Any "sitting duck" missions for beginning F5 simmer

[MaxMorlock]

Dear all,

 

I am relatively new to DCS but not new to flight simming (X Plane for years. Countless hours with Falcon 3.0 in the early 90s). I purchased several planes during sales (F/A 18, A 10C plus upgrade, F 5). Obviously, learning all three of them at them same time is a bit too much. That is why started out with the F 5, as recommended in quite a few forum posts.

Starting from Cold & Dark, take-off, flying, trimming, navigating with TACAN, landing works nicely. My idea was not to do too much at once but to proceed slowly.

Now I thought I am ready to take the next step: Air-to-Air engagement as well as Air-to-Ground.

What is the easiest way to learn it (apart from reading & watching videos)?

Maybe I have overlooked something but are there missions easily available where, for instance, enemy planes are just flying around and I can try to find them with the old-school F5 radar and attack them (and they don't fight back)? Or ground targets? I.e. a "sitting duck(s) mission".

I am aware that there heaps of missions available, in general. But I thought it would be nice not to be shot down immediately but learn to use the weapons, first, as an intermediate step.

I am also aware of the mission editor. But it looks a bit overwhelming at first, I have to admit.

 

Thank you in advance for any pointers, even an RTFM (but with a link to the place in a manual or a link to a previous post somewhere in the forums).

 

Thank you!

[twistking]

Sorry, i don't have the answer you're looking for, but i just want to encourage you to have a look at the Mission Editor. It's great for learning, because you yourself can tune your training-mission to your growing skill in seconds between each flight.

You can set up a simple mission with an aircraft and some enemies in well under 5 minutes.

 

I think the basics of the Mission Editor are covered in the official DCS manual.

[draconus]

Run ME, choose map, click aircraft icon on the left tools, click on the map where you want it, then another click for waypoint 1. On the right choose US, F-5E, as difficulty choose "player", start type: air start, select second tab for weapons and fuel configuration. Again click ac icon on left, then on a map around your wpt1, then another click around your ac. Choose Russia, A-50, airborne. Save the mission. Green arrow on the left is for running the mission. You should start heading toward unarmed russian AWACS hot, it will be also visible on your RWR. Find and destroy - good luck!

Edited November 27, 2020 by draconus

[MaxMorlock]

Thanks to both of you!

Seems like the "unanimous" (2 out of 2 ;-) ) suggestion is to get used to the mission editor. Post #3 makes it sound really easy and straightforward to create a simple mission. And I guess I can go from there and make things more and more complicated as #2 recommends.

 

Thank you for taking your time!

[MaxMorlock]

Run ME, choose map, click aircraft icon on the left tools, click on the map where you want it, then another click for waypoint 1. On the right choose US, F-5E, as difficulty choose "player", start type: air start, select second tab for weapons and fuel configuration. Again click ac icon on left, then on a map around your wpt1, then another click around your ac. Choose Russia, A-50, airborne. Save the mission. Green arrow on the left is for running the mission. You should start heading toward unarmed russian AWACS hot, it will be also visible on your RWR. Find and destroy - good luck!

Got him. ;-)

Thank you!

[Ozmandi]

Do you know about the User Files section? 

It's a place where other users post missions they create for others to download and fly.
I've found some pretty cool missions by some talented people.

 

From the main DCS webpage click Downloads and then User Files, or click here https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/

 

I did a quick search for F-5 missions and here's the result: F-5 Missions

 

Here's one that might be up your alley.
Operation Avar PAW F5-E3 Tiger II (PVE training) V1.1

 

When you want to up your game there are several user created campaigns available there too.

 

Short notes and information I learned concerning the Use Files section.

1. Maps you own. 
   1. Some of the missions are probably made for maps you don't own.  So keep an eye on that.
2. Downloaded missions
   1.  Open them in Mission Editor to see how things work
   2. GOOD way to learn what can be done with the Mission Editor
   3. Can use one mission to create several different missions by making changes and renaming them.
      1. I have used one mission to create 3 separate missions based on which plane I want to fly.
3. Copy missions to your Saved Games folder
   1. \Users\_YOUR_USER_NAME_HERE_\Saved Games\DCS\Missions

There are a lot of things available and can be somewhat daunting to new users, but if you start with the simple things (single missions), then over time you'll be able to try some of the other items.  The biggest hurdle most people run into is where to put the downloaded file - remember "Saved Games."

 

Good luck and happy flying!

[MaxMorlock]

Hi Ozmandi,

 

Thank you for your kind assistance.

I will definitely check the mission out (and more of them in the future, I hope).

 

Thank you!