not planned Easy mode AAR

[shagrat]

25 minutes ago, Tippis said:

It would be this one a few pages back:

 

  

 

Ah, makes sense now. "No plans"...

[SharpeXB]

2 hours ago, shagrat said:

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

Look at the flag on the thread title. 

[SharpeXB]

6 hours ago, cfrag said:

 

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. 

 

Hey if you want an instructor in DCS it can be done. This would work for AAR training in the F-14. 

 

 

Edited March 29, 2021 by SharpeXB

[Tippis]

32 minutes ago, SharpeXB said:

Look at the flag on the thread title. 

In other words, they didn't say anything of the kind. You're just having to retreat to outright wishful thinking as your latest attempt at not having any kind of actual argument against this idea. If you actually were to look at the flag of the thread title, you'd notice that you just outright lied. That's how far you've gone.

 

Awww… and a little sadface. You really shouldn't cry over Sharpe making stuff up and posting about his alternate realities as if they were true — it happens so often you'd run the serious risk of dehydrating yourself in 7 minutes flat. Come to think of it, isn't there a forum rule about making up dev statements…?

Edited March 29, 2021 by Tippis

[Mars Exulte]

3 hours ago, shagrat said:

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.

  Singleplayer/multiplayer has absolutely nothing to do with forum usage... I'm myself a ''singleplayer'' and I'm sure there's tons of others. This is such a dumb thing to even say @@ Like... singleplayer games don't have or use forums? Like I said ''results don't align with my worldview, therefore I shall manufacture an excuse for how I'm still not wrong'' @@

Edited March 29, 2021 by Mars Exulte

[cfrag]

7 minutes ago, Mars Exulte said:

  Singleplayer/multiplayer has absolutely nothing to do with forum usage... I'm myself a ''singleplayer'' and I'm sure there's tons of others. This is such a dumb thing to even say @@ Like... singleplayer games don't have or use forums? Like I said ''results don't align with my worldview, therefore I shall manufacture an excuse for how I'm still not wrong'' @@

 

 

Mayhaps the OP was referring to the players' marital status... Makes as much sense as the rest.

 

Edited March 29, 2021 by cfrag

[Tippis]

1 minute ago, Desert Fox said:

 

Thread has gone beyond absurd a while ago already with folks making up whatever just to be "right". It's hilarious and full bonkers at the same time.

It's kind of the standard MO to disrupt what would be, and indeed is, an otherwise quite constructive discussion of what solutions could work for what purpose. Given the utter lack of arguments against this kind of improvement, it's the best they can hope to interject, after all. Sometimes, they manage to be disruptive and toxic enough to get the thread shut down; sometimes it just keeps going because they make their trolling too obvious to ignore and they get removed for a while.

 

But the discussion lives on, and that's always a good thing.

[BIGNEWY]

its been an entertaining 16 pages but I think we have come to the end.

 

Easy AAR is not currently planned for DCS World. 

 

thank you all for participating in the discussion.

[PhantomHans]

I'd like to see an easy refueling difficulty option, or perhaps even some steps to walk us through this.  I have tried many, many, many times to refuel the F-14 but at this point have decided that I simply haven't got the skill or time to make it really happen.

Ideally, a "Game" mode where the player could somehow select or indicate the tanker, initiate refueling, sit back, and watch the AI do the whole dance, hook up, take on fuel, etc.  When full, display a "Refueling Complete" message, deploy the airbrakes (if any) and return control to the player.

The next step would be an "Easy" mode that guides the player aircraft into position and hookup, but still causes disconnects if they apply too much power, slow down too much, stray away too far, etc.

[unlikely_spider]

*grabs DCS-brand popcorn*

[Jackjack171]

12 minutes ago, PhantomHans said:

I'd like to see an easy refueling difficulty option, or perhaps even some steps to walk us through this.  I have tried many, many, many times to refuel the F-14 but at this point have decided that I simply haven't got the skill or time to make it really happen.

Ideally, a "Game" mode where the player could somehow select or indicate the tanker, initiate refueling, sit back, and watch the AI do the whole dance, hook up, take on fuel, etc.  When full, display a "Refueling Complete" message, deploy the airbrakes (if any) and return control to the player.

The next step would be an "Easy" mode that guides the player aircraft into position and hookup, but still causes disconnects if they apply too much power, slow down too much, stray away too far, etc.

Have you asked for any advice on how to accomplish AAR? A track to show exactly where you are going wrong would also help others help you. Research goes far and this request has come up many times. Stand by for heavy rolls as the ship comes about!

I'd suggest you provide a track, that way others can chime in on this. That is, if you want to get rock and rollin' right away. Waiting for a fix will be just that, waiting!

[SharpeXB]

Already discussed and “Not Planned”

 

[Extranajero]

Easy mode won't happen, all the " please everybody look at me, I'm a real fighter pilot " nerds would have an aneurysm and I doubt it's even on ED's list.

But you can try this :-
Don't use the supplied training missions for practice would be my advice. They just drive you crazy when trying to learn. The second you get everything set up and match speed with the tanker it flies into a cloud and\or goes into a turn. Find a nice friendly mission to start with, one that has clear weather and a long straight tanker track.
Tankers are never travelling at the speed they say they are, usually you need to be about 10 knots fast to stay with them pre contact. God knows what their ASI's are calibrated in.
Bind the 'ready pre contact' radio call to something, you don't want to be faffing with the comms menus.
Don't look directly at the basket, look at...I dunno, something else. Experiment.
If you are refuelling off a boom then you'll have to work out some reference points on the tanker to gauge your relative speed. There are lights, but they are difficult to see.
You can't just set a speed and sit there once you make contact, you'll have to constantly move the throttle by small amounts.
If you want to refuel a Strike Eagle buy a neck brace, because you'll need it after contorting your head so you can look between the top of the hud combiner glass and the bottom of the canopy bow.

If after all that you can't be bothered with the effort, or still can't do it, give up and shoot the tanker down. Tankers don't turn well and they don't have tail gunners.
I still have a strong suspicion that air to air refuelling is a hoax, and all the footage you see was really filmed on a sound stage in Area 51.

[SharpeXB]

Good advice and great footage!

 

[diego999]

8 minutes ago, Extranajero said:

But you can try this :-
Don't use the supplied training missions for practice would be my advice. They just drive you crazy when trying to learn. The second you get everything set up and match speed with the tanker it flies into a cloud and\or goes into a turn. Find a nice friendly mission to start with, one that has clear weather and a long straight tanker track.
Tankers are never travelling at the speed they say they are, usually you need to be about 10 knots fast to stay with them pre contact. God knows what their ASI's are calibrated in.
Bind the 'ready pre contact' radio call to something, you don't want to be faffing with the comms menus.
Don't look directly at the basket, look at...I dunno, something else. Experiment.
If you are refuelling off a boom then you'll have to work out some reference points on the tanker to gauge your relative speed. There are lights, but they are difficult to see.
You can't just set a speed and sit there once you make contact, you'll have to constantly move the throttle by small amounts.
If you want to refuel a Strike Eagle buy a neck brace, because you'll need it after contorting your head so you can look between the top of the hud combiner glass and the bottom of the canopy bow.
 

 

This is good advice.

What changed it for me was a stick upgrade. While I had a normal X52, the woobly nature in the center position made it impossible to manage the small inputs you need to stay in close formation with the tanker. Since I changed it for a Thrustmaster, I can fly with a lot more precision. I'm still struggling, but now it has became doable.

[Exorcet]

Easiest way to do this would probably be to modify the plane jump feature. It used to be that planes jumped out of could be ordered to do tasks, which was helpful for many things beyond refueling. Now they just RTB. This should be fixed so that the planes stay around when jumped out of.

A workaround for now is to setup an AI flight for the specific purpose of jumping into. You can fly the same route as this flight, give it a task to refuel, and then jump in when refueling is done. The downside is it's hard to setup unplanned refueling and it won't work in MP.

[SharpeXB]

How to enable “Easy AAR”…
Get the AH-64 or any helicopter free trial or buy one.

Practice for weeks flying and hovering it around.

Come back to AAR and it’s so super easy you’ll think something is broken. I seriously went into the settings and wondered if something had been added to create an easy arcade flying mode or something

I went from being able to AAR but I have to think about it to being able to AAR without any thinking like it’s on some kinda auto pilot flying on rails crazy… and I don’t do this very much at all, maybe once every few months. Before I had to concentrate a bit, now I could be texting on my phone or reading my email at the same time.

Helicopters are fun.

 

Edited January 5 by SharpeXB

[Tank50us]

On 12/30/2023 at 7:25 PM, Extranajero said:

But you can try this :-
Don't use the supplied training missions for practice would be my advice. They just drive you crazy when trying to learn. The second you get everything set up and match speed with the tanker it flies into a cloud and\or goes into a turn. Find a nice friendly mission to start with, one that has clear weather and a long straight tanker track.
Tankers are never travelling at the speed they say they are, usually you need to be about 10 knots fast to stay with them pre contact. God knows what their ASI's are calibrated in.
Bind the 'ready pre contact' radio call to something, you don't want to be faffing with the comms menus.
Don't look directly at the basket, look at...I dunno, something else. Experiment.
If you are refuelling off a boom then you'll have to work out some reference points on the tanker to gauge your relative speed. There are lights, but they are difficult to see.
You can't just set a speed and sit there once you make contact, you'll have to constantly move the throttle by small amounts.
If you want to refuel a Strike Eagle buy a neck brace, because you'll need it after contorting your head so you can look between the top of the hud combiner glass and the bottom of the canopy bow.

This is pretty sound advice.

One thing I'd like to add though, if you're planning on doing long missions with other people, then it's best to do your practicing while on a server. "Train how you fight" is a big deal in this biz.

One thing I wish ED would add is an optional 'visual aid' for those lineup lights, similar to the Meatball of the Super Carrier module. This would help those with less than optimal monitors or visual acuity actually see the blasted things, while at the same time being something that could be toggled 'off' by those who just don't want it.

I once made another post here on the forums that I think would be good for those with disabilities: a 'hand off' macro. You would have to get well within parameters to refuel, but once in, it would take control of the aircraft until disconnect, at which point you'd have control again, though it could be interrupted at any point (like if a Red crossed the border and you needed to go intercept).

One thing that's always annoyed me are those who somehow claim it to be 'unbalanced' if such features existed... when in reality since the only ones refueling on a tanker are your own sides jets... I don't see how it would break the balance, or even the immersion of other players if someone is using any kind of aid to help them do what is easily a very complex task.

[SharpeXB]

I think the reason players find AAR so difficult comes down to these things.

First the game doesn’t offer you enough situations during typical missions or campaigns that involve flying formation. If DCS had a career mode or dynamic campaign where the player wasn’t always the flight lead, flying formation would be second nature. You’d spend hours simply keeping position in a flight. This is of course the prerequisite to AAR. If you jump right into trying to connect to the tanker without this skill it’s no wonder what a struggle it is.

Secondly the flight characteristics of the modern FBW jets are simply too easy. Not that they’re unrealistic, that’s how they are. But they don’t challenge the player to develop any flying skills. Again a solution is to fly helicopters or warbirds or something. Get some reflexes developed for flying instead of just being asleep at the wheel (stick). Get used to an aircraft that just requires constant attention and control. 
 

[Extranajero]

There are reasons for the lack of formation flying
1) If you are flying close formation it takes up attention that you should be using for situational awareness. Close formation, except for penetrating cloud and airshows, was buried as a concept ( together with many of the pilots who were doing it ) in the summer of 1940.
2) If you are flying close formation on more than one single AI then that's fine until they come to a turn. The last thing you want to do is be anywhere near them then. If you haven't seen it imagine a swarm of flies in a bottle that someone just shook up. Anyone who has any of the WW-2 campaigns knows this behaviour well.

 

[SharpeXB]

4 hours ago, Extranajero said:

1) If you are flying close formation it takes up attention that you should be using for situational awareness. Close formation, except for penetrating cloud and airshows, was buried as a concept ( together with many of the pilots who were doing it ) in the summer of 1940.

Right. There are some WWII DLC campaigns (Reflected) which have you doing this over long flights which is good practice. I have to notice again that the majority of DCS missions cast you as the lead and not a wingman hence people probably never get this experience. Reflected’s campaigns have you in the role of a wingman which is good.

4 hours ago, Extranajero said:

If you are flying close formation on more than one single AI then that's fine until they come to a turn.

Yeah it would be cool if they could get the AI to execute that correctly. 

Edited January 6 by SharpeXB

[Extranajero]

On 1/5/2024 at 4:26 PM, SharpeXB said:

Before I had to concentrate a bit, now I could be texting on my phone or reading my email at the same time.

 

 

 

It was a tragic day for your country's air force when you decided to take up DCS instead of being a fighter pilot.

[SharpeXB]

56 minutes ago, Extranajero said:

It was a tragic day for your country's air force when you decided to take up DCS instead of being a fighter pilot.

If anything DCS has taught me what a fail I’d be as a real fighter pilot!

AAR in the game is easy enough though 

[Tank50us]

15 hours ago, SharpeXB said:

If anything DCS has taught me what a fail I’d be as a real fighter pilot!

AAR in the game is easy enough though 

I'd argue that it depends on the plane, and the persons setup. Obviously someone with a full simpit and VR is going to have an easier time than someone just starting out with a Sidewinder. This is ultimately why I'm in favor of either visual aids or handicaps for those that need them. Meanwhile if you don't need it, you can turn it off in the settings.

Hell, one thing that would be nice is if Combined Arms allowed someone to sit in the tanker and actually guide you in like the real Boom Operator does. Or if the AI would talk you in (or at the very least warn you that the plane is about to turn)

[Exorcet]

1 hour ago, Tank50us said:

I'd argue that it depends on the plane, and the persons setup. Obviously someone with a full simpit and VR is going to have an easier time than someone just starting out with a Sidewinder. This is ultimately why I'm in favor of either visual aids or handicaps for those that need them. Meanwhile if you don't need it, you can turn it off in the settings.

Hell, one thing that would be nice is if Combined Arms allowed someone to sit in the tanker and actually guide you in like the real Boom Operator does. Or if the AI would talk you in (or at the very least warn you that the plane is about to turn)

Not only does hardware have a huge impact on AAR, real pilots say it's harder in DCS, even if you have the best setup.