Rick50

Well, someone announced a Spad module several months back, with a youtube I think. And wasn't there an F-100 announcement back in summertime? Probably not the D variant you want... but baby steps: Vietnam was "dead in the water" not that long ago, and now seems to be a "greenlight GO!" once tech catches up! I do think that CSAR missions on a 'Nam map would be really popular and gain popularity as people who didn't think about it discover it for themselves! The only real question is how long will we have to wait! Phantoms will be ready by then, I'd expect!

I think I read recently that there will be an update to the Mig-21 module? I think as DCS Cold War grows in interest and module availability, we well get more tweeks and minor updates to other modules. MEaning, after a terrain showing that certain strip of land in South East Asia goes into development, existing module devs may well add earlier variants to match that era. Well that's retail "simulation edutainment" products for ya! Was true in 1995, 2005, 2015 and will be true in 2025, probably same in 2035. Out of all the combat flight simulation products, probably only 2% of them were released "on time" by way of announced ETA at project announcement. 2+ years longer than the original forecast is NORMAL. As in maybe more than 50% of all projects. Civilian aircraft, the ones that don't go BOOM, don't get radar lock, don't drop things onto targets, have fairly linear development, and is usually down to how much time and skills can be put to the project. This just simply isn't true for the cannons and missiles crowd. And for "Full Fidellity"... for the super-demanding expectations of the DCS ED customer, that just adds a huge level of complexity for the developer that devs for civilian aircraft modules don't deal with. Go look at the history of Microprose's Falcon4.0 from announcement to launch, and then the aftermath... right now flight simulations, both combat and civilian, are experiencing a true "golden age" never seen before. But when you expect full realism for super-complex systems, it takes a LOT of time to do, and "brute forcing" that with money and bodies, might not scale very well. To be honest, I'm just glad that there ARE developers like Heatblur, Eagle Dynamics, RAZBAM, Magnitude3, Aerges, Polychop, Kunos Simulazioni (hey I love cars too, so sue me!)... the industry realities had forced me long long ago to be patient, and almost completely ignore all proposed release dates as irrelevant fluff, because the only thing that matters is that when they decide to release, that it's as bug-free as they can achieve, is stable and offers a great experience. Don't feed me promises that you can't keep, or tease me with thousands of screenshots YEARS before release, just plug away at it until it's ready, or you run out of money or time. Don't worry about early hype, when it's ready and good, the masses will flock to it, credit card ready at the speed of "VISA"!

So do it. Pool your money together, gather up your industry expertise, and make those maps. ED won't stop you if you are capable of delivering. Maybe if you bring great things to the table, maybe ED will hire you on to make the "world map" in development.

A year ago none were DCS modules... now all three are in development! And ED said recently that at some point in future they'll make an ff Mig-29 Maybe someone soon will consider making the Starfighter... Edit: Don't forget the Sabrejet, Huey and the Bo-105 TOW/HOT tank buster that should show up this year or next... the modeler is very skilled, looks like a passion project for him, just hope he gets some simulation programmer to do it justice and help release it!

Well, during that era, BVR was in it's infancy still... and the idea of visually ID'ing a target was not even thought of in those early days. See, in those days, they were still in the idea of thinking that a ground radar operator would vector you to "the enemies"... which in those days they imagined masses of enemy bombers and strike aircraft coming to sink your ships or nuke your cities... the BVR was imagined to stop some enemies before you got to visual range... raining aluminium everywhere instead of raining artificial "sunshine". Thus, a giant enemy formation flying to you, you just pick one and shoot it before it gets close. But then, plans rarely survive first contact with the enemy, in the real world. It took real world considerations seen in Vietnam, to show that the original simplicity of employment they imagined, was so clearly flawed that they needed to invent what became IFF, probably among other tech. Lots of friendlies around the skies, lots of non-combatant aircraft, including civilian airliners just taking people here and there. Lots of reasons. And yet, Vietnam also proved that BVR was also too effective and important to simply abandon, rather, it needed to be developed and refined into an all-new form of combat aviation, one with unique tech, unique support, unique training curriculum. Edit addition: I just remembered that one technique used early on, was to have a pair of Phantoms split up: one would hang back, the BVR "shooter", and the other would burn ahead as fast a sageburner, who would be the "looker" or "spotter" that would vis ID the threat and then burn back out of the line of fire. Once clear, the shooter would take the long distance shot. Sounds simple enough... and while I'm sure it worked a few times, I also bet that getting all the coordination and timing just right was probably a LOT harder than it sounds. Especially given how interceptor radars were totally manual in those days, and trying to use the earliest Sparrow with any effectiveness was probably an exercise in frustration. add in the lack of networked datalink for showing where threats and friendly's are...

Ah well, I'm no "DCS historian", but I believe that there have been some good mods that got abandoned, and aren't working in several years, because no one kept up with DCS World updates and changes. And those that DO try to keep them updated, sometimes struggle to accomplish that. Either due to a lack of enough time to actually get changes done... or it's an actual challenge to figure out the problem and find a solution that works. But despite that, I think such a project holds promise!

Is it super important to have a paid module of the Comanche though? Pay money, expect full fidellity. Impossible for Comanche due to it never getting near the finish line. HOWEVER... there are several great "free mods". The A-4 Skyhawk. The UH-60, the F-16I Sufa are just a few examples. A Comanche RH-66 high quality free mod could bring a few advantages: -actually getting completed -not require any permissions from the original aircraft manufacturer -people wouldn't feel cheated out of a full fidelity, as there was no money exchanging hands -this could lead to a good team that could go on to develop other projects. An example could be the C-130 mod that is now a full fidellity module in development Probably the biggest downsides to a good mod would be: -team members abandoning the mod after 3 years after completion -difficult to keep the team working on it once it's "fully developed", to keep it working with every new DCS World update. This is a problem facing many mods.

I agree, well worth your while!

There IS one recent change though... ED no longer has it as an absolute requirement to be 100% real world full fidellity... I can't recall exactly, but it was due to recognition of a little bit of fudging that would be needed to ensure one particular module to be completed. So maybe not impossible for the Comanche... but still unlikely, as it was never even close to production, there would be more "fiction" in a Comanche module than raw "fact". but not impossible!

LOL!!

Sure, why not? I dunno if they were ever in service... unlike say CCIP and iron bombs. I mean, sure, mildly silly due to probably high difficulty at getting documentation, and also lack of satellites to shoot at... ... but thinking about it, for the future global map, maybe the editor could allow the addition of some satellites! LOL!

"because you can" maybe? I mean, no one's ignoring the F-5E, F-86 and Mig-19 just because we have Amraam dump trucks spamming up the skies With maps that would fit IDF / Israel, it's quite conceivable that in a sudden attack on their nation, that a sudden shortage of airframes capable of dropping iron, with overwhelming armored advances from multiple locations, could easily occur long before E's appear in the IDF inventory. Yea, maybe not in the super giant USAF... but other nations may not have the EXTREME LUXURY of not using an asset they can muster in a national existential crisis. Yes, it's true the E will be better suited to precision strike than a C... no one's arguing that. But in real world, sometimes desperation turns into an "all hands on deck" situation, doing things you might not have even had one minute of training for. Cooks suddenly having to use Browning heavy MG's. Specops having to drive a supply truck. Mechanics having to escort ambulances. Also remember, there was a substantial time between the Eagle and the first Beagle going operational. Ultimately, we won't be dropping millions of tons from C's, but that's not the point: it was able to do it, at least by CCIP, and darn it, if a module for DCS doesn't match the actual capabilities, people will complain, full stop.

So the idea of a Kiowa carrying 8 Hellfires is a wee bit "optimistic" then?

Oh, we wanna try launching some E's off a deck? Have you considered JATO rockets? and Zero-length launch? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-length_launch

About a year or two ago, a real KiowaW veteran described how in "hot and high conditions", the KW would not handle 4 Hellfires well (can't recall if it COULD do it, or if it was unsafe) with a good amount of fuel... so they'd reduce the combat load to one Hellfire per side (might have something else on the other side though). Keep in mind that with helicopters, the heavier the load, the faster you burn your fuel... so if you need loiter time, you might want to trade munitions for time airborne. Another issue is that all that weight has a HEAVY penalty for helicopter agility. Just because you can, doesn't mean you SHOULD.

Wow... kind of amazing to think about, considering that in the 70's and 80's the idea of reunification seemed... well, a longshot, at least to ousiders like me! Visiting the museum at Checkpoint Charlie in 1995 was kinda sureal. For those who don't know the history, it's well worth your time to learn about it... but that's all WAY off topic for a thread about the "Flying Sledgehammer of Doom" known popularly as the Phantastic Phamous Phantoms! (ok that last bit might have been a little over the top) As for the Heat F-4, the videos from the other day look fantastic! ( mean, Heatblur has done amazing visual models for it's Tomcats and Viggens, but this Phantom looks to match or exceed those earlier products!

Coota0 thanks for the info!! Recently in the Apache forum (DCS Longbow Apache) there was talk about how during the sandbox wars, Apaches suddenly got new IR lasers attached to the 30mm cannon, apparently to allow the Apache crews to "indicate" items of interest to anyone with NVG's, like forward observers, spec ops, armored or infantry, or even other aircraft. This all confused me because up to that point I thought the laser designators used for LGB's and Hellfires were able to be seen using NVG's but apparently not! Thus, with real tactical situations occuring so incredbily often, a quick fix solution was bound to appear. I'm guessing this is a very similar or the same laser type, and can't be used for Hellfire or LGB ordnance, but is great for NVG use?

I think it's Kiowa shooting it's .50cal BMG on one pylon, with the laser as an aiming aid that can be used with NVG's... but that's just a guess. Kinda straffing, a bit like a WW2 fighter doing a run on ground targets, but from a light helo! Considering how often the Kiowa appears in this particular video, I'm thinking it will be released sometime in 2023. I hope!

Not the conclusion I read. "this year you'll hear more about the product and it's progress. Eventually it'll be in Early Access.", to paraphrase. But nothing about a release date this year. I'm guessing it's more like Christmas 2024 at the earliest... LOL!! EF2000 2.0 was awesome, no doubt!

Yea, that's probable: Kate doesn't have that listed on an official production list, while Wags and others at the company WANT to do it once it becomes possible. Both can be true at the same time. I guess that means Wags' comment was not at all "official", but rather a comment about future aspirational goals. But I do think that we are maybe approaching the time when this becomes a practical project. If nothing else, at least this gives us a bit of hope that we'll probably get an SEA map at some point in future!

Uh... you just said it was ALWAYS possible. Wags just said that there are STILL technical hurdles to overcome. ED has always maintained that they're only wanting 100% accurate high fidellity. So a low or medium quality jungle was NEVER going to happen in DCS.

Well... see here: That said, despite substantial technical issues, they DO officially plan on having a Vietnam map for DCS!!! "in the future" might mean a bit of a wait though. Still, I'll take it!!

Well there IS the Mosquito for bombers! Not exactly heavy though, nor moderrn. From the point of view of DCS modules, I think some bombers are likely to eventually appear, and other bombers are NOT likely. The B-1B and B-52 are on my "probably not likely" list because you'll need 4 to 6 crew stations to properly operate them. Developers looking to code such beasts would have a steep uphill climb, and a lot of buyers might be put off by the reality of those crew stations that don't have large windows. Same for a Bear or Backfire, Hustler. Bombers that will probably be developed, eventually? A-6 Intruder, F-111 Aardvark... at least there, both will have a view of the action, and two buddies doing a mission coop multiplayer could be great fun, and a nice way to initiate non-pilots into enjoying a flight sim. Even those might run into issues for Devs, needing documents to be available and legal for public use outside the USA. And the rights holder to the original aircraft might deny a licensing deal or permission to depict the aircraft. I also think that WW2 era bombers are probable soon. B-17's, B-29 Superfortress... I think those are quite doable for DCS, because the workstations are somewhat simple compared to the jet heavies, and often revolve around manning a gun station.

what joystick are you using? have you used the rudder function with this stick in DCS in other modules ?

Every time some dev team gives a hard date, or even a rough estimate, for a simulation's ETA... there's at LEAST 2 major delays. Even one delay could take months, or even MIGHT add 2 YEARS. Or longer. This is not limited to DCS modules either, but flight combat simulations in general. Dev teams can only estimate that there will be delays at some point, but can't guess when or why they will occur or how long it'll set them back. They are the ones that get the grief for it, and have to suffer through solving the delay problem, whatever that may be... all we have to do is be patient, it will arrive when it's truly ready for us, and not a moment earlier.