Struggling with SA in the a10c..

Hi all, just started operation piercing fury campaign, and it's excellent. One thing i have always seemed to struggle with is my situational awareness. Once things get busy, and i'm getting radio calls for x no of trucks leaving camp xy to the north east i'm a bit lost really. I can pilot the aircraft without issue for the most part ;) employing weapons are no issue etc i just cant seem to understand my position relative to the enemy, and this can be really frustrating. If i'm really fed up, i'll click on labels to help me and of course that makes it really easy to finish the mission but i don't want to do that. What am i missing, how do you guys keep SA? Tad? HSI? tgp? any advice on how to manage SA better would be welcome.

Its a bit like going hiking, you need to know the route, important land marks etc before you actually go there. So when you go there and get lost or something like that, you will have the information you need to figure out where you are relative to your target/destination.

And most importantly, keep your head out of the mfcds during the flight, and look around you. Its far more easier to stay aware if you keep checking whats around you instead of being heads down whole flight.

Its a bit like going hiking, you need to know the route, important land marks etc before you actually go there. So when you go there and get lost or something like that, you will have the information you need to figure out where you are relative to your target/destination.

 

And most importantly, keep your head out of the mfcds during the flight, and look around you. Its far more easier to stay aware if you keep checking whats around you instead of being heads down whole flight.

^this.

Pay attention to visual landmarks. It may sound obvious but it's easy to get your head wrapped up in the cockpit and forget to simply pay attention as you look around.

Look for big prominent landmarks that area easy to find and then remember relative positions from them.

For example, the target may not be easy to see but if you notice it's near the tip of a large "pointy shaped" forest or roughly between two large lakes that are easy to spot, you can reorient yourself from there.

Also, if you are comfortable with the instruments, don't forget about markpoints. They're quick/easy to create spatial bookmarks and useful for much more than marking targets. Drop a few of those like breadcrumbs to help you find your way.

Hope that helps.

Just like people are saying above the key is often to get your head out of the cockpit and look around more. If you have spent a little time studying the maps and the area the mission will take place in you should know where the primary landmarks are like town, conspicuous hill and forests, etc

As you enter a target area where you'll working try to identify those landmarks you have picked out from your map study and work out you orientation on the ground.

Hi all, just started operation piercing fury campaign, and it's excellent. One thing i have always seemed to struggle with is my situational awareness. Once things get busy, and i'm getting radio calls for x no of trucks leaving camp xy to the north east i'm a bit lost really. I can pilot the aircraft without issue for the most part ;) employing weapons are no issue etc i just cant seem to understand my position relative to the enemy, and this can be really frustrating. If i'm really fed up, i'll click on labels to help me and of course that makes it really easy to finish the mission but i don't want to do that. What am i missing, how do you guys keep SA? Tad? HSI? tgp? any advice on how to manage SA better would be welcome.

It's much more difficult because you're using a 2D monitor. I had the same problem because it's very hard to orient yourself to the terrain and it takes *A LOT* of practice because our brains are in 3D, but the sim is in 2D only. Trust me, as a former Infantry officer, I can read maps and terrain associate. Hell I was in pre-GPS era.

So if you're using a monitor (which is probably the vast majority) you have to do what others have said and look out and try to orient yourself.

But since I got into VR, I realized how much easier it is to track where I am in 3D space with VR. I didn't have to do anything because my brain and and where I am in 3D space was one and the same. Just by glancing at a hilltop, I knew where I was in 3D space.

Again, it can be done with monitors, but you just have to practice and get used to it.

Excellent advice all around! :thumbup:

Two more things that come to mind:

Mission preparation can really help with SA. Of course that only works if there is sufficient information provided by the mission designer, and if the mission doesn't completely catch the player off guard by presenting challenges that were impossible to prepare for.

The other thing for me is the TAD, and specifically the FOV EXP modes.

I like the normal mode, when the TAD screen rotates along with my aircraft, for route following. But as soon as I get into a combat situation, I prefer the EXP1 mode (China Hat Forward Short with TAD as SOI), where the map is fixed to the north. Compared to all the other aircraft we currently have in DCS, the bonus for SA that the TAD provides in this mode is simply spectacular IMO (I'm aware Harrier and Hornet have just gotten a moving map, but I haven't looked into that yet).

I know I tend to lose SA when the situation gets rough, and looking out the window is usually the best way to regain (and maintain) SA. But the TAD is really, really helpful as well. The key is getting all the required information from the TAD without spending all the time heads down.

Yes this is the thing i have not been using to the max, TAD & the exp modes. I understand about keeping eyes out of the cockpit, all good advice. But it's knowing where n, s, e, w is that i'm getting disorientated slightly. If i have co-ords then it's not an issue, but if i have a target in an 'area' 10 miles south of whatever that's where i start to loose it a bit and often it takes ages for me to find it, especially if i'm under time pressure..

When you're given a position relative to you, quickly glance down at the HSI, it will help for those cases where people give you cardinal headings, if you find yourself turned around.

I usually do well with markpoints. In the Enemy within campaign where a lot of flying usually is done in valleys and such, I used the HSI course arrow to fix the main valley inbound and outbound route, so I can find myself when things start going south.

I never tried using the TAD in EXP mode, but after reading some tips here I will surely do, it looks like a nice way to keep SA as well.

..., but if i have a target in an 'area' 10 miles south of whatever that's where i start to loose it a bit and often it takes ages for me to find it, especially if i'm under time pressure..

That is where eyes on the world outside is key. Fly familiarization over the area. If the campaign does not provide a famflight, make your own, by "save as..." the first or second mission. You will loose all triggers etc. due to copy protection, but the area and FARPS and such should be there.

Now fly around and visualize the landscape to the north, south, west and east, until you can confidently look outside and recognize where the cardinal directions are. South of the Caucasus Mountains, the Mountains are North. See the coastline? In Georgia that should be to the west.

On the russian side of the Caucasus the Mountains are south of you...

Find the rivers and lakes from the F10 map when looking down from the cockpit and try to get a "picture" what the lakes coastline looks from each direction.

Next train vocalizing your turns, attack runs etc. whenever you turn right or left look around verify on you HSI/Compassband where you are heading and where you want to turn and say aloud "CALLSIGN 1-1, turning north/east/west/south to XXX degrees." or "CALLSIGN 1-1, running in from north to south/west to east" etc. make this a habit. It helped me to get a much better awareness to where I am in relation to the world.

Finally you can use this general spatial awareness to finetune directions from ground locations.

Say you now know what "North" and "South" look like and you have eyes on an Outpost/Checkpoint near a prominent road-crossing. Now when you get a call like "CALLSIGN 1-1, JTAC 2-1, suspect vehicles north of checkpoint A", you look at the crossing, look up and find the mountains ("north") and move your eyes back to the crossing, if possible in a straight line, so you know where "north" is, in relation to the checkpoint.

If eyes outside the cockpit isn't an option there is a compass cross in the upper right corner of the TGP (but keep in mind that most of the time it is perfectly possible to use your eyballs Mk I) :smartass:

and last but not least this isn't something you get used to and learn in 5 minutes, it takes a bit of time and forcing yourself to memorize the sourroundings, but it pays off, as you need no longer rely on TGP,instruments alone and free your mind for more urgent tasks when you instinctively glance at the horizon and know where you are looking.:thumbup:

I find it helps to change the TAD to EXP 1 so that it stays North Up...

Helps anchor stuff so it's not in front of you one second and behind you the next.

I struggle with this bigtime. Ive been flying sims for tens of years. Last six very seriously. Its getting a but better for me but it just takes so much work and practice. I drive with an iPhone app called spyglass for extra curricular practice :)

That is where eyes on the world outside is key. Fly familiarization over the area. If the campaign does not provide a famflight, make your own, by "save as..." the first or second mission. You will loose all triggers etc. due to copy protection, but the area and FARPS and such should be there.

 

Now fly around and visualize the landscape to the north, south, west and east, until you can confidently look outside and recognize where the cardinal directions are. South of the Caucasus Mountains, the Mountains are North. See the coastline? In Georgia that should be to the west.

On the russian side of the Caucasus the Mountains are south of you...

 

Find the rivers and lakes from the F10 map when looking down from the cockpit and try to get a "picture" what the lakes coastline looks from each direction.

 

Next train vocalizing your turns, attack runs etc. whenever you turn right or left look around verify on you HSI/Compassband where you are heading and where you want to turn and say aloud "CALLSIGN 1-1, turning north/east/west/south to XXX degrees." or "CALLSIGN 1-1, running in from north to south/west to east" etc. make this a habit. It helped me to get a much better awareness to where I am in relation to the world.

 

Finally you can use this general spatial awareness to finetune directions from ground locations.

Say you now know what "North" and "South" look like and you have eyes on an Outpost/Checkpoint near a prominent road-crossing. Now when you get a call like "CALLSIGN 1-1, JTAC 2-1, suspect vehicles north of checkpoint A", you look at the crossing, look up and find the mountains ("north") and move your eyes back to the crossing, if possible in a straight line, so you know where "north" is, in relation to the checkpoint.

 

If eyes outside the cockpit isn't an option there is a compass cross in the upper right corner of the TGP (but keep in mind that most of the time it is perfectly possible to use your eyballs Mk I) :smartass:

 

and last but not least this isn't something you get used to and learn in 5 minutes, it takes a bit of time and forcing yourself to memorize the sourroundings, but it pays off, as you need no longer rely on TGP,instruments alone and free your mind for more urgent tasks when you instinctively glance at the horizon and know where you are looking.:thumbup:

Thanks Shagrat & everyone for great advice, this campaigns first mission is one where we take a tour of the AO, of course i just flew the wp's looking at the green smoke etc lol i should have paid more attention! I flew again last night and focused on directions and using the TAD better, exp modes are really useful if i remember to use them ;) I still had to click on labels when i lot the sight of some ground units but it was better so thanks to all ;)

Don't be afraid to pause the game and write down the coordinates that you need. It will come in handy if you need to make a waypoint in the cdu.

Don't be afraid to pause the game and write down the coordinates that you need. It will come in handy if you need to make a waypoint in the cdu.

Trains a bad habit and if you were ever to play on a multiplayer server, there is no pause...

The "autopilot" helps a lot with that, use ALT (altitude hold mode) and circle while inputting coordinates into the CDU.

Trains a bad habit and if you were ever to play on a multiplayer server, there is no pause...

Yes and no. ;)

Scripted events in SP don't care if you're in any way distracted.

Since most of the time I don't know if there's a way to have coords repeated, I tend to pause in SP whenever I receive something that needs to be written down.

In MP, there is no pause. In MP, there's a dude that will repeat the coords until you've got them. And if he's good at his job, he'll try to make sure you're ready to copy before he transmits them in the first place. :thumbup: