Naval environment

[Northstar98]

[EDIT Should be called improved water environment]

 

Hi Guys

 

Really, really bananas idea that I'm probably going to get a lot of hate and grief for, but I'm going to be confident and say it.

 

Now as we know DCS advertises itself as an air, land and sea combat simulator but obviously focusing on air. Now, we have the air environment pretty well in hand, sure there are only limited aircraft but we've mostly got the environment for it (at the moment all I can think of is improved weather and improved control over weather and that's it). We sort of have the ground, the vehicle mechanics themselves still leave gigantic amounts to be desired but that's for another thread, they do however have the environment well in hand, or at least they will with DCS 2.5 and the improved Caucuses map.

 

What we are really lacking is water mechanics, at the moment no amphibious vehicle is actually amphibious and we have super basic rivers, lakes and oceans which are basically the same as normal terrain but for boats and ships. The ships themselves can't make full use of their armament, have super limited AI logic and only a handful have decent 3D models most are in desperate need for updating and all together you can't really do much with them apart from shoot at them - the same as what we get if anybody played Strike Fighters 2 (although the more decent looking ships we have actually have proper VLS, proper animations and with small tweaks are damn near perfect from a graphical perspective. We are getting an improved Kuznetsov and Nimitz, I think Heatblur are working on a Forrestal for their F-14 and Razbam on an LHA for their Harrier and hopefully improvements will be made to have greater purpose for ships.

 

What I'd love to see and this should probably be super low priority - there are so many things that are more important and I certainly don't want to delay DCS 2.5 for a single nano-second, is some degree of underwater modelled in applicable maps. So that submarines can actually dive and there is something below the waterline for ships.

The sea-floor doesn't even need to be that detailed, it need only be super simplistic with only marginally accurate elevation mapping, the same for rivers where the river whole profile can be approximated and even generalised (this would be perfect, if not too far http://www.revision.co.zw/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/short-profile-min.jpg). The same for lakes and reservoirs which can just be a generic basin that conforms to the shape of the lake. All of it can be roughly approximated without need to waste resources on finding super precise and accurate underwater elevation maps for specific bodies of water. Even with elevation maps they only need to have an elevation resolution of not even the current v.1.5 Caucuses map and textures should follow suit. It could even just be randomly populated with rocks etc. (I just had a thought, that would also improve bridges as now their supporting structure can actually go below the water, so they don't look like they're just floating on top of it).

 

This would allow for a whole new warfare type to be brought to the table - ASW and even improved ASuW, as well as having improvement possibilities with naval combat and maritime operations on the whole (naval mines, sonobuoy, torpedoes etc). I mean, we have a really fab looking Kilo class submarine with a submarine launched cruise missile to go with it but it's completely and totally useless and almost seemingly a waste of resources since they can't be used even as an AI unit. As it needs to submerge in order to be effective. Amphibious vehicles also aren't amphibious and if you do anything near water with a ground vehicle it kills and mutilates immersion. Proper amphibious operations would be great in DCS and to me would be very welcome (they would also go well with the new Normandy map thinking about it). And we can have much more immersive mission potential, as well as looking much more realistic (which is DCS's main selling point for me as an ex-FSX player.

 

I know it would be a massive undertaking and yes it is a bananas idea. But with underwater simulation maritime operations and naval combat and even on land amphibious operations and river crossings could easily be revolutionised, be much more immersive and realistic as well as opening up further potential for missions involving water as well as improving the overall realism of DCS.

 

I appreciate that this should probably be made very low priority as there's so much that I alone can think of that takes precedence but hopefully in maybe the more distant future this I hope could be a reality. Obviously being map dependent and obviously taking into account performance. (Though I swear P3D has an underwater capability, similar to what I'm suggesting).

 

The other thing that I'd also like to see in DCS and this is more off track from an environment perspective and is a more ship based thing than anything else, is firstly to have better AI control for ships as well as better mission editing controls for them (specify ship designation, formations, tactics etc even things like loadouts - which would also be useful for ship designation again, as ships are currently listed (where applicable) by their actual vessel name, it would be better if they were listed according to class name and then in the loadout menu designate the ship's markings along with individual vessel name and designation. Ships are also completely missing countermeasures and some of their weapons aren't even functional (ASW rockets on like every single Russian ship, torpedoes on most ships and ASW missiles on the Krivak class frigate and VL-ASROC on the Ticonderoga class cruiser). It would also be nice to have damage model improvements, so that ships sink more realistically depending on the magnitude, what and where the damage takes place (maybe an improved module based damage system, with the hull being separated into different sections and areas to dictate how the ship sinks). Ships also don't have their proper aviation facilities properly modelled (though the WIP Kuznetsov and Nimitz probably will). Some even have the wrong icons (the icon of the OHP class is DD (destroyer) when the ship is in actual fact a guided missile frigate (FFG). Same for quite a lot of ships that have their actual, correct designation when you select them in the mission editor, but their icon once you place them is wrong or doesn't match up.

 

Drifting into the realms of over the top realism, another improvement for ships, is improved animations for missile systems with trainable launchers which have a missile magazine. More specifically the reloading of said trainable launchers. At the moment we have 2 trainable missile launchers for ships the Mk 13 launcher on the Oliver Hazzard Perry class frigates and the ZIF-122 launcher for the SA-N-4 system on the SLAVA, Krivak and Kirov classes. On the SLAVA class (the only SA-N-4 equipped ship that has a decent 3D model) the ZIF-122 has a reloading animation, except it's a little broken, see the above track file to see for yourself, they do some things perfectly but sometimes they do things not so perfect. For example they initially pop-out with the missile rails horizontal (or at least moving) so they clip through the cover, they should pop-out with the rails vertically then after the cover closes they should move into position) when both missiles have been fired the launcher resets like it should, but then when the launcher reloads the rails go horizontal just before it retracts, so they clip through the cover. However if the launcher is retracting with missiles still on the rails (so not to reload) it retracts as it should with the rails vertical and with the missiles facing downward (as I believe it should) :huh: The Mk 13 launcher however doesn't have a reload animation, the missiles just pop onto the rail without the launcher doing anything when in fact, the launcher should return to a vertical position then a hatch underneath the launcher (which has a non-functional 3D model) opens and the missile pops out vertically onto the rail (

). For the new Kuznetsov class the missiles on the Kashtan-M CIWS are reloaded like this (

from 5:02 to 5:25) It's realism overkill I know, and has no functional purpose other than improve realism and should be extremely low priority, but it looks cool and we nearly have it for the SLAVA class so why not?

 

Cheers,

 

Ollie

SLAVA class air defences.trk

Edited April 17, 2017 by Northstar98

[shagrat]

There is already a thread, initated by Wags about ideas/wish list for naval operations.

May be you should look at it and add if something's missing.

[Northstar98]

There is already a thread, initated by Wags about ideas/wish list for naval operations.

May be you should look at it and add if something's missing.

 

I did but that thread is very old and was more about features of actual ships, not the environment facilitating said ships (please correct me if I'm wrong).

[shagrat]

Hmm, I need to search a bit.

 

It was a Request from Wags (ED Producer) for ideas, wishes, etc. in terms of Naval Operations.

To me it looked like they want to enhance that part in the future.

 

Would make sense with F/A-18C, F-14 and AV-8B (Harrier) in development for DCS...

[Northstar98]

Hmm, I need to search a bit.

 

It was a Request from Wags (ED Producer) for ideas, wishes, etc. in terms of Naval Operations.

To me it looked like they want to enhance that part in the future.

 

Would make sense with F/A-18C, F-14 and AV-8B (Harrier) in development for DCS...

 

So it seems with the new carriers and a truly dedicated modern naval aircraft but (again please correct me if I'm wrong) that thread was more about the ships themselves i.e what level of control over them, what should we be able to with them etc and not so much the actual engine improvements (presumably) and environment to facilitate enhanced naval ops. Which for this thread is amphibious capability for applicable ground vehicles and some kind of underwater simulation for the sea, rivers and applicable lakes. So submarines now have a point to them, brown-water maritime operations can be a thing, as well as improving immersion for river crossings and wading. Plus with the added benefit of bridge supporting structures reaching the true bottom of the river, thereby eradicating them floating magically above the water in the current Caucuses map (which is being improved).

 

But if memory serves me well then I think there are crossovers with that thread and this one which I apologise about. But at the same time I don't remember that thread having the same environment/engine improvements to facilitate better maritime operations or even operations on land involving water (such as river crossings, wading etc).

 

Again please correct me if I'm wrong and I do apologise if this is a more-or-less duplicate thread.

Edited April 16, 2017 by Northstar98

[shagrat]

It's not about crossovers, more about losing valuable input!

I guess it is a good idea to ADD your ideas to the original thread.

 

It is likely Wags still looks at it, if ideas get added...