Devil's Cross 01A - from start to finish

[Tracer2k]

I have a maybe a bit dumb question, but how do i use the coordinates given from the JTAC, for example in your video MM152752

 

i have problems finding the right spot.. when i tried this, the JTAC did not send me any data.. he just gave me the coordinates, but i cant find the column just by using the coordinates

[Sinky]

hey zamboni... what stick are you flying with? I was surprised to see how smooth your flight was and noticed that you were flying with your gun armed the whole time.

 

Have you considered playing with your curves for you joystick axis's? Make's all the difference, you can achieve extremely smooth flight. It is not cheating at all, the real pilots have controls at the same sensitivity as a curve of 0 ( I think ). The fact that their control stick extends from the floor makes all the difference, the longer it is the more precision you have at the top end, something we don't get with our flight sticks. 'Least that's what I was told.

[Nate--IRL--]

Have you considered playing with your curves for you joystick axis's? Make's all the difference, you can achieve extremely smooth flight. It is not cheating at all, the real pilots have controls at the same sensitivity as a curve of 0 ( I think ). The fact that their control stick extends from the floor makes all the difference, the longer it is the more precision you have at the top end, something we don't get with our flight sticks. 'Least that's what I was told.

 

I wholeheartedly agree. Adjusting the curves and deadzone is almost required.

 

I use Curvature 30 and dead-zone 10 on both X and Y axis.

 

Nate

[zamboni]

I tried to record the second DC mission last night but was having problem with FRAPS. For some reason the Sim would freeze for about 3-4 seconds and at the end of the freeze, FRAPS had quit recording and there was no joy hitting the record button again. On the video above it happened to me on the ramp after I landed so it was no problem, but last night it happened to me in mid mission. Not sure what is going on. It may be because I was trying to record to an external USB HD and that drive was spinning down for some reason.

 

Black Razor,

Situational awareness is always a problem. Much more in a aircraft like the A-10 where you have no radar and you have to go round and round after each attack. It is not like a strike aircraft where you just have to go, bomb and get away, all in the flight plan. The good side however, is that you really have to learn to navigate: look at the compass (be it the digital on HUD or the backup on the canopy), use references on the ground to locate the enemy (liked the way you were looking at roads looking for enemy armor; it's a good tactic. :thumbup:); etc.

 

Unfortunately, my SA plain sucks. When I was recording the second mission last night I had my head down in the cockpit too long concentrating too much on what I wanted to do for my next guns run and BAM! Missile launch warning, Two missile launch warnings! Tried to start a CM program....where are the flares? I had ran out of flares! BOOM! BOOM! Luckily they only took out my Right MFD and I had a CICU warning light. I wasn't paying attention and drifted behind the enemy lines and into the range of an SA-13. I started to head back to base and then FRAPS quit on me :(. Stupid me, I deleted the files....should have posted it as a lesson in what not to do :).

 

Re: Brightness/Contrast in the MFDs

The white background map is just too bright for and I cant see the symbols on top of them....even though I lower the brightness I still feel that the symbols aren't bright enough, and feel I should be able to get them brighter. Cant have everything I guess :).

 

Re: Equipment

I probably should add it to my profile/signature so people wouldn't need to ask :)

 

AMD Phenom X4 955 Black Edition O/C to 4GHz

8GB RAM

500GB WD 7200RPM HD

HIS HD5770 1GB memory

Windows 7

HOTAS Cougar

Saitek Pro Flight Rudders

TrackIR 3Pro + Vector + Vector hat clip

 

Re: TrackIR

I cannot do without one. I think it is required for flight sims along with a good HOTAS setup. I liked the TrackIR so much I did a review of it years ago! (Cant believe it has been that long!).

 

I've had a bit of problem looking to the side and down and trying to keep a switch centered a bit. I think part of that has to do with the hat clip not being the best, and that the resolution of the TrackIR camera is showing its age. I am wondering if the track clip might work better. I upped the smoothness to max and it seems to help a bit though.

 

Re: Smoothness in flying

You know, I have a feeling that when I first started out in the sim I had very heavy loadouts and I usually ended up flying too slow. In those situations you can easily get yourself into stall situations where you have to learn how to fly lightly and smoothly with such a laden down hog. When you expend ordinance, it becomes much easier to fly, but you retain the smoothness (I'm just hypothesizing here).

 

I have my stick setup with a curve of 20 (no deadzone), I tried higher but didn't like it. Even at 20 I run into a problem of yanking a bit too much pitchwise and getting stall warnings...but again being smooth helps out. The stall warnings usually come when I yank the stick back just a little too much.

 

i have problems finding the right spot.. when i tried this, the JTAC did not send me any data.. he just gave me the coordinates, but i cant find the column just by using the coordinates

 

Right now there is a bug where JTAC will only send the datalink symbol when your GroupID is set to 01. Take a look at 0:20:45 in the video above. That is where I change the GroupID (at takeoff it is 02), I change it to 01.

[Tracer2k]

OH! well that explains it, thanks

[zamboni]

Ooohieee...

 

I DIDN'T delete the videos of the second mission (that didn't record completely). Sometime tomorrow I will try to post the video of it. I'm going to edit out the takeoff and stuff (and go through till the end when FRAPS gave up the ghost).

[zamboni]

Okie, here is a short video showing just what you shouldn't do in the waning parts of a mission.

 

 

At this point in the mission, all four of our flight have expended all mavs and CBUs (I loaded up with 4 mavs + 4 CBU97s + a little extra fuel). #3 was either shot down or RTB because of damage. Since our flight had only guns left, JTAC sent and ABORT! and then assigned us to go after the BMP-2s with guns.

 

A sane flight leader would have said "too dark, cant see targets...lets RTB and have a few brews". But not me. I decided to designate the BMP-2 with the TGP, and then put the pipper over the SPI in the HUD to see if I could be effective at taking out the BMPs. Because the gun pipper dot obscures the SPI in the HUD, I am only kinda guessing at where to aim. Goal was to attack from 2mi - 1.5 mi and break off before the BMPs got a bead on me.

 

When the video starts, I have already taken out maybe 2 BMPs and I'm about to go after the third. The columns were originally moving from west to east. There are no threats to the east, north or south. I'm trying to attack the BMPs from the side from the South.

 

When the video begins I roll in from the South and fire off a burst and egress to the SE, I pump chaff/flare on egress....but I don't notice that my flares go from LOW to N/L. On my next pass I come in from the South and stupidly egress to the WEST. I am now SW of the target.

 

Although you may want to call the AI stupid, they still have Eagle eyes. #4 shouts out "Air defense target 1 o'clock". Of course, I ignore him.....and then put the stupid label on me...what direction do I turn when I search for that last BMP-2?

 

You can guess what happens next. Fixated on the TGP, I ignore the RWR and launch signal for a couple of seconds and then BAM! Of course from above you can see that I had no flares even if I did act quickly enough. I was lucky enough to get out of dodge alive with only a broken left MFD.

 

I want to give a huge tip of my hat to the ED coders. When I first looked at the video I was blown away by just how good everything looks in this sim. The fading sunlight on the countryside looked marvelous, and when I zoomed in on the HUD, the town/city below looked so realistic with the streetlights etc. And to top it off, the view through the TGP on the MFD was stunning with the smoke remnants passing in front of the target in view. Top notch!

 

I went through the second mission last night again and was able to get the whole thing recorded via FRAPS. I'm going to get that together and try to post it sometime tonight.

[CaptKornDog]

Again, thank you very much for this video. Very helpful.

[zamboni]

Devil's Cross 02B video

 

 

In this CAS mission you are tasked to defeat an assault from the Motor Rifle Regiment attacking from the West. Your 4 person flight will be aided by AWACS, a CAP flight and a SEAD flight to help take out the major SAM threats.

 

For this mission I again loaded out our flight with 4AGM-65Ds + 4 CBU97s and a TGP pod. The ramp start, takeoff and ingress are uneventful. I circle at the CP and contact JTAC. He assigns us the tanks from one of the two regimental groups. When I first spot the column(s) with my TGP, the original two armor columns have split off into several columns showing a wider front.

 

We push from orbit and head towards the columns. As we head towards the targets, the column formation changes again and shows a broad line of T-80s with a line of BMP-2s behind and some Shilkas bring up the rear for AAA cover.

 

At around 8nm out I send #3 and #4 to attack the AAA guarding the columns with Mavs. Order #2 to hold 8 miles out. At this point, I decide to break right and flank the column from the North. My plan was to his the leading line of T-80s with a ripple of CBUs down the line to see how many I could take out. Then send in the rest of the flight to mop up with the Mavs they had left.

 

As I turn in on the line of tanks, I basically guess at the lead to give when release, and rely on the SPI diamond in the HUD. I pickle off the 4 CBUs and it ends up I did some significant damage to the line. The debrief showed I ended up taking out 11 of the tanks with that one pass :). On egress from the line I send in the rest of the flight to take out armor with their mavs as I pull back to a safe distance and height to wait.

 

After the flight finishes their attack I roll in to fir off my Mavs on the BMP-2s. I wanted to get rid of them because they cause havod with their guns when you are low and slow over the target....and right now the wingman AI when dropping unguided bombs, they get too close and too slow and are a prime target for the BMPs. When I take 3 of the BMPs out JTAC calls for a new target, the armored vehicles that are left in the advancing attack.

 

After getting the new target, I call for the rest of the flight to hit the armor with their CBUs while I fire off my last Mav. I hit one BMP with the mav and the flight takes out a couple with their first CBU run. I attempt to go guns on one tank and completely miss, but #4 comes in with a CBU run to that that last tank out. When that tank is destroyed JTAC comes in to tell us we have cleaned the area of threats.

 

Unfortunately #3 got taken out by one of the BMPs. A final scan of the area with the TGP and eyeball showing things he rest of us clear the area and head back to base.

 

Back at base the debrief shows that I took out 16 of the armored vehicles, with 11 of them coming from my CBU run. The mission score only turned out to be 75% though.

 

After the mission I opened it up in the ME to see how the points were distributed. You get 50 pts for starting the mission and 1 pt for landing. You are supposed to get 25 pts for delaying the column from reaching their destination and 25 points for completely wiping them out.

 

Turns out we didn't get the 25 for delaying the column, but I think the way the mission goes it will be very tough to get the delay points. The column doesn't stop and defend like they do in the first devil's cross mission, they keep charging forward. Totally destroying the units would be tough also because our flight barely took them all out even with my 11 kills on my CBU run.

 

As it turns out, the flag for the points are kinda screwed up in they reference the wrong flags. Something that should be addressed by the developers (or you could go in and edit the mission yourself to correct it if you feel like doing so).

 

Although this mission didn't net us the complete 100% score, I felt this mission to be more satisfying than the first Devil's Cross mission. Our flight of 4 ended up taking all of the armor out, and surely helped save the lives of some of our retreating forces. The lighting was tricky here, NVGs would be no use here, good use of the IR Mavs and IR from the TGP helped spot the armor and put weapons on target (even though I was guestimating on how much lead I needed on dropping my CBUs).

 

We will see what is store for us in Mission three next time!

[Zenra]

Very nicely executed, zam. Thanks for another excellent video and AAR!

[fael097]

guys, JTAC wont send target data to my TAD? am i doing something wrong? it simply says "stand by data" and after that "you're clear to engage" but no red signs on my TAD. what am i supposed to do?

[Nate--IRL--]

Due to a bug in 1.1.0.7 you will need to set your Datalink Group ID and OWN ID to 01 on the TAD. See pg 319 of the manual.

 

Nate

[hassata]

Awesome

[fael097]

great, thank you Nate

Edited May 9, 2011 by fael097

[Xxx]

Hey Zamboni, great videos! Lets people see a complete mission.

 

Just a question, what did you use to compress 50 GB of FRAPS video file to 2GB for YouTube?

 

I Use the "Track" feature and then use FRAPS (Its the free version, so 30 seconds and then press record again!) That way it forces me to edit more ruthlessly. But obviously some action will go onto the cutting room floor! I then use my video editor to finalise the clips and add titles etc.

 

Cheers.:thumbup:

[fael097]

btw, how do you change your weapons on the ramp? you managed to switch your cbu 87s by cbu 97s, but if you can do that, so you should be able to change all your payload, am i wrong?

[zamboni]

Hey Zamboni, great videos! Lets people see a complete mission.

 

Just a question, what did you use to compress 50 GB of FRAPS video file to 2GB for YouTube?

 

I Use the "Track" feature and then use FRAPS (Its the free version, so 30 seconds and then press record again!) That way it forces me to edit more ruthlessly. But obviously some action will go onto the cutting room floor! I then use my video editor to finalise the clips and add titles etc.

 

I tried to use the track feature, but invariably something would be busted with the .trk and it would end up way different than the mission actually happened. For example in one mission I had an explosion (not caused by me) that took out a bridge. The caused the column to pile up and I used that to my advantage. When I went to use the .trk to record. The bridge was intact, and when I went to destroy them in the .trk, they just rolled on through because the bridge wasn't destroyed :(.

 

That is why I settled on recording with FRAPS as I fly the mission. I have the full version of FRAPS. so I just hit the record button and FRAPS records continually through the flight....although it breaks up the video into 4 GB chunks. The first mission in the OP I think it netted me about 16 different files each of 4GB.

 

Because I wasn't trying to do extensive editing, I could have loaded the first video into VirtualDub and then use the Append command to add all the other parts of the video. Would have added a little title at the beginning and then did compression using the Xvid codec for final .avi export. That would have decreased the size quite a bit.

 

I didn't do it that way because I have been trying to test out Adobe Premiere. I threw all of the video segments in there and, did a title and some other minor tweaks and then exported it using the MainConcept H.264 video codec. I selected 2 pass VBR encoding and tweaked the Target Bitrate to give me an estimated File size under the 2GB limit for YouTube. Luckily the quality was pretty good at the bitrate that I chose.

 

btw, how do you change your weapons on the ramp? you managed to switch your cbu 87s by cbu 97s, but if you can do that, so you should be able to change all your payload, am i wrong?

 

I didn't actually change my loadout. I had selected the CBU-97s in the mission editor. What I was doing on the Ramp was going into the Inventory page and changing the burst height for the CBUs from the default 500ft to 700 ft. It didnt switch the weapons.

[Xxx]

Thanks. Adobe Premiere? I will look it up.

 

(EDIT..Its 600 pounds over here in old Blighty!!I will stick to my old method for now and defer to your professionalism!)

 

Looks very cool, your results are astounding. I mean, 50 GB to 2GB with that excellent quality..:thumbup:

 

I have seen some odd things with the track facility, mostly on BS, since I am a recent convert to A10c! Its a mystery to me?

 

Cheers.

Edited May 10, 2011 by Accipiter

[fael097]

I didn't actually change my loadout. I had selected the CBU-97s in the mission editor. What I was doing on the Ramp was going into the Inventory page and changing the burst height for the CBUs from the default 500ft to 700 ft. It didnt switch the weapons.

ahhh ok, now that explains a lot. thank you

[RodBorza]

Zamboni,

 

Man, thanks for uploading another great video.

Very high def, well executed, good flight management (ok, apart from #3, where did he got his flying license???:doh:) and nice line-up on the bombing run! (Eleven tanks in a row is no small feat).:smilewink:

 

Well, I would like to make what I believe to be a constructive critic. I know, I know, it is easy to talk about after everything is said and done, but I think it will help you, me and all others in the future:

 

1) From 27:36 to 28:50 on your video, I think you lost too much time looking at/for the targets. I know, decision making when confronted with a previously unseen situation is very difficult.

Anyway, I believe that for the future, when facing 6(!) columns as you were facing you could send #2 after air defenses, #3 and #4 after the two columns on the left (or right, whatever) and you firing a MAV at the point tanks at each remaining column when in range. And doing that fast, not giving the chance of them going line abreast.

This way I think you could stop the columns and cause general confusion. Also, the AI wingmen although not very intelligent on their use of Mavericks, since they will spend them all in one pass and not just one on the point vehicle, but at least they would destroy their assigned tanks and that would be two less columns to worry about.

I think that after this it would be just a matter of releasing CBUs on a bunch of sitting ducks.

I know it is easier said than done, since enemy behavior is not always what we expect to be, but I think that would be a valid tactic to stall the enemy and get the remaining 25% of the goals in the mission.

 

I believe that mission goals in this particular case had to do with tanks crossing a pre-determined line in the map. Although you got them all destroyed, they've kept moving and already had reached their pre-set objectives when you got to them.

 

2) From 48:00-48:25 - Your gun run on BMPs. Regarding gun usage I agree with cobrabase when he says that tanks are too tough to destroy in this game. But, and you assumed right, BMPs are not a match for the gun. However, you really need to get up close and personal when using the GAU-8. I think you fired from too afar, when the range circle was about the 12'o clock to 11 o'clock position.

For soft skinned targets you need to fire it when the range circle is at the 9 o'clock to 6 o'clock position. This way you have better chance of concentrating fire in a single point. In your run although you had the piper right on target, you can see in the TGP screen that the shots were too far spread out (you can see the secondary explosions all around the target, but not on it, unfortunately). :(

 

And I really don't know how you were able to see it in the dark, but congrats on that. I really would like that the gun piper would not obscure the TGP diamond. That would be a really great help on gun runs.:D

 

Well, that's it. I feel like the sports newscaster who has just sitted through a game and now has all the right solutions and answers AFTER the game has been played, but the intention is to help and exchange ideas.

 

See you around and maybe someday we can multiplayer togheter.

 

P.S.: And I really hope that the helicopter pilots to be alive and well.:thumbup:

Edited May 12, 2011 by RodBorza
Grammar, new ideas and such.

[zamboni]

Just added some raw footage from the attack in the previous mission. I know my video making skeels suck but wanted to give it that "man with a camera in the middle of who knows what action". It is also hard to control the movement with the mouse when you are at full zoom...also...it sucks that my CBU-97 bomb run was basically blocked by the trees :(.

 

 

Rod, thanks for the feedback, I know what you are saying about wasted time...but I don't feel like I did waste time though. Main reason is because I didn't want to rush into the area without letting SEAD do their job. No use jumping in on the columns when you end up spending time dodging SAMs that SEAD hadn't gotten to yet instead of firing off Mavs :).

 

When I got the target from JTAC, I started straight at the columns, I held back on the speed so I didn't get to the target too fast (the whole SEAD thingy). Even with holding back speed I was still going around 230 on ingress. Most of my time looking at the target was me just checking things out and wasting time until the flight got within Mavs range. I cut loose the second element to attack the AAA right about 8-9nm out. No use letting them go at it any sooner, I think.

 

I had already thought about letting #2 go for the AAA, and saving the second element mavs for the tanks....but the previous time I did this mission, I DID send #2 for the AAA, but he only went 3 for 4 on the Shilkas leaving one of them. I didn't want to run the risk of him missing one or two of them while I swung around for my bombs run....so I sent #3 and #4 in to make sure they were taken out.

 

As for sending #3 and #4 for one side or the other of the formation....I would if I could trust them to actually attack the targets I tell them to :). I had previously did some testing and they seem to attack the first target they find within a 5000m radius. If I tell them to attack the left side and a column on the right side is closer, I believe they would attack the ones on the right instead. Maybe they will get the AI tweaked sometime and they will be better. I also probably could have told them to attack the left side from the south or something....but I just didn't want to experiment in the middle of a mission.

 

As for the gun run I did. I wasn't sure if the wingies had any CBUs left. There was one tank left and I decided to give it a pie in the sky shot. Totally missed with the guns though. Hard to hit anything when you are completely relying on HUD symbology to line things up. Heard the wingman call he was going on his attack run, I should have broke my run off at the time but I said "what the hell", good things his bombs were on target, not sure If I could have gotten him with it so dark out there.

 

One of these days I will actually fire up multiplayer, haven't tried it yet. Gonna have to do it sometime soon.

[RodBorza]

Rod, thanks for the feedback, I know what you are saying about wasted time...but I don't feel like I did waste time though. Main reason is because I didn't want to rush into the area without letting SEAD do their job. No use jumping in on the columns when you end up spending time dodging SAMs that SEAD hadn't gotten to yet instead of firing off Mavs :).

 

Ops, sorry man. I totally missed the fact that SEAD still had to finish its job. I am a heavy user of support flights and I should have noticed that. :doh:

 

I had already thought about letting #2 go for the AAA, and saving the second element mavs for the tanks....but the previous time I did this mission, I DID send #2 for the AAA, but he only went 3 for 4 on the Shilkas leaving one of them. I didn't want to run the risk of him missing one or two of them while I swung around for my bombs run....so I sent #3 and #4 in to make sure they were taken out.

 

As for sending #3 and #4 for one side or the other of the formation....I would if I could trust them to actually attack the targets I tell them to :). I had previously did some testing and they seem to attack the first target they find within a 5000m radius. If I tell them to attack the left side and a column on the right side is closer, I believe they would attack the ones on the right instead. Maybe they will get the AI tweaked sometime and they will be better. I also probably could have told them to attack the left side from the south or something....but I just didn't want to experiment in the middle of a mission.

 

Well, this is the problem with the whole "sportscaster experience": not knowing what the other previously had tested and experimented with before. About the wingies AI, you are right: they do attack the first thing they see, not that smart to attack this or that column. But, you may have given the answer right there: "I also probably could have told them to attack the left side from the south or something...." Maybe, this will make a difference, so wingmen may attack the desired columns. Something to be tested in the future.

 

As for the gun run I did. I wasn't sure if the wingies had any CBUs left. There was one tank left and I decided to give it a pie in the sky shot. Totally missed with the guns though. Hard to hit anything when you are completely relying on HUD symbology to line things up. Heard the wingman call he was going on his attack run, I should have broke my run off at the time but I said "what the hell", good things his bombs were on target, not sure If I could have gotten him with it so dark out there.

 

One of these days I will actually fire up multiplayer, haven't tried it yet. Gonna have to do it sometime soon.

 

Well, I understand. Even when wingmen have bombs or MAVs left, it is good to try and use that big gun. I think that crew chiefs would give the pilots a frown if they ever come back with the munition drum full. :D

But you were right, too dark, and not being able to use NVGs, with the sun setting on one side and shadows on the other.

 

But, nice tactics. This game is challenging and sometimes I have the impression they gave you more than what the A-10 can chew. But learning, exchanging ideas, trying different things, it is all part of the fun. :thumbup:

[sofie_59]

Nice video!

But in# 4.14 what are you doing?

There is some numbers that just pop up!

16B

37C

63S

And yes i have RTFM but dont find any description enywere.

[Nate--IRL--]

Brightness and contrast for MFCD I'd guess. Pg99. of the manual.

 

Nate

[zamboni]

Devil's Cross 03B

 

 

Here is the third installment of the Devil's Cross series. The commentary on this mission is going to be a bit short because -- for this mission the times I have played through it -- there really isn't that much for you to do. The enemy tank columns are rolling into a defensive tank position that has a superior defensive position and is set to get slaughtered regardless of the CAS support.

 

Again for this mission I loaded out 4 Mavs and 4 CBU-97s. I didn't even use any of em :).

 

When I reached the CP, contacted JTAC, got target and then sent the second element in to take out air defenses. Then sent in #2 to take out some armor. You'll probably notice that I end up losing the target in the TGP. I spend a bunch of time trying to find them again. I had to resort to visually looking for smoke of the taken out tanks and using the HUD to set SPI and then slew the TGP to that.

 

By the time I decide to try and take out some armor myself, JTAC contacts me to say that there aren't any left. I took a look around (turned on the labels to make sure :) ), and then turned around to head for home. In this mission if you or your flight cant take the enemy tanks out yourself, your tanks in a superior position will take them out. All that is left is to return home and bank your 100% mission score. Although you didn't get any kills for yourself, you did let your flight rack up some shacks and gain some experience :).