Realistic sucks...

[leroy1964]

I just got back into DCS Blackshark and have set everything to realistic, because I figure might as well play the game for real. Couple of points I have noticed, the trim sucks, I manually set the chopper's speed, heading, altitude etc and then hit the "T" key keep it held until happy and let it go and the chopper does a complete nose dive and goes from 500ft to crashing into the ground, what the heck???

 

Secondly, I slow down to get ready for landing or just some slow low flying and the chopper starts drifting sides even when I adjust with rudder, most of the time it is drifting to my left. I am sure my joystick is calibrated, so why is this happening? This morning it drifted me into the side of a building???:doh:

 

Which brings me to my third point, if the pilot (me) cannot even get the chopper to hold level flight, and or hover and or basically after trim fly and hold alt without spinning, drifting, losing altitude, etc etc, how am I supossed to be able to go "hands free" and view over displays and push buttons for other stuff???:cry:

 

I guess it means I should go back to "Game settings" but I reckon that spoils this otherwise fine sim.:pilotfly:

 

Finally just when you probably thought it couldn't get much worse, I finally land the chopper (rough at that) and once I realse the stick the chopper, starts "rolling along" trying to turn left and generally do it's own thing, so unless I keep control of the chopper (as in hands on joystick 24/7) the chopper bouncess around like a kid on a trampoline and such. :joystick:

 

I have been in a few choppers (as a passenger in my Army days) and although I was in the back they didn't do all the stuff that happens in this game, maybe the old Huey was a more stabile machine? anyway the flight dynamics of this sim must be all stuffed, or I just suck at the game, (maybe a little of both).

 

So I have vented, but I would love to hear what others would like to contribute to my points, lastly, shouldn't one be able to lift off and climb say to 50-100ft and just hover there "hands free" (without the use of the hover button) and not have the chopper go nuts?:joystick:

 

Cheers all, venting over.:cry:

[dburne]

Your post sounds like the way I was feeling about a week or so ago. Seemed like I was never going to learn to be able to control this bird. But after lots of practice and lots of reading up on these forums, I seemed to have finally developed the hang of it. I know at one point I certainly wanted to vent myself in much the same fashion as you are now.

 

All I can say is keep working at it, read up on these forums - a lot - especially the stickied threads. They are very helpful.

 

A week ago I could hardly keep the chopper in the air, now I can hover low, even without auto hover, point it and make it go where I want, and am even starting to be able to blow stuff up now. Not very proficient at blowing stuff up yet, but am working on that now...

 

Hang in there, don't let it get to ya, and good luck!

[astrospud]

Stay with it Leroy.

Your perseverance will pay off.

Just a couple of questions.

Have you checked to se if your autopilots for pitch, roll and yaw are on? They are the little blue, square buttons on the righthand lower panel, just south of your nav aid panel.

If these are not illuminated, then you're going to struggle. They dampen your inputs, so that you won't be fighting the cyclic all the time.

Second, and this is a point, and not a question; when the chopper is drifting sideways, if you are going to correct with rudder, will only be bringing it from side slip to forward or backward movement. Counter any lateral movement with gentle opposite lateral input on the cyclic.

Lastly, trim, trim , trim.

It seems counterintuitive, but having you cyclic recentred after every input - even when banked and climbing - is very important for keeping control.

Just so you have a 'handle' on the control regime, switch in the Controls Indicator (Ctrl+Enter). This will give you real time info on where your trimmed inputs are in relation to the neutral state of your controls. You will see what I mean when you trim first time.

The idea, as far as I can tell, is this; Hold trim, move controls, release trim, release controls for new attitude/heading.

Getting the coordination right is the hard part for me. letting the trim go at the right time and also recentring the cyclic can be a struggle.

 

Stay with it, mate. In time you will tame the beast!

[Triangle99]

Sure you can lift off into a hover and rise as high as you like but it won't happen the first time. The chopper is very sensitive and you will need to continually make minute cyclic corrections to keep it at 0km/h - likely it will bank to one side and start drifting so you will need to counter with a slight pull of the cyclic in the other direction. You will need to practice and learn the nuances of the Ka-50s flight dynamics.

 

When I first started with DCS it was crash, crash, crash every five minutes, straight into the ground. I was discouraged. However, I kept practising (I have a training mission I wrote for myself involving take-off, fly waypoints, destroy targets and land) and have probably flow it 30 times. Now, I can rise straight into a stable hover without need for the auto-hover at any height, perform rolling take-offs, hard turns etc. Practice, practice, practice and then practice some more. When it all suddenly starts to 'click', it is a wonderfully satisfying feeling :-)

 

Oh yeah - and watch the producer's notes as often as you can :-)

Edited September 20, 2009 by Triangle99
Forgot to mention

[Martillo1]

Well, you can also turn and change angles without pressing trim, but when you want to trim the new attitude, depress the button and wait a bit instead of just clicking on-off. In the wait do not be idle, but correct the parasite trends that always happen thanks to the Yaw AP channel.

 

This method allows me to turn without pressing Trim all the way, something very useful to keep the right thumb free for other HOTAS buttons :joystick:

[Cionara]

Yea the trim is a b*tch but when you learn how to deal with and how it works it's very easy. Just center the stick very quickly after pressing trim and it won't dive that much (if you have a non forcefeedback joystick).

[26-J39]

When i first was learning to fly, i found it really helpful to keep the Heading Hold off ( L-Shift H) and just keep the Pitch & Bank AP's on.. This allows you to fly the bird without heading hold pulling you in the wrong direction.

e.g- When in forward flight and you think you are trimmed good.. turn off Heading Hold and you will most probably see the heli suddenly yaw one way or another, this is because your heading hold was pulling or had some authority in holding your "trimmed position"). I only use heading hold really when in a hover, if you are trimmed well in forward flight you don't really even need it and the benefit is that you can dodge and turn and evade without ever pressing the trim button..:thumbup:

[astrospud]

Thanks for the update guys.

So, I would assume that HH is only useful in a hovering attack/view position, using turn to target? So, by switching it off, I am able to fly low and fast in close terrain without trimming? If so, that sounds more like flying to me! :D

I am going to jump on a training mission right now and give it a go!

[TKMR]

It's very useful if there is wind trying to turn your helicopter, or yes if you are trying to do an overview hover. If you have it on, you can still do emergency maneuvers to avoid buildings, or hills, the helo will just take longer to start yawing, take longer to yaw, and then begin to yaw back to the original heading once you are done with your awesome-spinny-maneuver of d00m. It helps you bank, and fly sideways easier as well.

 

You should ALWAYS be moving during an attack though. I really wish I had TrackIR for this reason... trying to pan my view + fly + lock targets with shkval = DIFFICULT.

 

Leroy: Sounds you are fighting the AP a lot... read the manual, and do the training missions. It WILL help. I know it's a daunting task, and I didn't want to do it either. I flew for awhile before doing it, and never did really well. But after I started reading the manual, and doing the training missions I've become a lot better. I still haven't finished, but I control the helo now, the helo doesn't control me. ;)

Edited September 20, 2009 by TKMR

[MTFDarkEagle]

Practice makes perfect! keep flying! how frustrating it still can be, keep flying!

If you dont have one, get a TrackIR. It really helps! its again a step backwards when you first try it, but when your used to it it will be 104658259760857 steps forward. That's how it was for me in any case :)

[VS461]

Hi Leroy,

 

practice, practice, practice... or "learn, learn, learn", as Mr Lenin said:). I fly helos IRL, so controlling this beast was not as hard as I can remember my very first real flights:D. To learn how to control a helicopter, it requires full attention, no weapon system, navigation etc. in the first couple of hours, let's say 15-20 or more (don't wanna frighten you).

 

Take-off, land, hover, traffic circuits, basic maneuvers like acceleration, brake, controlled turns, climb, descend, then advanced maneuvers and aerobatics, hour after hour until it becomes a fun, before you start to bother nav and weapons.

 

And yeh, BS's trimmer and autopilot are tricky ones, they must be in the top five in numbers of threads on ED forum:D. Trimming is unnatural, it's made for people mostly have non-FFB sticks. You can try various methods: push and hold trim, maneuver, release the trim, center the controls is one method. I prefer continuous trimming in pitch angle (speed) and make turns without trimming, but I use Flight Director. Well... it might not be an aid but you should read BS threads here about trim and AP usage, try the methods and choose the best for you.

 

Another IRL story: rookies often ask for advice about trimming, instructors often tell the basic two methods and say "... but you must coose your preferred one".

 

Practice, mate, and it will be real fun as you can, for example, land on a roof within 30 secs, from a 250 kph level flight, no matter which roof you've chosen around you.

 

Cheers!

[Shaman]

You can't learn this over night. You need to accumulate tens of FH to feel more confidence and understand the machine better.

[VMFA117_Poko]

Arcade sux!

[dburne]

leroy 1964:

Have a look at post# 47 in the following thread:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=44165&page=5

 

And have a look at this one as well:

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=731504&postcount=8

 

I made those changes and it really helped me using the new trim fuction that came with the patch.

 

And as TKMR suggests, use those training missions! Once I had progressed to the flying the traffic pattern training mission, I stayed there for quite a while, reading up and practicing, practicing , practicing till I could fly the traffic pattern and land safely on the runway.

 

Best of luck,

Edited September 20, 2009 by dburne

[SnowTiger]

I have a question for "MTFDarkEagle" regarding your comment about TrackIR.

In your post you said "it really helps! its again a step backwards when you first try it ...."

 

I wonder what you mean by that ?

I am hoping/planning to purchase TrackIR 5 within the next month (Xmas at the very latest). I don't even want to learn too much until then because I am still in the early stages of figuring out the best Button Assignments on my X-52 (and now with rudder pedals too).

 

I can appreciate that it probably takes a bit of getting used to, in order to refine TrackIR to one's liking, but is it that much of a draw-back initially ?

Or does one just have to learn to stop looking around the room and every girl that walks by and/or stop trying to scratch your head and eat sandwiches while flying with it ? Or all of that ?

 

I have little doubt that TrackIR is a HUGE advantage once mastered (and I trust that is your point), but I am just curious what type of a learning curve does come with using it ?

Can you please provide some examples of things that happen that make it "a step backwards" when first using it ?

 

Thanks in advance.

PS> If you don't wish to reply in this thread (since I have just changed the topic in this thread .. no offense to the original poster), you are welcome to PM me instead if you prefer.

 

Have a great day and happy flights everyone.

[sobek]

I have little doubt that TrackIR is a HUGE advantage once mastered (and I trust that is your point), but I am just curious what type of a learning curve does come with using it ?

 

Well i guess nobody that ever tried headtracking will ever again doubt that it is an enormous help with flying. The learning curve is not really steep. What's a bit of a struggle probably is getting everything set up properly (at least with free track). I guess you'll be handling it like a pro after one week.

[CAT_101st]

Well i guess nobody that ever tried headtracking will ever again doubt that it is an enormous help with flying. The learning curve is not really steep. What's a bit of a struggle probably is getting everything set up properly (at least with free track). I guess you'll be handling it like a pro after one week.

 

Freetrack took me a little to set up ut it works great and I don't think I culd fly with out it. Head tracking in the helo is a big plus. you need to be able to swing your head around fast for gitting a refranc points in hovering and landing. One of my mercenarie pilots finly got his FT working right and he is a difrint pilot now smoth and has much better SA.

 

As for the flying and bucking around, It's just gitting flight time I have over 500hs of online flight time. But when I first started I had the same problems you are having bouncing yawing allover the place. there are thing you are doing wrong and don't even know it. :doh: Make sure you read the manual dont just learn enough to blow things up there is so much to learn in this choper that will help you in flying and employing weapon system's :book:

 

And one other thing if you dont have a forc feed back stick you need to turn off the FF in a Lua file. I am thinking this is your problem with the trim. (DO NOT EDIT Lua FILES WITH OUT USING NP++ you can crupt the files)

[muamshai]

I destroyed 53 helis, and costed a litte bit of money to taxpapers before I learned how to fly this machine, and how to be back in one piece (and how to spot a sweet spot before shooting)...

 

..of course I am talking about game heli :D

[leroy1964]

Many many thanks

 

All the replies were excellent and informative. I am going to stick with "realistic settings" and as all of you said it takes many hours. Again, I was just venting after one bad training session after another. The game is superb and sounds amazing on 7.1 speakers with the volume cranked up (the wife told me to turn it down) and she was in the lounge room.:music_whistling:

 

Anyway, many thanks.

 

Cheers:thumbup:

[diveplane]

SMALL INPUTS no f16 here... constant trim

[Triangle99]

All the replies were excellent and informative. I am going to stick with "realistic settings" and as all of you said it takes many hours. Again, I was just venting after one bad training session after another. The game is superb and sounds amazing on 7.1 speakers with the volume cranked up (the wife told me to turn it down) and she was in the lounge room.:music_whistling:

 

Good man :-) You won't regret it. Truly the hardest but far and away the best air simulation I have ever flown. Incredibly immersive and just so much fun :-)

[Pyroflash]

Good luck, and something I found helpful is to trim the A/C once in forward flight to stop it from moving around all over. If you do that, just remember to trim it back into a hover once you stop flying forward.

[ruprecht]

Everyone's been there mate. You will get it - you just have to "do your time" before the hover fairy taps you with her wand and it all slots into place.

 

One tip - map a HOTAS button to "cancel trim" - if it all seems too weird, hit that and at least you know your trim is centred.

 

Another tip - use the flight director when not hovering. Much smoother. Just don't forget to turn it off when you try to autohover :)

 

Good luck man.

[GGTharos]

One tip - map a HOTAS button to "cancel trim" - if it all seems too weird, hit that and at least you know your trim is centred.

 

You mean 'reset trim', right? It resets it to the 'landed at rest' position which can easily get you killed in flight.

[ruprecht]

Yes, reset. If the alternative is crashing because you have accumulated trim settings that are throwing you off, it is useful. And the OP seems more concerned about trim issues in the hover or near to, where the trim reset won't "easily get you killed". it also fixes the trampoline issue on the ground if one lands with significant trim on.

So yes, it's useful.

Edited September 21, 2009 by ruprecht