Black Shark and NIGHT OPS

[skypirate]

Greets to all!

 

In my last night mission "ALERT!" in which you take off in the middle of the night under enemy fire I managed to scramble and go in the sky before the rebels make the heli swiss cheese. Now I'm hovering above the battle area Night Goggles on and ammo for guns only - well I discovered Shkval is as blind as me in the dark and targeting was impossible SO >>>>

 

The question is:

 

Whether you can use Ka-50 in NIGHT OPERATIONS or NOT??...

 

If yes - HOW?...

[airea]

For night missions, I turn the tags on:) Otherwise, I can see nothing even with the NVG:)

[skypirate]

For night missions, I turn the tags on:) Otherwise, I can see nothing even with the NVG:)

 

Even with tags ON the Shkval is blind and you can not properly target a thing.....

[Frederf]

The Ka-50 is marginally night operable.

 

In Alert the trick is to dim your cockpit lighting, HUD, TV screen, etc very low, even the NVG blue lighting should be dimmed or even totally off (the only blasted instrument illumination dimmer that works in the whole dumb game too!). With your NVGs on high you should see quite a bit.

 

The Shkval won't lock at low light levels but it'll ground stabilize just fine. TV brightness/contrast settings have to be just right to make out anything.

 

Tracers are your friend for finding the bad guys, just make sure it's the bad guys (usually they are on the outside of town firing inward). Once you do that you wanna get nice and stable in an auto hover at 1000-1500m, bring down the HMS (again, dimmed to almost nothing), and uncage on the tracer origin. Ground stabalize the Shkval and adjust the TV so you can see the texture of the ground and go slewing.

 

You should be able to pick out black dots in a dark green haze, switch the cannon trigger up and fire off a burst. The APCs are harder because the perfect range for finding them is also the perfect range for them to hit you with 25mm rounds.

[skypirate]

Great!...

 

the whole cockpit lighting was dimmed..that was fine

Only the Shkval screen was so pitch black couldn't see a thing.

Is there option Black on White / White on Black on this screen?

And where to find the TV contrast/brightness buttons?

 

Cheers :) ...

[VMFA117_Poko]

Great!...

 

the whole cockpit lighting was dimmed..that was fine

Only the Shkval screen was so pitch black couldn't see a thing.

Is there option Black on White / White on Black on this screen?

And where to find the TV contrast/brightness buttons?

 

Cheers :) ...

On the center panel under weapon control wich is under Shkval screen. RTM

[skypirate]

OK fair enough.... (I'll have to read my manual one more time hehe:book:)

 

And still what is the REAL LIFE NIGHT TIME deployment of the Black Shark?

If we want mo make this as real as it gets (no lables, PC monitor brightness up etc..) how to use the BS effectively at night (if possible at all of course)?...

[Frederf]

Black markings on the Shkval screen (as opposed to white) is practically useless, at least in my experience. I'm sure they would be nice under bright daylight or snow but not at night. The brightness and contrast knobs (esp. contrast) are key for night targeting.

 

Realistically the Ka-50 is not really a night hunter as its useful night capabilities are limited to ferry flight and pre-planned attacks against static targets with well-developed intel usually with support illumination. The lesson is don't feel bad if you're not doing well at night in the Ka-50, it's not really designed for it.

[VMFA117_Poko]

It needs something like FLIR - not only optic sensor. To operate at night you should send Su25 with illuminating flares to drop them somewhere over a target. In that short while you have to find and destroy target.

[zdXu]

What distance should I keep against opponents with shouldermounted manpads, iglas, rpgs in the dead of night at 01:00am and all the ka-50 lights are off?

Or the other way round: have shouldermounted iglas, rpgs in the DCS-BS-game night-fight capabilities?

[sweinhart3]

That particular mission your goal is just to ferry your helicopter to the base on your flight plan rather than CAS. Your best bet at night if you need to attack something is to bring some illumination rockets with you.

[ZQuickSilverZ]

OR.......... if allowed in the mission you could use a rocket flare. That illuminates the ground just fine (fine as in it sucks but is serviceable).

[zdXu]

That particular mission your goal is just to ferry your helicopter to the base on your flight plan rather than CAS. Your best bet at night if you need to attack something is to bring some illumination rockets with you.

I have played this mission

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=836255&postcount=7

Thxs.

I will keep at night a save distance from 4 km from possible manpadlocations, since I'm on the safe side.

[sweinhart3]

I played that mission a few times and never got shot at. I just took off and made a straight line course according to flight plan.

[nemises]

The shark is NOT intended for night ops at all ...

As above, the goal of that particular mission is to navigate the shark out of there, not to help defend the base ....

 

However, your options for night ops are your pilot NVG's, and mannual release mode on the weapons.... without illumination, the shkval will not lock on, and you will not get release authority, however, in manual release mode , you can get weapons on target in the dark by manually making sure you are within parameters ... Target aquisition becomes the difficulty here...

 

I believe a night variant of the KA50 was floated early in it's development cycle however?

[Frederf]

That's not exactly true. The Shkval will happily allow the pilot to fire a Vikhr missile with 0% ambient illumination in automatic weapons control mode so long as the laser range is less than maximum and the Shkval cue is within the launch parameters circle.

 

Despite this, attacking targets at night is extremely difficult.

[Boberro]

I believe a night variant of the KA50 was floated early in it's development cycle however?

 

Yes and there were tests equipped in Merkurij pod, however due to it quality poorness and weight they removed it and later were no money for more.

[Haril]

What distance should I keep against opponents with shouldermounted manpads, iglas, rpgs in the dead of night at 01:00am and all the ka-50 lights are off?

Or the other way round: have shouldermounted iglas, rpgs in the DCS-BS-game night-fight capabilities?

As far as I'm aware, ground forces are not affected in any way by light levels, fog or cloud. They do not notice units more or less if they're lit up like christmas trees or completely blacked out. Only AI aircraft have decent spotting AI at present.

[Bucic]

As far as I'm aware, ground forces are not affected in any way by light levels, fog or cloud. They do not notice units more or less if they're lit up like christmas trees or completely blacked out. Only AI aircraft have decent spotting AI at present.

Correct - DCS: Black Shark Target Detection Model for AI Aircraft

[nemises]

That's not exactly true. The Shkval will happily allow the pilot to fire a Vikhr missile with 0% ambient illumination in automatic weapons control mode so long as the laser range is less than maximum and the Shkval cue is within the launch parameters circle.

 

Despite this, attacking targets at night is extremely difficult.

 

Ah cheers, yes you are quite correct....:thumbup: you just will not be able to achieve a "TA" lock with the Shkval (which precludes moving targets unless you also move the designator manually), but you can still fire in Auto mode without a TA

[Essobie]

Thread necromancy here, but I'm stuck on this mission mainly because I don't see any kind of a flight plan in either the PVI-800 nor the ABRIS. It seems like one of the guys on comms says I'm supposed to follow the river and go to some town that starts with a K.

 

Am I supposed to actually make my own flight plan in this mission?

 

I even tried telling my wingman to "Engage mission and return to base" and the guy leaves me and turns around to go back to where we took off from. Pretty sure that's not where the end of the mission is going to be, guy!

 

Thanks for any help.

[My Fing ID]

Last time I ended up flying to a town up north. I selected the Airfield option on the ABRIS and found an airfield close by. It wasn't the same name but it worked. This is the night fire one where you have to GTFO right?

[LukeFF]

The destination FARP's coordinates are in the ABRIS. Use them to set a one-route course from your takeoff point to your destination. Of course, it also helps to change the coordinate display in the ABRIS to decimal degrees as well.