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Pitot

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I just want to make sure everybody is on the same level here because I think we've got a bit of a communication failure here. Pitot, your wording is needlessly complicated and difficult to interpret, and comes out as slightly insulting because of that. I assume it's because you're a non-native English speaker. From reading back in the thread, I have identified what I think are the two points you're trying to make;

 

1. You don't like that the instructor is a bit of a dick in the first training mission.

 

2. You want more "Background" information as to what each switch does when you're flipping it.

 

Is that about right?

 

Also, Pitot, Cobra isn't yelling. Exclamation points in English writing, especially on internet boards like this, indicate enthusiasm. ALL CAPS IS YELLING.

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1. I don't care if he's "a dick".

2. I am not illiterate, and it is not about "I want info, provide it to me". It is about the quality of the mission which learns you - nothing.

3. In the context of his sentence, there is no place for enthusiasm. "That is what the manual is for!" - this is shouting. The first use of ex. mark is indeed enthusiasm, I agree (the one where he talks about positive feedback).

4. Me not being native english speaker does not at all make the tut. mission any better, nor it is any of my fault that someone has it hard to understand sentences longer than usual. But yes, I write long sentences, but that does not have anything to do with my native language. And I speak English only 4 years less than my native language. Being able to write long sentences is not a sign of not knowing a language, but a sign that you know it well enough to construct them. CAPS is shouting, but it is done by me here just because few people act as if they don't "hear" things they read. I say something, and put other words in my mouth and then blame me for something I haven't said at all. :) Also, I am sick of how every time someone says an opinion, people dilute the thread with trolling and personal attacks up until the point where admins are forced to lock it. Nice way to silence people...

5. Don't try to identify things, I said it clear enough in the first post, but then some people dragged me into discussing on their level where the subject gets diluted. If anything I wrote is insulting or seems insulting to anyone - then they should read it again and pay attention on all those places where I mentioned faith and appreciation toward the module and the developer. It is insulting how those who "support" the devs are in fact acting as if I said that the whole module is rubbish. I was talking about one specific mission and how it demotivates from going further. I never said that I want to kill stuff in 5 minutes, or that I have given up on Mig21, but people read half of it, forget a quarter and then start flaming.

+1 for your effort in keeping some reason in this discussion (which ceased to be discussion because few people talk about everything but the mission I posted about in OP).


Edited by Pitot

Don't ask, here's the answer: 95% of my posts are edited because I have OCD.

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1. I don't care if he's "a dick".

 

On the first post you complain the instructors attitude is unprofessional, which may be realistic, but you do not appreciate it because you paid for a professional product. Am I misinterpreting what you're saying?

 

2. I am not illiterate, and it is not about "I want info, provide it to me". It is about the quality of the mission which learns you - nothing.

 

Then what are you complaining about in terms of mission quality? The mission tells you what switches to flip, that's its job. If you're not looking for more information, what is it that you want?

 

3. In the context of his sentence, there is no place for enthusiasm. "That is what the manual is for!" - this is shouting. The first use of ex. mark is indeed enthusiasm, I agree (the one where he talks about positive feedback).

 

On the contrary, he's hawking his product. "That's what the manual is for!" He said with a wide grin on his face, arms gesticulating wildly.

 

4. Me not being native english speaker does not at all make the tut. mission any better, nor it is any of my fault that someone has it hard to understand sentences longer than usual. But yes, I write long sentences, but that does not have anything to do with my native language.

 

If your sentences come off as brusque and rude to native English speakers, then yes there's a reason why you're getting a less than kind reaction from a lot of people. You not being a native English speaker isn't an insult, but it does mean you may not catch some of the nuances of what you're writing. It's not an English thing only, I speak English natively and learned Japanese, and there are times when I come off in the wrong way because I'm not speaking 'naturally'.

 

5. Don't try to identify things, I said it clear enough in the first post, but then some people dragged me into discussing on their level where the subject gets diluted. If anything I wrote is insulting or seems insulting to anyone - then they should read it again and pay attention on all those places where I mentioned faith and appreciation toward the module and the developer.

 

I have read your first post, several times. Your complaint about the quality centers around lack of Professionalism, not being educational and the fact you didn't like the instructors attitude. How is the tutorial not educational if you do not want additional information as to what switches you're flipping? What specifically is lacking?

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I just want to make sure everybody is on the same level here because I think we've got a bit of a communication failure here. Pitot, your wording is needlessly complicated and difficult to interpret, and comes out as slightly insulting because of that. I assume it's because you're a non-native English speaker. From reading back in the thread, I have identified what I think are the two points you're trying to make;

 

1. You don't like that the instructor is a bit of a dick in the first training mission.

 

2. You want more "Background" information as to what each switch does when you're flipping it.

 

Is that about right?

 

As usual (or often :)), nice post Tirak - I think you captured the gist.

 

The first training mission for the A-10C is pretty awesome, its a narrated overview of the aircraft and is fun to watch. It also seems to be the only tutorial that takes this form (from what I've seen, I haven't tried every training tutorial).

 

I think that more tutorials like this would be great as it does build enthusiasm for the training process. It also doubles as a first "classroom style" introduction to the aircraft which is a central part of training in real life (as far as I know).

 

I am hopeful that ED considers a similar overview for the Hornet and Leatherneck for the Tomcat, however this is a stylistic decision on the part of the developer. Considering that no other recent aircraft has a similar tutorial, it's hard to declare this first mission a "standard for all DCS modules". I wouldn't mind if it were, but its not currently.

 

Pitot - I think people would be more receptive to your suggestions/request if you framed it as such. This isn't a quality issue IMHO, this is a preference. Trying to convince the developer that they did a bad job on something is going to be an uphill battle (even more so when its untrue - such is the case here), you might have more luck convincing them that something else would be appreciated. FWIW, Novak (dolphin) mentioned some time ago that he created the training missions to reflect his own experiences with training, including the formatting and conversational nature. These tutorials are a reflection of a real MiG-21 pilots training experience.

 

It's fine to say that you like another format better....but why not just leave it at that?

 

-Nick

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Cobra, man, I really appreciated you until now, and I still do. I have respect for what you do, but please - don't go on us with such attitude. In this thread itself you have somewhat balanced sides on do we like that kind of mission or not. If you do know how to do serious marketing research, you'd hardly say such things out loud. As long as you don't show us any serious market analysis and interviews with user groups divided into sub-groups that correspond the target market age/financial status/region and other attributes important for creating a DCS market target group, with statistics divided into time frames of pre-purchase, initial release and at least two points in time separated in relevant time periods from initial release - don't pull out the "we have data" argument. In the form you just presented it, we might get the wrong picture from your 2 comments. The picture that you base your opinion on initial release comments and interviews with people close to Leatherneck. I want to believe that you don't base them on that. The only reason I've posted this is because I wanted to give insight into other side of story, and you act as if you deny existence of unsatisfied customers. That really puts out a bad picture. I don't want that, I want 3rd party developers continuing to provide quality content. The whole point is: It is nice to have humor, but make tutorials more informative and keep it like that without having a large amplitude between individual missions. Include humor, why not, but info too. As far as the "manual" argument few of you have put out - it is a bit rash. If we'd look things like that, DCS would not have ANY need to have tutorials, because it is all said in the manual. But there is a reason ED made a game frame which contains tutorials and I believe that, with a good point, the reason is that in that way you get better immersion, and you get encouraged to continue with learning the modules, while after completing the initial tutorial you don't feel as a complete noob and you can have confidence in yourself, go trough the manual, consult people etc. The first Mig21 tutorial mission does not learn us anything except how to press a sequence of buttons that is anyway listed in many places, and that the instructor had a shepherd, and also that he has paychecks due. Sure, it is funny, it gives personality to the instructor - and that is good. I applaud that initiative. But, I still stand with other people who wanted more. AND AGAIN I remind you that you need to take care about new customers who aren't in the FC/DCS world for ages, but are new customers who don't know the functions of APU, or Batteries on a plane, or any of the sistems they turn on in the first mission. One sentence per system is enough to make them feel confident and thus - make the tutorial rewarding. When in that mood, they are surely going to fully enjoy product and appreciate your work more. And buy the next module you provide.

 

So, all of you, please stop with personal attacks, stay on the subject; don't pull out fictional arguments without physical proof, or just ignore the thread.

 

 

While I agree that the form of the start-up tutorial of the MiG-21 can be improved, I think you are overreacting and taking things too personally. Cobra didn't attack you: he just gave you a gentle reminder that Leatherneck Simulations is very much aware of what the community thinks about these tutorials, whether you believe it or not. Nick is facetious by nature but it is universally acknowledged on the ED boards that he is a class act. While it could be argued that people who don't like the form of this tutorial don't post on the forums, it can also be argued that people who like it and are totally fine with it don't post on the forums either. Still...

 

I've taught countless people about start-up procedures for various aircraft. There are usually 3 types of people

1) those who want detailed tutorials explaining systems in depth like in the A-10C

2) those who find tutorials dry and boring and just want to learn what buttons to push without all this technical mumbo-jumbo

3) those who skip the tutorial and mash every button until something happens/explodes

 

Each developer has his own opinion on how a tutorial should be done. Some are quite exhaustive, others are pretty light on content, and others are simply non-existent (a.k.a. RTFM). A little bit of humor in a tutorial is an effective way to grasp someone's attention and to get him involved in the process. Honestly, I think there is no perfect tutorial. Everyone learns differently and responds differently to different ways of teaching the ins and outs of an aircraft. Some people want interactive video demos, others want a checklist, others want an audio walkthrough, others want pictures... everyone has a "favourite" way of learning. I think it is erroneous to assume that everyone wants the same thing out of a study sim, or to assume that something that does not meet your expectations doesn't meet someone else's.

 

Some people just have a couple of minutes per week to fly and find it difficult to sit on a chair and go through an exhaustive list of buttons to press. Others are real life pilots and want a whole flight manual crammed in a 5-minute-long tutorial. I personally have a very short attention span regarding things that I find trivial or uninteresting. Sometimes, I go through tutorials that I find excruciatingly boring and needlessly thorough... Some other times, I go through tutorials that make me think "uh when and why am I doing that with what again?"

 

Let me be absolutely clear about something: I do believe that tutorials in DCS should be improved. As an example, A2A Simulations has these expertly crafted tutorials on youtube that I think should be the benchmark of every flight-sim-related tutorial. I think you are right in wanting tutorials of a higher quality. However, I also think that what we have at the moment, while not perfect, is definitely not as bad or "unprofessional" as you claim it to be. If your flight sim experience is completely ruined by a couple of jokes in a tutorial that you will most likely go through once and never touch again... then there is nothing I can do for you.

 

I wrote thousands of tutorial pages... and if there's one thing that I learned from this whole experience is that there will never be a perfect tutorial for a world-wide community that has different needs, personalities, cultures, social and education backgrounds.


Edited by Charly_Owl
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While I agree that the form of the start-up tutorial of the MiG-21 can be improved, I think you are overreacting and taking things too personally. Cobra didn't attack you: he just gave you a gentle reminder that Leatherneck Simulations is very much aware of what the community thinks about these tutorials, whether you believe it or not. Nick is facetious by nature and but it is universally acknowledged on the ED boards that he is a class act. While it could be argued that people who don't like the form of this tutorial don't post on the forums, it can also be argued that people who like it and are totally fine with it don't post on the forums either. Still...

 

I've taught countless people about start-up procedures for various aircraft. There are usually 3 types of people

1) those who want detailed tutorials explaining systems in depth like in the A-10C

2) those who find tutorials dry and boring and just want to learn what buttons to push without all this technical mumbo-jumbo

3) those who skip the tutorial and mash every button until something happens/explodes

 

Each developer has his own opinion on how a tutorial should be done. Some are quite exhaustive, others are pretty light on content, and others are simply non-existent (a.k.a. RTFM). A little bit of humor in a tutorial is an effective way to grasp someone's attention and to get him involved in the process. Honestly, I think there is no perfect tutorial. Everyone learns differently and responds differently to different ways of teaching the ins and outs of an aircraft. Some people want interactive video demos, others want a checklist, others want an audio walkthrough, others want pictures... everyone has a "favourite" way of learning. I think it is erroneous to assume that everyone wants the same thing out of a study sim, or to assume that something that does not meet your expectations doesn't meet someone else's.

 

Some people just have a couple of minutes per week to fly and find it difficult to sit on a chair and go through an exhaustive list of buttons to press. Others are real life pilots and want a whole flight manual crammed in a 5-minute-long tutorial. I personally have a very short attention span regarding things that I find trivial or uninteresting. Sometimes, I go through tutorials that I find excruciatingly boring and needlessly thorough... Some other times, I go through tutorials that make me think "uh when and why am I doing that with what again?"

 

Let me be absolutely clear about something: I do believe that tutorials in DCS should be improved. As an example, A2A Simulations has these expertly crafted tutorials on youtube that I think should be the benchmark of every flight-sim-related tutorial. I think you are right in wanting tutorials of a higher quality. However, I also think that what we have at the moment, while not perfect, is definitely not as bad or "unprofessional" as you claim it to be. If your flight sim experience is completely ruined by a couple of jokes in a tutorial that you will most likely go through once and never touch it again... then there is nothing I can do for you.

 

I wrote thousands of tutorial pages... and if there's one thing that I learned from this whole experience is that there will never be a perfect tutorial for a world-wide community that has different needs, personalities, cultures, social and education backgrounds.

 

This!

Leatherneck is giving their best to the DCS community, not everyone will be happy with the tutorial.


Edited by Darkbrotherhood7

Mission: "To intercept and destroy aircraft and airborne missiles in all weather conditions in order to establish and maintain air superiority in a designated area. To deliver air-to-ground ordnance on time in any weather condition. And to provide tactical reconaissance imagery" - F-14 Tomcat Roll Call

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

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Pitot- Cobra wasn't being rude to you.

Mission: "To intercept and destroy aircraft and airborne missiles in all weather conditions in order to establish and maintain air superiority in a designated area. To deliver air-to-ground ordnance on time in any weather condition. And to provide tactical reconaissance imagery" - F-14 Tomcat Roll Call

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

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I just expressed my opinion in the OP, everything else is reaction either to people being friendly toward discussion, or defensive attitude to those who don't want to discuss the subject - but rather have need in life to prove how I am a bad guy. That is really not worth mentioning anymore. Every time someone tries to discuss a subject about the game, bunch of people start talking things that were not called for. I am sorry that most of people here are unable to stay on the subject, but are meisters in dragging the discussion to the pit. This is not a place for a reasonable conversation, as far as I can see. I said many nice things about LN, Cobra and some of you, but the blind attacks continue without even trying to discuss the OP. Okay, I am a miserable person for saying my opinion, or for feeling that a developer needs to have more temper in talking to people who earn him his pay instead of using "there are people who think otherwise" as a reason to call our opinion non-important - and that when he claims things - he must provide proof for that. No problem. I am insane, sure. And rude. No problem. LOL. This is ridiculous, and I do admit - I am stupid for not ignoring those comments which dragged the try to discuss a matter in which I see many people outside of this thread agreeing on with me. I was thinking this will turn out to be a discussion where we can agree on what would be balanced approach to tutorial missions, because there is diversity among clients, but no. People need to go into "you're this, you're that". No probsey mates, ahoy.


Edited by Pitot

Don't ask, here's the answer: 95% of my posts are edited because I have OCD.

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I just expressed my opinion in the OP, everything else is reaction either to people being friendly toward discussion, or defensive attitude to those who don't want to discuss the subject - but rather have need in life to prove how I am a bad guy. That is really not worth mentioning anymore. Every time someone tries to discuss a subject about the game, bunch of people start talking things that were not called for. I am sorry that most of people here are unable to stay on the subject, but are meisters in dragging the discussion to the pit. This is not a place for a reasonable conversation, as far as I can see. I said many nice things about LN, Cobra and some of you, but the blind attacks continue without even trying to discuss the OP. Okay, I am a miserable person for saying my opinion, or for feeling that a developer needs to have more temper in talking to people who earn him his pay instead of using "there are people who think otherwise" as a reason to call our opinion non-important - and that when he claims things - he must provide proof for that. No problem. I am insane, sure. And rude. No problem. LOL. This is ridiculous, and I do admit - I am stupid for not ignoring those comments which dragged the try to discuss a matter in which I see many people outside of this thread agreeing on with me. I was thinking this will turn out to be a discussion where we can agree on what would be balanced approach to tutorial missions, because there is diversity among clients, but no. People need to go into "you're this, you're that". No probsey mates, ahoy.

 

There's no one attacking you or trying to make you the bad guy, Buddy! :-)

As Cobra said, let's keep on topic, and if there's any problem/bug with the MiG-21 training, let's reported it. :)


Edited by Darkbrotherhood7

Mission: "To intercept and destroy aircraft and airborne missiles in all weather conditions in order to establish and maintain air superiority in a designated area. To deliver air-to-ground ordnance on time in any weather condition. And to provide tactical reconaissance imagery" - F-14 Tomcat Roll Call

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

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I liked the training missions. Together with the manual, they were a comprehensive introduction to the aircraft. I did not find the lack of a voice-over a problem. If I had to, I would just pause the mission.

 

The best training mission was the landing mission, I thought. Very no frills, but it got the point across. I flew it over and over.

 

The navigation missions were quite fine as well.

 

The MiG-21bis was my first DCS module. What attracted me to it was the training missions and the manual.

 

I hope LNS keeps up this high standard for future modules. I'm sure it is a pain in the neck to write a detailed manual and script lots of training missions, but I think in the long run it will attract buyers, and first-time buyers like myself!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Love the Mig21 and could only imagine how hard it is to write a good manual and setup the training to please everyone.

The training was good enough for the Mig. Then come here for help or YouTube for more training and then practice and more practice.

 

I could see it would be difficult for some one to start flying the Mig21 first, now that would be very daunting and impossible to setup training

for the beginner with little to no study sim flying experience.

 

The F14 we will possibly see a lot of new flyers here thinking they will be top gun in a couple of days!

 

So good luck Leatherneck on writing the manual for the F14 that is going to be a massive task that I would not want to do! :(


Edited by David OC

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Chuck's DCS Tutorial Library

Download PDF Tutorial guides to help get up to speed with aircraft quickly and also great for taking a good look at the aircraft available for DCS before purchasing. Link

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To the OP -

 

Unfortunately the thread hasn't worked out how you wanted, which is a shame. Constructive discussion over the tutorials would be good for everyone.

 

Without being rude I think you have a small problem with the way you communicate which comes over as brusque and has set a few teeth on edge. That's just my opinion.

 

Your English is definitely good enough. It's just the way you used it here. I hope you post more.

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To pitot if you have Teamspeak I would not mind teaching you the more intricate details of the MiG if you want to learn it's smaller functions so if you're up for that send me a PM and we can organize and hour or two to touch on some things that you would like to learn.

 

Sent from my SM-G900W8 using Tapatalk

Know and use all the capabilities in your airplane. If you don't, sooner or later, some guy who does use them all will kick your ass.

 

— Dave 'Preacher' Pace, USN.

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Let's steer this thread back to the topic at hand:

 

If you have specific issues with the MiG-21s training, list them concisely and we will take the feedback into account for our next training missions.

 

For the moment, the biggest issue is that visual references ("yellow boxes") sometimes don't go away when you complete the operation they reference. A repeated issue, for example, is when you need to close the cockpit. Yellow box stays, and tutorial does not advance. However, fortunately, if you know that you need to lock and pressurize the cockpit - triggers move one as you do those next steps, and boxes again act as intended. As for any compiled list of uncertainties, bugs or else, you'd have to wait for few days from me. Thank you for your reply.

 

---

 

I am glad that the sparks didn't burst into flames and salute all of you. Flying together sounds nice, with all of you who proposed it, but when there is free time. You can always PM me for setting the timeframe.


Edited by Pitot

Don't ask, here's the answer: 95% of my posts are edited because I have OCD.

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For the moment, the biggest issue is that visual references ("yellow boxes") sometimes don't go away when you complete the operation they reference. A repeated issue, for example, is when you need to close the cockpit. Yellow box stays, and tutorial does not advance. However, fortunately, if you know that you need to lock and pressurize the cockpit - triggers move one as you do those next steps, and boxes again act as intended. As for any compiled list of uncertainties, bugs or else, you'd have to wait for few days from me. Thank you for your reply.

 

---

 

I am glad that the sparks didn't burst into flames and salute all of you. Flying together sounds nice, with all of you who proposed it, but when there is free time. You can always PM me for setting the timeframe.

 

Unfortunately we can't really do anything about this issue. We've known about it for a long time.

 

This only happens if you release the mousebutton quickly. If you hold it down for a little while, the box will disappear and the tutorial will trigger as it should.

 

Hopefully we can fix it in the future.

Nicholas Dackard

 

Founder & Lead Artist

Heatblur Simulations

 

https://www.facebook.com/heatblur/

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