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WHEN ARE WE GOING TO GET Mi-8MTV2 and UH-1H MULITCREW?


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Surely the main issue with multicrew is not switches but controls. Only a very unhelpful co-pilot will flip switches on the pilot's dash/panels unbidden. But the RIO concept works if he is not trying to control the aircraft simultaneously with the pilot.

But if both pilots have hands on sticks/cyclics and throttles/collectives, and they are not linked mechanically, and they push and pull in different directions, how does the sim grant authority? And if its a case of "You have it/I have it", what happens when control is swapped and respective sticks are in different positions/trimmings and throttle amounts/blade angles, pedal positions etc. ?

 

That is the real issue I am sure for dual control airframes like helicopters and other 2-seated airframes, where the real world two sticks would be linked mechanically, while in the sim, the 2 pilots are unlikely to be sat next to each other sharing mechanically linked controls (much more likely to be in completely separate countries... and with completely different equipment). Syncing controls would be so hit and miss, or would require a great deal of skill and precision, or a very wooly lack of precision and hence a poor representation of flight. For one pilot to "hand over" control to another, they would need to both first match control inputs, angle of sticks, turn of pedals, throttle, trimming, etc in their physical sim-pit, so that when authority is swapped ("You have controls"), the aircraft does not jerk suddenly sideways or pitch forward, or nose up etc.

I suppose there could be a short period of "autopilot control" during the hand over period, and then the new authority has to match that setting before authority can be granted. Even that would require perhaps a 10-20% allowance for imprecision, and a smoothing from the autopilot to the new pilot in control.

 

Not ideal in a combat situation....

 

A great idea for multi-tasking, as in the Gazelle where one is basically the pilot, and the other weapons officer, (and similarly the impending Mi-24), or the Huey where one pilot is flying while the other operates the Flex guns...

 

Of course, in real life, only one or other of the 2 pilots is flying the machine at any given time, even if both have hands resting on cyclic and collective, or FW equivalents. So yes, sitting as co-pilot and reading the map, operating the radios, arming the the weapons etc. that will be a great possibility for multicrew. But that transfer of stick control from one pilot to the other in the sim.... That is going to take some serious consideration of how. And I am sure that is the main reason it has not happened yet.

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Surely the main issue with multicrew is not switches but controls. Only a very unhelpful co-pilot will flip switches on the pilot's dash/panels unbidden. But the RIO concept works if he is not trying to control the aircraft simultaneously with the pilot.

But if both pilots have hands on sticks/cyclics and throttles/collectives, and they are not linked mechanically, and they push and pull in different directions, how does the sim grant authority? And if its a case of "You have it/I have it", what happens when control is swapped and respective sticks are in different positions/trimmings and throttle amounts/blade angles, pedal positions etc. ?

 

That is the real issue I am sure for dual control airframes like helicopters and other 2-seated airframes, where the real world two sticks would be linked mechanically, while in the sim, the 2 pilots are unlikely to be sat next to each other sharing mechanically linked controls (much more likely to be in completely separate countries... and with completely different equipment). Syncing controls would be so hit and miss, or would require a great deal of skill and precision, or a very wooly lack of precision and hence a poor representation of flight. For one pilot to "hand over" control to another, they would need to both first match control inputs, angle of sticks, turn of pedals, throttle, trimming, etc in their physical sim-pit, so that when authority is swapped ("You have controls"), the aircraft does not jerk suddenly sideways or pitch forward, or nose up etc.

I suppose there could be a short period of "autopilot control" during the hand over period, and then the new authority has to match that setting before authority can be granted. Even that would require perhaps a 10-20% allowance for imprecision, and a smoothing from the autopilot to the new pilot in control.

 

Not ideal in a combat situation....

 

A great idea for multi-tasking, as in the Gazelle where one is basically the pilot, and the other weapons officer, (and similarly the impending Mi-24), or the Huey where one pilot is flying while the other operates the Flex guns...

 

Of course, in real life, only one or other of the 2 pilots is flying the machine at any given time, even if both have hands resting on cyclic and collective, or FW equivalents. So yes, sitting as co-pilot and reading the map, operating the radios, arming the the weapons etc. that will be a great possibility for multicrew. But that transfer of stick control from one pilot to the other in the sim.... That is going to take some serious consideration of how. And I am sure that is the main reason it has not happened yet.

Maybe, but who needs controls in the second seat. In the Huey it would be ok to just control the radios or the forward miniguns, or actually no controls and switches at all, just help my pilot navigating, tell him frequencies and help spotting threats and objectives would be a blast...

Shagrat

 

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Shagrat, I totally agree.

But of course from the "sim" perspective, one should be also be able to swap who is flying, ideally.

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For one pilot to "hand over" control to another, they would need to both first match control inputs, angle of sticks, turn of pedals, throttle, trimming, etc in their physical sim-pit, so that when authority is swapped ("You have controls"), the aircraft does not jerk suddenly sideways or pitch forward, or nose up etc.

 

 

When control is transferred, linearly interpolate the control inputs from one player to the other across a span of several seconds. This allows the player giving control to ease their stick inputs back to neutral while the other pushes theirs out of neutral.

 

 

If that's too hard for some reason, you can simply treat the control transfer as if the aircraft has its control inputs trimmed to the moment of the transfer. Whatever input was applied at the time of control transfer is the new center position, and the new pilot can trim to a new center on their own time.

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When control is transferred, linearly interpolate the control inputs from one player to the other across a span of several seconds. This allows the player giving control to ease their stick inputs back to neutral while the other pushes theirs out of neutral.

 

 

If that's too hard for some reason, you can simply treat the control transfer as if the aircraft has its control inputs trimmed to the moment of the transfer. Whatever input was applied at the time of control transfer is the new center position, and the new pilot can trim to a new center on their own time.

can be done even easier. We have "Auto-fly-straight-and-level-pilot" already implemented, in one way or the other, so AI can take over as off today. Now pilot press "Transfer controls" and AI takes over, second pilot press "Transfer controls" and AI gives back control... that way you could even cover latency and sort sync issues between the actual transfers. We could simply use the control indicators (CTRL+Enter) to adjust the axis.

But that would mean programming and integrating. If they could just let us sit in the virtual cockpit and as a bonus give us control over radios and may be the miniguns, or weapons panel on the Mi-8, I would be more than happy.

Shagrat

 

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Or make it that the transfer doesn't happen until the 'new' pilot has synchronised their cyclic with the original pilot's +/- some user defined %

 

Example - you agree to transfer control, the second pilot looks at where the in-game collective is, and gives his controller a little circle around that area.

As the collective passes through the correct point control switches and you get a message that the transfer has happened

 

I have a MSFFBII, but with a standard stick don't you have to return the stick to centre after trimming before it becomes live again ? - similar idea...

 

Same for the collective - don't have it snap to the new position, have it only become an active control at the point where the new controller passes through the current setting.

 

In essence though, all the suggestions show that it's not actually a simple thing to do well for an aircraft where you can plainly see the other pilot, and in multi-player, neither player (no player for 3 seats) should be able to reach all the controls at the same time.

 

Maybe they should just implement a half-solution, but maybe they figure it makes more sense to take the time to implement a full solution (which is what Pilot-Mi8 said they are doing), than to do a half ars*ed job, then still have not only implementing the full solution ahead, but also squashing all the complaints that come from it being half ars*d, and any bugs, and then backing that code out before implementing the full solution.

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Or make it that the transfer doesn't happen until the 'new' pilot has synchronised their cyclic with the original pilot's +/- some user defined %

 

Example - you agree to transfer control, the second pilot looks at where the in-game collective is, and gives his controller a little circle around that area.

As the collective passes through the correct point control switches and you get a message that the transfer has happened

 

I have a MSFFBII, but with a standard stick don't you have to return the stick to centre after trimming before it becomes live again ? - similar idea...

 

Same for the collective - don't have it snap to the new position, have it only become an active control at the point where the new controller passes through the current setting.

 

In essence though, all the suggestions show that it's not actually a simple thing to do well for an aircraft where you can plainly see the other pilot, and in multi-player, neither player (no player for 3 seats) should be able to reach all the controls at the same time.

 

Maybe they should just implement a half-solution, but maybe they figure it makes more sense to take the time to implement a full solution (which is what Pilot-Mi8 said they are doing), than to do a half ars*ed job, then still have not only implementing the full solution ahead, but also squashing all the complaints that come from it being half ars*d, and any bugs, and then backing that code out before implementing the full solution.

I wouldn't mind a half- or full-a***d solution, while they work on the full blown perfect solution... if we could have sit in the left seat (and I mean JUST sit, no controls etc.) we could have already done helo pilot training with an instructor, support a friend with navigation and help spot threats, landmarks etc. for a good couple of years.

Shagrat

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Note the developer did not weigh in on this at all.

 

It's been YEARS...... Just how patient are we supposed to be?


Edited by ZQuickSilverZ

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Controls sync would be no problem if we all had FFB devices. Not just sticks, but also throttle units and rudder pedals. It would be great to have some sensing feedback in all input axes (rudder like X/Y, throttle with simulated friction and detents) in the first place, but technically it should also be possible to sync controls via FFB in multi-control cockpits, even though with the latency over network. But I mean, we'll soon be exposed to useless game streaming services like Google Stadia (that's more than just input lag), compared to that FFB sync of spring forces should be easy as pie.

 

 

For non FFB I'd probably also try to go a similar way that's been taken with the helicopter trim. In that case, give control and take control commands (both executed to be mandatory for a switch) and then "ghost" sticks/throttles/collectives displayed at the position they are at the moment for the one in control so you see where you'd have to put yours to complete the take over without getting weird control spikes due to different input positions.

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+1 to the original question. I absolutely loathe having to change seats to do the co-pilot/gunner jobs. :/ And, I'd be happy to play 2nd seat with friends half the time, and have them play 2nd seat the other half. It just kills my immersion to be doing both.

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Multicrew is bugged in L-39, when you switch controls between pilots - airplane stresses out and receives damage, you can even loose aileron or flaps in an instance, when just giving control to your buddy. This has to be fixed. Multicrew controls is a key feature for L-39 too...


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  • 4 weeks later...
We could simply use the control indicators (CTRL+Enter) to adjust the axis.

But that would mean programming and integrating. If they could just let us sit in the virtual cockpit and as a bonus give us control over radios and may be the miniguns, or weapons panel on the Mi-8, I would be more than happy.

 

I was about to suggest that.

 

When you press "You have the controls", then the other pilot will get on the screen the axis indicators. All that the pilot needs to do, is to move his controls to the same positions and then automatically "I have the controls" is said and pilot has the controls and at that moment the axis indicators are gone.

 

So what the receiving pilot needs to do, is to move controls to correct position and automatic pairing is done and controls are transferred.

 

This way you don't need to press anything for acceptance, just to move your controls ready. The giving pilot needs to have just a radio ICS button and from there select "You have the controls" and it is initiated.

 

This would as well allow delays to be between transfer as if other is not yet ready, his HOTAS axis doesn't get matched and transfer is not done (and the axis needs to be matched by moving the receiving HOTAS so transferring one can't just move his accidentally to match the receiving one).

 

This would not solve a problem in training where a new pilot does a mistake and the trainer needs to take a control, as likely the new pilot is already waving the cyclic and collective around and the trainer can't match those. Why there should be in such cases just a "override" button that directly no matter how the trainer HOTAS is positioned, takes the control.

 

Of course in such cases it would be nice if the trainer could see the trainee inputs all the time, so knows already from that what to do.

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Here we are looking for simple compromises, and thinking up ridiculous reasons why these two modules, that were sold with the promise of multicrew which never happened, and another 3rd party has gone and show every single one of the excuses fed to us was utter nonsense. After what what we have in the Tomcat, there is no more excuse for other devs to not give multicrew, in the modules they promised.

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Tomcat was released 6 years after UH-1 and Mi-8 and RIO is not even able to control plane. It proves only that you can now make module where you can have other person able to flip switches. Also 3 years ago other 3rd party tried that with Gazelle and were not able...so ED may had made a lot of changes that make that possible now.

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Tomcat was released 6 years after UH-1 and Mi-8 and RIO is not even able to control plane. It proves only that you can now make module where you can have other person able to flip switches. Also 3 years ago other 3rd party tried that with Gazelle and were not able...so ED may had made a lot of changes that make that possible now.

Indeed, gazelle was working before the 2.5 update.

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Tomcat was released 6 years after UH-1 and Mi-8 and RIO is not even able to control plane. It proves only that you can now make module where you can have other person able to flip switches. Also 3 years ago other 3rd party tried that with Gazelle and were not able...so ED may had made a lot of changes that make that possible now.

Thats because the RIO in the real Tomcat has no controls to fly the plane....and not a limitation of DCS.

 

But yes, sad for those people waiting to fly together in their MI-8 or UH-1

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@unknown: That's the point, they did not have to. So we can say it is possible to make module when you will have other person flipping switches, but that's still not full picture of what is needed for complete helicopter multicrew.

 

Ah, i understand your point now. :thumbup:

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I have tried multicrew in L39, F-14 and Gazelle. While it is sort of fun, it usually has a bunch of desync issues (not as much on F-14). Tbh I don’t know if it’s worth it at it’s current state. New tech needs to be developed to make multicrew more viable. In the mean time I would settle for a ”Jester” crew chief. That helps spotting threats, cargo, friendly units, remind you of EGT temperatures and stuff :)

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Multicrew would be cool.. ( as pilot and if person could jump to the gunner possition as well.

 

But if its realistic, well i dont think we will ever see it.

Lets put it this way, the Mi8 i would say have finished development and now they maybe do a hotfix now and then so it will continue being compatible.

The mi8 do still sell copys now and then but DLC is a bit of a "niche" kind of thing and lets face it... It cost to develope and update a sim, and you cant have developers sitting arround waiting for money while they maybe today are working on something els.

 

But it would be cool with multicrew, but is it really that big a features that will make the mi8 more attractive to most players also vs how many who will actual use it, then i think its a feature that will not be of that much economic value to the developer to spend time on implementing since it will not result in allot of more sales, but maybe only a few sales extra.

Time = money

 

BUT ofcourse it depend how easy it is to make.

I am not a game developer but i imagine that multicrew code they can get from eagle dynamics for free since its should be some kind of "framework" in the game engine that can be re used and copy/pasted into the mi8.

 

Technical speaking the mi8 is great and one person can today click all buttons ect.. I dont really see it should be that difficult to implement that two "single players" are in the same cockpit (different seat ).. BUT that only the pilot can fly the helicopter ( when alive ) and when dead co pilot get the controls of the trottle and stick automatic. OR a keyboard command to switch who can fly the heli.

It should also be pretty easy to make the co-pilot able to switch seats from co-pilot to gunner 1 and 2.

I also dont see any issues with "two singplayers in one cockpit" that click buttons.. except if they click something at the same time then it will be a double click.

Basicly its a "single player" helicopter, but where two "single players" can click the same buttons, they just sit in two different seats.

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Flew the Gazelle M one time into combat, hovered about 5 km from target, switched to copilot / commander seat, got sniped by a tank right away, thanks no. One flies, the other aims and shoots, Multicrew is very much needed. Otherwise we are sitting ducks during fire phase.

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