LanceCriminal86

Folks can skin anything they like for userfiles of course, there have always been multiples of any one jet of course on there. Everyone takes a different approach and some folks prefer one or the other. As far as the official stuff the goal was to spread as much as possible for variances in the schemes themselves and represent a good amount of the squadrons that operated the E Phantom, which will potentially be expanded on more with whatever decal system can be implemented to help with less weight for multiple tail numbers.

As discussed a few times the 335th primarily used DMAS aircraft, and officially they'll be done when that time comes. There were older airframes used by the air wing however so we may try to add a few of those DSCG jets space permitting. Re: Olds' helmet, the one at the AF museum is suspected of being a replica, as photos show his helmet without the high-brow cut and the wear in the paint looks artificial. But colors wise it should be green and tan/brown, we actually did that helmet already but I'm not sure if it's in the common files or not, but it was done. It may have been something intended for the pilot customization.

Interesting, I was trying to comb through Forgotten Jets and also looked at Wiki's list of Vietnam kills. Basically all of the E kills were Linebacker II, ie '72 and were pretty spread around. I'll have to dig through photos and see if anyone's got some wide shots of the flight line from that period. I'm going to assume early-mid 80s since you mentioned 337th as well. There would have to be a good explanation for it, either the combined kills from the air wing or something. The other explanation could be someone got the kill count wrong or mixed serials up and it was eventually removed. I found one that wasn't on the list in Forgotten Jets showing 2 kills, 67-0270, but comments on the photo say it was a mistake. The 2nd star on there apparently said "4th TFW 1973" but of course the only kills in '73 were credited to an F-4D and F-4B respectively, the D kill is listed with 4th TFS. Jet was with the 21st TFTS at George at the time the erroneous star was seen first. So it seems there's a precedent of paint shops goofing kills sometimes, the one on 0270 seems to have followed it on display in NJ even.

I couldn't find any with 3 kills but a couple with 2. 68-0338 which I'm working on for the 110th TFS, 67-0392 that spent time at Moody in the 80s, then a bunch of singles. Could there have been a D still hanging around, or maybe the kills were the CO? 337th had a fair number of single Mig kills from my pass the other day and some others that were passed through 4th TFW squadrons. Looking at the wing commander jets, I guess 334th is the blue stripe, 335th the green, and 336th the yellow. Then later 337th I guess made for the red stripe on 1040?

Will definitely note that one when it's time to crank up the DMAS art. I need to find closeups of the logos on the 337th intakes, a lot of times the logo you find on wiki or elsewhere don't exactly match what was actually painted on the jets, or they changed over time. I'll keep searching around but it looks like there were a few airframes in the 337th that were Mig killers

Only active for 3 years, guess that's why it wasn't showing up in my other list. But we can probably work them in since they should fit into the DSCG perfectly. Shouldn't be too challenging to add.

As mentioned last page most SJ jets will come with the DMAS jet, as 4th TFW primarily operated the later TISEO equipped jets which received the DMAS upgrades in the 80s. There were some non-DMAS jets around, but I'm not 100% clear if they were operationally used with the squadrons or if they were attached to the maintenance wing or what. I guess we could try to sneak one in like this, she's a Mig Killer after all, 67-0210 marked up with the 335th. https://www.airfighters.com/photo/23407/L/USA-Air-Force/McDonnell-Douglas-F-4E-Phantom-II/67-0210/ https://www.airliners.net/photo/USA-Air-Force/McDonnell-Douglas-F-4E-Phantom-II/4246241/L And some other older airframes

I found another jet, wish I could find closer shots but proving difficult. Definitely 90th but I'd like to see if I can find the design as we do want to add some 90th skins in

4th TFW operated as a QRF, so they can pretty well be used on any map. That said, they operated TISEO/DMAS jets during that timeframe, so for DSCG you might look at some other options. Mid-late 80s, there were exercises where ANG/Reserve squadrons went to Europe, such as the 110th TFS. While some were still operating Ds earlier in the 80s you could still use 110th, NJ ANG, Indiana, or California, or Texas even. What you can also do, is use some German skins. I did some asking myself, and during a cold war gone hot situation, apparently the plan was that the GAF would deploy up to Norway while the USAF would focus on Germany. 57th FIS could also make a cameo, though their focus was Iceland and protecting that gap against Bears until they transitioned to Eagles in the mid 80s.

VTAS was never used outside of the AIMVAL/ACEVAL and is entirely outside the scope of anything Heatblur would add.

It's not a popular opinion but I'm of the mind that until Vietnam can be done "right", I'd rather not do it. It's worth doing right but it will take a concerted effort of ED and 3rd parties to fill the voids of modules and AI assets. You'd need focused timeframes to match a map that can cover both USN and USAF operations at a minimum. The FF modules would need to be as closely aligned for those timeframes as possible, which in itself is difficult. You of course need aircraft to fly on both sides, but as DCS' achilles heel continues to be, you need assets to make those eras feel alive. The AI side of aircraft, helicopters, ground models like trucks and AAA and infantry, ships, firebases are all essential. But those mean time/$$$ for folks to make them, and then have it be comprehensive enough to be worth the customer's $$$. It would need to be a major expansion with promised FF modules, and have them all aligned to complement each other. Otherwise, I'd rather see the Cold War years of the mid-late 70s to the end in early 90s be focused, both for historical and "What If" Red Storm Rising style scenarios.

The issue is rooted in there not being a cohesive "era" of modules and assets for the bulk of Vietnam combat timeframes, so any added Vietnam jet is going to get dragged in against much later aircraft. If DCS actually could commit to a Vietnam era from 64-72 with flown and AI assets that actually match 100%, most of the issues would go away. The Cold War has this same problem, where the current E and upcoming DMAS should thrive as a fighter-bomber or frontline fighter for a partner nation, the assets against it just aren't really time matching except the MiG-21 Bis, as I believe it's actually a variant that is close in age to our Phantom. There's just not enough proper 70s-80s air, ground, and sea assets or modules to really get the Red and Blue forces where they need to be. The F-4E can exist on modern servers too, as they are quite literally just being retired and still serving. Not all the Phantoms out there have new radar and modern electronics, the Korean ones were fairly close to original and their DMAS jets as well, plus Iran's are unlikely to be much different from a DSCG. Their TISEO equipped jets would be closer to the DSCG but with the camera system. But their age is going to show in a modern context just as in reality, their RWR and radars are just not designed in any way close to what people are used to, and are not designed to detect modern threats.

When missiles leave the pylon, they become ED's problem.

The B Upgrade got JDAM first and took it to combat in 2002 with VF-11

Spang jets were DMAS and will come later.

The F-4s in Vietnam were "hard wing" without slats (except a small number in late 72 during Linebacker II), and of course would perform and maneuver differently than these mid-late 70s+ F-4Es with slats. The aircraft is of course going to bleed speed differently as the slats deploy, and even with them locked in the outer wing sections still have a fixed slat that will result in different flight dynamics.

Yes the E was used in Vietnam, but not *this* E as presented in the DCS module. To get some ideas of the upgrades Joe Baugher's page is a good start as it walks through some of the upgrades. Mainly as said the slat retrofit kits didn't start being applied until after Linebacker II in late '72. The ALR-46 in the module was retrofitted somewhere from the mid to late 70s, same with the ALE-40 flare dispensers, and the upgraded DSCG screens and interface was again somewhere 72-74 and on. It also has a few under the hood changes that were done into the 80s, but the above would be the big differences from a Vietnam E.

Ben decided not to include the ICE jets for now, and the Holloman jets were later TISEO/DMAS serials which will of course be done when that addition comes along. 81st TFS, again DMAS jets. I think we already have a lot of special/demo jets but the rest of the 32nd and 3rd TFS are certainly ones we'd like to do.

SJ were 99% DMAS jets, we'll of course be bringing plenty of them in when it's that time

I'll talk to Ben_Der and see if I can make a version of his .bat from the F-4E into an F-14 one and share the contents here. I might be needing it myself soon.

The F-4Es presented in the module are pretty far off from the Vietnam jets. You could maybe get away with a 1974+ reignition of hostilities type thing but these jets have late 70s RWR, slats that had only shown up at Linebacker II, and the DSCG. Most Vietnam Es were hard wing, early gun muzzle, DVST screen, and either no RWR or some APR-36/37.

You can convert from PNG to DDS BC7 using AMD Compressonator, which can be easy once you write up a script/.bat for it and just run it in the folder with the PNGs. It's what we've been doing with the F-4 as it lets you do the whole stack of textures at once. If you read the documentation you can figure out how to create the .bat so it looks for each filename and then knows what kind of DDS compression to do, ie BC7 for albedo and Roughmet, and BC5 for Normals.

I don't think you'll be disappointed, it will give you tons of breathing room to try/fly modules as you please, have piles of skins, without having to rotate modules out.

It's gotten to where you almost need a 2TB, even if you don't have every module ever installed. Especially if you want to cram Kola in there if it gets some more improvements. If you stay slim on modules a 1TB will probably continue to work but liveries, mods, maps, etc. can really start to blow up drive space. If you can somehow swing a 2TB, it will give you a lot of future proofing but I totally get if that's not in the budget. I'm looking at doing this myself, getting a 2TB to replace/supplant my current 1TB DCS drive.