sk000tch

its... beautiful... have same bit kit btw, probably favorite gift i've received in years.

Its a frustration at times because you have to find a different solution to what's usually bound to it, but on every module I have the paddle switch bound as a modifier. It opens ever hat/button/switch on the WH to a second use - so, for example, unshifted hat is trim, shifted hat is left-left click, right-right click, up-scroll wheel up, down-scroll wheel down. Center VR, various other things I would have room for (NVG gain, changing f-18 CM programs, hood, launch bar, probe, JHMCS knob, AA/AG modes), are all on hotas. I rarely if ever take my hands off. Useful on other modules as well. I have VR zoom as left pinky toggle (forward), and as shifted trigger. Fire gun is trigger obviuosly, but also shifted full pull. So straffing, if I want, I can pull the paddle and autozoom as I engage PAC, or not. I've tried a lot of setups, and while bindings are personal preference, this is hands down best i've used

I believe just about every ‘gaming’ cpu since Broadwell has been quad core, so that’s over 5-years. People run all kinds of stuff though, how many times have you seen a post on Hoggit from somebody through the roof excited after saving for a Black Friday rift to fly FC3 planes on a 10 year old laptop? PC market is small already, hardcore sims with modules that take most people a year to learn (if they ever do), are a fraction of that. I certainly don’t blame devs or publishers for keeping minimum reqs as low as possible, and it keep community bigger, which is good for everyone. I agree though. Obviously everyone would want better performance, I’m just not sure where it falls in the priority list with all the stuff they have in the pipeline. What would you choose? Feature complete hornet, viper EA? Or an improved engine?

I think your taking this a bit personal, almost like getting pissed when you see someone with a yacht. I do agree the post comes off the way you describe, but people put hardware in their sigs all the time. I’m not sure the difference. That said, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to want your game of choice to utilize your hardware effectively. Coding for a variety of hardware has always been a challenge for PC devs, some do it well, others don’t. When they don’t, it’s fair ground to bitch, especially for a game with relatively high reqs. I actually think DCS, for all its complexities (and limitations), utilizes hardware pretty well. I don’t swing it around on forums, but I spent some money on myself over the holidays and upgraded from a 6700k/1080ti to 9900k/2080ti on a custom loop, and the difference is substantial. Now, that is going from high end hardware to the highest possible consumer grade, and as I said, there’s a significant upgrade. Not just in fps, but in fidelity. I play almost exclusively VR, at 1.5 pd, msaa at 4x, all view distances/eye candy maxed, it is smooth as silk dropping to 45ish only in congested MP scenarios, running VA, vaicom, srs, and tacview. Still some distracting occasional issues, clouds popping, stuff like that. Network issues are another matter. They are generally minor though, and scenery/lighting, models, gauge readability all very much imporived (I could not run any msaa on the 1080). I barely play anything else. If I play track IR at 1080 or 1440 then yes, the difference will not be as significant. I don’t know why people are pretending like BF5 is a shining example of hardware utilization. I applaud their pioneering RTX features, but on a 2080ti at 2100/8000 the game still runs better in dx11 than dx12. Single player is jaw dropping beautiful, but performance hit is too high in MP. In DCS, I’ve been dropping msaa to 2 depending on what/where I’m flying but otherwise settings stay the same. FWIW, I would have no issue with paying for substantial engine upgrades. DCS has massive potential to grow over time, not just in its current form, but to a full battlefield sim. The amount I’ve spent of peripherals, mods to those, mounts, modules, terrains, etc., I would drop $50 on on an engine upgrade in a second.

This is my understanding as well, changes whether seeker attempts to lock on dark or light contrast. I could swear I heard wags confirm in a vid as well. Tested under previous beta and can't guarantee, wasn't exactly scientific in my methodology

Hmm kinda leaning the opposite way on this one... Current g’s are known, most of the modern aircraft display it on hud. Those that don’t I’d imagine the FM knows. So talking about modeling pilot effects, impacts like collisions and whatnot with extremely high (de)celleration are different, but in flight it’s sustained g’s that induce blackout. In short bursts very high positive g loads are violent and take some getting used to but don’t cause blackout. My aerobatic flight time is limited (spendy hobby), so I never became particularly skilled, but 8-10gs for say, 5 seconds or so to pull through a vertical dive is fun. Fighter planes have the speed and thrust to sustain long 5-6g turns and thus can induce black/grey-out, but it’s the time at g that causes it (I think around 15-20s is the magic number but not sure). That’s how it should be modeled, hard bouncing your nose gear should be like hitting a big speedo bump too fast, you might break something expensive but not going to black out. Damage model should model individual system failure (e.g. AAA hits to wing causing flat tire in a-10 is a good example). DCS could actually improve quite a bit here relative to other sims. So I’ve got no problem with something wonky in the beta causing unrealistic loads on landing gear and failures, that’s what beta is for. But it shouldn’t trigger blackout.

I’m on mobile so it’s difficult to replicate your calculation, interesting though. 900kts seems high launched from a p-3 cruising at 300 kts. Are you going by a time stamp or video length/assuming no editing? Makes me wonder about trajectory Also, someone above said the F has twice the explosive of a mk-82- you’re mixing up payload and warhead, the terminology in bombs vs middles are different. There’s a lot of variants now but standard mk-82 has a payload of 200lb, the remainder fragmenting iron casing. The F has a 300lb warhead (which isn’t 2x), but more importantly that’s the total warhead weight, not payload. I don’t remember the Explosive weight but it’s like 80lbs or something, less than half. Misses reference warhead weight bc of propulsion and guidance systems, in that sense unguided bomb weight is all warhead

As mentioned, useful as a sensor, and to engage certain targets depending on airframe. A-10c for example, the AI superhuman ability to get 6 mags off against anti air in a single pass is handy, as is their ability to snipe infantry in trees that you will never spot. Also as others have stated, they are more ordinance, and sometimes you can’t carry enough. I struggle more controlling them in CAP roles than ground attack, you can’t effectively assign airborne targets like you can with a human (or ground targets by attack my SPI), and just telling them to engage bandit will result in you firing up tacview to figure out what preceded the “ejecting” call. An extreme liability at other times, again, partially airframe dependent. Not so much to you, though I’ve been hit mid air, especially refueling or when tbey freak out if you forgot to call RTB and they attempt to hold formation while you are full flaps and gear down. Their propensity to fly into mountains and wreck your campaign score is a frequent occurrence. Again, depends on module, but “anchor here” is a phrase you should know.

well damn way to make me feel like an ass, suppose it is sticky for a reason. But ya nospin to my knowledge that is the only use for the AN/AWW pods. Some of the standoff weapons (I think the SLAM and Walleye) can launch on INS guidance to a TGT waypoint, datalink target, or A-G MAP/SAR/SEA target designation, but are equipped with a maverick seeker head and transmit video to the datalink pod to allow pilot to fine tune terminal guidance. E.g. you know approximate location, launch from 100 miles/below horizon, steer to target via video. I believe harpoon terminal guidance is active radar homing, SLAM-ER has the video link or image/scene match (not sure how this will work, whether we can receive recce imagery via link16, but SAR image can be used as well). I am not sure about the JSOW. All of this will be interesting to see how its implemented as it depends on what targeting functionality is available. Another interesting aspect is how SAM AI will handle it, they are vulnerable to SAMs, so we probably will not taking out SA-10s from 50 miles out, but reviewing that list it looks like we are getting decoys as well (glider and towed). With saturation techniques SAM AI becomes a factor. *edited to fix 4am acronyms

I don't know as that doesn't make sense, and I don't see where I said that. Can you clarify what you're referring to?

Thank you, that's exactly what I was looking for. I am not sure what PVU or IRA is, but the datalink pod is interesting - real time video from agm-84's? Should be able to find a use for that... link-16 doesn't exactly tell us much but again, a functional SA page alone would be great. Realistic modeling would add some mission diversity and, well, realism, but relative to other things seems low priority (except that it is a prerequisite for other things). Where did that info come from? I have not seen a feature description with that level of detail before

I understand that, however, it’s not just about programming a single system on a single module. On many modules certain systems are not modelled thriroughly or very simplified, EW/RWR, IFF, tactical datalink, anything crypto related are all high on that list for similar reasons. Also, while link16 information is widely available, especially for our block, DCS doesn’t have the components necessary to model the network. It’s not a webpage you refresh, AWACS crew SA displays aren’t just broadcast to all friendly aircraft, or even communicate directly (for our block). Different aircraft or terminals (and nato members) communicate in different formats/interfaces, rather than go into unnecessary detail just google mids lvt fdl and you’ll have plenty to read. My point is that even if the complexities of various systems are simplified so that a mirage, f-18, f-15 all interface in the same way, wags could just be talking about mids voice radios, with the SA page being populated like the f10 map, ignoring line of site or command and control functions. If that’s the case we probably shouldn’t expect imagery or targeting beyond the basic 9-line msgs the a-10 can receive. It’s still a study level sim, but in a pay no attention to the man behind the curtain sense. It would be extremely cool if we had ISR assets, even just predator data or upgraded jtac/SF/sniper teams, with enhanced targeting functionality, which would open the door to create a FAC mission type. It would also allow missions targeting those ISR assets, or even DCAOCs to degrade the other sides SA/datalink on a strategic level, making multiplayer a lot more interesting. Again though, if you don’t have the functionality, there’s nothing to take away. My hunch is that it will be simplified, SA page info coming from the fact that it’s a simulation and thus the position of every asset is known, and not dependent on individual assets’ sensors and their ability to communicate that data to the network.

In his latest beta teaser, wags mentioned significant work on the SA page. I've been wondering how they were going to make that work without tactical network in place. Presumably the mids radios are a step in that direction, but is a dumbed down simulation or full fledged link16? Have we been given any type of indication of what to expect long term? The SA page at a minimum will have friendly position/heading/speed/alt info overlayed waypoint sequence. So it should be a step up from the buggy SADL 9-lines and text messages we have in the a-10, for example. But the real value is the complete tacitical picture provided by multiple sources, notably AWACS, which seems potentially doable. But IFF, EW, any word? I've searched and didn't come up with much, and much of this kind of info seems to be random comments in youtube vids. Also, in the air to ground role is a whole other complication. I thought I had seen something about a link16/SADL gateway, which suggests other modules will eventually be networked (or that is the goal, at least?). Bug given the complexity and the scarcity of info on a2g radar implimentation I'm assuming we don't have much info here. By all means if there's some info out there i'd love to know, i'm just assuming there's not. I searched and could not find much regardaing wether the implimentation will include MAP and the EXP/SAR submodes, GMT, SEA, the CCRP/ranging or terrain modes for example, much less whether targeting or image datalink.

Both civil and military aviation has moved to glass cockpits from vacuum tubes, mil has had huds and mfds for a while but full glass cockpits have been around in civilian were civilian first (see B787 Ana suite for example, or cirrus for GA). It takes some training to transition, but I’ve never heard a single person say glass wasn’t better from a performance aspect (functionality, SA, etc). It is quite literally the equivleant of analog vs digital. That said I get what you’re saying, the million switches and vacuum instruments in traditional cockpits have a certain charm. I’ve had an Oregon ANG f-15 pilot say he has more fun seat of pants flying a super cub at 100kts over mulnomah county farmland (with a quiet radio) than the eagle. His point was just more about the joy of flight, and how modern military aviation (since 60s70s) the pilot stuff is a very small slice of your workload relative to everything else going on. Though I’m not sure I buy it (I’d give my left nut to run some time in a f-15), but I think your point is similar. There’s a lot of nostalgia in aviation for a reason. There are a lot of cool historical planes, but arguing that the modern tech is not better from a functionality standpoint is just dead wrong.

Though much less than in prop planes all planes, even big iron require correction to hold centerline and will always require roll correction on climb. You should be able to trim an a-10 for AOA and not touch pitch all the way 18k ft, but it's going to drift left/right. Relative to other modules the a-10 has much lower wing loading, large vertical control surfaces and windage, so any cross wind effect will be much more pronounced.

Anybody else encounter severe performance issues? I don't mean a small hit, I mean from 90fps in VR to single digit slide show and crash/freezes. I've been through setup and advanced config docs multiple times but I must have something wrong, the performance hit is way to big to be from overhead, I've got to have some conflict in the config blowing things up. I am not sure where to start troubleshooting, I suspect maybe I've got something wrong with H1 (warthog user, 2x MFD, VR) views and/or how VR 0 vs VR1 work, or maybe with the view luas or perhaps not disabling something in DCS settings that I should. Honestly I don't know, there are so many possibilities that I don't know where to start process of elimination. For now not running vaicom, teamspeak or simpleradio - just the target script and default mods