Question(s) about Pave Spike, GBU-24, Jester, and steering the bomb from the front seat

[jubuttib]

Wanted to ask about this before I go and make a full bug post, in case I'm missing something:

I'm trying to get to grips with dropping GBU-24s onto command centers when flying solo. My problem currently is that when I tell Jester to start tracking a spot on the ground with the context button, he initially establishes a good track, on the left I get a solid bottom bar and a solid top bar (or sometimes flashing top bar if I do it too far), but after either pulling up from the dive (12-vis designation) or trying to move the cursor myself with the extra bindings (Pilot's temporary [WSO] hand control bindings) they both start flashing, indicating that he has stopped lasing. Pressing the context button again in this situation boresights the pod, so I have to turn around and start all over again.

So far the only way I have managed to get a solid track with lasing is by hopping to the backseat myself, and doing the trigger full action to command tracking and lasing.

So the process ends up being like this:

1. Fly plane towards the target, with everything set for a TGP drop.

2. Dive towards the target, hit Jester Context Action to initiate tracking.

3. Pull out of dive, settle into level flight on autopilot.

4. By now the bars are both flashing, so I hop to the backseat and command trigger full action, and maybe finesse the aim a bit.

5. Hop back into the front seat, hold pickle and follow guidance until drop.

6. After drop trim the plane for level flight on autopilot again.

7. Hop back to the backseat and make sure the laser is firing, finesse the aim (if I finesse the aim from the front, it tends to stop lasing).

 

Clearly this isn't how it's supposed to work, any ideas what I could do to solve this?

EDIT: Or is the incapability to keep lasing expected, and I just need to map more of the [WSO] commands?

EDIT2: Quickly tested mapping the [WSO] challenge and trigger commands too, and this seems to be the way to go, not using Jester context at all.

Edited September 10, 2024 by jubuttib

[Zabuzard]

7 hours ago, jubuttib said:

Wanted to ask about this before I go and make a full bug post, in case I'm missing something:

I'm trying to get to grips with dropping GBU-24s onto command centers when flying solo. My problem currently is that when I tell Jester to start tracking a spot on the ground with the context button, he initially establishes a good track, on the left I get a solid bottom bar and a solid top bar (or sometimes flashing top bar if I do it too far), but after either pulling up from the dive (12-vis designation) or trying to move the cursor myself with the extra bindings (Pilot's temporary [WSO] hand control bindings) they both start flashing, indicating that he has stopped lasing. Pressing the context button again in this situation boresights the pod, so I have to turn around and start all over again.

So far the only way I have managed to get a solid track with lasing is by hopping to the backseat myself, and doing the trigger full action to command tracking and lasing.

So the process ends up being like this:

1. Fly plane towards the target, with everything set for a TGP drop.

2. Dive towards the target, hit Jester Context Action to initiate tracking.

3. Pull out of dive, settle into level flight on autopilot.

4. By now the bars are both flashing, so I hop to the backseat and command trigger full action, and maybe finesse the aim a bit.

5. Hop back into the front seat, hold pickle and follow guidance until drop.

6. After drop trim the plane for level flight on autopilot again.

7. Hop back to the backseat and make sure the laser is firing, finesse the aim (if I finesse the aim from the front, it tends to stop lasing).

 

Clearly this isn't how it's supposed to work, any ideas what I could do to solve this?

EDIT: Or is the incapability to keep lasing expected, and I just need to map more of the [WSO] commands?

EDIT2: Quickly tested mapping the [WSO] challenge and trigger commands too, and this seems to be the way to go, not using Jester context at all.

 

Jester currently only lases for 2 seconds to get good range info. He is not ready to lase for a bomb drop yet. You are supposed to bind the temporary WSO binds of the Antenna Hand Stick. You do not have to go to the backseat for that, thats why there are the [WSO] binds in the Pilot bind list

Jester context command can be used to just get the pod quickly locked into the enemy area, from where you can then fine tune with the Antenna Stick yourself and start lasing whenever you like by hitting its trigger. Jester will of course eventually learn to operate the pod, but for the meantime the Context Command is just meant as an aid for you to transition from flying the plane to operating the pod, allowing you to put the nose on the target area, lock the pod on the target area, perhaps level out again and enabling the autopilot to then transition your hand from the flight stick to the Antenna Stick for Pave Spike operation.

The main reason why Jester doesnt just keep lasing is because the correct procedure is to only lase on the final ~10s before impact, not all the way down. So this would require some advanced coding on Jesters part first. Lasing during the entire attack is problematic because the Pave Spike is so sensitive to any aircraft movement that bombs will chase the laser on any unintentional wobbling and then bleed their energy.

That said, if you want to drop dumb bombs you can do it with Jester Context Action alone in a single go, similar to Dive Toss, provided you can hold the camera on the target accurately enough that it does not need any fine adjustment.

[jubuttib]

Cheers! I guess where I got confused was that I'd only ever seen the Antenna Stick _axis_ bindings before, wasn't even aware that the buttons were there before I went looking yesterday.