LanceCriminal86

Stories are one thing, evidence is another. I'd need specific cruises, squadrons that used them into the 80s because by then fewer Navy squadrons had Phantoms. Marines maybe held onto them longer, but a few F-4 group discussions indicated VTAS were a headache to maintain and didn't stay around long. And other references indicated the Navy effectively divesting by '79. VTAS helmets stick out, I'm just not seeing them in cruise books, pre-/post cruise photos. Yes, the boxes are still in the jets but it doesn't work without the helmets.

Okay, for a moment I thought you were still trying to overwrite stuff in the Ordnance folder. Makes sense now. Yeah you can name the texture whatever you want you just have to make sure it matches the LUA and that the material name is right. For those curious early in the paint kit thread there was a dumpout of all the LUA options for the various external parts. There may be parts in there that even the model viewer tool wouldn't dump out. I believe it was a few pages in.

You missed what I said then: In each line of the LUA for a livery, there are a few components: {"HB_F14_EXT_BRU-34", 0 ,"HB_F14_EXT_BRU_34",false}; "HB_F14_EXT_BRU-34" The first portion is the material in the model. This is what I was telling you, it is not the same as what the texture file was, it's where the texture file is going to get slapped on the model. In your case, it doesn't work because the MATERIAL in the model is not called BRU_34, it's BRU-34. 0 This is telling it which material type the texture is, in this case it's the diffuse, or the color/paint. "HB_F14_EXT_BRU_34" This is telling it the name of the TEXTURE file that's in your custom livery folder. You can actually name that whatever you wanted technically, as long as it's in your livery's folder and has the same name. Note that it doesn't contain .DDS or anything. false This is telling DCS to load the file that's in your livery folder instead of the default texture inside the module in F14/Textures/Diffuse_Roughmet or whatever the folder is. Why are you overwriting the defaults in the ordnance folder?

Feedback I'm seeing from Phantom pilots was VTAS again being potentially great, WHEN it worked, which from the maintainer and crew inputs often it wasn't. Feedback about it adding a whole new list of things to down a jet before the flight or the system being INOP. The trackers in the cockpit often had issues and required protective coatings and such to frequently be replaced, wiring hassles, the helmet sensors being somewhat fragile. Basically by the end of the 70s the Navy crews weren't using it anymore on Ns/Js/Ss, maybe the Marines did a little longer but it sounded like they ditched it too due to upkeep vs benefits. A paper on head tracking helmets, particularly Honeywell systems like VTAS, mirror the Navy divesting interest by 1979. So whoever said VTAS was getting use well into the 80s, cruise photos and personal accounts seem to show that not to be the case. VTAS boxes were left in the jets as you can see them on the canopy rails, but no VTAS helmets present at all in the 80s cruises. They either converted the helmets back to a traditional configuration or went with replacement APH-6s or HGU-33s. One of my two helmets from the PMTC/Pt. Mugu is a VTAS I with a standard single visor APH-6 housing fitted. The guy that wore it in the backseat said it was noticeably more difficult to keep his head up during maneuvers when he rode with VX-4, and very fatiguing. VTAS II are exceedingly rare to find on the collector side, and stand out pretty sharply in photos due to their offset visor housing knobs. I did find out that there is a "manual" of sorts out there for use of the VTAS in the Phantom II, but it appears to be exceedingly rare and not looking good to be able to find a copy. It might be able to fill in some of the blanks that would be missing from any F-4J/N/S manuals, but have to actually acquire one first to get it scanned. As to ACEVAL/AIMVAL, nothing I can share openly but "Roger, ball!.." covers a lot of the pre-event training and then lessons learned from the event. It sounds like somewhere out there is a report from one of the big T&E departments in the DoD that discusses the major flaws of the test itself being the scenarios and ROEs. It essentially forced a slanted result because of how the scenarios were being run, allowing the pilots to "game" the system to get wins because they didn't actually have to defend an objective or deny the enemy, not to mention the numbers of aircraft involved didn't really reflect realistic scenarios. Plus they were all seasoned pilots, and they also had full knowledge about their adversaries as they had trained together. And probably because the takeaway that was chosen from ACEVAL/AIMVAL was "we need longer range fire/forget missiles" due to high attrition and 1:1 kill exchanges in the testing, which also killed AGILE (that could actually have made VTAS worth it), it seems to be why VTAS was skipped on the F-14 and phased out of F-4 use.

These are what I have from an old skin for the BRU-42 and BRU-34 {"HB_F14_EXT_BRU-34", 0 ,"HB_F14_EXT_BRU_34",false}; {"HB_F14_EXT_BRU42", 0 ,"HB_F14_EXT_BRU42",false}; Just verified again, this does work. Like I said, some material names don't match the texture name. The material on the jet is BRU-34 but the texture is BRU_34. I'm looking at a painted BRU-34 on my jet in Model Viewer right now from an old skin I made. In Model Viewer you can use the Connector Tool to mount the BRU-34, you then have to select the BRU-34 in the "Scene" dialogue by clicking the loaded BRU-34 model, then using the livery tool to again select your skin.

The name of the texture may not be the name of the material on the jet. It's not always 1:1. You'd need to do the LUA export in model viewer but that function may have been broken recently.

You skipped right over the core of my list, and that's the "how it works" details. That's the stuff HB needs/wants before they will implement something, for the same reasons things like PTID or "filling in the blanks" of later Tomcats isn't being done. They are not going to copy/paste ED's HMD code and throw some angle restrictions in, they want to know HOW VTAS works from the ground up, its limitations, how it is handled/managed in the cockpit, how it communicates to the AWG-10 and Sidewinder, all that jazz.

Folks, things being "optional" isn't the problem here, it's the level of effort to implement in the first place whether you think you want to turn it off and on. VTAS presents a good number of hurdles, many of which I've already run into as a collector, namely being: 1) Preserved examples for scanning/fitting/modeling/weighing 2) Photos of the helmet in use for skins, timeframe of use 3) Photos/diagrams of the complete setup including where all the wires and plugs run, where the IR boxes are and what they look like, processes for starting up/enabling VTAS, actual limitations of use, reticle, troubleshooting.

Yes, they did test it in ACEVAL/AIMVAL and ultimately wasn't worth the cost, weight, or complication when compared to the available acquisition modes like VSL-HI. It was a bit of acquisition gain traded for a decent bit more weight and neck strain. The lessons taken from ACEVAL/AIMVAL seemed to be more focused on killing the enemy further away with a launch and leave missile, naturally that became the AIM-120. If VTAS does somehow get modeled, it better have neck strain also modeled in prolonged fights.

Interesting, those don't look at all like F-4Es

As a reminder export Es will be limited to liveries only. They're staying in front of the scope creep that happened with the F-14, the most you will see for the F-4E anytime in the near or mid-term would be some special pilot equipment for some of the ones that had more unique helmets or survival gear, namely Germany and Japan. They're not adding on the ICE, Kurnass 2000, Greek upgrades, EJ/EJ Kai, any of that jazz.

Unless it's been updated, in the past you couldn't keep liveries zipped in the savedgames folders. I stopped keeping most of my liveries in core mods only because test builds meant having to completely remove all those folders and copy them back later. Eventually I'll probably move them back over and zip them. Another thing being some folks have a smaller C drive where SavedGames usually is, and liveries add up. So there can be some reasons to stick to coremods or the DCS main Liveries folder. It's only a risk if you decide to do a repair and tell it to remove all non-original files. Other option, move your whole Saved Games folder to the same drive as DCS, which is what I did.

The desire for Vietnam is logical, but the modules with very few exceptions just aren't going to accurately fit that conflict. A late-70s to 80s version of a jet isn't going to provide the same experience as one properly configured from '64 to '74/'75 or so, namely RHAW and RWR. The harrowing experiences from the earlier years as the SA-2 arrived on the scene and radar guided/assisted AA/AAA aren't going to play out the same way with a newer RWR system like the APR-36 and APR-37 that the Es received later. To really get the full on Vietnam vibes it's going to take older versions of the modules, otherwise it's just a jungle map with 80s Cold War jets. So far I believe only the F-100D and A-1H that have been announced would be actually accurate to Vietnam. I was under the impression the MiG-21 and even MiG-19 were both post-war setups, as are the upcoming F-4E, A-7E, and eventual A-6E. And the Huey is a whole other ball of wax. On the other hand, Marianas can work for having F-4Es from say Clark AFB or Seymour-Johnson, or even Osan/Korea plus excuses to have Korean and Japanese Es out there for exercises or some other fictional combat scenario. Syria as mentioned has use for Israeli, Turkish, even Greek F-4Es and US F-4Es if you strike the northern parts of Iraq from Turkey. PG covers IRIAF F-4Es. Nevada covers the USAF Weapons School. South Atlantic, completely fictional or just pretend it's Ace Combat I guess and do whatever you want. Caucuses you can mix in whatever I guess. For upcoming maps, the Kola Peninsula works great for Cold War, with an excuse to bring the Air Defense Command F-4Es from Iceland into the picture. And the Sinai adds all the possibilities in for again Israeli and Egyptian Phantoms.

It's a demo jet

It's pretty doubtful an EJ would be pursued with the already large/growing list of modules and variants that are being supported by HB. With the differences in systems, slats, and other changes from the USAF blocks it seems it would be like developing a whole standalone module. Adding some altered pilots with Japanese flight gear and as detailed skins as possible should be the limits of expectations.

The problem with the TF-30 replacement was that it was tied with the Air Force's F100 program, which itself was having issues. When reliability couldn't meet what was specified the Air Force apparently lowered the required hours, but the Navy wouldn't accept it. So the Air Force pressed on with the F100 in the F-15A which had its own issues, and the Navy kept the TF-30 as the Tomcat program was already under heavy scrutiny and embattled and I guess the Navy wasn't about to start over again trying to get a new engine. The proposed F100 based engines (F401) would, on paper, have had almost the same uninstalled numbers as the GE F110 at 16.5K dry in Mil and 28k in AB. But looking at how much the Air Force had to deal with before their F100s were improved by the 80s in the F-100-PW-200 and later 220 updates. It's funny how much <profanity> is talked about the F-14s engines while the Air Force was dealing with almost the same issues in the Eagle, including the afterburners stalling the engine out, and didn't have a "fix" until the early-mid 80s themselves. But in that light had we gotten the F401s for the F-14, there's a decent chance it would have had the same problems. However, the same remedies for the Air Force could likely have been applied as those updates to the F100 could be applied to existing engines, and the Navy would have been updating F401s instead of having to find another motor.

The only acceptable response. I need to build up a financial warchest to hire someone like Meteor to remaster/re-record the cheesy music from those old Great Planes tapes.

And to be clear, there will not be an "early" Vietnam E like those that started showing up in 66-67. "Early" in this case is still effectively post-war, but are those "early" serial jets (66- to ~70-) after they received the mentioned modifications. So don't expect to see the original short gun muzzle, hard-wings, missing/terrible APS-107 RHAW, etc. Like with the F-14A, "early" is a relative term and doesn't include those original F-14As with the IRST from Block 70 that deployed during Frequent Wind in '74.

Time to dust off old faithful

Again, the US version of the -95GR was only WISHED for, the "Early" F-14A as laid out by the Heatblur devs and pointed to in the FAQ, is still a 135GR but from the 80s. Hence, I continue to use "Earlier" because it is NOT a -70 or -75 as built and introduced around '72-'74. At most it's been petitioned to allow for the removal of the ALQ-126 jammers and an ALQ-100 only option for the TCS, which would allow you to functionally get as close to a -95 as we'd get, but it is not the roadmapped, acknowledged variant. The only iteration close to the -95GR will be the IRIAF jet, which functionally will still be the 135 with some systems turned off like TCS, reduced jamming strength, no mounting external fuel tanks, etc. There's also a difference between "a weapon could technically be carried" and that weapon being within the scope of the time represented by the F-14 modules. Not to mention if ED has not created/implemented said older versions of the weapons, then you're asking HB to stop and focus on recreating older versions of weapons which ED will have to take over anyways, and then figure out how they were implemented in the aircraft, symbology as needed, and any other functional differences in how the weapons are employed.

You need to go read the threads again because that is not the jet represented. The "earlier" F-14A will still be early/mid 1980s, and no the F-14 was not set up to simply run every previous variant of weapons in inventory.

Because you asked, all Hill One schemes have been deleted. The only Phantoms provided will be covered in Anime characters of ambiguous gender. *I kid* But in all seriousness the 110th TFS F-4Es from the late 80s through the retirement in 1991 were my main muse working on Hill One jets, and you should see the scheme in a few different interpretations around the area behind the cockpit. The more standard scheme the anti-glare gray along the canopy continued straight to the rear of the canopy hump, and then in an acute angle came back forwards and down across the intakes in a curve. Some of the 110th jets instead had a simpler iteration where it just curved down along or behind the canopy. Some jets with Hill One had a more sharp/crisp scheme while others had a more "feathered" edge and overspray look, and you should see variations over some of the different squadrons and countries that used the scheme. Hill one will appear on both by the way, the 110th being an ANG squadron had the early block jets that fit right into the initial module's serial range both with and without the APS-107 antennas, and of course other squadrons that had TISEO jets will be added when it's time. Turkey in particular seemed to eventually go with a darker, almost Gunship Gray coloration eventually so I need to hunt around and see if they actually shifted the color or if that's just folks using HDR or post processing, or just digital photography better capturing the tones. But to me it looks like a much darker gray than what the Air Force used, even on freshly painted jets. Again the intent here is to at least have a general representation of the schemes and the export nations, with more focus on the standard schemes pending any dynamic number implementation or other method to support multiple jet numbers in a simpler format for online folks and I suppose mission/campaign makers. Eventually, and maybe with release at a limited scale, some more specific jets should be included either with significant history, special anniversary paint jobs, or just because they looked cool or had something unique about them in the weathering or scheme. And of course whenever a community paint kit comes out, there will be tons of more specific jets people are going to make for their Dad/Uncle/Grandad etc's old squadron, or countries that flew Cs or Ds but not Es, probably going to see F-4G skins. And of course the inevitable blasphemy when people start doing Navy or Marine skins, which I *personally* think should result in revocation of your module license but I'm not important so I have no say.

You're not killing an ICBM with anything aircraft carried during the F-14's service life. At that time the only things remotely standing a chance to kill an ICBM were the Nike family of missiles, some of which being nuclear tipped.

Australian leased F-4E skin C A N C E L E D Keep it up and the Kiwis will get a fictional Phantom first and maybe even an All Blacks one to boot