Baldrick33

I agree, I recently flew the Huey again and it felt a bit toy like. Sure it is a lot lighter but I also feel it is a previous generation physics modelling wise. The Hind has really captured my imagination.

Just to add I tried adding a modifier and by assigning the y axis to an unused camera function in VR I can switch between collective and unused camera mode. This parks the collective where it is. Pressing the button again enables it. Might be useful for anyone who has a collective that doesn't stay in position on its own. Or even to deliberately reduce the friction to get rid of the dreaded stiction!

You should still have the Mi-24P folder in the config/input folder. You can copy the folders from here to the new Mi-24P Pilot folder. Seems to have worked fine so far for me.

In my case the solution was a replacement cable for my G1. It was losing connection regularly causing SteamVR to crash. However, I also had some other crashes which appeared related to WMR for SteamVR beta so I opted out. Since the two things it seems to be fixed. Edited to add: WMR for SteamVR beta was recently updated and included: Fixes a crash due to a race condition with game titles during their startup. note it should say rare. So maybe this will fix the startup issue mentioned above? Edited again to add: No, opted in to beta, crashed a couple of minutes into DCS!

I believe you are losing 6dof tracking rather than simulating never being out of the cockpit, so getting to positional tracking. Some cope with 3DOF and being limited to rotational tracking ok but it isn’t a nice solution for many, myself included. Having limited head movement works ok in race sims which prevent you from having any kind of view advantage but the positional head movement is far less, cranking you head over a bit into corners etc. compared with combat flight sims. I guess an option would be ideal, defaulting to no limit so as not to cause VR nausea.

I think there are two questions here: Should a new map run with high settings on a mid range graphics card? Should a new map run with any settings well on a top end graphics card in VR? I believe the recent posts have been to the former question, we might expect the boundaries to be pushed so the latest and greatest hardware can be used to the full, yet lesser hardware can also be used albeit with reduced settings. The latter is an example of early access work in progress. If the very top hardware can't run it at acceptable rates then it needs to be addressed. Of course that could mean the user parking combinations of content, or mission types whilst the development progresses, safe in the knowledge there is other content you can use. Given the free aspect of the new map it doesn't really hurt the customer having to wait. The feedback that the new map doesn't really work acceptably in VR on a 3090 should be more than enough to highlight the need to address the map going forward. Be that optimisation, reducing detail or even waiting for Vulkan.

I think some choice on settings for the older maps and those pushing the boundaries is somewhat inevitable, especially in early access. Also catering for a wide range of hardware is always going to involve some compromise and IMHO providing a range of content with somewhat varying performance allows for users with low, medium and top end hardware to find what works best for them. This is very different from console games where the hardware is fixed. In my view aiming all content at a "standard" configuration is going to disappoint more enthusiasts. Which brings me to my second point, this is an enthusiast piece of software which typically is going to require some greater investment both in software and hardware than a typical computer game. Fortunately the continual development approach of adding more content rather than replacing it in a more typical release cycle (DCS 2018, 2019 2020 etc.) does mean we can pick and choose what works well with our hardware. Sometimes though we may need to pass on the shiny new early access until either it gets better tuned or we upgrade. Of course we want ED to do everything possible to make it run faster and be more detailed and have more features but it isn't exactly as if we aren't already vocal in asking for that and the early access process seems to work pretty well in allowing us to feedback back experiences with a wide array of hardware beyond any closed test group.

I didn't see any real improvement using this. I tried lots of settings but the loss in quality and gain in performance seemed similar to simply reducing the SteamVR SS.

Removing as much "stiction" as possible has been key for me to enjoy flying this aircraft. I did the spring mod for my Warthog stick - removing the big spring and moving the four small coil springs from bottom to top. It makes for very light resistance ( I also have a 10cm extension) but will still recentre although not from full deflection. I tend not to bother trying to trim it and seldom have the joystick centred and I find I have the most control this way. The Warthog throttle on the lightest friction and angled down isn't a bad collective but also using it for aircraft messes with my muscle memory (old dogs, new tricks and all that!). So I have re-purposed an old CH flightstick, removed the pitch spring and angled the base at 45 degrees and it is a super precise collective albeit with no friction to hold it in place. It makes for a great experience as long as you keep holding the controls. With the mouse buttons mapped to the CH buttons there is little need to take a hand off although I have also mapped the collective up and down to the CH hat, so I can drop the collective, immediately pull that hat back to restore it to level flight and then let go if needed. In VR the CH makes for a surprisingly immersive collective

I find it the same in sim racing, to be ultra competitive I would still recommend triple screens but for a sense of being in a car VR wins hands down. I have no sense of flying an aircraft with monitors now, I have tried a number of times.

Once in the cockpit I get a blue cross either way. Mouse off the blue cross moves with my head. Mouse on the blue cross moves with both my head and mouse. Same open beta version.

I would say if you can manage Half Life:Alyx you should be fine with DCS. I cut my teeth in VR with race sims and never had an issue with DCS. Maybe a fixed wing aircraft might be better to start though.

The key thing is to try for short periods, the moment you feel nauseous then stop as you typically can't get through it, things just get worse. My first go I believed VR wasn't for me, I felt really bad which lasted for over a day. I tried again a couple of days later just for ten minutes or so and stopped. I gradually increased this to 20, 30 minutes and in a week or so I had got my VR legs. That said I still can't really manage games where you walk or run without using transportation locomotion. Seated games like flying and driving are perfect for me but it took a little while for my brain to adapt to movement I could see compared to what I could sense.

I can throw it rally style around the agility training course https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3309227/ even get in the hangers and turn it around and out again, land on roofs including the curved hanger ones. However my big challenge is slowing down to hover speeds, where I often end up spinning to the left which takes me ages to recover, sometimes not all all, or descend too fast and am unable to recover. For example landing on the ship in the instant access free flight Caucasus everything seems fine until I get near the ship and I am following it with full right rudder and sometimes it starts yawing to the left. I feel I need to drop the collective but don't have enough height, pushing stick forward seems to make it go backwards more. Eventually some forward and left cyclic seems to slowly address the spin, providing I haven't already crashed! Generally I feel it is my impatience to rush the manoeuvre and inexperience but once I am on top of it I find it as easy as the Huey, just getting on top of it from fast to slow, high to low is a real challenge for me!

I have use mouse on. Note the mouse still works with VR in addition to where you look (which can be a downside as you have to stay still when moving the mouse accurately), the blue crosshair moves with your head and the mouse. I just prefer not to use the mouse in the cockpit preferring to look at the switches and use a bound button for LMB, RMB and rotary for mouse wheel. If I need to move the cursor without straining my old neck then I use the aforementioned mouse up/down bound buttons.

I use Joy2Key to bind vertical mouse movement to a rotary but it could be to any hotas button pair. This dispenses with the need for using a mouse in the cockpit to get at those awkward to get places. I have another button bound to recentre the mouse position again using Joy2Key.

There is a thread for this under bugs and problems:

The P47 feels like a more recently developed aircraft, both in terms of visuals & sound but also in how it feels. Maybe it is simply the extra weight but it just feels like it has more fidelity to the model to me. Of course whether that makes it more fun will come down to preferences as the P51 is faster and more nimble. The P47 just feels the newer simulated model to me.

I am in what I expect is a very small minority that didn't get on with PointCTRL. I think it is an ingenious solution and well implemented , I just never felt as immersed as pressing a more physical switch. I have also got pretty adept at accurately looking at a switch, quickly locating the button box for a right or left click or to rotate the rotary button. It just feels more physical than pressing a micro switch in mid air. This is real preference stuff mind. I also use a Logitech Quadrant for gear lever, flaps and canopy (RPM on warbirds). I don't want to be staring at the lever whilst flying and can easily locate these with a bit of muscle memory, just like operating a gear shifter in sim racing in VR. Personally I have found the whole control aspect of DCS using VR quite fascinating and have tried many combinations of physical switches and clickable cockpit controls to improve immersion. If I spent as long flying I might be a bit better at it by now All I know is I enjoy the experience of flying in VR with DCS immensely.

Joy2Key has a neat function to centre the mouse which I have mapped to a button next to the buttons mapped for mouse buttons. As I said I also have a rotary mapped four mouse movement up and down. I never need the physical mouse to do anything. it is a preference thing but I like voice attack solely for comms. It doesn’t feel quite right talking to a relatively old tech aircraft like a modern car, probably just me though!

I dislike using a mouse to operate cockpit controls so I have bound a right and mouse click to a button box which is close to hand and easy to find in VR and just look at the control and press the button. I find this more immersive. I use rotaries which are clickable and then use the rotary for the mouse wheel. I also a rotary to move the mouse cursor vertically if needed to get at those hard to get places without straining my old neck (like oxygen switches right at the back of side panels)!

I have a few Arduino boxes which sometimes get swapped. Initially I created a batch file to swap the controller files in the input joystick folders. I copied this into each Aircraft’s folders and ran it. More recently I have used Joystick Gremlin to merge the Arduinos into one virtual controller and hidden the Arduinos from DCS. This seems to prevent any swapping of devices. Usually though it is unplugging them that causes the issue more so than a DCS update.

There are quite a lot of missing keybinds, it is just part of early access and stuff to do as I see it. In the meantime there are some clever folk who have worked out how to add them and providing them on these forums which is much appreciated.

In the Service tab you can check "Check for update on startup". Then you will be prompted every time there is a new update available.

Thanks for these, very helpful. Took me a while to work out the folder structure as the DCS folders in Mods/Aircraft have been named Mi-24P and Mi_24P. I didn't spot that for a while!