MBot

I don't think there should be a problem with that. Just remember that you have to remove the late activation for the flight. Also there will be some unnecessary dummy waypoints that the AI needs to properly descend.

The real Hornet can link to the INS of the carrier to align on the carrier's position, but ED has not implemented this. After alignment you therefore need to fix it to your WP0 position. Select WP0, WPDSG, UPD and FIX or something like that. The carrier (with you on it) will have moved a little by that time so your INS will be off by that amount, but it will be sufficient for navigation. The real INS would drift by the time you reach the target (which ED has not implemented either), so the result is the same.

There won't be any technical issues with that, other than the fact that you may use more aircraft that may be available to the squadron. There won't be any stats tracking in the debriefing for the extra flight you put in, but there should still be stats tracking for all clients. Also if the additional flight is using the established naming convention it should still contribute to the stats tracking of the squadron (kills and losses).

It seems that the latest openbate has resolved all the singleplayer spawning issues introduced by the previous openbeta. The campaigns now seem to function as intended again. I made some first tests with the supercarrier but it doesn't look encouraging. I had hopes that improvements with spawning and AI on the deck would allow to spawn all AI parked cold instead of hot at the catapults so you would get a better experience for launch operations. But it seems that the player will always spawn in the sixpack, where he will block all AI activities on the deck until the player has completed start-up and taxis away. So the player won't be able to observe launching of his package during startup and the 10-15 minutes delays inflicted will lead the other flights failing their missions. In order to ensure that AI can fly their missions on time there is still no way around spawning them on the catapults. Very disappointing. So far I think that the supercarrier is rather underwhelming and I don't see much incentive to upgrade the campaign to it. The deck crew is fun but the few animations are not exactly game changing either. And the LSO won't talk much anyway (or at all) as long as you shoot reasonable approaches. Not enough to put the campaign behind another paywall. Right now the plan is still to use Heatblur's free Forrestal once it gets available to have the correct USS Independence. I am currently updating all campaigns to a newer DCE version. Primary feature is compatibility for both the DCS release and the beta version without having to mess around with any files. There are also some other new features mostly related to other campaigns I am working on. I will need some hours though to fly a couple of missions in each campaign to verify all things are still working.

Considering that you will never salute in the air or call the ball on the deck, I suggest to combine both into a single context sensitive command to simply the control scheme. Saves you one keyboard/HOTAS command.

Here is anther view of the obscured ball.

Low ball on the IFLOLS is obscured by stuff. If you are on center-line, you are physically unable to see a red ball.

Is that the 100% correct directory name? If so I could add it as a 3rd contingency to try (although it would still use first DCS or DCS.openbeta if a DCE installation would also be found there).

The irony is, it took about 30 seconds to implement once I gave it some thought :)

Just for information, the next version of DCE should run without further modifications on both the openbeta and the release versions of DCS (as long as you don't want to run separate installations of DCE on both versions). I actually just added 4 lines of code that automatically replaces DCS in the filepath with DCS.openbeta if the first doesn't work. So for the majority of users, DCE campaigns should be playable out of the box after just unzipping them into the correct folder. I also fixed the errors related to the new scripting events introduced in the latest beta. I am still waiting on the new carrier implementations (and hopefully the addition of Heatblur's Forrestal) before updating all existing campaigns.

Probably caused by carrier deck sliding, which breaks proper INS alignment.

Only the taxi light (swiveling mounted on the nose gear strut) is implemented. While its light cone is working, the light itself remains dark even when its on (meaning you can't see the light when looking at it from the front). The landing light (mounted inside the wheel well and pointed downwards) is not implemented at all. This means at night on short final at approach AOA, you have no light shining on the landing area. Also the lights switch which is supposed to have 3 positions (off, taxi and on) only has two positions (off and taxi).

Waypoint speed defined in the mission editor is incorrectly applied to the TID in the aircraft. In the mission editor, the set waypoint speed means speed TO the waypoint. Speed is then set to the same waypoint in the aircraft. But because the logic in the Viggen means speed FROM the waypoint on, this sets to wrong speeds for the respective route legs. Example flight plan defined in mission editor: WP0: Take Off WP1: speed locked M0.7 WP2: speed M0.9, time locked 12:30:00 This is how this is automatically transferred to the aircraft: LS B1: speed M0.7 M2: TOT 123000 This is how it should be transferred to the aircraft: LS B1: speed M0.9 M2: TOT 123000 Remember, in the Viggen B1 defines speed from B1 to B2.

Its related to script engine changes from ED in the latest beta. I am waiting for their final implementation when it gets pushed to the release version and will then adapt my own code.

The latest beta changed things around in regards to scripting output for hitting stuff. They also introduced a new kill event, which makes some of my own hit tracking in DCE redundant (I needed to track who hit stuff last in order to award kills). I am still waiting on what from the open beta ED pushes to the release version and will then adapt DCE.

Maximum radar range of MiG-23MLD: https://books.google.ch/books?id=ff-zDgAAQBAJ&lpg=PT286&ots=5BEXUAi6Nx&dq=sapfir-23%20range&pg=PT287#v=onepage&q=sapfir-23%20range&f=false This is a really annoying and extremely long standing problem. I am trying to make missions for the Viggen where flying low serves to hide you approach but all Russian fighters just pick you up from afar regardless of you altitude.

Meanwhile, detection ranges got shorter. They are still wrong though: Detection range look-down against A-10 in the latest beta: MiG-19: 60 km MiG-21: 60 km MiG-23: 60 km MiG-25: 60 km MiG-29: 80 km F-5E-3: 80 km Again, this does not take into account missing look-down capabilities for aircraft with pulse radars and is still excessive for older aircraft even for a co-altitude situation. The MiG-21bis radar display doesn't even go beyond 30 km. Strangely the AI F-4E is correctly not look-down capable. It won't detect and engage aircraft below it unless they are within visual range. So the capability clearly exists in DCS.

I agree that the deck sliding is an extremely annoying bug. I hope that this will be fixed in DCS once and for all. Stored heading align is enabled for the Tomcat in the campaign, I am not sure why this isn't working for you. If you want to change the hotstart for the first mission, you have to actually edit the first waypoint of your flight in the mission editor. The line in the LUA file will only affect how the next mission will be generated. On your second mission, how long have you stayed on station? You are tasked to cover your CAP station for 60 minutes, and the Backfires are set up to attack with a time on target that falls randomly in your CAP time (with even a little fuzziness before and after). So it might be possible that you have to wait and monitor for a while, all while planing your visits to the tanker. Thanks to the magic of writing missions with a custom program instead of in the mission editor, the area "outside" the map is available too. Because the map is so small, the enemy will actually spend a lot of time outside the nominal map edges. The Backfire home bases are some 2500 km away for example.

As a player I am unable to release a Lysbomb. Lysbomb released by AI will not deploy a parachute and drop straight to the ground.

Rb 04E cannot be hit by ship-borne guns. It seems as if the missile has no hitbox.

Rb 04E for AI fly at 50 ft and are engaged by ship-borne SA-N-4/Osa and SA-N-9/Tor. Rb 04E for players fly at 30 ft and are not engaged. One of both variants must be wrong. I highly doubt that Tor is unable to engage this old anti-ship missile.

Is this an engine limitation?

This issue is still present. The RB-75T in-game is 70% heavier than the RB-75. I doubt this is possible considering both missiles have the same motor.

According to the manual, the aircraft is supposed to be equipped with anti-skid brakes (p.83). This is not working in-game.

According to the manual (p. 194-195), current time, time on target and mach speed is output when a waypoint button is pressed and held. But in game, this data is output when a waypoint button is just pressed, without it having to be held. As a consequence the timetable deviation output can only returned to by cycling the input/ouput switch. But by the logic of the manual, the timetable deviation should always be output when no waypoint button is being actively held.