D-Scythe

Um, tactics *can* overcome *any* limitations. If the A-10 has some trouble in one area, get it to work with a fast-mover like a Viper. A B-1B can't defend itself against a Su-27 either - and the tactic to overcome this limitation has NOTHING to do with the B-1B, but rather to provide some F-15 escort. Nobody works alone in the battlefield - you're thinking is highly one dimensional. They flew low over Baghdad, and that's arguably a more dangerous environment than Kosovo. Um, NATO F-117s, F-15Es and Tornados hit basically every type of target imaginable in Serbia, highly defended or not. And technically, there was no CAS operations of ANY kind during the conflict, since there were no ground troops in Kosovo for Coalition jets to provide "close air support."

Even from 3 miles away, you are not gonna see a missile lance through the fuselage of your target in a spectacular explosion. Honestly, LOMAC has the best explosions of any sim modelling modern air combat that I've seen - the scripted missile explosion behaviour is in every other sim anyway. Unless you're killing things a thousand yards in front, LOMAC's explosions are fine. Instead of wasting programming resources on modelling how a missile should explode, how bout we spend more time on how the missile behaves to get to the point where it kill the target? End-game performance is of infinitely higher priority IMO.

Did you pull that 40% out of a rather large body crevice, or do you actually have something to substantiate that statement?

Um, better explosion visuals? Why would you want ED to even add more eyecandy than LOMAC is already LOADED with? And better explosion modelling? That ranks even below 'realistic bullet ballistics' in terms of what the user can see/experience. If I'm going Mach 1 and something blows up 6 miles away, I don't want to waste my CPU power on calculating the physics of how the debris should behave.

Wow, someone get out the burn unit stat :rotflmao:

Haha, now that was a low blow. Tuckson, since we're already off-topic, any news on those new Russian engines?

NVGs = much smaller FOV and degraded visual clarity for one. It doesn't matter if a MANPADS guy is operating with NVGs or not - they shouldn't behave/engage at night as if in the day. They should have a lot more trouble scanning for targets, and their tallys should take place much later, which would in turn reduce their PK because the aspect of the target becomes exponentially more unfavourable as range decreases for a MANPADS shot. For example, a head-on target becomes a crossing, shooting up at the belly target, or an off-aspect target eventually becomes a crossing target. No matter which way you look at it, NVGs or not, MANPADS should be much, much more effective during the day.

...and the prototype F135 produced 52000lbs of thrust back in the JSF competition. Now that it's settled that "ours" is bigger, let's just drop this nonsense and get back on topic.

Well, in LOMAC, you can't "force" a missile to have a lower PK because of AI skill level. What you can do is make the AI take shots in a less desirable portion of its missile employment zone, like close to Rmax/Rmin. Anyway, I think for the MANPAD guys they should be programmed to cover only a 90 (or even 180) degree arc of coverage in front of them, rather than the 360 degree omni-coverage they have now.

Um, when you have all-aspect missiles at your disposal, why just limit yourself to a rear-aspect shot? Against fast CAS aircraft (i.e. NOT the A-10/Su-25), your missile-employment zone is TINY in the rear-aspect - the odds heavily favour the target defeating your missile kinematically.

The actual thrust for the F119 was never publically released AFAIK. All (reliable) sources simply state a thrust output in the "35 000lb class," even in the YF-22/23 days. Quite vague, don't you think? ;) However, IAPR did state that Pratt & Whitney uprated the F119 since the YF-22, since at that time General Electric's F120 was the more powerful engine. Pratt&Whitney, however, made the case that the F119 was more mature and that they could scale the F119 up to F120-levels (or above) performance if desired. I haven't been able to come across a source that definitively confirmed the USAF did choose to uprate the F119, but most state (or assume) that this had been the case. I personally think that the F119 has been uprated since the YF-22, but by how much, I have no idea. The reason I think this is the case is that the F119-powered YF-22 could barely break Mach 1.5 in supercruise, but the current F-22As with F119s can push Mach 1.7 in a supercruise no sweat. Something must've changed ;) Actually, the F135, if anything, was DOWN-rated. Some sources stated that the prototype engine which equipped the Boeing and Lockheed Martin JSF prototypes produced upwards of 50 000lb of thrust according to some public sources (the highest figure I heard quoted was 52 000lb of thrust actually). I honestly expected more than 43 000lbs of thrust from the F135, but such an output is impressive nonetheless.

And that applies to the F-35's engine...how? The fact that it produces 43 000lb of thrust in a specific environment (specific speed, altitude, etc.) doesn't mean that the engine would automatically scale the same in every part of its flight envelope. The F119 already produces something like 39 000lb of thrust AB, and 28 000lb dry. Disregarding everything else except pure thrust for a moment, the F119 probably outpowers the F135 in certain portions of the flight envelope already. Now add the fact that the F119 was designed to supercruise. If you take older engines, like the F100-PW-220 on the F-15 (14K dry, 23.8K AB) or the F100-PW-229 (17K dry, 29K AB), you'll see that their dry thrusts only provides about 60% of the power available in AB. Last I checked, the F135 wasn't a supercruising engine, so I doubt it would be much different. Again, keep in mind these figures are highly situation-dependent. In comparison, the F119 dry produces over 70% of the thrust available to it in AB in the same conditions above. Put it in a supercruise, and there's no doubt in my mind that it'll absolutely leave the other engines in the dust.

Thought the F-35+"single most powerful engine in fighter"-thing was old news. If it wasn't designed to supercruise, it probably won't be very good at it. The Eurofighter can supercruise at Mach 1.3, but it needs AB to get it there first. I'll guess low Mach 1 for the F-35 at best, if any at all (not that I think it is kinematically challenged in the first place). Besides, who says the engine will push 43 000 lbs at 30 000ft and Mach 1 anyway? ;) For all we know, it can still have the same dry thrust as before.

LOL, yeah, obviously I wasn't implying that the duck nose made the F-22 faster. I was just saying that even though it's...more duck-ish, and looks clumsier, the F-22A is actually much better in terms of speed than the YF-22 (mostly due to Pratt&Whitney's extended work on their F119 engines).

Well, looks are as far as that goes. The production F-22 supercruises at Mach 1.7 - almost 15 percent faster than the YF-22's Mach 1.5.

You're not the only one - apparently, McDonnell Douglas couldn't believe it either. And this is the Israeli Air Force we're talking about - you're lucky we got photos. SuperKF, all the photos with the F-15 flying are fake. In fact, they're F-15Es.

...and people think the R-74 isn't modelled in LOFC :)

Well, ATI is selling its top-end X1950XTX for $450, which is a better bang-for-the-buck IMO. But I think everyone agrees that in the single card department (and $150 more) the 7950GX2 has no competition in the performance department.

Hajduk Veljko, I'm *agreeing* with you in that the MiG-31 can attack 4 targets simultaneously like the F-15C can. However, I'm *also* agreeing with Pilotasso in that the way the MiG-31 accomplishes is in a much different manner than the F-15C. The means is different, even though the end result is largely the same. What the MiG-31 does (from publically available info) is to use its advanced PESA technology to overcome the shortcomings of SARH missile technology when engaging multiple targets. Theoretically, the end result should be the same, but practically, there are important differences. For one, the more targets the MiG-31 attacks simultaneously, the less effective its AA-9 Amos becomes, since they recieve less updates less frequently. On the other hand, the F-15C/AIM-120 combination is not hampered by such a limitation, and being that the AIM-120 guides itself during the end-game, it's PK is not affected as significantly as the AA-9. With the F-15C, it's a "true" multi-engagement capability in that missile PK isn't as affected when target number is increased, unlike the AA-9/MiG-31. Actually, from now on, I think we should stop calling it "true" multi-target engagement because that seems to push your buttons a bit. I'd call it a "normal" multi-target engagement, and the MiG-31 "SARH" multi-target engagement. About 15 years. And if it's going to be armed with the baseline R-77, the -27SM ARH missile armament would also be about 15 years behind too, as that missile doesn't offer anything more than what the AIM-120A offers.

AFAIK, both PESA and mechanical radars lack the beam agility to designate 4 targets for attack with SARH missiles in an instantaneous manner - only AESA radars can direct multiple, fine radar beams from its antennae array AFAIK. I do think that the MiG-31 uses time-sharing to attack targets simultaneously with multiple missiles (i.e. the designation of targets is not simultaneous, even though the attack is). Although its radar can't send out multiple radar pencil beams at once, it probably does have the agility to send out single radar beams very rapidly while hopping around separate channels. So I guess, something like illuminating Target 1 for 0.1 seconds, on channel A, then moving onto Target 2 for another 0.1 seconds at channel B, etc. etc. until the radar cycles back to Target 1, channel A, 0.3 seconds later (in a 4 target engagement). Conceptually, that's how I think it works. Each missile, of course, would only react to its respective channel, so as not to confuse its target with that of another missile's. So, Pilotasso is sorta right IMO in stating that it's not a "true" multiple-engagement capability (where all targets are designated/tracked simultaneously), but it effectively accomplishes the same thing with SARH missiles by virtue of a PESA radar. There is really no advantage to either method until the end-game phase, since in the "true" multiple engagement method the targets are also not designated tracked simultaneously in real-time (in the case of a mechanically steered radar like the APG-63 - an AESA radar can do whatever it wants ;) ). In the end-game, of course, the "true" multiple engagement method allows the launching aircraft to break lock and leave, since it utilizes ARH missiles. The PESA/R-33 combination cannot.

They're actually really easy to shoot down. Their AA-9 Amos missiles may be fast, but they otherwise suck. Usually, if you just press the chaff button 10 times as fast as you can and turn, you'd evade it in the end-game. And if you know a missile is in the air at long range, you can buy yourself a few extra seconds by turning your ECM on and off at intervals of 3-5 seconds. This forces the missile to continuously switch between pure pursuit and proportional navigational guidance - very inefficient. Also, your radar missiles have a better chance of killing their targets when fired from below than from above.

Does it matter? It's an AMERICAN book. The fact is that if you accept a portion of a source (i.e. A-10 destroying minimal Serb ground forces), you cannot reject the rest of it (i.e. Serbs using human shields) and then use it as proof. An A-10 pilot account is obviously going to contain strong American views on the conflict, for crying out loud - what on earth did you expect? What REALLY throws me is how you think you can get away with this nonsense. You guys point out that, in this book, it states that A-10s didn't destroy too much enemy material. We counter with the point that, according to the same book, it said that there were a variety of reasons for this, including the use of civilian shields. You guys then state that this is a load of crap. Like, what the hell are you guys smoking? Find another source for crying out loud. Geez, sometimes I get the impression that some of you would do ANYTHING to bias information in your favour, even if it means losing your credibility once someone knowledgeable waltzes in and rains on your parade. EDIT: I refuse to talk politics and other irrelevent crap. You have your opinion, and I have mine. IMO, you seem well "educated" by your country. Good for you. Yes, NATO claimed more Serb vehicles destroyed than they actually did destroy, but if you want to discuss the propaganda war and what the Serbs *claimed* to have destroyed during the war (you know, the 100 F-15s, 20 B-2s, etc.), then give me a PM. I'd be happy to explain why the Serbian propaganda statements were even more ludicrous and stupid than...I mean, I'd be happy to discuss the propaganda war between Serbia and NATO with you.

Um, most A-10 pilots *are* American. What would you expect them to say? That the U.S. was fighting dirty and the Serbs were the good guys? Again, that's was what was in the book YOU guys cited (A-10s over Kosovo). It's NOT my source - it's YOURS. They are not my words, nor my opinions. However, if you are going to use the book as a source, it's hypocritical of you to just take the stuff that supports YOUR argument then IGNORE the other stuff as political crap. Jeez, you would think this was basic. What kind of logic is accepting the A-10s as destroying minimal Serb equipment based on this one source, yet ignoring the fact that the source cited many reasons for this including the use of civilians as human shields?

Meh, it was an okay campaign :happy: I am working on another one, with more variety in missions (basically every air-to-air mission you can think of). I'm 8 missions in, but development has taken a temporary hiatus for now - got school and LOBS to worry about.

If beaming is what's throwing you off, try "dragging" your opponents to a higher altitude (if they aren't already) then drop ten-fifteen thousand feet to fire your missiles in a look-up situation. The enemy can't beam you looking-up.