Call Fighters to your location!

[Longjap]

Last night I was doing a campaign mission where I had to lead some troops to a checkpoint. So me and my wingman did the job, killed the air defenses, tanks, armored vehicles and I was proud to insert the JTAC 9-lines manually in the CDU. Everything went well, almost reached fence out till some pesky mig-29 showed up and shot me. And again, and again, (Yep, its an A-10 allright) and i was running through the radio options to find a phrase like HELP ME fast movers! To my horror I couldn't find any which resulted in a blown off tail and me hanging on a parachute. Wouldn't it be nice to have such an option? Maybe I've missed something, I'm fairly new to DCS.

Oh and hello all, and what an awesome sim!! Hooked like a hooker.

 

cheers!

[slug88]

The option is there in most (all?) of the Georgian Hammer campaign missions. Open any radio channel, hit F10 (other), then select the CAP (Combat Air Patrol) flight. The flights typically don't become available until you're well on the way to the target area.

 

Note, this won't call the friendly assets to your location; rather it will command them to advance from their holding positions to search for targets along their pre-planned flight path.

[Wags]

Indeed, as indicated in mission briefings.

 

Glad you are enjoying the game!

[Longjap]

Thx for the reply slug88, I'm aware of the others menu, and had already selected the CAP flights to proceed. Guess i wondered off of their/my flight path to much. What would an A-10 pilot do in real life? I think it would be nice to have a sort of distress call to notify the nearest fighters to your location to help the hog out? I've played Il-2 allot, and I remember me banging the tab-7 in A-10 instinctively which of course, didn't do anything. ;)

[Torment]

I haven't tried in game but under the communications options there is a "Cover Me" with the command defaulted to LWin + W

[RodBorza]

I think it is a shame most players out there don't even know that CAP and SEAD flighs are available to make the work easier for us, Hog pilots.

A good thing is to to have an "ear out" for AWACS calls. When "Magic" says that a bogey, is "hot", "40 miles", "10,000", it is time to call the cavalry. It means that a possible enemy fighter is coming (bogey, hot) and at 40 miles out gives the CAP flight enough time to come out of loitering position and start their patrol. The "10,000" is the enemy altitude, so, it is typically a fighter coming to intercept. Note that choppers will be called "bogey, hot, XX miles, low".

After you call the CAP, if you pay attention, you'll see that they will call out any enemies they find. Take note of the CAP callsign and wait for the "Fox 1", "Fox 2" calls.

The CAP route is more or less your route, they will inform the waypoint they are passing at a given moment. So, if they call "Passing Waypoint 1", look at your map and try and see that the fighters will show up via datalink on the TAD, close or on top of your own waypoints. Very cool to watch! :)

After they engage or if they didn't find anything, they will RTB. However, in the campaigns the CAP flights will be replenished as time passes. Again, pay attention to the guard frequency on your radio, because you will hear some flights being launched by a carrier (something like "Texaco flight, airborne"). And yep, there is a Navy carrier on the Black Sea, if you look at it, you'll see it's real nice.

And last, but not least, one thing that is recurrent on the campaign missions is that the first wave of fighters that will come after you,usually are Su-25s. Once they are engaged by the first CAP, you can do your mission with no worries.

However, to the end of the mission some nasty Mig-29's will show up. Be aware of the AWACS calls so that you'll know when they are coming. Look at the F10 menu, and there will be some new CAP flights avalable. Once the enemy gets to 40 miles, call the CAP and turn your nose towards frendly territory and dive to the deck. Luckily, the 29's will be shot down and you'll be home free.:thumbup:

Edited September 15, 2011 by RodBorza

[WildBillKelsoe]

cant you hook the mig on the TAD to a flight element via SEND 2514 or similar number? I think this is specificity...

 

Today, multiplayer, I had 2 guys, tiger shark and some other bloke, and they couldnt buddy lase.. I got shot twice by a cruiser or a destroyer (??).

 

Third time, I shot a maverick but grew tired.. They didnt have teamspeak, we used in-game chat. Point is, to know the network ID, place the TAD cursor over intended unit. usually its four digits.

Edited September 17, 2011 by WildBillKelsoe

[Nate--IRL--]

Enemy Aircraft are not shown on the TAD.

 

Nate

[cichlidfan]

Beat me to it Nate. I was wondering what NOC was hooking.;)

[WildBillKelsoe]

Enemy Aircraft are not shown on the TAD.

 

Nate

 

But they could be shown on the TAD. If you ask your wingman to engage bandits, he will set it as SPI, which appears on your TAD... All you gotta do next is to switch TGP to AA and long press V. There you go..