Been away since FC2 was current and wow DCS!

I mean I've only just upgraded from my old single core WXPSP2 that basically struggled with FC2 on medium settings when it ran well back when flip phones were still cool, but then y'know motherboards fry eventually...

I was busy spending every waking cent on a classic AMG build and sorting better employment. These things take years and yes, I've only done the mechanicals on that fricken car but at least it's the fun part. Nobody expects a rough looking 80s Merc i6 to keep with their vanilla LS or 24v quad tailpipe jap V6 or sound cammed and track prepped so 90% happy there but I really need to do paint/interior one day. At least I got a few votes for best modified on the German auto day in Canberra but seriously it still looks like a $1500 car with $3000 rims until you hear it run. It's a cammy granny car, I love it haha.

So pausing that, now I spent a few grand on a high end box and went crazy on the 50% off xmas sale for DCS products. Almost as fun as the car.

Sadly it's very Americentric and/or NATO heavy on the module options and ship remodels. Which is terrific and logical given a large American and west European contributor interest in DCS but I just wish there were more Russians involved in module projects.

It's really the Russian birds and maps that drew me to LoMAC in the first place. I just never flew the F15 and always flew the Flankers. Fulcrum's a bit of a pain in the butt mainly with fuel load but I still find it really interesting.

I love the MiG21bis DCS module, but would've preferred the 21F13 and other Russian versions. The "bis" is a post production export variant never used in VVS service. It's an Italian term adopted in the 1930s for updated models offered for export, eg. the I152, an update of the I15 was exported using the Italian suffix I15bis so the general market would realize it's an I15 update and not an entirely new model called I152, in VVS service the same plane is the I152 and the I15 was retroactively designated I151. The trick about the MiG21bis is being conceived long after the MiG23 entered service with the VVS and has no VVS counterpart; a downgraded version of the MiG23 was to be exported to loose allies outside Warsaw Pact and the MiG21bis was conceived for non-NATO markets that weren't allies, with roughly similar (avionics, warfare) capabilities to the downgraded MiG23 but less overall performance envelope. It's really not a VVS warbird and in fact its VVS contemporary at time of production would be the MiG23ML, which is a bit like drag racing a Ferrari with a top fueller: just when you're done saying wow over the Ferrari the top fueller just creams you all over the place. Performance wise the F5E most closely matches a MiG21 at low altitude for flight envelope, whilst the MiG23ML is most noted for out-accelerating an F16 at mid alt. I'm just not as excited by the MiG21bis as I would be by the MiG21F13 or MiG23ML being AFC modelled, but at least a "sort-of-Russian" bird has one alongside the A10C, Hornet, Mirage, WW2 planes, decades worth of western clichés, etc.

I understand the reasons and applaud the developer team on that bird not just for all the intensive work and character involved but also the very conception. It is still in contemporary service and a NATO campaign build on a DCS map benefits tremendously with it, in fact its absence would be a conspicuous oversight trying to build an immersive campaign in terms of force coalitions and their realistic equipment stocks. So kudos, I'm just coming at it from my own selfish direction of a personal wishlist I can only look forward to in years to come.

Like I said I'm really greatly interested in the Russian (VVS, PVO, Naval Aviation) warbirds.

My favorite AFM at the moment is obviously the MiG21bis but my wishlist is thus:

MiG25P a-la 1972 production, there seems to be enough technical information for an AFM build and you could charge double price and it'd still sell like guaranteed hotcakes. Trick here is mainly getting the engine management routines down, with overspeeding failures prone above 2.5 Mach and dramatic fuel load influence on envelope but the systems themselves are fairly basic and revolve around brute force over fine engineering. Fire control couldn't even be described as lookdown/shootdown, more like way overpowered microwave emitter capable of burning paint off a target aircraft at close range. And the engines are so stressed just maintaining 2.3 Mach combat loaded cruise you basically get 10-15 flights before you scrap the plane. But y'know, that one shot use 2.8 Mach level intercept dash at around 20,000m and the endgame, split second 25,000m supersonic zoom for missile release just sounds fun fun fun. Of course the PF is a different bird with far more expensive engines and avionics updates and more of an 80s bird than a 60s bird like the P. So it's more of an historical desire than contemporary, since by the campaign period of most DCS users the only Foxbat still in service is the Russian wild weasel 25BM produced in 85, with a nose packed full of ECM jammers and four Kh58 antiradiation missiles...although still 2.8 Mach capable war loaded, in fact the basic airframe was demonstrated in service example with four 500kg bombs on external racks clocking 2.83 Mach reliably so the PF and any RB~ and BM model have no problem with high Mach carrying warloads: single biggest difference to NATO warbirds, which have top speeds always quoted clean and without war loads and often only with special preparation of unique airframe variants designed specifically to accomplish design targets well outside regular service capabilities. The Foxbat is the one, true, genuine exception to this rule. So I'd really like to fly an aircraft that accomplishes quoted performance maximums all dirty, randomly chosen off the production line and loaded up with mission gear, off a snowed out, partly disused runway nobody's taken a broom to in ten years and it still clocks the quoted maximums day after day and then breaks on the fourth day but what a few days haha.

My wishlist also includes all the Russian navy remodelled for high polycount and inclusion of a destroyer class and kiev class. Especially in the Black Sea, I mean maybe you'll get the hybrid-nuke cruiser and kuznetsov class sent there in a war climate where NATO naval forces are likely to venture but okay another technical explanation: the kuznetsov is really a modified kiev hull, they're both really missile cruisers in naval terms, they just expanded the air complement but the real focus is that of a missile cruiser: Surface action, ASW and air defence: fleet screening. Rather than looking at either design in terms of successes and failures as ultimate WWF cage fighters like American war materiel, think in terms of mission design. Kiev is a white water naval screen. Kuznetsov is a blue water refit. Kiev gets supported by land based Naval Aviation, it's white water. Designed for the Gulf of Finland and Black Sea/Med. Kuznetsov is really designed for Arctic/Pacific or any venture into the North Sea/Atlantic, hence even 4000km range Flankers from land based Naval Aviation can't protect it, so it carries its own. Still a missile cruiser with ASW emphasis and air defence role but, it's even secondary to dedicated missile cruisers like the Moscow as a command vessel because the Russian Navy doesn't function even remotely like an American carrier battlegroup, they're not into force projection, just enemy destruction. In a combat sortie the American destroyers range ahead and the cruisers rally around the carrier to protect it, which launches air attacks and CAP screens and the battle is coordinated from this command point...the Russian carriers rush forward flanked by destroyers and attack like missile cruisers in their combat sorties. Totally different ballgame and the command ship keeping further back is actually a 60,000 ton missile cruiser launching dozen strong volleys of nuclear tipped antishipping missiles the size of an F7 Corsair apiece from about 150km behind the attack line, each with Nintendo game quality AI flight control protocols and autonomous inertial guidence. But that's okay because the fricken aircraft carriers rushing you are also launching a dozen of those vertical off the flight deck, next to about 150 ASW rockets and missiles to kill your sub protection. They're just playing a completely different game to NATO so the roles for similar looking craft are completely different and so are their equipment and capabilities. You don't compare a Kuznetsov to a supercarrier, you compare it to a missile cruiser to understand deployment. Hence generally you're more likely to find a Kiev in the Black Sea than you will a Kuznetsov, given the Russian navy treats them like the same thing but one ocean going and the other coastal or sea bound.

However there is the simple fact that solid international treaties surrounding entry to the Black Sea from the Mediterranean clearly state that no catapult equipped, dedicated aircraft carriers may pass the Dardanelles Strait it is a reasonable assumption the Kuznetsov refit of the Kiev hull was specific not just for blue water operation in which the Kiev is unstable but also, coincidentally brings an aircraft carrier of high performance, fixed wing aircraft into the Black Sea without challenging any international treaties, where an American supercarrier is prohibited by those same treaties. Aside from the Kuznetsov class this leaves only the ramp equipped British carriers embarking Harriers and otherwise only helicopter boarded ASW carriers and marine landing craft allowed entry into the Black Sea without international incident, most particularly with Turkey's more extremist governing elements outside NATO interests within its military, but also with Ukrainian and other regional authorities and their west European support ranging Spain to Italy and some corners of British Parliament.

This was only possible with introduction of the Flanker, being high performance en par with an F15C/E Eagle but also STOL en par with an F/A-18 Hornet, so brings Tomcat supercarrier teeth in an air complement from a ramp carrier with no catapults like a Harrier or Heli carrier. The aircraft here made a difference more than the ship, but makes the ship bigger and badder than anything else allowed in the Black Sea without declaring a war.

Have to note that because it means a Kuznetsov can be in the Black Sea and long before any NATO carrier battlegroup will even try to go there, without international incident, but it's unlikely unless a NATO carrier battlegroup intends to head there. Kievs would be there.

There's more political details latent here, like a higher potential for rogue elements to secret around the Kuban and then Ukrainian issues between the Crimea and Kharkov, possibly a criminal element around Odessa. Then Georgia romancing NATO whilst being supplied by Ukraine. Finally weapons deals with Iran mixed in smack in the middle of that. Turkey has a NATO military that are being brought up on treasonous charges by a Muslim extremist government but defended by Christian isolationists in Istanbul. The Black Sea region is nothing short of turmultuous, especially in the 90s at the height of international black market arms trading worldwide and no small amount coming from right there.

Right wing American extremist economist fears of Chinese sabre rattling in the Pacific Rim and Taiwan Sea aside I think the most immersive campaign builds still revolve around rogue elements of Russian/CIS forces and nevertheless would like to see more emphasis on modules constructed based on Russian/VVS equipment.

My wishlist also includes, of course a full AFM, mouse interactive Flanker cockpit. Some of the MiG29 models, the original design goals are vastly changed between the late 80s and late 90s to the point of being completely different aircraft. The MiG23ML, the Su15 which is little known and therefore vastly underrated but essentially carried the PVO backbone for 20 years and had little expense spared in development and design. The Tu128 which formed the second specialist arm of the PVO air defence system under command of the Soviet strategic missile forces as opposed to the VVS air force, essentially the PVO received prioritised equipment in advanced development and specially produced airframes like the Tu128 for long range (typically arctic) patrol, the MiG25P for high altitude and high performance interception, the Su15 for mundane high altitude interception and the MiG23P for mid-low altitude, high performance interception. The MiG31 eventually epitomized the PVO technical favoritism with its deployment of the world's first digitally scanned phased array fire control system in a fighter aircraft, matching what amounts to a 4th gen radar set with a Foxbat's performance envelope and an Eagle's management system way back in the 80s. Give the low RCS part of the conversation a rest and it's basically 30 years ahead of NATO in the teeth department, not entirely unlike the Kashtan/Kinzhal naval air defence system compared to Sea Sparrow and CIWS.

I've just had American (and to a lesser extent, NATO) materiel marketing shoved down my throat since the 80s and no kidding it's just like wall to wall telemarketing. I'm really interested in simming in some Russian birds with the whole DCS thing, any Russian birds. But I just don't want to see a situation where DCS turns into an arcade and the Russian equipment is like stormtroopers in star wars.

I did develop flight modelling for mod versions of IL2 Sturmovik of Daimler-Benz DB603EC and LA engines at 1.9 and 1.72ata and Allison V1710-39 engines at 68" and 72"Hg and adapted the engine for lack of a boost regulator and the Daimler for mid-alt slippage of the hydraulic coupling so I wound up fairly accomplished in period technical research and filtering wheat from chaff as far as militarist propaganda efforts (often based in sincere patriotism or political righteousness) goes. I'm pretty good with engines and mechanicals in the real world so tend to filter out claims that don't make engineering sense when constructing a profile or performance envelope. Sometimes it's translation ambiguity in foreign documentation, like I found researching BMW801D2 engines looking into the performance regime of Fw190A models, particularly charge cooled boost improvements from late43, which were also relevant to Jumo engine specifications in early Doras. I instantly recognized similar systems used on drag strips in auto racing, obviously the later performance inspiration drawn from WW2 piston engine development so it became easy to pick glaring fallacies other enthusiasts were overlooking because they weren't reading a document translation right, ie. with some technical knowledge of the subject independent of the documentation to qualify it in the first place. It means nothing for a document to say water injection adds 300hp when it is a logical fallacy and the way race engines make an extra 300hp is by cooling the cylinders with water injection but then adding another half bar of boost, which is what actually bumps the power, the water just lets you up the boost. You've no idea how long I spent arguing with seeming-idiots that pouring water into an engine doesn't magically produce bonus horsepower. Jets work the same, a MiG Foxbat works the same, an Eagle works the same. Claims are technically sound or aren't, many of the really popular ones aren't.

So if there are groups looking at Russian AFM projects like maybe a MiG23ML or a Foxbat or whatever, be glad to help in the research department. I mean these are some old school valve and vacuum mechanical warbirds that have elementary checksums to get accuracy with. More modern digitalized birds are way harder investigating every specific tech element. But a Foxbat is basically a leggo set that doesn't make sense when you get it wrong and will when you get it right, even if it challenges conception. I mean every time it's been examined closely it's challenged a conception. It must be super advanced, no it isn't. It can't perform at low altitude, yes it can. It must handle like a brick, no it doesn't. Pretty much every time someone makes a statement about it that turns out wrong the next encounter of one actually flying. It'll be fun. Who wants Tomcats in DCS, I want a Foxbat man :)

My gosh what a massive book you wrote down here, do you have a TL DR version? :D

Anyway, welcome back :)

Depending what your looking for 100 kiap are running a pvp squadron of SU-33s and also to dabble in some mig-23 when its here, You can check our discord out in my sig

Thanks man for the excellent write, especially the section on Russian naval doctrine was very illuminating. And welcome back, I took a 6 year break as well (after 10 year break from sims) after a false start in DCS when BS2 came out.

First off I must apologize not replying to your 3 page essay in kind due to time pressures. So I leave the task of picking apart any misunderstood facts or gaps in reasoning to the rest of the DCS community. Perhaps there should be a forum rule that any long contribution to the discussion must sport an executive summary together with a list of forum rules that the included flames (if any) intend to violate, just to make the moderator's job easier :smilewink: Just a few notes below.

Do you like helicopters? We do have the Ka-50, a full blown front line power house and a rare gift to DCS, thanks to Russia's difficulty in modernizing its aircraft designs and also politically better times I believe. Then there is the Mi-8, a strong icon and a very popular helicopter from the middle of the Cold War. Mi-24 is coming, in my mind the most iconic of all helicopters and it's a strange bird because it's more like the American equipment - brewing a ton of conflicting requirements into a single package instead of a clear single mission design we're used to from another direction of the compass. (I understand if some americans think Apache is #1, I'd give it a close second.) Did you know Razbam is making a Mig-23, I'd like to see the Mig-27 one day as well?

The lack of Russian planes is probably because many developers of DCS are russians, not regardless of it. But the issue has been discussed in numerous threads, you should be able to find them. Obviously, would love to see more but I'm not hoping for anything 4th gen and high fidelity - but please do also note the JF-17. Mig-25 is one of the hottest items on my wishlist as well, sad if the SEAD version is still in operational use and can't be made for us but the other variants should already be possible in the immediate few years - the interceptor certainly would be interesting but equally much the recon version which was famously used by India for a long time. The Su-15, Su-17, Su-7 planes which you also referred to should be no-brainer even if they have been strangely overlooked so far - actually the middle of the Cold War could be where DCS holds the most promise! Go to the DCS Wishlist part and keep up the flag, if enough people ask for something it often gets made!

TBH the situation is actually quite fair in DCS all considering, we do have aircraft that are even Czech or Swedish made, also France, not to mention very different time periods, already a far cry from a "most modern possible US vs USSR" type of lineup we've seen just way too many times in games.

Also seeing that Razbam thinks 3 different versions of the Mirage 2000 is a good idea, perhaps we could have different variants of the Mig-21 as well? The most widespread fighter during the Cold War it's just as central as you say, so aircraft with different specs would be good to include in scenarios in different decades. Even the Mig-29 already has two variants, although at FC3 level.

I suppose you already have the legendary Mig-15. Also do not miss the L-39 trainer, an interesting aircraft in its own right!