Bunny Clark

My understanding is that the cockpit textures are largely based off actual photography of a real F-14 cockpit in a museum. This means the weathering is totally realistic - but for a plane at the very end of it's lifespan.

In real life all mission planning elements: waypoints, offset points, target points, radio channels, maps, threat locations, IFF codes, bomb release programs, countermeasures programs, datalink frequencies, and so on are set up ahead of time on a computer by the mission planners and pilots. The info is then saved from the computer onto the data card and loaded into the jet at startup. In real life you would not sit in the cockpit entering waypoints and data, there's no reason to do so unless there was a very last-minute change. Someday we'll get this functionality in DCS. From what I understand weapon loadout isn't actually a thing that's stored on the Hornet's data card in real life. What weapons are loaded onto what stations is a thing that the ground crew programs directly into the jet through a computer interface behind an access panel and isn't something the pilot needs to be involved in at all. So in that sense the Hornet simply knowing what loaded weapons have changed after a rearm is realistic, except that it happens 20 times faster than is realistic.

The cockpit displays are only powered by the two AMADs (Airframe Mounted Accessory Drives, or generators). Generally it's highly unlikely that you'd loose both AMADs without also loosing both engines, so it's not like you'll be flying back to base and navigating or trying or fight with two dead AMADs. If both AMADs are gone, you're pretty much in an eject or emergency landing situation. The APU will power the FCS channels 1 and 2, and control actuators, so you can still fly the plane effectively using standby instruments, assuming whatever caused the loss of both AMADs didn't do any other damage. The ground power system in the Hornet is primarily intended for use by ground mechanics who need to work on or test systems without starting the aircraft engines. It's not generally used as a part of flight operations.

Yup, as Ziptie said, channels are usually arranged in such a way that makes sense within the context of mission. For example Ch1 could be ground control, ch2 tower control, ch3 departure control, ch4 the strike common or AWACS channel. In Navy ops they typically program the same channel as the carrier marshal and tower for every mission. Consistently using the same channel for the same function makes it easy to remember what channel you need to be on for each phase of flight, even if the actual frequencies change. The Antenna Selector Switch is used to select which physical antenna on the aircraft the radios use, there are radio antennas mounted on the top of the aircraft and on the bottom. Auto is typically used, but sometimes a manual selection is used because one radio antenna is masked (such as trying to transmit to a ground station with the top antenna when at high altitude) or to deconflict multiple radios trying to use the same antenna.

It's certainly possible I'm wrong. Wikipedia isn't a good source, and detailed info is difficult to find elsewhere. But as far as I can tell the missile doesn't use SARH guidance. The target is usually tracked by a radar, but as far as I can tell that radar system is then used to send command guidance signals to the missile, rather than the missile itself homing onto reflected radar signals off the target. That's how it can also operate in an optical mode, the optical tracking system is used instead of the radar tracking system to send guidance commands to the missile.

Yah, that's a separate, though related, issue. When we call the tanker on the radio in game it should really report it's altitude based on the current pressure altitude, not absolute altitude. Yah, that's one thing I really like about the Viper, being able to always see rad and baro alt on the HUD together is great, rather than needing to fiddle with a switch or get an annoying flashing B whenever I'm above 5,000 feet.

With Easy Comms enabled, or with any of the FC3 aircraft, the basic DCS radio button is [\] In the high fidelity modules with Easy Comms off, you need to hit the appropriate radio transmit button for the correct radio in the aircraft to transmit on the radio. But for things that are not necessarily radio transmissions, such as communicating with the ground crew, you still use [\]. You can also speak with the ground crew by using the radio tuned to the ATC frequency, but in some aircraft it's not possible to transmit on the radio without the ground crew doing something first, so using the [\] button simulates speaking in person with the canopy open, using hand signals, or using a plug-in intercom system. Easy Comms is both a local setting and a mission setting, so it may be being enforced by the server. Do you see the same behavior when you run missions locally?

The Roland missile is command guided, it has no radar receiver. Ground equipment tracks the target using either an optical system or a radar system, or both in a coupled mode, and transmits guidance commands to the missile with a radio. The Roland 1 didn't even have a radar system, it was optical only.

Do you have easy comms enabled?

It's not a bug, you're misunderstanding what the numbers mean. When you set an aircraft in the mission editor to 20,000 feet, they are placed 20,000 feet above the "0" elevation mark on the map. What does that "0" altitude correlate to? Whatever the person who built the map geometry decided it was. It should be roughly mean sea level, but of course in the real world sea level fluctuates based on the position of the Moon and Sun, the winds, and the water temperature, so there's no "real" exact sea level. In a DCS map "sea level" is an arbitrary point determined by the map creator, especially on a map with seas, which is most of them. Then once in an airplane, you measure your altitude above mean sea level by measuring the air pressure outside the plane. But because atmospheric pressure fluctuates with the weather and temperature, this needs to be calibrated every time you fly (really, multiple times per flight) by referencing the current pressure on the ground at a location with a determined height, typically an airport. But that still doesn't get you a reliable measurement because atmospheric pressure varies from place to place, and doesn't always decrease linearly as you increase altitude. Depending on how the exterior pressure is measured the gauge can also fluctuate with airspeed. So the problem isn't that the game is placing your aircraft at a different altitude than you set it to. It's placing the aircraft exactly where you set it to, but your cockpit gauges aren't measuring altitude accurately - which is 100% realistic. This is a challenge for real pilots every day. It's why air corridors are separated by at least 500 feet in altitude. You can minimize the discrepancy by setting your altimeter up correctly. In your F-16 screenshot I can see that the barometric altimeter is reading lower than the radar altimeter, which is a sure sign that your barometric altimeter is set incorrectly (unless you're flying over Death Valley).

Flight path marker on the end of the landing zone, centered ball.

The altitude in the Mission Editor is a magic number that represents the absolute distance between the aircraft and exact sea level. This isn't a number that has any real equivalent in the real word or gauges we have in the cockpit, as there is no such thing as an exact sea level, and there is no way to reliably measure an aircraft's exact altitude above sea level. You can think of the Mission Editor altitude as a bit of a peak behind the curtain at what the game engine sees. Since it's a simulator, the altitude you see in the cockpit is derived from the absolute altitude based on the local barometric pressure, temperature, and your altimeter setting.

Well, let's use an example. Turkey operates F-16s with Harpoon capability. The most similar of their aircraft to what we have in DCS are the F-16C CCIP Block 50 aircraft manufactured locally by Turkish Aircraft Industries (TUSAS) under license as part of the Peace Onyx IV program. They use different engines (TEI F129 IPE), a different radar (APG-68(v)9), and are equipped with the Loral ALQ-178(V)5 Rapport III internal ECM system, which is mounted in an expanded fairing at the base of the vertical stabilizer, so the aircraft exterior also looks different. They can also carry the AGM-142 Popeye, and the SLAM-ER. So if we take the F-16 we currently have in DCS and just add a Harpoon then we have either: A USAF F-16CM carrying a weapon it was never cleared to carry and has never carried operationally, or a Turkish F-16C with the wrong engines, wrong radar, and without it's ECM system. Neither of these options are realistic.

The Maverick has two lenses that can swap in and out, toggling the FOV, and no digital zoom. IRL, switching Maverick FOV will actually cause a locked-on missile to drop the lock, as the image sensor looses sight of the target as the lenses are shifted. This isn't modeled in DCS right now. The Lightening pod also has two lenses that can swap FOV. It's basically an optical zoom, though it's more like swapping the lenses on a camera than using a zoom lens. The zoom levels 0-9 are a digital zoom, and higher zoom levels should become progressively more pixelated. So WIDE Zoom 9 should look significantly worse than NAR Zoom 0, even if the area covered by the image is similar. ATFLIR has three different lenses it can swap between, giving you a WIDE, MED, and NAR FOV. And I think no digital zoom at all? I haven't been able to find a solid source on that part.

Two reasons: realism and scope. There is no reality where mix and match features are plausible. No single feature or function of a fighter jet in the real world exists in a vacuum. F-16s in service with other nations have a wide range of different capabilities: they mount CFTs, carry different weapons, use different RWRs, use different EW suites - including internal jammers, different radars, different FLIR pods, different cockpit panels, switches, and displays, different HUDs, different HMDs. So, for realism, does ED try to make this all match? If someone wants a Viper that carries Harpoons, should that jet then also represent the specific sets of modifications in use by a nation that employs Harpoon on the F-16? Or should it be a purely fictional 2007 USAF F-16CM Blk50 that can carry Harpoon? Do we expect ED to model every possible variant in use by all 27 nations that fly the F-16? Do we just get some random subset of variations based on what the community thinks is cool and ED can find documentation for? Do we go the BMS route and just let users hodgepodge features together willy-nilly which may or may not represent a realistic aircraft in service somewhere in the world? With development progress on the Viper already well behind what many people would want, does significantly increasing the scope of the module make any sense at all? ED has chosen to solve these problems by sticking to a well-defined and limited scope. It means fewer fun toys for us, but given the minefield of problems that lay outside of this scope, I can hardly blame them for that decision.

Take a look at the table you posted, the "Name" column will you exactly what device/vehicle is associated with each RWR code and table ID. An "11" is the SA-11 tracking radar, which is attached to the launchers. "SD" is the Snow Drift search radar. Typically, the tracking radars use the NATO SAM code number for the RWR ID while the search radars use an abbreviation of the NATO call name for the system. Killing the SD will make it more difficult for the battery to find you, but it could still shoot at you. Killing an 11 will make it impossible for that launcher to shoot at you, but keep in mind like I said before an SA-11 site will have multiple launchers so you'll need to kill 2-6 11s before the sire won't be able to shoot at you anymore. Again, take a look at the names in the table. ID 205 is the search radar, and 201 is the director radar. Roland is not actually a radar guided missile, it uses command guidance with either a radar or optical tracker.

SLAM, especially the E version, is not particularly accurate without manual terminal guidance. If you're attacking a target where a miss by several hundred feet would be successful it could be useful in that mode, but that's hardly common.

That's a slightly complex question. Generally, the tracking radars are the priority targets, as the battery cannot guide missiles without them. But sometimes different tactics may be used against different systems. For example an SA-11 site has a single search radar and as many tracking radars as there are launchers (since each launcher has the tracking radar built in). When attacking an SA-11 site, killing the tracking radars basically means eliminating the entire battery. So for the SA-11 it's a valid tactic to kill the search radar first, crippling the battery's ability to find targets, then you work on eliminating the launchers. It also depends on what your mission is. The goal of SEAD is suppression; so long as the battery is made to not be a threat to a strike package, the SEAD mission is a success. This could mean killing the tracking or search radar, it could mean shooting some HARMs at the battery and scaring it into turning off it's radars until the package is out of the threat zone. The goal of a DEAD mission is to destroy as much of the battery as possible. A DEAD strike against a SAM site will generally start with the radars, to minimize the battery's ability to defend itself, and then the launchers and C&C vehicles will absolutely be targets. HK is a Hawk site. As it's a NATO system built by the US, it's not loaded into any of the Viper's threat tables by default since it's assumed that it is friendly. Of course the US has sold Hawk systems to many nations, not all of which are friendly to the US anymore - most notably Iran. If you're going to be attacking a Hawk battery, you'll need to edit the threat tables.

On the SA page, if you slew the cursor over a friendly datalink contact, you can see their callsign in the info block at the bottom right corner of the display. For brevity, that callsign is displayed as the first and last letter of the word and the two digit number. Now, the problem is that DCS only allows a very limited set of callsigns, none of which line up very well with the callsigns used in the book. So, Baltic Dragon needed to assign DCS callsigns to the flights, which in turn sets the callsign codes on the SA page. So for example, in Mission 10, Iron 21 is identified as PC11 on the SA Page, that's because in DCS his callsign is set to Pontiac 11. In real life you'd see IN21 on the SA page. (An aside to BD, I see the briefing image shows Hammer flight IDing as "CY11" - I'm guessing this is a typo and should be CT11 for Colt? I'm looking on Stable, so maybe you've already fixed it.)

Dropping on moving targets from high altitude in the Hornet, in my experience, presents two problems: PTRK does not update the designated target location, so if you acquire the moving target early, you'll be aiming the bomb at a location far off from when it'll be when the laser turns on. I usually hit TDC Depress at around 5 seconds to release to update the point, and if I'm dropping from very high altitude or on a fast moving target offset my aimpoint slightly in the direction of travel. Even if you've aimed perfectly, the AUTO release cue is aiming where the target is at the time of release, not where the target will be when the laser turns on. For longer bomb fall times, such as at very high altitude, target movement can take it outside the bomb seeker's field of regard by the time auto lase turns on. For these attacks I will usually manually lase at around TTI=30s.

Yah, NWS Hi causes really significant nose wheel deflection when it's pushed all the way to one side (70° IIRC). If you do it too quickly while going too fast, the nose wheel just tends to skid sideways. Be gentle with your control inputs with NWS Hi.

A lot of this comes down to understanding how SAM systems in general work, and then how each specific SAM system works. Generally, most SAM systems will have one or more search / surveillance / acquisition radars who's job it is to scan the sky and find potential targets. Then the tracking radar locks on and guides missiles to the target. Killing the tracking radar will prevent the site from supporting a missile launch at any any targets, while killing the search radar will make it more difficult to find targets to engage. Some systems have multiple search radars, the Hawk and SA-10 are both examples of this, and each search radar has different abilities. In the SA-10 system for example the 64H6E Big Bird (BB) radar is the general surveillance radar and the one that will usually be looking for you. The 5N66M Clam Shell (CS) is a search radar that specializes in detecting low altitude threats and cruise missiles. Some systems work differently. The SA-11 has a single search radar that detects and hands off targets for the entire battery, and then each launcher has it's own built-in tracking radar. This makes it a particularly difficult system to defeat, as there are any many tracking radars as there are launchers. The Patriot, on the other hand, uses the same radar for both search and tracking. Hawk batteries typically have two identical tracking radars, each supporting three towed launchers. The SA-15 is a search radar, tracking radar, and launcher all on one.

Yup, since we only have the BLU-109 version in the game so far. Once (if?) the Mk.84 version gets added it'll be less effective against hard targets.

I thought in the book they abandoned their briefed aim points in favor of a visual delivery on a related but easier identify target. At least, that was my reading of it. I was confused what I was supposed to do in the mission as well, but since I happened to still have functional JDAMs I just dropped on my briefed target and everything worked out.

From a cold start? Press the IFF tile, then ON. The display is now blank until IFF if turned on.