit here, it’s really not as slow as people make out. Well it can be slow if you try and carry too much stuff, but with 6 Amrams and 3 bags I have no trouble getting high and fast, takes a little longer to get going though. For my tests (I call them tests, others would call them buffoonery) I don’t find much difference. Granted in a GS type setup the Vipers speed is a clear advantage but I find in scenarios closer to “real life” ie had to travel 200 miles before the engagement begins, then have 200 miles to get back home again. I find the Vipers speed advantage is negated somewhat due to fuel concerns. I would add radar lock range as a factor too but I need to start using the radar properly before I can comment on that. Just to be clear, I’m not a Hornet fan boy, In fact I want to be a Viper fan boy, I’m just in a transitional process at the moment trying to move from one to the other. The differences between the two aircraft are not as pronounced as I thought they would be. The end results are very similar. But man sitting in that Viper cockpit is a pleasure in its self, and I prefer the way you interact with the avionics too (didn’t at first) though it’s taking a bit of getting used to.

Hi and thanks for the tip, I’m currently using 30 degree scan and 2 bars. That’s something I hadn’t considered, I’ll bare that in mind in future. I always thought standard practice was to get up to 40+k ft to increase range (missiles & aircrafts) but I guess that isn’t always the case? That’s the thing, I can visually see 4 mig 29s flying straight and level towards me and still I’m dropping the lock. (Edit: That being said I’m 10kft above them so maybe it’s the look down thing). I was wondering if there was something like the Hornets, I want to say PRF but I’ve no idea if that’s right, where you set it to Hi Med or auto depending on the aspect of the bandit. Or if the radar be if it’s from you being a bit offset from the bandit rather than head on?

I posted the other day in the F 18 forum about an experience I had comparing the 18 & 16s radar in bvr. It got moved btw. It was surprising to find the F18 out performing the F16 in BVR and it seems quite a few people are finding the F16 radar to be “underperforming” and ED say it’s correct as is and they must have good reason to not just say that, but also are going to show us a white paper on why that is. This got me to thinking, (my wife immediately asked if something was burning) I remember a similar thing with the Hornets radar a while back. Then Wags (and 104th Maverick) posted a video on how to use it properly. This made all the difference to me and normal service was resumed. So I’m wondering if it is the same or a similar thing with the F16s? Are there some techniques required to get he most out of the FCR and increase lock range and/or reduce the likely hood of dropping the lock? I’m most definitely NOT trying to start a debate on whether or not it is how it’s supposed to be, just wondering if there is some piece of the puzzle I’m missing as there was with the F18.

Edit: changed the confusing title I thought the Viper was the king of BVR? Having been trying the same little set up (4 Mig 29s’s at 30k ft hot) in both the Hornet and Viper (40kft Mach 1+). I’m finding I can lock them up in the Hornet at 40 miles and successfully splash all 4 of them. Can’t recall at what distance I get the shoot cue but it was above 20miles and none of them even got a missile off. The Viper on the other hand, I can’t get any kind of lock till about 25 miles and even then it keeps dropping the lock. I got 2 missiles off before the merge and then died So from this can we conclude the Hornet now does everything better than the Viper? I keep going back to the Viper because it looks so good and I really like the cockpit and just in general it feels like it has a higher level of polish and attention to detail. But every time I find something else that surprises and makes me think the Hornet is better in almost every regard. It’s a bit annoying, as great as the Hornet is I really want a change, I’ve got my eye on the Harrier now, but that’s a story for a different sub forum

Please don’t invade the Falklands, my country is already suffering enough embarrassment.

From the interview on the podcast the people who made the map are rotor heads so down low is where they play. Bodes well

Normally I’d agree, but I think those sea pikeys have got a bit too big for their boots, or should that be fins? I can’t promise I won’t be introducing them to some 20 mike mike. Thanks to them I can’t go back to False bay, South Africa to cage dive with great white sharks again which was not only the fulfilment of a life long ambition but also hands down the best thing I’ve ever done with the exception of having my 2 beautiful daughters. I’m aware of how juvenial that makes me sound, it’s probably because I am! There’s also sheep that we’ve seen and I think they mentioned penguins but can’t really remember, I’m sure they said orcas and possibly some others, in the interview with the Air Combat Sim podcast. Also functioning lighthouses should look pretty cool not to mention the Royal Navy assets. Ive just started, for the fifth time, to learn the viper but perhaps I should be learning the Harrier instead. Haven’t flown it since the Hornet came out but it fits the bill for this map and assets. The Apache too, but that ones in the hanger till multithread magic has arrived in DCS. From the little I’ve seen this map looks next level from anything we’ve had before and so much more pleasurable on the old peepers than deserts. Well played Razbam!

It’s the fuzz, leg it! Those mountains (the Andes) look soo good, the glaciers and topography, I just can’t wait. There’s even going to be killer whales, or sea pikeys as I call them, and penguins? what a time to be alive, be a real bummer if ww3 kicked off.

Not including the Vulcan/multithread stuff, it’d be SA then Eurofighter, not really sure after that. F15E could be good if I can do all the cool stuff in SP. I’m struggling to chose a plane to sink my time into having got a bit bored of the Hornet. On reflection it’s a bad time to be bored if the F18, it’s perfect for this map. Maybe Top Gun 2 will reignite my fire. I’d like to be hyped for the F4 but I suspect a second person is going to be required to get the most out of it, like the F14. I’d be very happy to be told I’m wrong.

I’m really excited for this! I just hope the performance isn’t like Marianas. That map looks great but I can’t use it because it turns my VR headset into a Head Mounted Puke Inducer. I get more hyped for maps like this than almost any other addition to DCS, except multithread support/Vulcan, as I’ve already got more planes than I know what to do with. Seriously can’t wait (which is unfortunate because I have to) has it been two weeks yet!?

Thanks missed that in two pages of posts arguing about weather or not a WSO is a pilot. Is it ironic that the point of the thread is whether or not the pilot can also be a WSO but from the front seat?

Hehe I was hoping this thread would tell me if I could control most/all the F15E’s systems from the front seat. The thread had other ideas! isn’t the internet a funny place.

Nice, thank you draconus. Haha posted while I posted my thanks to draconus. Nice one, thank you Flappie

Well the way you say that makes it sound like you are someone who has experience programming flight models, I do not so I’ll take your word for it, but still that’s considerably less work than starting a whole new module. To be honest I do find it hard to believe that you’d have to start from scratch, ie a blank sheet. Didn’t the work on the F18 help with the development of the F16? Though different airframes have many differences they also have similarities. We’re not talking A10 to F18 or even F18 to F16. Id guess workload would be a fair bit more than the A10C II but a lot less than the F18C, which was truly starting from scratch. Anyway I’m finding myself playing devils advocate here, I don’t think it’ll happen either, we just seem to be disagreeing on why.