Is The Air To Ground Workflow In The Real F16C Blk50 Really This Clunky......

[DD_fruitbat]

Here's a really easy way of getting a steerpoint onto a target of opportunity, 5 button presses....

 

[TobiasA]

vor 16 Stunden schrieb davidrbarnette:

Well, regarding the "flying around and looking for targets is mostly a sim thing", that's really not the case.

For the past 20 years, most of the activity that the US Air Force, Navy, Marines, and Army Aviation have been engaged in can be almost exactly described as "flying around and looking for targets." 

It's actually easier to name the few circumstances where pre-planned targets were a thing than it is to name those where they weren't. The early stages of OIF were largely pre-planned targets, but after the first week or so, it switched to mostly on-call CAS. OEF was almost exclusively on-call CAS, and Syria has been much of the same, except for the few instances where there have been retaliatory pre-planned strikes against fixed assets.

Indeed, most of the activity the A-10, F-16, F-15E, F/A-18, F-14, AV-8B, and AH-64D that we have modeled in DCS have really spent most of their time over the past few decades just flying around looking for targets. Most accounts from pilots involved in these operations go something to the effect of "we took off, flew to the Ops area, checked in, refueled, refueled again, got called to respond to a target a JTAC had identified, dropped a JDAM on it, refueled again, and went home after 6 hours."

You always get a rough steerpoint from people with boots on the ground. 

Especially if you have a JTAC, you rarely ever find something out of the blue and decide to engage it.

Edited December 19, 2023 by TobiasA
Double posted on the mobile

[probad]

On 12/18/2023 at 11:26 AM, davidrbarnette said:

Long story short, most real missions for the past 20 years haven't been pre-planned strikes. They've been pilots loitering, waiting on someone to pass them a target, whether through coordinates, a visual talk-on, or in most cases a combination of both.

this is still a far cry from the ad-hoc TOO engagements that gamers are desirous of. prompt TOO engagement capability is prized because the typical format of the game boils down to a footrace to see who can complete the chain from zero intel to kill faster than the competition. in reality, this is a cooperative task for the entire military, but for the gamer, it is typically a miniaturized and personal battle that starts on arrival at the ao and is fought against fellow competing gamers and self-expectation.

the typical a2g player is no less competitive about racking up his own score than any a2a pvper (perhaps even more so), and its from this narrowly self-serving perspective that many people judge the competency of an a2g platform. i consider it important to identify this tendency so to avoid conflating it with any discussions of realistic fidelity.

Edited December 20, 2023 by probad

[davidrbarnette]

1 hour ago, probad said:

this is still a far cry from the ad-hoc TOO engagements that gamers are desirous of. prompt TOO engagement capability is prized because the typical format of the game boils down to a footrace to see who can complete the chain from zero intel to kill faster than the competition. in reality, this is a cooperative task for the entire military, but for the gamer, it is typically a miniaturized and personal battle that starts on arrival at the ao and is fought against fellow competing gamers and self-expectation.

the typical a2g player is no less competitive about racking up his own score than any a2a pvper (perhaps even more so), and its from this narrowly self-serving perspective that many people judge the competency of an a2g platform. i consider it important to identify this tendency so to avoid conflating it with any discussions of realistic fidelity.

 

Oh for sure. I think I agree, and keep in mind, I don't find the F-16's systems to be "fiddly" at all, and don't have any problem employing it. My only point is that if it is "realism" you're after, the majority of the missions of the past few decades have been on-call CAS, not pre-planned strikes. Coincidentally, DCS can simulate this in a kind of "ok" fashion. The built-in JTAC gives a simple 9-line once you're on station, you plug it in as a steerpoint, slew the POD onto the target, designate, and drop. 

[Gunfreak]

2 hours ago, davidrbarnette said:

Oh for sure. I think I agree, and keep in mind, I don't find the F-16's systems to be "fiddly" at all, and don't have any problem employing it. My only point is that if it is "realism" you're after, the majority of the missions of the past few decades have been on-call CAS, not pre-planned strikes. Coincidentally, DCS can simulate this in a kind of "ok" fashion. The built-in JTAC gives a simple 9-line once you're on station, you plug it in as a steerpoint, slew the POD onto the target, designate, and drop. 

Hard to make planned missions when you are fighting people in black pyjamas with less military hardware then what certain South East Asian peasants had in the 1960.

There were of course planned attacks in 2003 and some now and then. And in the last few months both F16s and Stike Eagles have delivered planned strikes (basically playing taxi cab for some bombs)