not planned Easy mode AAR

[SharpeXB]

12 minutes ago, Exorcet said:

Why does the number of assists matter? 

Because asking ED to work on making more of them is detracting from their other progress. And DCS really doesn’t need more of them. 
Again... ED just said this ain’t happening so there’s no point to going on about it. 

[Exorcet]

2 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Because asking ED to work on making more of them is detracting from their other progress. And DCS really doesn’t need more of them. 
Again... ED just said this ain’t happening so there’s no point to going on about it. 

DCS doesn't need more of them? On what basis? That's a meaningless statement.

 

Now if AAR is taking away work from a project that you prefer, that's an actual reason to oppose it. So, how much work will easy AAR take to implement, and what feature is it blocking? Even if ED decides to work on it bit by bit when some free time pops up or lumps the work in with a AAR rework that would improve realism?

 

ED had no plans for a world map before. Now they're investigating the feasibility of a world map. It's not hard to figure out why the thread is still going.

[Tippis]

17 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Because asking ED to work on making more of them is detracting from their other progress.

…such as? Do you have any examples of what it would supposedly crowd out?

 

17 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

And DCS really doesn’t need more of them. 

Why not? Why should the game not continue to fulfil it intended design goal?

 

17 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

ED just said this ain’t happening

Nope. That's just your reading problem and your willingness to imagine your own reality surfacing again.

[SharpeXB]

34 minutes ago, Exorcet said:

DCS doesn't need more of them? On what basis?

They just said so. 

[Tippis]

3 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

They just said so. 

They really didn't. You really need to learn to actually read what people write rather than substitute it for your own wild fantasies.

[GGTharos]

2 hours ago, sthompson said:

Something is missing in my technique but I don't know what it is. I'd get help from a squadron, but real life prevents me from committing the time that most squadrons want. Furthermore, it isn't clear to me how such help would work. For those of you who have learned from a squadron, or successfully taught someone else online, I'd like to know more about how that worked.

 

You don't need a squadron, you should be able to just find someone who'll help you.

 

Quote

If DCS can have green gates floating in midair for training then surely they could provide a similar visual aid for AAR.

 

That is a pretty neat idea.

 

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So I try to focus on what the tanker looks like, ignoring the basket as is universally recommended to DCS pilots (but presumably is not the recommendation to real pilots).

 

You should definitely not ignore the basket - what the advice is meant to be is don't fixate on the basket.

 

Quote

The best of these videos do describe the visual clues on the tanker that the author is using, and that has been quite helpful in helping me understand the basic idea of how to fly formation in the right place. Despite this, I never seem to connect, and if I start hunting for the invisible sweet spot in invariably end up in PIO. I've shot that tanker down so many times in frustration!

 

Don't hunt, fly to it with authority.  Also, as you've pointed out the visuals will vary from video to video, so figure out your own - sadly it's sort of the only thing you can do after watching and reading - you know more or less the techniques that you need to use, meaning use cockpit references and once you connect, you now have a track from which you can produce images for yourself.

But really, all of this is dynamic so it's all about flying GOOD formation, and that means being able to move your plane anywhere you want with confidence next to that other plane.  So don't 'hunt', if one spot isn't working, fly formation in another stop.  As in deliberately choose 'I will fly there now' and do that.  Don't hunt for anything.

 

Now, if it's your formation flying that's bad, that's a different problem.

 

Quote

It's been argued that AAR isn't a needed skill because you can use unlimited fuel, or land more often, or because fuel isn't a constraint in many or most missions. If you believe that, ask yourself whether DCS would have the same appeal if AAR were removed from the game altogether. I doubt if anyone would like that, even those of us who haven't been successful learning AAR. We would love to be able to do AAR in a realistic fashion. We are looking for ways to join the club, not to create our own. 

 

But if you do consider some of the specific asks here, one of the work-arounds (as long as an easy feature doesn't exist) giving the specific pilot who cannot AAR can be given unlimited fuel and they can just fly along in formation with the refueling aircraft.

 

Quote

Relatedly, I'm not worried about splitting the MP community, which is a whole other topic that would hardly hinge on this one feature. I sincerely doubt that offering AAR learning aids or even auto-AAR as an option that can be disabled by the server would cause more fragmentation than is there already. The hardcore servers would leave it turned off, and the less hardcore pilots would avoid those servers just as they do now.  

 

Right?  Options for this are generally good.

 

Quote

The only potentially legitimate argument I've heard against introducing learning aids is that it takes resources away from other development at ED. If that is the concern, then I suggest a better approach would be to create your own "wish list" items about what you want, rather than try to argue that what others want is unnecessary. Nothing about DCS is necessary for any of us. This is not RL. It's entertainment. Ask for what you want. Respect that others might want something else.

 

Good suggestion.  I'm in the 'don't do it, do something else instead like fixing radars/getting the tanker to bank up to 60 deg for refueling' camp but despite that, that's just what I want.

Edited March 28, 2021 by GGTharos

[shagrat]

6 hours ago, draconus said:

 

Imo any potential assist/helper/cheat allowance in MP should be clearly stated in server info and should be able to be filtered on the list.

You mean like the auto Startup, Zoom-View-Axis and the rudder assist?!

[Mars Exulte]

I like a good fight as much as the next man, but the same 3-4 people keep having the same conversation over and over, and this is like the fifth or sixth thread. Don't you guys have anything better to do?

 

 

 

 

 

Ohhhhhhhh.... nevermind. Carry on.

[shagrat]

4 hours ago, draconus said:

I think it's important part of the game where someone who can't AAR don't get AAR, the same as someone who don't know how to startup their aircraft won't start up. It might be ok in SP, on training servers or even combat MP, but only when all participants agree with that or it is clearly stated that assists/helpers are allowed. Otherwise everyone should play by the same rule

That's when they simply press LWIN+Pos1 and watch the plane start itself.

Though it has its disadvantages like taking longer than manual or not setting weapons, sometimes make you forget something (switch TGP to STBY), but it is available. And honestly, I use it regularly when testing while mission building, or when translating and checking stuff, or simply because we had a server crash on us in MP multiple times and I need to take a bathroom break after 50 min of "start ups".

Assists like "Rudder Assist" for physically impaired people or even guys that can't afford more than a simple joystick may also have a different view of getting effectively banned for being disabled... or rich enough.

[shagrat]

4 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

And threads like this show that the majority of players don’t want it. 

It only shows that about 200(?) forum members out of more than 119,000 noticed the poll and voted no. That doesn't even account for the majority of single players that don't have a forum account at all... 

[SharpeXB]

13 minutes ago, shagrat said:

It only shows that about 200(?) forum members out of more than 119,000 noticed the poll and voted no. That doesn't even account for the majority of single players that don't have a forum account at all... 

well a poll is a poll like any other on here. There’s no other way to sample opinions.

[SharpeXB]

44 minutes ago, shagrat said:

You mean like the auto Startup, Zoom-View-Axis and the rudder assist?!

You’re getting the commands confused...

There’s Auto Rudder = an automatic rudder axis

Takeoff Assist = a helper for the prop effects (rudder?) in the warbirds. 
 

So IMO and in other sims:

Auto Rudder = definitely off. Since it’s a flying helper

Takeoff Assist = not sure, maybe. But its only a takeoff helper not an artificial flight or combat help. 
 

Plenty of games have FOV adjustments and none I’ve seen regulate them since they are basically self limiting just trading one advantage for another. 

[Mars Exulte]

19 minutes ago, shagrat said:

It only shows that about 200(?) forum members out of more than 119,000 noticed the poll and voted no. That doesn't even account for the majority of single players that don't have a forum account at all... 

 

 For statistical purposes, a general sampling of a few hundred people is likely to be accurate plus or minus a couple points. The smallish sample size is more indicative of utter indifference than anything else.

[shagrat]

1 minute ago, SharpeXB said:

well a poll is a poll like any other on here. There’s no other way to sample opinions.

The point is less than 200 out of over 119,000 people is a fraction (0.17 percent), not a majority... And that is only forum members. The majority of DCS players is not even represented on the forum.

[shagrat]

36 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

You’re getting the commands confused...

There’s Auto Rudder = an automatic rudder axis

Takeoff Assist = a helper for the prop effects (rudder?) in the warbirds. 
 

So IMO and in other sims:

Auto Rudder = definitely off. Since it’s a flying helper

Takeoff Assist = not sure, maybe. But its only a takeoff helper not an artificial flight or combat help. 
 

Plenty of games have FOV adjustments and none I’ve seen regulate them since they are basically self limiting just trading one advantage for another. 

Auto rudder is necessary for people who don't have functioning legs or have no rudder pedals.

That's why auto rudder was implemented, as you need to compensate the torque, slipstream etc.

Take-off assist is similar to what I would propose for AAR an adjustment of the contact box maybe something like an adjustable magnetic tether that supports station keeping, but still have you disconnect when you are way too fast/slow or fight the stick.

That way you could manage your first couple contacts, get a feel and visual for the approach, station keeping and when you get a bit of consistency you dial it down a notch until you learned to hold position without assistance.

That worked pretty well for me in the Bf-109 and FW-190 with Take-off assist.

Zoom view is an unrealistic "cheat" to compensate for the lack of focus on a 2D screen. It can also be used to zoom out beyond a normal FoV giving you more SA in competitive fighting, or do you "cheat" and adjust your "eyesight" while flying in a dogfight? You know that isn't realistic, but with a peripheral vision like 70-80° instead of the real life FoV of the human eye it is a nice helper to see something.

Per your argumentation this should be a server side blocked option, though.

Edited March 29, 2021 by shagrat
Typos corrected

[shagrat]

23 minutes ago, Mars Exulte said:

 

 For statistical purposes, a general sampling of a few hundred people is likely to be accurate plus or minus a couple points. The smallish sample size is more indicative of utter indifference than anything else.

That's if you have a representative group. Here we have a tiny group of naysayers out of a fraction of the actual customers. The majority of DCS players play single player and would likely benefit from that assistance, but most of these player types are not present on this forum. The vocal minority tends to be the hardcore flightsuimulation (competitive) Multiplayer group that is far more active on the forum than the majority of forum members. So likely the "majority" isn't "indifferent", maybe they haven't seen the poll, or are not regularly browsing the wishlist threads like we flightsim nerds... That is a typical issue with forum polls by the way, that they usually represent a biased group and are rarely representative.

[Mars Exulte]

Just now, shagrat said:

That's if you have a representative group. Here we have a tiny group of naysayers out of a fraction of the actual customers. 

  No, what we have here is representative of people who care enough about the game to be active on the forums. It is otherwise not specifically biased toward any particular group or subset.

 

  The ''oh it's only fractions of a percent'' is not how polls work, and people who claim otherwise are invariably bitching cause they didn't like the result. Polls are ALWAYS ''fractional'', because it's not remotely feasible to ask everybody what they think about a certain policy or candidate or whatever. Several hundred people indicates a poll that ran long enough and drew enough attention to actually be noticed, and (probably) didn't have the kind of bs questions/options that make a poll useless.

 

''The vocal few'' thing works both ways, and STILL indicates a certain result even if within a smaller subset. ''But I don't like the results! Their vocal few outnumbers my vocal few! It's not possible that means what it looks like it means, because clearly I'm always right!!!'' That... isn't relevant to the accuracy of a poll's sampling. 

[SharpeXB]

9 minutes ago, shagrat said:

Auto rudder is necessary for people who don't have functioning legs or have no rudder pedals.

That's why auto rudder was implemented, as you need to compensate the torque, slipstream etc.

Take-off assist is similar to what I would propose for AAR an adjustment of the contact box maybe something like an adjustable magnetic tether that supports station keeping, but still have you disconnect when you are way too fast/slow or fight the stick.

That way you could manage your first couple contacts, get a feel and visual for the approach, station keeping and when you get a bit of consistency you dial it down a notch until you learned to hold position without assistance.

That worked pretty well for me in the Bf-109 and FW-190 with Take-off assist.

Zoom view is an unrealistic "cheat" to compensate for the lack of focus on a 2D screen. It can also be used to zoom out beyond a normal FoV giving you more SA in competitive fighting, or do you "cheat" and adjust your "eyesight" while flying in a dogfight? You know that isn't realistic, but with a peripheral vision like 70-80° instead of the real life FoV of the human eye it is a nice helper to see something.

Per your argumententation this should be a server side blocked option, though.

The only other WWII combat flight sim has Auto Rudder as server side setting because as an automatic flying aid it allows you to turn and maneuver perfectly. But here in DCS the WWII population is so sparse who really cares? 
 

As for the zoom view, plenty of games including every flight sim have it for the same reasons or have it adjustable. I’m not aware of any which consider that a cheat or exploit unless it’s been modded. It’s a self-regulating feature where you’re just trading one advantage (size) for another (FOV) so there’s no need to restrict it. 
 

Many people on the thread would want Easy AAR sever side, I would be inclined to agree. Although it doesn’t affect combat directly it would affect the gameplay. 

[cfrag]

10 hours ago, sthompson said:

I doubt if real pilots learn without any teaching assistance, so I'm not very sympathetic to arguments that teaching aids are unnecessary. That some people have learned without them does not mean that all people can.

 

That's pretty much the whole truth, and illustrates the absurdity of the debate. I have a pilots' license, and of course I only learned using aids and with hand holding. There's a reason you don't solo on day one. People who claim here that they learned AAR or landings without help are overlooking a central fact: their aid is that you don't die if you screw up, DCS continues to function, and so does your computer. Land a plane in RL and you have pretty much one shot at doing it right. Of course in RL you don't just try on you own until you get it right. So when you already have the ultimate help (immortality - I don't think these people deleted DCS the first time they died and never played it again - that would be more realistic), deriding any lesser help or aid is a non sequitur: If you cheat by surviving, you have no recourse against lesser cheats. That particular branch of the debate ends there. 

Edited March 29, 2021 by cfrag

[cfrag]

7 hours ago, Mars Exulte said:

 

 For statistical purposes, a general sampling of a few hundred people is likely to be accurate plus or minus a couple points. The smallish sample size is more indicative of utter indifference than anything else.

 

The method of sampling, however, is a big issue: because of natural bias. If you sample a Manchester United Fan club on "who is the greatest Football Team in the world" you'd get a different response if you posed that same question to Hamburg's Dachshound Socienty - even if you got a 50% sample size.

I would posit that people on this forum pose a minority wrt average DCS user, and there's a strong preselection bias at work here. Anyone posting on these forums has above-average interest in DCS and is therefore NOT a representative of the average user. I posit that "Average users" (those that make the majority of paying customers) are a minority here.

 

Any sampling done in these forums can only gauge the interest/indifference of the atypical (albeit vocal) users. I don't think we can derive any meaning from forum polls except how a topic scores among fans.

 

[shagrat]

9 hours ago, Mars Exulte said:

  No, what we have here is representative of people who care enough about the game to be active on the forums. It is otherwise not specifically biased toward any particular group or subset.

 

  The ''oh it's only fractions of a percent'' is not how polls work, and people who claim otherwise are invariably bitching cause they didn't like the result. Polls are ALWAYS ''fractional'', because it's not remotely feasible to ask everybody what they think about a certain policy or candidate or whatever. Several hundred people indicates a poll that ran long enough and drew enough attention to actually be noticed, and (probably) didn't have the kind of bs questions/options that make a poll useless.

 

''The vocal few'' thing works both ways, and STILL indicates a certain result even if within a smaller subset. ''But I don't like the results! Their vocal few outnumbers my vocal few! It's not possible that means what it looks like it means, because clearly I'm always right!!!'' That... isn't relevant to the accuracy of a poll's sampling. 

I just pointed out 0.17 percent of 119,000 isn't a majority.

The fact that single players are not represented on the forums and would benefit the most from the options, makes the "majority" claim even further questionable.

If you know anything about statistics you should know what the difference between a biased group and representative group is.

If you ask people on a car tuning forum to vote pro/con a tempo limit or raising fines for driving offenses the result likely is a bit biased and not representative of "car drivers" in general.

But let's leave it at that we argue in circles and pretty much have our individual opinion. I am interested to see what ED makes of the suggestions.

[shagrat]

12 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

They just said so. 

Where? And who? Any link? Really curious here... 

[Tippis]

3 minutes ago, shagrat said:

Where? And who? Any link? Really curious here... 

He thinks that BIGNEWY's statement that they have no plans like this for AAR means that everything he ever wished for in terms of DCS stagnation has come true. Comprehension of the written word was never a part of the MO.

Edited March 29, 2021 by Tippis

[shagrat]

1 minute ago, Tippis said:

He thinks that BIGNEWY's statement that they have no plans for AAR means that everything he ever wished for in terms of DCS stagnation has come true.

I still would like a link. The only comment I found was related to another topic of improving tanker AI and update the procedures... And that was not a "no", but a "it is planned, but is a huge task so take a while".

I also have a total different feedback from someone else, so I'm really interested to see that official answer from ED.

From my experience it is mostly a matter of ressource constraints, time and priority, but rarely an outright rejection, if it comes to improving the sim and make it accessible.

Mind I am talking about individual accessibility options in terms of learning curve, compensating for disabilities or simpler hardware, NOT nerfing DCS in general.

[Tippis]

2 minutes ago, shagrat said:

I still would like a link.

It would be this one a few pages back:

 

  

18 hours ago, BIGNEWY said:

Hi all

 

We have no plans for easy AAR. 

 

at this point the thread is starting to be full of bickering and back and forth, it wont be long before this thread is done and locked. 

 

please be respectful to each other even if you dont agree with them.

 

thanks