Ability for pilot to handover controls with keypress.

[Floydii]

Problem: Currently in MP the pilot needs to approve the CPG's request to assume control via a dialogue on the screen that requires use of the mouse. This generally requires taking a hand off the cyclic which is not ideal, particularly at low level or in VR where wrangling the mouse cursor can be problematic.

Proposed solution: make the pilot's 'request control' command ('C' by default) also approve any active request for control by the CPG. If the request is in error then the mouse can be used to deny it.

 

Caveats: I am aware that the assumption of control behaviour can be changed per-airframe in the ME, so please do not raise this as a solution. This request is about streamlining the process when the pilot must still approve any request for control as per the editor setting.

[FalcoGer]

Sometimes it is required for the CPG to take control of the aircraft, perhaps in DCS more so than in real life. There is a confirmation dialogue that the pilot has to approve if the CPG wants to take controls, which makes sense, but only in a setting where you are not already in communication. If you are already in communication, for example in SRS or the voice messaging service of your choice, then it would be much more convenient to just press the button and have control, confirming the handover over voice.

The requirement for this arises primarily from 2 factors.

1. It's inconvenient.

It's inconvenient to take your hands off your flight controls, grab your mouse and click the approve button when in reality all that is really needed to happen is: a) you trust your CPG, b) your CPG takes control.

If you do not trust your CPG, then why are you flying together? If you want your CPG to take control for whatever reason, then why is there this hurdle in the way that makes it clunky?

2. DCS is still a piece of computer software rather than real life

DCS has a framerate, and at times it drops to slideshow levels for various and sometimes inexplicable reasons. If this happens while you are flying, it would be safer to hand off your controls to your copilot who might not have a potato for a computer (like I do). Unfortunately the confirmation dialogue gets in the way. And if you are having a slideshow, you simply are unable to click that approve button and thus you are doomed in a perfectly good aircraft. If the CPG could simply force take the controls (presumably after a lot of cursing from the pilot and telling him to do so) everything would be well until DCS has resumed running at a normal pace after the upset, after which controls can be switched again.

A second example happened to me today. The pilot was flying with VR and his VR software inexplicably popped up and tabbed him out of the game. I tried to take control while he sorted that out, but could not because he was unable to get DCS up again quickly to click the approve button.

 

I understand the reason for the confirmation dialogue, and it makes sense in some circumstances the same way as not having that dialogue makes sense in others. If your CPG hits the take control button on accident, things may go south very quickly. If you fly with random people they might be malicious, but then again they can just drop the stores for you.

This is why I advocate for a system that allows for each individual person to choose whether they have this control handoff confirmation or not in the special options. Set once for all missions and on all servers (ie. not in the mission editor). If the CPG needs to take control, it might be because it's urgent and/or because the pilot is unable to maintain control or even control the game. In such a case the confirmation is game breaking in that it makes you blow up because of software or computer troubles while it can be prevented if only you could turn it off.

I think that most people flying together will have some sort of voice communication. As such forcing communication through a mouse driven menu is simply unnecessary, annoying at the best of times and frustrating at other times.

Edited April 25, 2022 by FalcoGer

[Frederf]

While there is an "equally responsible" option as set in the editor, this is inflexible. Being able to change your ignore/prompt/accept state for both control requests and join requests would be a lot of new usability even with the existing mouse-driven UI interaction.

E.g. one could set one as request join: prompt and request control: ignore on the ground and then change mid mission to request join: ignore and request control: accept or other combinations. The only features I might suggest in addition would be a password that the first user can set for join requests and a prompt which does not interrupt control and times out after a few seconds without interaction. This prompt could be at the edge of screen or even audio-only.