Yoda967

Looking back to your first post, your buttonology is correct, but it's hard to tell what you're doing wrong without a trackfile. I can offer some tips that helped me, though: After you roll in on the target, hold your dive angle (-15 degrees will work, as the previous poster said, and so will -25 degrees) and keep the VV above the pull up cue. Line up the bomb fall line (BFL) on your target and wait until the CCIP cross appears at the bottom of the HUD. Don't try to move the CCIP onto the target, just keep the BFL on the target and let the CCIP cross move up onto the target as you descend. Press the pickle when the CCIP cross is on target, hold the pickle until all bombs are away and start your egress maneuver.

I haven't looked too hard into the M2000C's INS waypoint insertion to know what the format is, but I've been trying to use this for a couple evenings in the FA-18C and it produces lat/long info that isn't directly usable for waypoint insertion. The FA-18C currently accepts only NDD.MM.SS WDDD.MM.SS. Last night, my JTAC gave me a target at N36.39.46 W115.59.88. Apparently, this is in a "decimal minutes" format, rather than seconds.

I'll concede that with a helicopter, you might be able to make that determination from the cockpit. But not in a jet. As you say, in a jet, you're following the directions of a JTAC, and in the real world, even the JFAC doesn't have approval authority for collateral damage assessment. That comes from higher. (See my sample three-way radio dialogue in one of my previous posts.) From a player perspective, if I'm flying an FA-18C and the ROE asks me to ID individual human figures before I press the pickle, I'll pass. That miz file will go straight into the digital oubliette. If, on the other hand, I'm briefed on the collateral concerns that I can reasonably see on a bombing run, and I'll get penalized for putting a bomb too close to one, I'd consider that a realistic presentation of a battlefield problem and a suitable challenge.

I suppose the discussion is academic, since a neutral faction is already on the roadmap. Having been a scenario designer for real world war gaming, the question I constantly ask myself is, "Will the player see this?" If the answer is no, it doesn't go into my scenario. If the answer is yes, then I ask, "How do I present this in a way that seems realistic to the player?" Someone higher up in the thread raised the question of morality within the context of the DCS engine, and that got me thinking. I did some research and found a document called "Legal and Ethical Lessons of NATO's Kosovo Campaign", which is a 600+ page transcript of a days-long legal symposium at the Naval War College in Newport Rhode Island sixteen years ago. One of the questions asked was by a military pilot, who wondered if decision makers considered the difficulty of conducting a humanitarian mission from 15,000 feet (her altitude, not mine). She expressed the opinion that it's impossible to tell who the civilians are from 2 1/2 miles up. The panelist's response was, in a nut shell, "It was hard, but they did it. They flew lower. They used binoculars. And in any case, most of the civilian casualties occurred when civilians were mixed in with military personnel in violation of International Law." (I'm paraphrasing there.) In the latter example, the player will have no way of knowing that's what he or she is facing until after the fact...just as in the real world. So what purpose does it serve? (That's not a rhetorical question. I'm seriously asking.)

Yes, and that should factor into the way the mission is designed, and you don't need "neutral units" to simulate either of these things. The core of all ROE is that, regardless of other restrictions, the unit retains the inherent right of self-defence. If a so-called "neutral unit" opens fire on us, we have the right to schwack him. If he's not shooting at you and you can't clearly identify him as a bad guy, you don't shoot him. If both red and blue forces are using BTR-80s, you can't go around shooting BTR-80s unless you can see that they're marked for the other side or they're firing at you. Formal collateral damage analysis isn't done in the cockpit, it's done by certified CDE analysts working in the Air Operations Center, before the mission for a pre-planned strike, or in real time in support of a FAC/JTAC. ("Real time" doesn't mean "quickly". An F/A-18 pilot once told me that he never once dropped a bomb in several months of flying CAS over Afghanistan. He got a 9-line nearly every sortie, but would drive around in circles waiting for approval until it was time to head back to the boat. That would make for a pretty boring campaign, wouldn't it?) Higher-level approval is what's missing from the current JTAC implementations, even if it's only: "Warrior 1, this is Higher. Target AA1001 approved." "Higher, Warrior 1, roger - BREAK - Colt 11, target AA1001, cleared in hot." "Colt 11, AA1001, cleared hot. Inbound." One way to realistically present those considerations would be to prep the mission with a graphical presentation showing areas where players arean't allowed to drop a bomb. Within the mission, trigger zones would cover those areas, and a set of triggers would set a flag to fail the mission and issue a debrief warning: "Turn in your wings, numbnuts. You bombed a baby milk factory."

Nailed it.

Yes. I don't know if you're still working on this, but I think it's worth playing around with. Basically, the jammer needs to provide a signal that's greater than the received returns from the radar itself. The strength of those returns is inversely proportional to the range to the 4th power. The strength of the jammer signal is inversely proportional to the range squared, so a jammer can be effective well outside the range at which the unjammed radar can detect a target, and the jammer can transmit less power than the jammed radar. The range of the burn through varies with the power of the jammer. One of the problems with the EF-111 was that it used internal power, limiting the amount of RF energy that could be generated for jamming. The EA6B and FA-18G use RAT-powered jammer pods, so they're not relying on aircraft internal power and can transmit a much stronger jamming signal. Burn through is why strike planners generally doesn't rely entirely on jamming to protect the strike force. They'll use ARMs in concert with jamming for enhanced coverage of the SAM threat.

Sedlo, I'll offer my thanks, too. Your work is impressive! I hope you don't mind, but I've been dissecting your first mission to see how it's done in DCS. I was a real-world war game scenario designer for 21 years, and that's definitely easier. Over the weekend, I got tired of waiting for an F/A-18C campaign and frustrated with building my own, so I swapped out the Harriers for Hornets in VF mission 1, and loaded them with 4xMK82s each. (Confession: I *thought* I loaded both with 4xMK82s, but somehow empty-loaded my wingman, who dutifully tried to stay with me through the mission.) I didn't complete the mission, but I was able to get a bomb on the BTR-80 group about 90 seconds after the ambush call. I clearly won't be able to do the missions requiring PGMs with an F/A-18C yet, but kudos for building such terrific missions!

1. Sort of. The carrier tries to achieve 25-30 knots of wind across the deck. I haven't pushed the limits to see what it could do, but it works very well with typical Case I light to moderate winds. With 8 knots of wind, the carrier moves at 20 knots. I imagine that at 1 knot of wind, the carrier moves at 27 knots. 2. As explained above, it will travel a distance you set when setting up the script in ME. Since the carrier will try to maintain 25-30 knots of wind across the deck, its speed through the water will vary with the speed of the wind and thus, the length of time it takes to travel the specified distance depends upon how you set up the mission. The amount of time on the launch/recovery leg is not directly determined by time, but by wind speed and your specified distance. It is entirely customizable. 3. Yes, unless you tell it not to through the radio F10 menu.

CH-46s for TARAWA, please.

Zooker, Rough calculating the value to enter for distance into the wind is a simple time/distance problem. Wrench says in one of his videos that the carrier will try to keep 25-30 knots into the wind. Through experimentation with classic Case I weather (8 knots of surface wind), I found that the boat will drive at 20 knots through the water, giving 28 knots of wind across the deck. At 20 knots, the boat travels 120,000 feet or 36,363 meters per hour. Multiply that by the length of the cycle in hours, then divide by two. A 1+15 cycle gives you 37 minutes into the wind for 22,727 meters. A 1+30 cycle gives you 45 minutes into the wind for 27,272 meters. A 1+45 cycle gives you 52 minutes into the wind for 31,818 meters. A 2+00 cycle gives you an hour into the wind for 36,363 meters. For experimentation purposes, I've been flying strikes with a 1+30 cycle where the carrier turns into the wind a few seconds after mission start (as Wrench explains in his video), and I launch at 0+10 minutes. The mission flight times have been 1+30, and I've pretty consistently arrived in the marshall stack shortly after the boat comes into the wind for the next launch/recovery cycle. Assuming that the boat steadies up ten minutes before launch (arbitrary, but consistent with my mission start) and launches for 15 minutes, I'm overhead at 1+45 or thereabouts with 20 minutes to go before the carrier wants to head back to its starting posit. If I can't get back aboard by then, the manual override is available. It's not perfect, but it works like a champ, and it really makes it seem like the carrier is operating in a CVOA.

Mule, If you're trying to get the carrier into the wind, check out Wrench's script here: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=213662 VERY easy to use, and makes it seem like the bird farm is working within a CVOA.

The short answer is "lift". The wings are still generating roughly the same amount of lift for a given airspeed, even with all the added drag associated with the external load. It may seem counterintuitive to you, but with all that extra "stuff" hung on the outside, the jet is heavier and LESS able to fly with the nozzles pointed down (hence the conventional and rolling STOL take off techniques). Same as with any aircraft, the wing generates more lift as the airflow across it increases, so the simple answer to getting airborne while loaded is to increase the airflow over the wings...to go faster. Of course, the faster you go, the more drag is generated and the harder the jet has to work to increase airspeed.

Also, when you have the correct TACAN station tuned, you'll see a TACAN symbol on the HSI showing the location of the TACAN.

I remember it that way, too. He provided a list of about 10 things to expect for the Hornet in that update.

34,000 pounds is max landing weight. Between 33,000 and 34,000 lbs, you need full flaps. Below 33,000, you can land with half flaps (but at a higher airspeed). With no stores and 2,000 lbs of fuel, your full-flaps approach speed will be 125 KIAS. For every thousand pounds of stores and fuel above that weight, add 2.5 KIAS to your final approach speed. (That said, this is a target speed...use your AOA indexer and E bracket to keep your jet at the proper landing attitude.)

Stick to practicing your landings on runways for a while, too. Trying to land on the carrier right away will just discourage you...there's a reason why carrier landings are more stressful than combat. Your focus on landing practice should be on consistency in the landing pattern. First lesson: Start away from the field and practice transitioning to the landing configuration at 5,000 feet. Work to get on speed at the correct AOA as smoothly as you can. Then add power, clean it up, and do it again. When you can make the transition easily and smoothly, go back to the field and practice landings. Second lesson: Apply what you learned in the first lesson by making a few landings. Hold the correct AOA and manage your descent with the throttles. Put the Velocity Vector on the far end of the white touchdown zone markers on the runway and hold it there with throttle control (not joystick pitch input). Don't flare. Don't hold the nose wheel off. Work toward consistently putting the plane down in the same spot on the runway every time and getting over the desire to flare or holding the nose up. Practice. Practice more. Do it a hundred times. You got this. It's a challenge, but it's also a lot of fun when you get it right and when you start getting it right every time.

What StandingCow said, plus PRACTICE. You'll get it. Then practice more.

To add to the chorus here, I'll point out that after transitioning from the T-45 to the F/A-18, a pilot will spend a while in a Fleet Replacement Squadron (VFA-106 at Oceana) learning to fly the Hornet before transferring to the Fleet. Just get the EA Hornet. Spend all the time you need studying the documentation. Practice everything. Practice more. The Hornet only LOOKS complex. It's actually pretty simple to operate. DIVE IN!

I'm using the script in my own mission, but I'll check it in your demo and report back. Edit: I don't get the identifier with your mission or my own. My mission is below...I've set up TACAN for STENNIS both ways in this version. ODR-FA18C-STENNIS_NAS-1.miz

In a way, yes, you should be able to. Just add the planes yourself to the VFA113 mission. It's much easier to add planes to the carrier deck if you follow the instructions here: https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=212059

Thanks again for your efforts, Wrench! 0.6 works beautifully. I'm still not getting an identifier for the JOHN C STENNIS' TACAN, though it's set to 'JCS' in the triggered actions. Otherwise, TACAN works fine. Flew a 1+45 sortie last night, and the TACAN was right where I expected it to be on my return leg. Still, the lack of an identifier is troublesome. Any idea how to correct this?

The incrementing time indication at the bottom center of the DDIs counts up minutes and seconds until the minutes (first two digits) reaches 59. At that point, only the seconds (the third and fourth digits) count up. It'll reach "5959" and then roll over to "5900" when it should go to "0000".

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3300712/

Also, in the center of the HSI on the FA-18C, you'll see two numbers: XXXT and XXXG. These are the true airspeed and ground speed readouts.