LanceCriminal86

I mean he does portions of it, but part of it is also over on the modeling side from what I hear. And if a portion of the project is not currently on their team's priority list he's probably not working on it. I don't think one guy is right now simultaneously texturing the pilot body, Intruder, and Forrestal. @Cobra847drives the bus, maybe he can clarify who does what but stop assuming that "rivet counting" fixes are somehow detracting from other features.

Separate employees. Why do people keep thinking these corrections and work are diverting resources?

I've been meaning to ask him if he ever sketched up some art for his fictional VF-104 squadron, I know some folks have taken swings at replicating them but it would be neat to get an "official" design direction and go from there. Maybe he'd even gin up a roster of characters for the different jets too in addition to the main characters.

Regarding the liveries: There's a lot of underlying work that is being done/needs to be done to get the base textures for the B and A adjusted/corrected. The previously mentioned model changes that need to be made are only part of that, but a good portion of the work needs changes in the Roughmets and Normals. Things like corrections to engine nacelle panel lines, relocating the fire punch-in panels, correcting the leading edge of the tails, etc. Some of this has been "crowd sourced" by a few of us, but more needs to be done to get it where HB likes it for quality. Thankfully some folks in the Livery group and Tomcat Assn have helped get photos of a few of the panel changes between A/B/D which has helped a lot. But almost weekly there are little things that we find that could or should be adjusted to be more accurate. The underlying issue there, is that the template does not include any layers for generating RM/Normals, so you have to edit the .dds files directly. Doing so and saving continually introduces grain and artifacts, which reduce the quality each time. To have them done right we are waiting on a PSD we can use to generate fresh RMs and Normals, and also some of the changes need to be done by HB using the Substance Painter tool so that all 3 texture types will line up, otherwise you can end up with misaligned changes which would be un-cool. Obviously @ensamvargand co would need to give an official reply but that's a good portion of the gist of it as a sideline observer. Oh and if you really want proper 1981 and 1989 Mig killers, then we need to keep twisting @Cobra847's various body parts and get a US Block 95 jet with old gun vents, beaver tail, and TCS-less ALQ-100 done, as that represents the 1981 jets and very closely the 1989 jets (1 and 2 blocks earlier than the 95 but very few differences visually).

With the Intruder and Corsair II coming we're getting there, but as said a lot of air wing gaps for 80s plus. We need those older E-2C + Ds, older C-2 maybe even a C-1 Trader since it wasn't retired until 1988. Need the SH-3 obviously, redone S-3A/B, and I think that covers the general period we're trying to cover of 80s+ with the Tomcat modules. By the periods HB is focusing on the A-3 and C-1 were about gone but they were still in service until the late 80s on carriers, which includes the 81 Sidra shoot down as well as some other Persian Gulf ops during that era. The SH-2 would be needed I think for the Destroyers though, so maybe some of this stuff can come with the Supercarrier's supposed rework of assets but they're doing way more modern era than we need. Sadly that puts the weight back on modders, but at least there are folks capable of doing it like the Military Aircraft Mod. Challenge though is finding or creating models good enough for them to convert for DCS usage and having to support it as ED continues to change/break/add features.

I mean there's two planes that could make a Tomcat seem small, the A-5 and the A-3. And EA-3s and/or KA-3s were on carriers through the 80s until VQ-1 stopped deploying carrier based Dets apparently, so there was Tomcat era crossover. Seems like a nice candidate for another AI bird at least, covers having an older carrier based tanker alongside the KA-6, if we ever get EWARish modeling it could be interesting too. Even without that being robustly modeled, planes like the EA-3 can make for fun scenarios for escort missions or even more if you want to make a scenario off how the "spooky" versions of A-3s and P-3s like to fly right on the edge of international borders and do listening ops. Perfect Tomcat scenario to buster in to cover them from being harassed by Sukhois or Migs.

Pfff, too small. Bring on the mighty Whale!

I mainly had been using this shader mod for the color balances, I had found that running this mod meant I had to run less color corrections/contrast tweaks in Reshade. Definitely will continue to use it. I'm personally interested in a version that just helps with color balance and visuals rather than turning off anything for FPS/performance. With all the AI, weapons, etc. issues still present in DCS I spend more time skinning and taking pretty screenshots nowadays. -- Correction, I guess this one doesn't actually turn stuff off like the VR shader mod, but I did want to say I'm all for keeping one the "pretty" shaders mod vs performance based.

I did see that, I'll give 25 a try and 24 after that to see if it changes any. Like I said the printed detents may be getting a bit worn so that could be meaning an inconsistent stop point when I was doing the measuring of box to dot to get the detent number. The throttles seem to be accurately paired as far as axes go. My typical fallback was just to tweak the nearest curve point but I'll see if tweaking the whole curve as said works as well.

If you do it right in a PSD you can actually link external dds files in each layer, so you can then enable/disable them and right click, and hit "update modified content". Photoshop will then go through and read through the current folder and update changes. I think you can actually even drag a DDS file into the photoshop window to accomplish this, but it's been a while.

I had to remove any mods with naval assets until I can pin down what is causing it but same issues. I had to remove the Cuesta CdG, LeClem, all ww2 mods, anything boats or vehicles. I'll try to go in tonight and re-add stuff one by one to figure out what it's hanging up on. A-4E-C and VSN aircraft, Military Aircraft Mod, and other aircraft seemed to be fine.

Hugely helpful, did have to make some tweaks manually though. Following the guide I landed on a 26 curve for the Tomcat with X-56 throttle and 3d printed detents. Only issue was I think the sensitivity plus some mushiness of my detent meant that bumping up against the detent made the AB start to try and light off. I had to manually tweak one of the values closest to the lightoff up to 18 from the 15 the calculator generated in order to be able to bump up against the detent and not light off the ABs. If I mess with the calculator to match the value that I had to change that one data point to (3rd value on curve chart), that would mean a detent location value of 22. Again I may blame it on my printed detents being a wee bit blown out, but I thought it was worth noting. I may go back and just tweak the calculator values up and down, adjust the whole curve, and see if there's another value that gets the same result but adjusts the whole curve instead of it being 0-8-18-24

This was in the patch notes, maybe the fix didn't take or something new got introduced: Fixed JESTER wire call on the SuperCarrier being errant.

So, I know most things AI are tied to the ED side of the house, but some things I noticed taking screenshots today: - AI Tomcat flight launched off of Supercarrier, the flaps/slats were constantly "popping" between deployed and retracted, during climb out. - AI Tomcat flight in level flight, wings were "flapping" between the various flex animation positions. - AI Tomcat flight wingman in 2-ship formation was flying at a nose-down attitude, while still apparently flying level formation with flight lead. And something I'm not sure if I missed but I haven't been noticing wings sweeping at high speeds with AI Tomcat flights, as I thought I did before. Wingmen of player formation follow your configuration but some AI flights at 450-500 knots were still bumping along wings well forwards.

I recall an "orbit" option was planned for Iceman at some point. I personally wish Iceman would operate like a full AI pilot in the regard that he would follow waypoints and do whatever the mission editor has assigned for your flight.

In the back seat, the TF-30 intake whine produces a notable "looping" sound to my ear in the A model. It becomes very distracting very quickly as my brain latches onto it and can't stop hearing it.

One correction here: You need to go in to the roughmets, I believe in the Blue layer, and cut out the little door in the rear gas purge vent. The whole thing is painted to be metalic/chrome looking, but there is a door there in the gun port that should be TPS/painted, ie gull or ghost gray.

Were the issues with the dud Phoenixes in Gulf War and all the no-fly zone periods on the propellant, or were they from electronics?

Not sounding like it. I believe it's been said the Viggen right now is taking priority to finalize it to get it out of EA, and the Forrestal as well. There's a lot in the pipe but it sounds like we'll have to wait for the roadmap that was mentioned by Mike or Cobra elsewhere. I poked around asking a little while back and it didn't sound like the pilot body had changed at all since last time it was presented. Realistically, I'd expect 2.7 to cause all kinds of fun and upheaval, need for new patching, and fixes, and then a resumption of feature releases. Maybe by the time the new pilot hits I'll have my Virpil stick, base, and extension.

Super well executed, bravo!

As someone who is supposed to knockout Net+ and has about 30 days left, I feel that!

Nope, it's been asked to add the second helmet to the LOD as well as a few other items. That's tied into the model itself. We've also asked about separate pilot bodies, separate tanks, and a few other sundry bits to add to the jet and LOD to help reflect some of the designs and schemes we've seen.

I think head tracking and especially technologies like VR are a must for the carrier pattern. I won't say that's the only thing holding folks back, because there are a LOT of building blocks Naval Aviators have to have down near perfect to even get to "Das Boat". Things like being able to actually fly a precise, timed route, formation flying, being able to maintain the AOA and on-speed having been built off of formation flying because you have to constantly modulate throttles and stick to maintain that ideal speed and positioning in a formation. Without those skills and practicing them flying an actual bang on CASE I pattern by the books seems really tough. Each element of the pattern is in itself a movement combining a few different skills. Holding a particular speed, altitude, and bearing over the boat with your jet configured one way, then executing a particular radius turn and changing your configuration while you do it. That there screws me up every time, because I can't quickly look back and forth to see things like speed, altitude, AOA, and vertical velocity all while trying to watch the boat. And then after that, getting the jet set up to on speed and AOA while descending to the right altitude and again, watching the boat the whole time. And then AGAIN turning in at just the right time from the 180 onto your final while not stalling out and also again dropping altitude, not being too far out, too far in, left, right, low, or high. I'll be honest I think equipment makes for a big part of being able to do a lot of this right. Not having rudder pedals, head tracking and a big enough monitor, good frame rates, rudder pedals, some good buttons/levers for all the functions you need in the landing cycle, and a good stick that allows you to make smooth and fine inputs, all of that makes each part of it tougher. And it's unfortunate that the overhead to run all of those things in DCS is so high, apparently even a 3090, a mountain of RAM, and an overclocked i9 or highest end i7 still isn't enough to have DCS run completely smooth with a reliably high framerate over areas like Syria, or heavily populated missions (In VR that is). In whatever case I do look forwards to the T-45C mod, and it seems like a reason for folks to actually get online and do virtual squadron stuff like VNAO because to really get good at this, some of us probably need a whole virtual flight school running through the Navy's program as though we were fresh faced LTJGs at Pensacola, Kingsville, or wherever.

I noticed some similar problems with the Clemenceau or perhaps the CdG mods, perhaps you guys can put your heads together as whatever fixes one mod should help the other, and all who follow after you guys.