CV-59 Forrestal Feedback Thread

[draconus]

3 hours ago, toni said:

Hi there, 

In a MP server ,how can I launch from a Forrestal with no deck crew ?

Use key binds for cat hook and launch. Default U and Lshift+U afair.

@D4n Your idea of wind over deck is wrong but you're free to make it yourself in ME.

Edited December 3, 2023 by draconus

[Nealius]

On 12/3/2023 at 8:15 AM, D4n said:

And STILL no "easy crosswind" instant action mission that I suggested nearly 2 years ago

Carrier operations are not (typically) conducted with crosswinds. 

[speed-of-heat]

On 10/20/2021 at 10:08 PM, MBot said:

First, a huge thanks to HB. This is a fantastic and very generous addition to DCS. The carrier looks beautiful.

 

What I have found is that in VR, the datum lights and the ball are severely over-blooming. They even spill over when viewed from the bow:

May I also make some suggestions in regards to the spawn positions? It seems that the Forrestal has taken the same approach as the Stennis and the SCs with the first flight at mission start spawning at the center of the deck (these spawn points only work at mission time 0 and wont be available into the mission):

This setup often causes issues for me, as this blocks access to the catapults. Especially with AI this often leads to problems and stuck aircraft. May I suggest to move this spawn positions in front of the island as so?

 

As you can see, there should be sufficient space available for that setup and it frees all aircraft to taxi. Personally, I would also re-arrange the numbering to give priority to the deck edge parkings, but that is just my preference.

May I also suggest that you define additional "overflow" spawn positions at the stern of the ship?

I know this will block the landing area, but don't think this is a problem. If numbered positions 13-20, they would only be used if the first 12 spawn positions are occupied. In single player the mission designer can coordinate landing aircraft if he wants to use these "overflow" positions. In public multiplayer I think it is extremely rare that more than 12 people will spawn simultaneously on a carrier. Organized multiplayer groups that might want to spawn with more than 12 players simultaneously will be able to coordinate launch and recovery operations.

 

this is still happening ... 

[RustBelt]

That’s because in 2.5 DCS gave the cameras a circular astigmatism for some reason, and they insist it will all be better when VULKAN comes so no point fixing it. Then they keep deprecating everyones work arounds because they just do that. 

[speed-of-heat]

Vulkan is not going to be "soon" TM... And 2.5 was not recently...

 

[draconus]

3 hours ago, RustBelt said:

That’s because in 2.5 DCS gave the cameras a circular astigmatism for some reason, and they insist it will all be better when VULKAN comes so no point fixing it. Then they keep deprecating everyones work arounds because they just do that.

There is no excuse for HB to hold off on fixing a single light this long.

[Uxi]

19 hours ago, draconus said:

There is no excuse for HB to hold off on fixing a single light this long.

Well the excuse is they're working on F-4 and MSFS F-14...  

[Goose489]

Go look at the wag interview post and hopefully, that will clear some things up.

[draconus]

2 hours ago, Uxi said:

Well the excuse is they're working on F-4 and MSFS F-14...  

And you think it justifies stopping maintenance of the other unfinished modules?

[speed-of-heat]

23 hours ago, draconus said:

There is no excuse for HB to hold off on fixing a single light this long.

This, it's a TGA file not the Pope... I know Taz fixed it for the  super carrier... But I don't think he has the Tom

[Northstar98]

On the subject of lights, recently a new trigger was implemented to the mission editor which allows you to control the lights.

For the Forrestal though:

• When set to "OFF" it takes a while for all the lights to actually go out - the navigation and landing area lights go out instantly, but there are lights around the island that take ~11 seconds to go out as well (a common bug it seems with the new trigger). EDIT: This behaviour does not occur when transitioning from "AC LAUNCH" to "OFF" - all lights immediately go out, as expected in that case.
• The OLS is off in "AC RECOVERY" (I have rarely seen it briefly come on in the transition to "AC RECOVERY", but then turns off and stays off - also a common theme).
• The landing area lights are illuminated in "AUTO (i.e. navigation for the track below)", "NAVIGATION" and "AC LAUNCH".
  • For "NAVIGATION" I would expect just the navigation lights and (assuming they're present and if so, implemented) deck-edge lights + any additional running light (there are lights on the stern that come on in "AC LAUNCH" but are off in all other modes. The same is true for some additional lights around the island which are only on in "AC LAUNCH" and "AC RECOVERY", otherwise they either have dim red lights ("NAVIGATION") or are off completely ("OFF").
  • For "AC LAUNCH" I would expect the same lights as "NAVIGATION" to be on + the deck floodlights (which do come on).

 

But as for the lights themselves, it would be good if HB could either tone down the scaling of the datum and navigation lights as well as make them such that they're only visible at the right angles.

CV_59_light_modes.trk

EDIT: The problems relating to the "OFF" only occur if it's selected after "AC RECOVERY", so long as any other mode is selected before "OFF" is set, then it works as expected (see CV_59_light_test2.trk below).

CV_59_light_test2.trk

Edited December 7, 2023 by Northstar98
Addendum

[RustBelt]

On 12/5/2023 at 3:21 AM, draconus said:

There is no excuse for HB to hold off on fixing a single light this long.

You assume they have the ability to. There’s a lot of “only I may touch this” going on with DCS.

[speed-of-heat]

10 minutes ago, RustBelt said:

You assume they have the ability to. There’s a lot of “only I may touch this” going on with DCS.

this is functionally a problem with a graphic file, that is in HB's gift to modify 

[Nealius]

5 hours ago, RustBelt said:

You assume they have the ability to. There’s a lot of “only I may touch this” going on with DCS.

In this case I suspect it's more of an "ED inacted a change and we didn't get the memo until the patch was pushed" issue, which also happens a lot with DCS.

[ThorBrasil]

On 1/1/2022 at 8:48 PM, D4n said:

Has Heatblur already asked ED to add their Supercarrier deck-crew code to the Forrestal (for Supercarrier-owners)? (Since the Forrestal would be even more immersive with a moving deck-crew)

I don't use Forrestal because it doesn't have the same immersion as SuperCarrier. I hope it gets integrated into SuperCarrier.

[Uxi]

On 12/5/2023 at 10:42 PM, draconus said:

And you think it justifies stopping maintenance of the other unfinished modules?

Well some of that is going to be back ported so we'll benefit in the long run, but yeah kinda frustrating to see no updates for F-14 every time there's an OB update...    I've been real busy at work so haven't had a bunch of time for DCS last few months but hoping to get back at it over the holiday break.

Edited December 12, 2023 by Uxi

[draconus]

2 hours ago, Uxi said:

...but yeah kinda frustrating to see no updates for F-14 every time there's an OB update...

Looks like they've been busy there: TARPS, ladders, stairs...

[Jackjack171]

10 hours ago, draconus said:

Looks like they've been busy there: TARPS, ladders, stairs...

Yeah, they have been busy! Thank you for sharing that!

[Raisuli]

1 hour ago, Jackjack171 said:

Yeah, they have been busy! Thank you for sharing that!

Do the radars on the forest fire still spin backwards?

I don't know why that's so distracting.  Probably the number of hours I've spent watching radars spin, if only in the background.  Maybe this is the anti-Forest Fire...

[Jackjack171]

39 minutes ago, Raisuli said:

Do the radars on the forest fire still spin backwards?

I don't know why that's so distracting.  Probably the number of hours I've spent watching radars spin, if only in the background.  Maybe this is the anti-Forest Fire...

I'm not sure TBH. I messed around with the Forrestal briefly, but just for nostalgia purposes (took a month off from DCS for MSFS 2020). I love the "back in the day" feel of CV-59 but with no deck crew and no other updates, it feels kind of dead. Also, JBD#3 is too small for F-14 exhaust. I'm not sure what year our Forrestal is based but it needs a little bit of an upgrade. Damn shame as I would love to use it as my primary. 

[Raisuli]

1 hour ago, Jackjack171 said:

I'm not sure TBH. I messed around with the Forrestal briefly, but just for nostalgia purposes (took a month off from DCS for MSFS 2020). I love the "back in the day" feel of CV-59 but with no deck crew and no other updates, it feels kind of dead. Also, JBD#3 is too small for F-14 exhaust. I'm not sure what year our Forrestal is based but it needs a little bit of an upgrade. Damn shame as I would love to use it as my primary. 

Oh, I don't know.  They can't model the smell, or vibration, or sounds.  The swish of water, the stars on a moonless, clear night in the middle of the IO.  In DCS a deck is a deck, and once the cat fires it really doesn't matter if that was 59, 64, 80, or Nellis Air Force Base back there.

Given a choice between a 'bit more life' or the Phantom?  Lemme hit the paraloft and get geared up...

I imagine they'll get back to it, but maybe like ED they're waiting for core features.  Or maybe they're waiting for bandwidth.  Either way given a choice between 59 and Cell Block 70 I'll take the asphalt burner just for nostalgia.  Ghost Shooters get you off the deck just as good as cartoon shooters.

But then I generally fly off SC and use 59 as a satellite air base just so I don't forget how to crash on it.  Besides, the forward wardroom is better!

[Northstar98]

17 hours ago, Jackjack171 said:

I'm not sure what year our Forrestal is based but it needs a little bit of an upgrade.

It's at least SLEP (owing to the weapons and sensor fit) - that makes it mid 1980s - early/mid 1990s (so basically perfect for the early F-14A-135-GR we're due to get).

18 hours ago, Raisuli said:

Do the radars on the forest fire still spin backwards?

I never noticed it before but yes - they all spin counter-clockwise as opposed to clockwise. The AN/SPN-43B also nods instead of rotating.

[Raisuli]

1 minute ago, Northstar98 said:

It's at least SLEP (owing to the weapons and sensor fit) - that makes it mid 1980s - early/mid 1990s (so basically perfect for the early F-14A-135-GR we're due to get).

I never noticed it before but yes - they all spin counter-clockwise as opposed to clockwise. The AN/SPN-43B also nods instead of rotating.

I didn't notice it until I flew around the thing in an AH-50, then it was just glaringly obvious.  Now I can't unsee it, and even notice during overhead breaks.  If HB were to crack that code base it would be item number one on my list, but it's probably trivial for the majority so no breath-holding here.

[Silver_Dragon]

Forrestal configurations, can be check here:

 

[Northstar98]

Speaking of radars, looks like Forrestal is also missing its AN/SPS-64 surface-search/navigation radar.

It's diifcult to see in RL images (I only found one from Forrestal where it's clearly visible), but at least on publicly available CV 60 plans (see the first page for the distribution statement) it's in front of the AN/SPS-48 antenna:

 

 

In DCS though, it looks like the mount is there(?) but the antenna is not:

 

The AN/SPS-64 version the Navy uses is the AN/SPS-64(V)9 (the RM 1120 6X is a civilian version), which has an antenna 6 ft wide (this example is from CVN 71):

Edited May 12, 2024 by Northstar98
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