BFT07 - qualifiying?

So, I get back to the ramp at Batumi, the instructor gives me a 'qualified' for every aspect except manoeuvres which he gives me a 'qualified minus', and yet, I am told I have failed and must do better!

What is going on there?

That's weird. Is it reproducible?

Your summarized mission rating will be the lowest rating of any section so if you pass all areas you get a Qual. If you got a qual-minus for maneuvers then you should have got a qual minus provided all the other areas were qual or qual-minus.

An unqual in any area would give you an unqual for the mission (like if you crashed the plane on landing for example).

Thanks Sabre, I persevered and passed the mission thank goodness!

I passed without ever successfully doing the cloverleaf. I think the time I posted above about, I failed at least 2 of the aerobatics, but still, on the Batumi ramp, I was given a qualify minus for that and qualified for everything else and still failed!

Don't know if there is maybe a little bug somewhere.

Hi Sabre,

Having difficulty with this mission as well. Can you give some advice in terms of how to set up for these maneuvers (for instance what airspeed to start at)? I am not sure if my G-force application is incorrect, but I roll out (and hit intermediate checks) on heading & altitude but still get "you failed to preform the maneuver ..."

Typically I cannot complete the immelmann or split-S. The loop and barrel roll don't give me as much trouble, as I usually complete them successfully about a quarter of the time. I have never completed the cloverleaf successfully. I have reviewed the related post on this giving the spoiler about what the program is looking for in terms of heading/altitude/pitch/bank/etc checks. As far as I can tell I am well inside the tolerances. Is there something else I can do to pass this mission so I move past this? Frustration and annoyance are strongly eclipsing any fun that I am having at this point ...

Thanks,

EDIT: I have also watched the related Recon Stewart video ... entertaining but did not help with passing these tasks successfully.

We recommend using the practice missions as much as possible before the campaign missions as they do have some extra dialogue to help you with the maneuvers.

For the Immelman you should get speed up as quickly as you can (max throttle when given the command) then slowly manage the back pressure on the stick so you form a half loop instead of cranking and pulling as quickly as you can. We have noticed that if you ease up on the stick you get smoother turns through all axis.

Likewise for the Split-S but it's easier since you are going nose down instead of pulling up so gravity helps you here.

The Cloverleaf is the toughest maneuver as it contains a barrel roll and a split-s while performing the turns to make the leaves of the cloverleaf.

It does take practice so we recommend using the practice missions until you get a feel for how much stick forward or back pressure to use to get smooth turns.

The practice missions will also give you some feedback (FE will say Good or something similar) when you hit each part of the maneuver correctly.

The triggers are setup to check heading, bank angle and altitude to test the success of the maneuvers so if you aren't successful check to see if you are drifting off heading or not flying level (even when inverted), off altitude at the end of the maneuver, etc.

It's a challenging mission but rewarding when you get the feel for the turns and can pass it.

If it's too frustrating then you can bypass the mission by editing your logbook. There is a post in this campaign forum section that explains how to do that.

Sabre,

I have tried a few more times without luck to get these maneuvers right. I am thinking it could be the way I have my axis tuned, and would like to experiment to see what works. However, even the practice mission takes too long for me to get loaded in, climb up & fly out to the MOA. I do not have experience editing missions, but is there a way I (or you) can trim the missions down to right before each maneuver, so I can practice each one until I can consistently get it right? If there was an option to save a mission in a current state that would fix this, but I do not see that option in the menu. Thanks for the help. I am really looking forward to getting past this mission.

Sorry there is no current way to change the missions as they are.

We could look at adding additional practice missions but they would have to be included in a future update.

What particular issues are you having? Speed is important in many of the maneuvers - too slow and you won't be able to do them.

The practice mission does have some extra voice overs to tell you when you get it right.

If you can post a trk file we an give you some feedback.

Sabre,

In particular the Immelmann and the cloverleaf seem unachievable for me. For the Immelmann it doesn't seem to matter if I roll out level after or prior to passing through the horizon, or level with the horizon; I still fail the maneuver (even staying on heading). For the clover leaf I often think I hit the headings, but the examiner disagrees every time. I have no clue where it is failing me. I have been careful to be at 260 kts or greater for these maneuvers. I cannot attach the trk because the file size is too large ... I will try sending it directly to you.

Yes email us at mapleflagmissions@gmail.com and we can review the trk and give you some tips on how to pass the mission.

There was a forum post awhile back that explained the triggers for each of the maneuvers (spoilers) but it helped folks understand what they had to do. I'll edit this post with a reference once I find it.

FOUND IT: https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=2781210&postcount=87

The triggers haven't changed much since Recon Stewart's video so you might want to compare your flight to his:

Sabre,

I sent the TRK to the mapleflagmissions email you have listed(earlier I sent it to the one provided by the ED forums which appears to be different).

While preforming these maneuvers I had both this spoiler thread open as well as Recon Stewarts video, I stepped through each maneuver after watching the video and reviewing the passing criteria with the results I have already mentioned (problems with Immelmann and Cloverleaf). By the way I believe that Recon was not able to pass the Cloverleaf either (I cannot check, at work now).

Hopefully you can review my file and let me know where I am going wrong. Thanks for the help.

Thank you for the help, I was able to pass it ... barely. Still unable to accomplish the cloverleaf. Has anyone been able to do this? I appreciate having Recon Stewarts videos, but if Maple Flag made actual demonstration videos of things working the way they should it would go a LONG way. Especially with the A-10C getting texture refresh, it could be a good time to do it.

A side note ... the trigger for going off course on waypoint 2 (where you turn from heading 300, angles 6 to heading 040, towards the MOA) is obnoxiously too close. If you wait until the examiner finishes his command to tell you to turn and make a standard rate turn, you will quickly get disqualified for course deviation. Instead I have to make a 2G turn as soon as he begins the command to both stay on course, and not get barked at by the examiner.

Now onto mission 08, emergencies, and to the associated forum thread to find out why my MAN REV. mode is going into wild oscillations ...

Even though this mission is very interesting, it consists of 90% pure frustration. The reasons are

• The FE does not tell you why you have failed a maneuver. Was it too slow, too much heading/pitch deviation or whatever? Without feedback I cannot improve myself. Actually I fail some maneuvers even when I think that I did it perfectly right. So I would like to know what went wrong in the eyes of the FE.
  
• The FE does not give me enough time to get prepared for some maneuvers. E.g. after the so called 4-G turn, which drains a lot of speed, you have to do the Immelman-turn, which requires at least 280 knots. I always have to make haste and dive very quickly in order to get enough speed for the Immelman or else he will say that I have failed the maneuver before I even started it.
  
• It takes a long time until you can get to the interesting hard maneuvers, because you have to do the easy stuff first. I would like to see the easy ones in the 6-th instead in the 7-th mission.
  
• The FE does not immediately tell you after the end of the maneuver series, whether you have performed good enough to pass the mission. Instead you have to wait until you have landed and shut down the aircraft, until he slaps you in the face with an unqualified rating. I kind of feel fooled, when my landing + shut down was for nothing.
  
• In between the maneuvers the FE often remains silent for a very long time. So I do not know what to do in order to get to the next maneuver test. I just fly around for a long time until the FE starts talking again. This is frustrating even though I am using the time acceleration.
  

I hope these problems get addressed in the next update, because this mission is too important for the campaign to be failed or to be skipped just because of bad triggers.

Thanks for the feedback. We will incorporate your suggestions into our next update set.

When the campaign was originally designed the intent was for users to fly the practice missions first to perfect their tactics, techniques and procedures. The practice missions have some extra dialogue to point out mistakes or acknowledge when the correct maneuver is done.

Many users wanted the campaign sequence to be just the QUAL missions so the practice missions were removed from the campaign but remained in the package so they could be flown separately (via the Mission Editor).

I don't see any issues adding the extra dialogue back into the QUAL missions and also being able to provide some mid-flight feedback if the users requests it (we didn't have the F10 menu option when the campaign was first created).

We have been making changes as the game engine develops so we will continue to do so to improve the package for all players.

Please continue to post any feedback or suggestions for improvement.

Thanks.

It is fine to keep the campaign missions just as difficult as they are (as long as the FE tells you immediately when you do not have enough points to pass the mission instead of waiting after shut down).

However, the practice mission need some changes. It has a bit more dialog like you said, but the important feedback is still lacking. Also I would like to be able to repeat certain maneuvers during the practice mission. For example you could add more items in the radio comms menu so we can tell the FE which maneuver we want to practice next. That would a huge improvement imho.

Update: I tried the practice mission a dozen of times now, but the FE even fails my split S which I am doing perfectly due to tacview. Is it maybe because I did not turn on those aerobatic smokes? I have googled and searched in the manual how to use that silly smoke, but I cannot find anything useful.

My maneuvers look even better than in the video linked in this thread. So I wonder if there is anyone who can complete this mission in the current DCS version or if there is a severe bug.

Update 2: I finally made it, but only because I could do the barrel role and the split s successfully. I found out that my split s is only rated as successful when I initially keep my plane leveled for a few seconds longer until the FE says "Good." It is not sufficient when you start your split s directly after the FE tells you to start it. So this is why this mission is so extremly frustrating, because you do not know which little detail can fail your test. More explanations and immediate feedback from the FE could solve that problem.

Interestingly I always successfully complete the 3 maneuver series in the end of the test, although I never manage to make at least three successful maneuvers in the first half of the test. That seems kind of illogical to me or maybe some triggers are weird.

We will see if we can improve the triggers with our next update however we are limited by the current game engine capabilities.

This post shows all the triggers used to detect successful completion of each maneuver. If anyone can suggest a better method please let us know.

https://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=2781210&postcount=87