Heatblur F-14 and Forrestal Update

No, you can be mine :rainbow_flag: :

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That sounds pretty much how I perceived the Iranians to use it.

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Hereā€™s how the conversion went with my 5 year old son last night while we were flying the Hornet.

Son: Daddy, not that plane again!
Me: What are you talking about the F-18 is super cool?
Son: Daddy, when are you getting the F-14 Tomcat?
Me: Maybe in a couple more weeks
Son: Daddy, the F-18 is only a little bit cool, the F-14 Tomcat is much more cooler!

So there you have it folksā€¦ the F-14 is much more cooler than the F-18ā€¦ :grin::grin::sunglasses:

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Iā€™d rather be somebodyā€™s RIO. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Thatā€™s not on Heatblur though. The mission maker decides what the aircraft will fight, and the player decides which mission heā€™d like to partake in. So far weā€™ve seen mostly fighter things because those are easy to set up, and appeals to a large portion of the potential customer base. Sitting Alert 5 for a half an hour, getting a call for an intercept, frantically trying to get shot off the front of the boat, find, intercept, and escort the target is equally doable (and it looks like HBā€™s attention to the INS and systems will make this a challenge in of itself), but thatā€™s a much more niche taste in a niche community, and harder to chop down into an entertaining thirty minute youtube video.

Likewise the air-surface attack interface is lacking, massed attacks are absolutely doable, but thatā€™s an ever more delicate scenario to sell because unless youā€™re rocketing off the boat to try and splash kitchens, thatā€™s an hour or three in the air punching circles in the air. Iā€™d argue the 30 minutes of sheer terror that follow make it worth it, but Iā€™d also struggle to sell that proposition to most sane people.

So far Heatblurā€™s simulation of the aircraft itself looks on track to be the most accurate Iā€™ve seen, checking off a number of features I didnā€™t think weā€™d ever see in a sim. Warts and all.

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That is not quite fair to HB though, isnā€™t it? Heatblur is neither making a Topgun F-14 nor a Fleet Defender F-14. So far I have the impression that they simply make a mostly realistic F-14. As such we will be able to use it how we please, that being as a fighter or as an interceptor. Both the real F-14 has been fully capable of. What sort of videos a couple of Youtubers make with their preview copies has zero impact on my enjoyment of the module.

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OKā€¦I never said that HB was doing anything but making a great, and as far as they can, accurate sim. :grin:

The bottom line is that they are selling a product. They have limited resources and limited time. Can they accurately simulate every aspect of this marvelous fighter? No. Nobody can.

Where should their focus be? Should they accurately simulate the painfully slow, painfully intricate, painfully boring aspects of long range intercept of bomber-sized targets in a jamming environment? Who is going to buy that? (Besides me, I mean)

Or should they focus on simulating exciting BVR against fighters? White knuckles dog fighting? Getting as much as the can very accurate for the majority of scenarios a typical sim-pilot will use? Of course they shouldā€¦and from what I have seen, they did.

Is anybody other than myself, or maybe @near_blind, going really scrutinize at the DDD when sorting targets beyond 100 Nm?ā€¦perhaps notice a slight discrepancy between the DDD reported closing velocity and the relative length of the correspondā€™s velocity vector on the TID? Heck, if I start to do that somebody needs to revoke my Mudspike membership and banish me to the ED Forums forever!

I will most likely purchase this mod (in a couple monthsā€¦after I finally can land a Mig-21 twice in a row, without requiring the fire brigade). I will likely utilize it as I think it should be utilizedā€¦that crazy old curmudgeon that cannot stop reliving the salad days of the Cold Warā€¦Yep thatā€™s meā€¦:slightly_smiling_face:

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Weā€™d kinda need ED to do something about the EW part of the sim for that. At present time, we really only have self protection jammers, even accounting for the Viggenā€™s U22 pod.

I will say that I do think it would be possible to structure a mission or campaign that represented the typical Cold War era life of a Turkey crew, where the threat is more along the lines of running up and escorting a Bear away from the carrier group, with no shooting allowed. Then after the 30th mission, after many uneventful drilling of holes in the sky, maybe have a Gulf of Sidra in where you might engage a couple enemy aircraft. Itā€™s all a matter of how it comes together and the ambience of it all. Some liberties would have to be taken, such as using Caucasus as a stand-in for other areas, but I think weā€™d be willing to overlook that detail so as long as the core is close enough to capture the feeling.

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Wouldnā€™t that be the highlight and final mission of the campaign? After 30 missions of CV ops ā€¦

Seriously. Thankfully, itā€™s up to each of us to select the missions / campaigns / servers we want to fly. If you donā€™t like to dogfight in your cat just skip these missions.

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Friends, Sim-pilots, Mudspikians, lend me your ears;
I come to praise HBā€™s Tomcat, not burry it.

The fun that Tomcats did lives after them;
The boring is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with HBā€™s F-14.

The noble @Franze
Hath told you ā€œRealistic tactics be damned,
the aim-54 will provide a distinct advantage in pvp multiplayer.ā€

If it is so, it is a grievous fault,
And grievously hath @Hangar200 puled about it.

ā€¦but really,I do get itā€¦I may not like it, but I get it.

At the end of the day Iā€™m excited that the Tomcatā€“the F-14 of my JO daysā€“will be in DCS and that it is evidently an awesome mod, doing justice to the real thing. And especially that it was developed by Heatblur (and not by another developer who will remain nameless but rhymes with ā€œJazz Damā€ā€¦too soon?) who has done such a fantastic job on the Viggen. :grin::grin::grin:

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And just imagine when HB finally realeases the mighty A-6!
:a6:

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haha nice post.

For me I shouldnā€™t follow too much F14 discussionā€¦ Iā€™m trying not to be too hyped I meanā€¦ when you think about it this module, with the dual seat co-op, swept wings, no FLCS aka real flying, AIM54, working TGP, INS accuracy, Jester, Icemanā€¦ Iā€™m not a F14 fan I like the viper better but even for me it all sounds a little too good to be true. Yeah totally not hyped at all.

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After the f111
:f111:
sized

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Let me fix that for youā€¦

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Nah, in PvP multiplayer I doubt it will have a huge impact. In PvE it will, because the AI will use radar and try to fly higher and faster than you for a first missile shotā€¦ In PvP, everyone will be diving low and using IRST with radar off to mask their signatures. Which the Turkey canā€™t play 'cause no IRST.

A very interesting point. I wonder how much of that is real world tactics and how much of that is ā€œsim tacticsā€.

I got my first look at sim tactics in a FPS PvPā€¦one of those ā€œrealisticā€ army shooters. Iā€™ve got an M4 with grenade launcher. I seen enemy moving in open about 40 yards from me. I pop a grenade that lands right at his feetā€¦and does nothing to him. The I notice that he is jumping. I fire another grenade, again a perfect shotā€¦nothing.

You all probably know what he was doing; I didnā€™t. I later learned it was called ā€œbunny hoppingā€ā€“that if you are up in the air you cannot be hit. My son, a CPT in the USA with 2 tours in Afghanistan tells me that doesnā€™t actually work in the real world. Aside from the fact that he is my sonā€“and Iā€™m really proud of himā€“I am inclined to believe him.

I never played that game again. No point if, while I am taking it ā€œseriouslyā€ā€“trying to follow realistic tactics regarding cover and movementā€“some clown is going to use ā€œsim tacticsā€ to beat me.

This is already way off topic (sort of), so Iā€™ll stop here with a suggestion that at some point we start a thread (or series of threads) discussing sim tactics vs real tactics. Just a thought.

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Yes, there are endless instances where people misuse something a game allows you to do (because itā€™s accurate) for inaccurate results.
Lots of twitchy jumpy movements of one kind or another is a prime example. The inaccurate modeling of explosives/shrapnel is another. Ballistics are modeled far easier in most games, does the bullet hit, does it penetrate, velocity, arc, etc.
As soon as you have a grenade going off itā€™s another deal entirely.

For sims, we have the equivalent problem of damage modeling where you can hit a large plane with like 3 missiles and it blithely flies along like nothing happened, which doesnā€™t seem right at all. At a minimum it should fly home and not press the attack.

One engine outā€¦ Elevator goneā€¦ Flaps stuckā€¦ Gear downā€¦ Rudder shotā€¦ One working aileronā€¦ Time to dogfight!

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You forgot canopy gone and RIO ejectedā€¦which is actually good because you donā€™t have to share the kill with a guy who basically was just sitting there, along for the rideā€¦and you can let your silk scarf flap in the slipstream as you move to guns, guns, guns! :sunglasses::stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

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Iā€™d be quite terrified actually - clearly my ejection seat has failed and now I have to bail out WWII style without falling into an intake or bouncing off the tail!