Patch Notes discussion November 2023

[KCOOL]

3 hours ago, St4rgun said:

Dear @BIGNEWY with maximum respect may I ask what is the explanation that the VR mask is still missing when not using MSAA (using no AA or using other AA methods)?

The DLAA technology is the best what happened to this sim visually recently, but the missing VR mask really ruins the experience, it's very bad. Is it really that resource-intensive work to patch it?

Not to mention the still existing over-exposure behavior in the cockpit view, the washed out visuals are not so appealing. I know, that's some fine tuning stuff and there're are much higher priorities in the current OB state. Maybe some options to turn it off? At least some autoexec parameter?

use wmr toolkit to fine tune visuals

95pct the 2nd from the bottom. I believe it is called highlights 

maybe 47.5pct exposure

keep default the rest (50pct most, 0pct Shadows). you can pump up a bit colors with vibrance 20pct (0 is default).

Try and look for the best visuals for your vr headset and taste 

dcs with latest Nvidia driver and taz mods runs VERY well on 4090 and hp v2

 

 

Edited November 18, 2023 by KCOOL

[Qcumber]

10 hours ago, St4rgun said:

over-exposure behavior in the cockpit view, the washed out visuals are not so appealing

The washed-out appearance is due to low contrast or rather a higher dynamic range. You can use open xr toolkit to control contrast and make the black areas appear darker. Unfortunately this applies to the whole image rather than just the cockpit. I agree it would be good to have these settings in DCS though. Ideally a full range of settings including contrast and light/dark sliders like in Adobe Lightroom. The biggest issue for me is the footwell is too bright relative to the upper cockpit controls in some planes. 

Edited November 18, 2023 by Qcumber

[draconus]

On 11/16/2023 at 11:25 PM, Davee said:

Exactly, can't find a toggle anywhere. Looks the same to me.

This is in options/gameplay tab as toggle but I don't see a difference either - stuck with new fat dots. Thanks ED for the option but please make it work.

@St4rgun There are two masks for VR:

• one for MSAA - setting for how big area of the center screen gets AA treatment - I don't use MSAA
• one for HMD - it cuts off the area of the screen that can't be physically seen in your HMD, so you get more performance - this works for me

[Ninjaviper]

1 hour ago, draconus said:

This is in options/gameplay tab as toggle but I don't see a difference either - stuck with new fat dots. Thanks ED for the option but please make it work.

@St4rgun There are two masks for VR:

• one for MSAA - setting for how big area of the center screen gets AA treatment - I don't use MSAA
• one for HMD - it cuts off the area of the screen that can't be physically seen in your HMD, so you get more performance - this works for me

How do you set the HMD screen cut off?

[St4rgun]

2 hours ago, draconus said:

This is in options/gameplay tab as toggle but I don't see a difference either - stuck with new fat dots. Thanks ED for the option but please make it work.

@St4rgun There are two masks for VR:

• one for MSAA - setting for how big area of the center screen gets AA treatment - I don't use MSAA
• one for HMD - it cuts off the area of the screen that can't be physically seen in your HMD, so you get more performance - this works for me

All right then, for everyone using VR and knowing what I'm talking about: 

 

I described the missing black VR mask which cuts off the non visible parts of the HMD, and indeed is missing. Try looking straight or up and check it out only with peripheral vision. Or just take off the HMD and look at the monitor screen: the black cutting mask is missing.

I's a well known, REPORTED bug for YEARS. This mask only shows when MSAA turned on. In other cases it's transparent, that's why the sky showing through. When with 2.9 the new AA method arrived (DLAA) I switched off MSAA to use DLAA instead, and this caused losing the mask. Simple as that.

@BIGNEWY, any thoughts?

Edited November 18, 2023 by St4rgun

[draconus]

1 hour ago, St4rgun said:

the black cutting mask is missing

It's not really missing - your only complaint is that the mask is not black - bacuase it has a background?

[St4rgun]

12 minutes ago, draconus said:

It's not really missing - your only complaint is that the mask is not black - bacuase it has a background?

Exactly, as described a dozen times. This is not "only" complaint, it's massively ruining immersion having the blue sky shining through the bottom of my view in an otherwise dark cockpit. As the "mask" is already there I simply don't understand what takes months (ok, let's be honest: YEARS) for the team to switch it to black regardless of applied AA type. Before 2.9 it was not a problem, because I always used MSAA which shows it properly black, but now after a month and two more patches later I'm getting really frustrated with it.

I really hope this bug patch only missing because some miscommunication and will be corrected in the next OB at last.

[draconus]

11 minutes ago, St4rgun said:

This is not "only" complaint, it's massively ruining immersion having the blue sky shining through the bottom of my view in an otherwise dark cockpit

This means the mask is wrong (too big) for your HMD in the first place. You're not supposed to see it, whatever the background is applied. It does not do its job in your case, so I suggest to turn it off until it's fixed. No problem with that in Rift S.

@Ninjaviper It's the toggle in DCS options > VR page.

Edited November 18, 2023 by draconus

[BIGNEWY]

Hi all, 

if you are having issues its best to post in a thread on your own with your DCS logs and track replays if required, in here it will get lost. 

Please keep this thread for patch note discussion. 

thank you 

[Davee]

7 hours ago, draconus said:

This is in options/gameplay tab as toggle but I don't see a difference either - stuck with new fat dots. Thanks ED for the option but please make it work.

 

Thanks. Overlooked that one. 

[Apache 64]

Am 16.11.2023 um 08:57 schrieb BIGNEWY:

DCS: F/A-18C Hornet by Eagle Dynamics

• Fixed: Distance to head is tuned at which head is visible

 

Am 16.11.2023 um 08:57 schrieb BIGNEWY:

DCS: Mi-24P Hind by Eagle Dynamics

• Added: New pilots models inside and outside of cockpit, new pilots animations

Many thanks for these fixes / improvements and the pilot boddies for the Hind. 

Hopefully you could implement the same for the Apache soon. Would be really great.

Thanks and best regards

 

 

[draconus]

We had a nice NVG circle in VR since 2.9. What happened in 2.9.1? Why it's back to full screen NVG?

[Dunska]

I like the Max FPS option in the GUI now, however it does not allow setting 72 FPS for VR usage.  I used to do this in autoexec.cfg, but that is now not taking effect.

I can set 72 FPS in the options.lua, but as soon as I open the options GUI in game it drops it to 70.  I would be great if the Max FPS slider would allow changing in 1 FPS increments.

[Buzz313th]

8 hours ago, Dunska said:

I like the Max FPS option in the GUI now, however it does not allow setting 72 FPS for VR usage.  I used to do this in autoexec.cfg, but that is now not taking effect.

I can set 72 FPS in the options.lua, but as soon as I open the options GUI in game it drops it to 70.  I would be great if the Max FPS slider would allow changing in 1 FPS increments.

Question on this topic.

Can the core simulation of DCS be running at a higher frame rate than the locked rendered frame rate going to display devices?   If so, would this new setting reduce system load if core sim frame rate was substantially higher than rendering display frame rate?

[Hiob]

56 minutes ago, Buzz313th said:

Question on this topic.

Can the core simulation of DCS be running at a higher frame rate than the locked rendered frame rate going to display devices?   If so, would this new setting reduce system load if core sim frame rate was substantially higher than rendering display frame rate?

Whatever the limiting factor to your (unlimited) fps is (show the in-game telemetry with rctrl-pause), it will be relieved from load when you limit the fps below that.

However, once you enable the fps-limiter, it will always show cpu-bound. (because it‘s the main thread that enforces the limit)

Edited November 20, 2023 by Hiob

[Buzz313th]

8 minutes ago, Hiob said:

However, once you enable the fps-limiter, it will always show cpu-bound. (because it‘s the main thread that enforces the limit)

That makes complete sense.  

So is the entire simulator running at the rendering limiter if set?  Or could other parts of the sim be running faster?  I am assuming the rcntrl+pause FPS indicator is only showing rendering frames.

[Hiob]

1 minute ago, Buzz313th said:

That makes complete sense.  

So is the entire simulator running at the rendering limiter if set?  Or could other parts of the sim be running faster?  I am assuming the rcntrl+pause FPS indicator is only showing rendering frames.

I‘m not 100% sure what you mean with „other parts“. Do you mean things like AI-calculations, physics model and such? I don’t think that those are bound to the picture refresh rate in the first place. Do you mean that limiting the fps does free „cpu capacity“ for other tasks….? Probably/Maybe…. to a certain extent. However, in the MT-version of the game it is probably irrelevant, since the main render thread is probably exclusive to rendering the picture (I assume)

[draconus]

57 minutes ago, Hiob said:

However, once you enable the fps-limiter, it will always show cpu-bound. (because it‘s the main thread that enforces the limit)

If you kill the GPU with some VR 8k MSAAx4 I'm pretty sure it will be GPU bound and won't reach your limit.

[Hiob]

15 minutes ago, draconus said:

If you kill the GPU with some VR 8k MSAAx4 I'm pretty sure it will be GPU bound and won't reach your limit.

Obviously. As I said, when you fps-limit below what your system can achieve unlimited. When you don’t reach your set fps-limit, it simply doesn’t apply.

To put in other words. You‘re basically setting a hard cpu-limit. When your GPU can‘t reach the set limited in the first place, you‘re back to square one.

Edited November 20, 2023 by Hiob

[YoYo]

Hot fix Today!

 

I hope NVG and some radio menu issues will be solved :).

[DAZnBLAST]

Hoping for black and white flickering fixed.

[BIGNEWY]

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/news/changelog/openbeta/2.9.1.48335/

DCS World

• IR-pointer visible without NVG, even in broad daylight (changed nvd turned on logic for laser ray) - fixed
• MP. Net protocol up - old MP version wont see new
• Crash when destroying vehicle with Insurgent AK-74 - fixed.
• Fixed crash on Lua states created outside of the ED_lua_open() wrapper
• Crash GetGeoInfoW DCS_server.dll  creating aircraft without 3d model. Added protection against  creating aircraft without 3d model.
• AI aircraft. B-52 wheel chock_NM texture
• AI aircraft. B-52 corrected textures name in LOD_0. Now not use pilots textures from bazar
• VR. NVG mask in VR covers entire FOV

DCS: F-16C Viper by Eagle Dynamics

• Updated German Flight manual

DCS: F/A-18C Hornet by Eagle Dynamics

• Fixed crash if two tankers added as member

Campaigns

DCS: MAD Campaign by Stone Sky

• In all missions, the bug with automatic installation of UHF in the Gazelle has been fixed.
• Fixed compatibility issues in some missions.

DCS: MAD AH-64D Campaign by Stone Sky

• Added DATALINK function to all missions
• Information about setting up DATALINK has been added to the briefing and the document.

DCS: MAD Black Shark Campaign by Stone Sky

• Missions 3 and 11, have been adjusted for players without the Supercarrier module.
• Mission 7, the attack scene at the start of the mission has been adjusted.

[Razorback]

MP. Net protocol up means ??

 

[DAZnBLAST]

Unfortunately, no flickering fix in this build

 

When will this be fixed?? IMO destroys immersion!

Edited November 22, 2023 by DAZnBLAST

[BIGNEWY]

17 minutes ago, Razorback said:

MP. Net protocol up means ??

 

• MP. Net protocol up, old MP version wont see new
  
  edited