Tanker lighting too bright

[Frost]

I don't think you could call this a "bug" per se,  but I don't know where else I should place this topic/thread. The thing is, that A/A refueling is hard enough as it is under daytime conditions. But when you can't even see the drogue it is basically impossible to make those very minute adjustments you have to do constantly. Not to mention, that the flickering of the tanker's position lights have a good chance to give you some actual headaches after hours of nighttime A/A refuel training. 
Question: is there a way to tone the tanker's lights down in some config file, or to change something on the NVG's, so you could turn up their sensitivity, without turning artificial light sources into retina melting lasers at the same time?

PS:I fly the A-10CII, the F/A-18C and the F-14B. I have no trouble with the A-10, because there are no position lights that could make the tail boom disappear entirely behind their brightness. And the F/A-18 has the benefit of having an actually very useful probe light, whereas the Tomcat's Probe light has to be some kind of inside joke I don't get. 

Thanks in advance for some constructive tips on refueling one of my absolute favorite DCS modules at night.    

Edited January 17, 2023 by Frost

[draconus]

On 1/16/2023 at 11:27 PM, Frost said:

change something on the NVG's, so you could turn up their sensitivity, without turning artificial light sources into retina melting lasers at the same time

This is how it works - it amplifies the light. You can't do it selectively.

[Frost]

10 hours ago, draconus said:

This is how it works - it amplifies the light. You can't do it selectively.

Ofc that is the way how NVG's work. That's why I also asked if there's a way to tone the tankers position lights down. I'm sure that in reality you either don't have to turn the NVG's sensitivity up as much as I do to spot the drogue, or the tankers lights are much more toned down/NVG friendly. With NVG's on even only formation stripes would be sufficent enough to get an idea of the tankers attitude. Also irl there would be actual communication between the tanker and the refueling jets. And as soon as the entire refueling party would have arrived and wait in line there iwould be no real need for those bright/obstructive position lights, since you can see everything as clear as in green daylight.

Either way, I tweaked the NVG file a little. It doesn't really change the contrast or anything what I was asking for, but now the NVG shader covers 95% of my screen which makes it at least in some way a little easier for me to refuel, since my "NVG enhanced vision" now also spans into my peripheral vision and I can see a good portion of the receptible tip in the corner of my eyes. Very helpful for situational awareness, at least for me. And it even makes it easier for me to spot the drogue in the first place, even with the same NVG sensitivity. Since the entire screen has more or less the same brightness.

I've changed those values in the PostEffects file called NVD_common, to those that are shown here    #define MASK_SIZE (0.7/1.2)

Directory:
\DCS World\Bazar\shaders\PostEffects\NVD_common

Aside from this I wouldn't touch anything in the game, neither via the UI nor through mods -in terms of making DCS anything but realistic. I have everything on realistic including wake turbulence etc., but the NVG's might be a little bit too tiny in my opinion.

Edited January 18, 2023 by Frost