Can we turn it into a title? Like the “regular” “respected” “resident snark delivery person” lol
5 Likes
No doubt, schurem crashed both Victor’s and my Yak pretty good.
That’s just perfect! I was considering raising this issue on the forums, though it’s not an issue as much as it is a slight inaccuracy.
Wait, someone is supposed to wheelbarrow me around? Let me fetch my fine roomcoat and wheel me to the rustic post office, you trusty deliverer of Snark!
5 Likes
I was referring to @Hangar200 but I think I actually prefer your interpretation more 
I really need to get off Mudspike today. This is i think the 2nd or possibly third thread I’ve completely derailed almost singlehandedly…sorry everyone
2 Likes
Go on, derail a few more, I dare you. the modelling thread, sic 'em boy!
Anyway, back on the rails you go, you rusty ol’ thing. [Mighty heave]
I hope today’s patch fixed DCS enough for me to no longer get a headache from flying it. And I can get on towards becoming tactical in a viggen. Shooting down a bunch of Il-76s with a gunpod does not count really.
2 Likes
I think that was the third one I derailed already…I was pretty close to putting a picture of a long ladder with a lego man on top but I calmed myself and thought of others 
2 Likes
Here:
You deserve it. The mudspike tankerbar of honor.
2 Likes
I flew the hornet in VR a week or so ago and it gave me such a splitting headache I had to go back to 2d. The Viggen was actually slightly better but still wasn’t what I would consider smooth enough to fight with. Being low level with the trees and clutter wasn’t helping i suppose. But as that kind of IS the Viggen’s mission i think that may be here to stay
1 Like
I prefer, “His Most Sublime Grace, The Sultan of Snark”…just say’n 
3 Likes
I do declare I have the strongest of predilections towards @TheAlmightySnark’s interpretation of the title you have so graciously bestowed upon yourself. You have made your bed, good sir, now lug the man around in it!
2 Likes
Tried the Time on Target function today with @miRage on the Normandy map. We took off and navigated to the target individually (although on a common route) and managed to hit two ships with Rb-04E from different directions within 10 seconds of each other. Pretty cool stuff 
9 Likes
It worked very well. The Viggen is a joy to fly.
2 Likes
Awesome! I was just reading about the time on target stuff on the manual - that sounds really fun. I’d imagine it’s basically a must if you want to overwhelm well defended naval targets.
On that note, I was wondering about this yesterday - I wonder whether it is better to do what you guys did and attack from opposing sides or to try and overwhelm one quarter of the ship / group?
There must be pros and cons to both approaches:
-
I assume, depending on the CIWS placement of the target ship, that only some of the guns can engage at a particular quarter - so in a way, more missiles in that quarter might mean overcoming the defenses better.
-
On the other hand, having more spread between the missiles means the turrets need to traverse more between targets, which gives the missiles more time to close in.
-
Are the ship search/track radars able to search and track multiple targets in a 360 circle or would approaching from 180 degrees apart provide issues for the defending ship’s SAM fire control?
5 Likes
You raise some good points. I think it depends very much in the target ship. The Krivak guided missile frigate for example has two Osa SAM systems, one forward one one aft. In this case, attacking from multiple directions actually makes sure that both SAM system get a clear shot. I think on many ship types, the placement of missile systems and guns would actually favour attacking from a single direction only and overwhelming a subset of defenses in a single sector.
One exception would be systems with multiple targeting channels per fire control radar (such as Tor or S-300), in which case spreading out would prevent a single FCR from engaging multiple targets simultaneously. But if there are multiple FCR, this won’t help either.
Not that any of this matters in DCS, as Rb-04E will not be engaged by any shipborne SAM and cannot be hit by CIWS (apparently the missile has no hitbox). The thing will get through 100% of times.
I think in reality, human factors would be important for multi-axis attacks (drawing attention to a certain direction). But that won’t matter in DCS either. The tactic would also help against enemy fighters. A single fighter can threaten a whole group of attackers, but only some of them if they spread out (again a defense against a single system targeting multiple targets simultaneously).
5 Likes
The doctrine back during “the Big One“, the Cold War, was multi-axis attacks trying to achieve simultaneous TOTs. Would it have worked? The 50lb brains at the Center for Naval Analysis said so. Anyway, that’s what we practiced.
The TID function is pretty slick. I’ve started using it for all sorts of things. I’ll develop some missions where it plays a role. 
4 Likes
Would you agree that the decisive factor for that practice would be human reaction and C3 issues under multi-axis attacks? Because from a strict rock paper scissors perspective, overwhelming a single sector seems most advantageous in most situations (for example in wargames).
Huh, that’s news! Slightly disappointing news, really - as I understand it, subsonic missiles are quite vulnerable to CIWS defenses, so while it increases one’s chances of a successful attack gameplay-wise, it detracts from the mission planning a bit. Still very cool to do a timed pincer attack, of course…but a 2-ship in a combat spread would be a more aggressive 2A2 formation in case of enemy aircraft engaging during / after the attack run (in MP in particular).
Speaking of being attacked by enemy aircraft during an anti-ship run, I was on Growling Sidewinder server a couple of days ago and just got a pair of RB-4E’s off the rails when I suddenly got hit by something and was on fire and out of control.
The message afterwards revealed that I had been shot down by a JF-17 with an SD-10, which is a bit like an AMRAAM, by the looks. Now, the RWR was making all sorts of annoying beeps during my attack run, but I assumed those to be from the ships I was attacking, and had no idea what the sounds meant.
That lead me to http://www.viggentools.se/ and the RWR soundscape…obviously that doesn’t have all the newer aircraft (I think @Hangar200 was talking about this somewhere?) but I guess the airborne radars still tend to sound a bit different to ship-mounted ones so doing a bit of listening would be pretty useful. Makes you appreciate the handy RWR scope with letters and symbols!
Edit: is that hitbox matter the same for RB-15?
4 Likes
The risk you take with a single axis attack, is that the enemy made the same guess about where you’re coming from and your firing all your missiles into the same area as the AM assets are. Going to a multi-prong approach with one prong weighted heavier than the other creates the need to provides the need to go 2+ threat axis of coverage and having to play a guessing game about where to put everything to counter that heavier attack.
Another issue is what time period are we talking about? Are we in the early cold war where soviet naval aviation is limited? CIWS systems are limited, and most ships can only track and attack 2 or three threats? Or are we talking late cold war into the modern era where every ship has 3-4 CIWS systems, at least 1 if not large caliber guns capable of engaging sea skimming missiles, and SAM systems that can track and engage a dozen or more threats with missiles at 60+nm? The early time period I’d say there is a realistic possibility to over saturate the defenses in single axis. In the later time period forcing assets to have to move to cover gaps as munitions are expended or ships fall out of formation from evasive maneuvers I’d imagine is the best option.
4 Likes