ChickenChance

Ok, thank you for the info.

Actually I tried to prevent a fueled discussion about what is right or wrong or what is more realistic. I only wanted to know who else likes to fly without or with less autopilot support because I think it feels better. Your replies so far are interesting and I am also happy to see that I am not the only one who likes to fly without stabilisations. Actually it is impressive how stable the KA-50 is in a hover without the stabilisations engaged. Thumbs up to the Kamov engineers. Maybe this also comes from the twin rotor design. Sometimes I am not even sure if I am flying without stabilisations. When I cold start and don't engage any of the 4 stabilisation channels there are no autopilot stabilisations active, right? Or am I missing something?

Indeed. Unfortunately this isn't easy to organize on many public servers as often no voice chat is available. BF2 (more specifically Project Reality) has shown how non-claners can teamup for coop play if voice chat is easily accessible. But that is a different topic of course and a known issue.

I would like to request that mission designers creating team deathmatch battles focus less on deathmatch and more on sneaking, as this is the interesting part with chopper warfare for me. Or the hosts change the options, I don't know who is responsible there. Please. Explanation: I recently jumped onto some server hosting a versus map. Unfortunately I did not check if external views of enemy choppers and map icons are available. So I powered up, flew nap of earth towards the FLOT, using tree lines as cover as there was very flat ground. Then I hovered near trees scanning the area for targets, when suddenly the laser warning system screamed and boom I was dead. This was the moment when I realized there were external views for enemy choppers enabled on this map/server. The guy that killed me, flew 300m high or so, flew directly to our next chopper, killed it too with his sniper guns, then flew to the next and so on. That was more like deathmatch and although I see there is skill involved in dogfighting I would prefer more sneaky matches. Since there is often only weak IR SAMs involved in these maps the one flying highest has the best chances it seems. No fun for me. I don't think this was the designers/hosts intention as there were ground targets fighting on the map and the briefing ordered to attack ground targets but to be aware that there are enemy helicopters in the area.

I mostly fly manual only, so all stabilisation channels are off all the time. I also don't use trimming much, unless I need to type long sentences into the chat. I think this makes it more fun to fly, less riding on a train, less switch fiddeling because you have to disable stabilisation channels to make decent turns. The KA-50 feels much more alive when flown like this, I like that. It is also more rewarding. And I think it is a pity that many virtual pilots here will miss out on the nice flight dynamics modelled in this sim. Of course it is more difficult to use other helicopter functions if you have to be focused on flying all the time. And I realize the real helicopter needs those stabilisations for long distance flights, navigation tasks, and so on to offload stress from the pilot. Hey, even switching ABRIS zoom modes is a daunting task under these circumstances while in a hover. Most likely I will never be as effectively deploying the helicopter as a pilot that uses these aids. I use stick, throttle, pedals and trackir and I know "this is not how the real KA-50 pilots do it" and "this is not what is written in the manual" and so on. I just would like to know, who else likes to fly without stabilisations?