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Remove fuel tank pylons


Egri_komrade

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Hi all,

My question is pretty straight forward, is there any chance we'll get the ability to remove the fuel tank pylons from any Tomcat? Not sure if this is historical/realistic in any way, but it would surely give the pilot more choices in terms of loadout selection.

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3 hours ago, Egri_komrade said:

Hi all,

My question is pretty straight forward, is there any chance we'll get the ability to remove the fuel tank pylons from any Tomcat? Not sure if this is historical/realistic in any way, but it would surely give the pilot more choices in terms of loadout selection.

It was historical (they did so for airshows, for example), but highly unlikely as it would require us to re-do huge portions of the exterior model. Some time further down the line maybe, but it is more likely that we will not do it, simply because of the amount of time it would take, for a rather small return.

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11 minutes ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

What about the IRIAF jets then? Those dont have said pylons and probably tubing for it either?

They will have in DCS. It is the nature of the external model, and owed to the fact that the IRIAF version never was really planned, and is being added as a small bonus with a little more than adding just liveries for it.

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This has been rehashed many times. Following a lot of begging in the forums they decided to do an Iran cat well after the project was announced. Well after the airframe model was being developed. a model that had the fuel pylons built into the main airframe model. There aren’t digital bolts to remove parts of the airframe model after the mesh is made. 
 

If it’s still hard to understand, just accept DCS has a lot of legacy code weirdsies. 

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14 hours ago, IronMike said:

It was historical (they did so for airshows, for example), but highly unlikely as it would require us to re-do huge portions of the exterior model. Some time further down the line maybe, but it is more likely that we will not do it, simply because of the amount of time it would take, for a rather small return.

Well that is a real bummer, but I understand the difficulties of coding, and like you mentioned, investing time and effort into a very little feature just doesn't worth it. Thank you for the honest reply!

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26 minutes ago, Egri_komrade said:

Well that is a real bummer, but I understand the difficulties of coding, and like you mentioned, investing time and effort into a very little feature just doesn't worth it. Thank you for the honest reply!


Thank you for your kind understanding. But it was either this, or no IRIAF variant at all, and we found in the end, it is better to have one, though with fuel pylons, vs not having one at all. 🙂

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4 hours ago, IronMike said:

They will have in DCS. It is the nature of the external model, and owed to the fact that the IRIAF version never was really planned, and is being added as a small bonus with a little more than adding just liveries for it.

What do you mean "was never really planned"

 

You guys literally announced during the initial release we were getting the Forrestal, B, A, and IRIAF variants....

This is 4 year old news; in what world was the IRIAF "not planned" ?

 

It was quite literally spoken about, and announced, during the preorder in 2018...

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15 minutes ago, XCNuse said:

What do you mean "was never really planned"

 

You guys literally announced during the initial release we were getting the Forrestal, B, A, and IRIAF variants....

This is 4 year old news; in what world was the IRIAF "not planned" ?

 

It was quite literally spoken about, and announced, during the preorder in 2018...

Idk where folks get this idea from, it was always gonna be the B version followed by an (one, singular) A version, the store page hasn't changed since EA release https://store.heatblur.com/products/test-product

Over time that got divided into an early A and a later A (different RWR), then later they added the Iranian version (A minus TCS) as a bonus after many requests. Seems like a massive game of telephone going on around these parts.

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32 minutes ago, XCNuse said:

What do you mean "was never really planned"

 

You guys literally announced during the initial release we were getting the Forrestal, B, A, and IRIAF variants....

This is 4 year old news; in what world was the IRIAF "not planned" ?

 

It was quite literally spoken about, and announced, during the preorder in 2018...

I mean by that it was never really planned. Where in this feature list, which was and remains the feature list from the pre-orders, do you spot an IRIAF variant?

Key features of the DCS: F-14 Tomcat include:

  • Simulation of both the A and B models of the Tomcat. The A model will follow the B later during the Early Access period.
  • A highly-detailed external model that has been built using laser scanning and photogrammetry taken of real, museum F-14 Tomcats.
  • New models for several F-14 Tomcat payloads that includes the AIM-54 Phoenix and the LANTIRN pod.
  • Incredibly-detailed and accurate 6-DOF (Degrees of Freedom) cockpit that was also built using photogrammetry from museum F-14 Tomcats.
  • An advanced flight model that will continue to be tuned to provide the most accurate F-14 flight model simulation possible.
  • Accurate aircraft systems simulation featuring:
    • The Automatic Flight Control System (AFCS).
    • The variable wing geometry, wing-sweep system.
    • Detailed electrical, hydraulic, and fuel systems.
  • Cooperative multiplayer that allows one player in the front seat to play as the pilot and one in the back seat to act as the Radar Intercept Officer, RIO.
  • "JESTER" AI: A new, lifelike AI that fills the role of RIO when flying in single-player or multiplayer mods without a human RIO.
  • A limited-functionality "Iceman" AI that pilots the aircraft in single-player mode when you are in the rear seat acting as the RIO.
  • Both AIs feature an interactive interface with a comprehensive library of voice-acted phrases.
  • Simulation of the AN/AWG-9 Weapons Control System (WCS), featuring:
    • A custom model of the AN/AWG-9 radar featuring Pulse Search, Pulse Doppler Search, Range-While-Scan and Track-While-Scan modes as well as both pulse and pulse doppler Single Target Track (STT) modes.
    • The ability to prepare and launch the AIM-54 Phoenix at single targets and at up to six targets simultaneously using the TWS mode.
    • The Television Camera Set (TCS) allowing visual identification of targets in Beyond Visual Range (BVR) situations.
    • The Link-4 datalink allowing reception of tracks from an E-2 AWACS or a surface unit.
  • The complete F-14A and B Tomcat payload, including AIM-7, AIM-9 and AIM-54 air to air missiles, various unguided- and guided-bombs and rockets, and the M61 Vulcan 20mm cannon.
  • A functional simulation of the LANTIRN target designator pod, allowing the RIO to guide laser-guided munitions dropped by the pilot or other aircraft (buddy-lasing).
  • The Tactical Airborne Reconnaissance Pod System (TARPS), allowing the player to fulfil the aerial photographic reconnaissance mission. *
  • Fully-functional carrier interoperability that features Instrument Carrier Landing System (ICLS) and the Automatic Carrier Landing System (ACLS).
  • Comprehensive digital manual, both as a PDF and as a continually-updated online manual.
  • A complete set of interactive and voiced tutorials.
  • Comprehensive campaigns for both the F-14A and F-14B Tomcat; one will be set in the Caucasus theatre and the other will be in the Persian Gulf theatre.

Early Access Note:

* The F-14A and the TARPS pod will follow later during the Early Access period and the tutorials and campaigns will be implemented and expanded during this early access as well.

---------------

You can read the above both on the ED E-shop and our store here, since forever, not once did we adjust a single line in there from the moment that it got posted - at least not to my knowledge, and if memory serves correctly. https://store.heatblur.com/products/test-product

This is what was promised. On top of that you get a whole chock of additional content, which yes was promised, but still is considered bonus content by us. And we do keep our promises.

The IRIAF variant is absolutely a cherry on top, a free bonus, which you are getting purely, and absolutely purely because we wanted to give you guys even more than was actually promised. Would we have kept to our initial feature list, you would get the B and early A, and nothing else (in terms of variants). Two variants were promised, which we increased now to 4 variants.

Yes, we announced it, and promised it, at some point around release (or during pre-orders), because you guys wanted it, and we will keep our promise, but at no point did we plan for an IRIAF variant for that matter at any time during development. It is a free gift, from us, to you. Sometimes a thank you instead would be nice to hear as well.


Edited by IronMike
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2 minutes ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

How hard can it be to make removable fuel pylons? Every other module allows to remove pylons.

Extremely hard in the Tomcat's case. It is akin to making two fuselage models, really. Which is months upon months of work unfortunately.

Maybe at some point in the future we will have both ressources and time to revisit the matter, but for the time being we do not plan on it. Our apologies if that disappoints.

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1 hour ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

How hard can it be to make removable fuel pylons? Every other module allows to remove pylons. Considering you want to rework the model anyway for like the ECM fairings and new HGU55 pilots.

 

Both I and IronMike literally explained to you why. They built it as part of the airframe. You can’t just cut pieces out of the mesh and give them an argument setting. You have to build it Originally that way, or not at all.
 

The airframe of the tomcat including the pylons is ONE continuous surface.  ONE. A subtractive change would be a full start back over from scratch job. Including the full pipeline of mesh, texture, articulation points, arguments, flight model mating, and on and on.

 

Sim’s look like you just make a shape in blender and stick it in a magic computer reality and it just works. But it doesn’t. The bit you see that acts like the real world is working in totally different and unintuitive ways in the system to make that output. And making it do that is years of work. Ask ANY of the big mod makers. It takes years to go from 3D cad object to plane module that works. Taking off the pylons that are already baked in would basically be starting from scratch. 
 

changing a pilots head, or making an add on mesh to sit “on” the airframe mesh for some extra bumps is much easier than removing something baked in.

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4 minutes ago, WarthogOsl said:

Is TARPS still planned?

Personally, I'll I want at this point is an official, early (1977) VF-84 livery. 🙂

Yes, of course it is still planned.

It will be a rather rudimentary implementation, aka eye candy pod with some basic gameplay surrounding it. The INS and HUD implementation is just too much work for what little recce gameplay there is in DCS. But we will think of something nice for that, we'll see. Should DCS expand the recconnaissance gameplay at some point, we might expand on it then later, too.

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14 minutes ago, IronMike said:

Yes, of course it is still planned.

It will be a rather rudimentary implementation, aka eye candy pod with some basic gameplay surrounding it. The INS and HUD implementation is just too much work for what little recce gameplay there is in DCS. But we will think of something nice for that, we'll see. Should DCS expand the recconnaissance gameplay at some point, we might expand on it then later, too.

Cool...I know of at least a few campaign missions that simulate a recon flight using the LANTIRN pod.  I'd bet their creators would happily update them with a real TARPS pods (that and an A-6 tanker!).


Edited by WarthogOsl
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3 minutes ago, WarthogOsl said:

Cool...I know of at least a few campaign missions that simulate a recon flight using the LANTIRN pod.  I'd bet their creators would happily update them with a real TARPS pods (that and an A-6 tanker!).

 

Including myself fwiw. Like I said, we will think of some form of gameplay surrounding it, like maybe dropping a screenshot with the layed over data in some recce folder, or something simple of that sorts, which you then also can use in roleplay in squadrons, etc. Or something similar to the ELINT function in the Viggen, etc.

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9 minutes ago, IronMike said:

Or something similar to the ELINT function in the Viggen,

 

The Viggen's Elint was an amazing feature, I truly enjoyed performing this type of recce and then follow up with a strike .. was so different to what other DCS Modules had at the time (or even since). 👍

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1 minute ago, Rudel_chw said:

 

The Viggen's Elint was an amazing feature, I truly enjoyed performing this type of recce and then follow up with a strike .. was so different to what other DCS Modules had at the time (or even since). 👍

Thank you. Let's hope we find an equally fitting formula for the TARPS (I am confident we will).

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7 hours ago, WolfHound009 said:

Will the IIRAF F-14 still be able to equip fuel tanks?

No.

7 hours ago, Katj said:

So, why were the tank pylons added to the base model of the aircraft? Was it an oversight, or is there some kind of limitation in DCS?

It seemed like the better solution at the time, simple as that. Tomcats generally do not fly without tanks, and the overall model was possible to be made more organic like that. In hindsight, was it a mistake? Possibly. But again, at that time no one thought we would ever do an IRIAF version.

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4 hours ago, RaisedByWolves said:

What about glove vanes?

For anyone who asks about glove vanes, we are delaying the decision whether or not to make them for another year. 😄

 

Jokes aside: we said it many times now: lowest of all low priority items (okay maybe not lowest lowest, and admittedly they are cool), but if we do them, then only visually without impact on the FM.


Edited by IronMike
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8 hours ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

It was an oversight more than likely. Our model is a weird mix of F-14A and F-14D. The same way we should also be able to remove the LAU7 and 138 from stations 1A and 8A. It really depends on how poorly thought through and optimised the mesh is - if you look a the insane amount of polygons the TCS fairing has one can only imagine the rest...

And quite frankly the IRIAF Tomcats being "clean" is a distinct feature - should they come with a TCS and the pylons it would kind of be out of place and not very realistic. I think a lot of people were primarily looking forward to the IRIAF 14 because it is unique and actually different, even more so than the late and early A which are more of the same. But you can't have everything I guess. 

I mean, if someone really wanted it. They could make it happen as an unofficial mod. Wouldn’t be easy, but based on some of the mods out there, it’s doable.  

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14 hours ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

It was an oversight more than likely. Our model is a weird mix of F-14A and F-14D. The same way we should also be able to remove the LAU7 and 138 from stations 1A and 8A. It really depends on how poorly thought through and optimised the mesh is - if you look a the insane amount of polygons the TCS fairing has one can only imagine the rest...

And quite frankly the IRIAF Tomcats being "clean" is a distinct feature - should they come with a TCS and the pylons it would kind of be out of place and not very realistic. I think a lot of people were primarily looking forward to the IRIAF 14 because it is unique and actually different, even more so than the late and early A which are more of the same. But you can't have everything I guess. 

OTOH, it basically could be a F-14A-95GR for both US Navy and IIAF.  If the base F-14A model is really being sorted out from the composite  F-14A/F-14D we have now, that's an excellent opportunity to do that one without the pylons.  Definitely recognize it's work but it's work that's already kinda being done though maybe not on the lower nacelles, so another feather in the cap maybe to have complete.  I for one would love to see the proper VF-84 Final Countdown version (which should be a 95GR without pylons). 

Glove vanes would just a bonus. 😄 

 

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Edited by Uxi
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6 hours ago, RustBelt said:

I mean, if someone really wanted it. They could make it happen as an unofficial mod. Wouldn’t be easy, but based on some of the mods out there, it’s doable.  

Most of the mods are based on FC3...  and haven't seen anything touching the Tomcat unfortunately or someone might have done an ST-21 by now. 😉

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