My Fing ID

I once locked my gun forwards and took down two copters, turns out they were friendly. Yeah, that set me back to 0.

I was reading on on Chernobyl again a few days back. Freaky stuff. Glad they don't make those kinds of reactors anymore

So I was strafing a convoy of trucks with some armored escorts (BRDMx3 and 2 of something else). First run I fire my rocket pods. I hit 1 escort and took out 3 or 4 trucks. I pull left, drop the expended pods, and start engaging with my gun. I came in perpendicular and missed but took a few rounds from the escort. I then went right and decided to put myself between them and the sun. Its dawn so the suns low and I figued they wouldn't be able to hit me. I was wrong. I took a few trucks out and started firing on an escort when suddenly my HUD goes blank. I pull off the attack and notice my controls suck. Figued I was dead, that they'd got an engine or something but after looking at the box on the right I see my hydrolics are shot. All my APs are flashing and when I look back at my gauges I see my guages read empty (and my wheel brakes still on). With almost no experience flying without AP I was site I was boned. I tightened my grip on the controls and started to head back. Since the enemy was between me and the airfield I figued I'd give em another run. No hydrolics isn't an excuse for failing now is it! I decided to play it safe at first, moving my gun back into movable and aiming at a dead target. Thinking about the hydrolics and probable loss of my ability to aim the fun via camera I fire off a few rounds. They go no where near target. Ill have to close with the enemy and kill them blind, no HUD no camera. I come upon the rear escort about 3 km out near a bridge. In my excitement I'm starting to gyrate the copter, making it difficult to aim. The escorts open fire. I raise the collective, ease the stick, and get stable. I then fire a burst at the closest escort, about 0.5km out. Almost hit him. I aim low and walk in the tracers. He starts flaming. Next targets up. I'm starting to gyrate again but none the less manage to get off a good Z pattern, killing him with only a few AP rounds left. Continuing down the road I seemed to have missed the remander of the convoy, nothing but trucks now. I switched to HE and pulled left. 270 degrees later I spot the trucks. They went off road, following the river. Managed to kill 3 more before running out of ammo and returning to base. I knew landing would be rough. No AP = too much gyration, though tbh I'd been flying pretty steady. I flipped the landing gear. Who'd of thought it wpuldnt work right? I flipped the red switch by the gear switch, did nothing. Tried releasing the parking break and flipping the switch again but no luck. So again I'm boned. I slow way down, get nice and low. Once over the airfield I pull into a hover a few meters from the ground and probably had the smoothest landing ever. Don't even think I scratched the bottom. Fun flight!

Find a building and get really close.

I play without any head tracking just fine. Best advice is to make a good profile with your X52. Don't be afraid to use shift states. I have one for navigating that allows me to push a button for landing gear and use the triggers for brakes, then flip states and I now have a lase/lock target button and a trigger. Really though if you set your sticks right then you'll never need to use anything but the sticks and buttons you click with the mouse (no keyboard). Really unless you're strafing you'll have plenty of time to flip what ever switches you need to. If you're getting shot at while you're targetting then you're doing it wrong and if you're strafing the only button you need to push is the trigger.

I don't know if anyone else had this problem but for me parts of the manual were very confusing. Take the nav numpad 2000 (whatever that thing on the right is called). I had no clue how to use it. Then one day a guy asked how on the forums and someone told him how, even answered my followup question. After that I read about that system in the manual again and it all made sense. Sometimes things can be explained better on a forum than in a manual.

As long as it gets you where you're going without crashing any method is the right method! I've been doing the trim, bank, trim, turn, even out, trim method of turning. It takes time to get used to but it works pretty well. You have to get just the right amount of bank and click the trim quick before the ap starts fighting back.

The trim is both trim and the Auto Pilot, which makes it really weird at first. Any time you do anything you need to hit the trim button. Change direction, altitude, speed, etc, hit the trim. People have different methods but the one that works best for me is to move the helicopter into the position I want it it then click the trim. Sometimes I have to click several times. So if I want to turn 180 degrees, I start banking the copter, trim, maybe bank some more, trim, etc until I'm about to finish the turn, then it's slowly correct the copter, trim, etc until I've completed the turn. I also use the old method (no check mark I think?) because it doesn't require your stick to be recentered. This is because when I tried the new method, I ended up doing some crazy stuff like flying sideways at 100 k/h before flipping upside down and exploding. I just don't feel comfortable with that mode. In any case getting used to the AP takes time but after a while it's like second nature. Used to be I'd fly like I was on a roller coaster, now I can lift off, turn, get moving, set my AP and fly hands free towards my destination. Oh, there's that FD button by the autopilot buttons, if you hit that then the AP will only stabilize your copter rather than try to run it. This is nice for strafing or any time you need to do fancy maneuvers. I also use it a lot for landing because I've never been patient enough to plot my course out before I hit the ground. I like to fly in fast, pull up and drop collective to stop then slowly move in rather than prepare for landing 10 k out or whatever. Hope this helps. Best thing to do is just make a quick level where you start up and take off. Just fly around for a bit and get used to the controls. Maybe even toss in a few targets that won't shoot back so you have something to fly too, then try blowing 'em up!

I've seen you post this a few times and I really wish I could help.

Old system. I had a hard enough time just getting trim to work right I'm not going to be able to trim then center the stick in combat. I'm sticking with the old system because worst case if I forget to center, I'm not flinging the stick around like a mad man while going sideways into the ground at 50 kph while being shot at.

I almost made it online today. Only 14 hours but I'm getting better. My missions usually end in a landing rather than a crash now lol. Speaking of that mission it pissed me off the first time I played. I figured the enemy would come from the city so I scanned all over with my weapons systems but saw nothing. Figuring they wouldn't just spawn out of no where I continued on to the next woodline when suddenly the radio blows up.

I like the FD for strafing, but flying around I use the AP. I guess I'll have to be a big more gentle and plan my hover points farther out. Usually I just pull up and drop the collective like a rock. After that I'm at about 50 kph so I just slow down to as close to 0 as I can and hit the AH. Usually works, it's just sometimes it doesn't, almost always after a strafing run. TY. Hey, is there a way I can tell where my power's at, well other than systems restarting like the Shulka or whatever the targeting system's called? I see the power gauge move when I turn on my batteries but I never see it move past there.

ty. I was wondering why that thing was there since I was able to just fly off the map. Guess that also explains why I never could find a nav carrot. I'd tried reading the manual on the system but it's like trying to read a dictionary. Very hard to understand what it's saying some times. Maybe I was just reading the wrong part though. In any case thank you again.

I still can't figure out why the AP does some weird stuff at times. Sometimes I'll hit the Auto Hover and my copter will start spinning wildly or suddenly pitch forwards 30+ degrees. My AP buttons I've noticed are flashing at this time. Usually I just have to kill the AP all together and try to hover while I re-engage. This usually happens after I've been doing some fancy maneuvers and yes the FD is off.

I always go manual myself. I geek out over switches

It's funny, I didn't know there was a shortcut until after I figured out how to start the damn thing lol. You may be right, if you're looking to blow stuff up right away then autostarting may be a better idea so as not to lose interest. Still I liked it but I geek out on stuff like that lol. If I can say one bad thing about all the switches in the cockpit it's that they are making me want to buy a damn TrackIR bad.

I still haven't figured out how to use the PVI-800. I can hit a few buttons but all I do is make some buttons glow and make a few numbers pop up. It's like a broken number box to me. The ABRIS is much more intuitive.

Try the sim, just don't get frustrated. Find a start up list and print it out, then watch the tutorial once or twice to get orientated. After that try to start up the helicopter on your own. Eventually you'll be able to start that thing in no time. Took me like 10 times before I had the list practicely memorized (though I always forget the damn radios). Anyways don't be scared off by the sim mode, it's totally worth it to know in the back of your head that if you ever came across a blackshark irl, you could totally start the APU. Oh and don't feel bad using the english cockpit. If you were a real pilot, you'd be able to read the damn controls.

True but that's why you have to lock your gun and strafe some AAA every now and again.

TBH I never noticed until now but they had 360 degree coverage. I never play with armor much in that game but now I'm curious to see if all vehicles do that or what. Damn, so much hate for Arma 2 on this forum. I don't understand it. Admitably the campaign is crap and the vehicles and certainly air controls are simplified but as a sandbox providing a combined arms simulation it's pretty good. Would be nice if they concentrated more on the vehicles AI, but I suppose getting the infantry right is hard enough. Even then the infantry still suffer from some dumb moves, but it is much improved form Arma. /rant

When you look at your hud you'll see a circle indicating where your weapons are projected to land. So when you use that knob by the laser switch you can set it to fixed, meaning the gun is locked in place and your sight will stay pretty much in place, or tracking which means it'll move with your targeting system. Pretty much the only reason I can see for using fixed is if you're strafing. If you locked a target and you're missing, watch where the rounds land and adjust your aim. Rockets always fire from the fixed position so again look for the green circle and that's where you're shooting. They're harder to use and I still can't use them effectively, but damned if I can't hit things with the gun. Make a mission with a convoy of UAZs if you want to practice strafing. On auto/manual the C shows on manual because the weapon will fire whether or not it has a target and the ability to hit it. You can guide missiles on manual using the screen to aim. Oh and the laser. You need the laser to get range. This range is used by your weapons to calculate its firing formula and shows range on your targeting screen. It does burn out though so switch it off when you're not using it.

I had the AP doing all sorts of stuff earlier when I tried to auto hover. The copter almost went 90 degrees straight down. Hit F2 on my way home, turned out all my high speed maneuvering tore up my copter.

Print a checklist and use an english cockpit. It makes things much easier and eventually you'll be starting up quick as hell. Don't feel bad about the english cockpit, if you were a real KA-50 pilot, you'd be able to read the instuments. Oh, don't try to start both engines at the sane time and don't shut down the APU until the engines are both at 70

I suggest making a mission which has a convoy traveling down a straight road. Then practice strafing runs. Be sure to lock the gun using that switch and push the flight director on your auto pilot so you can maneuver without fighting the ap. Switch between the gun and your rockets and you'll see the aiming reticles. The one for the gun is high and the rockets low. Usually I'm shooting UAZs with HE. Just line up with the road, fly low and open fire. All goes well you should kill all but a few. Use your pedals to stay centered. After you pass the last vehicle keep going forwards for a bit then turn. This will make lining up your next run easier. Ofcourse if you wana be all flashy you can drop the collective, pull back then to stop then do a 180 lol. Anyways that's what I'm doing to train. My biggest problem with the rockets is that they fire so fast that I feel like I'm not getting enough dispersion. Another fun one that I can't do yet is to go perpendicular to the road and fly sideways like in the movies, but I'm not that good. I need to practice my funnel too.

I'm curious why the FD isn't activated by default. You'd think you would want a button to turn on the ability to lock trim and AP rather than have that be the standard. Since reading this thread I've been doing much much better. Fighting the AP has caused everything from rage to outright crashes. Now I can do fancy stuff like get in a gun duel with a ZSU! Lost my SHILKA or whatever and my speedometer but damn if it wasn't fun.