Heatblur F-14 and Forrestal Update

[near_blind]

Because Cobra Senpai won’t notice me…

@BlackLion213

@razza1974

Hi all,

Bought the f18, looks awesome and i support ed to further develop DCS.
I was wondering, which module will be easier to learn the f18 or f14. I am really waiting on the f14 and am a bit dissapointed that it isn’t announced for EA yet, anyways the EA announcement for the hornet is great news!
Which module will be easier to get to grips with? I am not a pro by any means and tears of joy flowed when i landed the mirage the first time (yeah that’s the level i am at, love the mirage)

Cheers!

Great question.

In terms of stick and rudder activities, the F-14 certainly takes more time to learn than the Hornet. That said, it’s certainly not an unruly beast to fly. It was stable and well mannered in normal flight with some gotchas that you need to account for at high AOA. But compared to other modern fighters in DCS (like the F-5E or F-15C, non-FBW jets) it feels pretty similar except that it is a bit less responsive in pitch and roll during normal operations. There is a sense of inertia when initiating pitch, but big inputs get the nose moving quickly (and potentially building AOA quickly so don’t just pull the stick into your lap and leave it there). However, its pitch rate can match the Mirage and F-15C (and exceed the rate of both at speeds less than 350 knots), so performance is excellent.

Roll is also much more stable than the F-5E or F-15C in that it takes bigger inputs to generate significant roll rate and max roll rate is slower than either of those. Also, depending on speed, stores, and G-loads you will see either proverse or adverse yaw during roll. It is generally not something that requires compensation, you just might notice it during maneuvers.

One of the gotchas is control reversal at high AOA - once AOA reaches the 20s or so, left stick will generally result in rolling right. The key is that above 20 units AOA you use the rudders to roll and this works great. However, if you don’t turn off roll SAS before starting these maneuvers and try and rudder roll, SAS will try to cross control the aircraft and a departure is fairly likely. You need to set-up the jet for ACM with a couple of system settings (like the SAS system).

Landing the F-14 is really fun though! The aircraft likes to slide around laterally on approach and roll inputs generate adverse yaw followed by the desired lateral movement. The aircraft also requires frequent adjustments to the glideslope since it likes to float (it has a ton of lift in the landing configuration). On the other hand, you can really slam it onto the deck and don’t have to worry about flaring. I’m a Heatblur F-14 tester so I’ve spent a lot of time in the module and tried to land the F-5E recently - blew both tires.
So staying on course requires some effort/attention, but touchdowns are easy.

However, the kicker is that the module is simply so much fun to fly. I whole-heartedly agree with this statement:

@bbrz

The real ‘feel’ is IMO only present in non-FBW planes.

The Tomcat really feels like flight and is very rewarding to fly - more so than anything in DCS imho. The FM is simply fantastic, very dynamic depending on flight regime, stores, speeds, etc. It feels like you are piloting a machine and the challenges make it much more enjoyable in the end. It is bewitching and awesome. I think people will love flying it. I also have no doubt that the Hornet FM will be exceptional, but the piloting sensation will probably be covered up somewhat by the FCS.

Systems wise the Tomcat is certainly much simpler than the Hornet - largely because there is a division of labor between pilot and RIO. Most of the complicated systems are managed by the RIO and the pilot really focuses on flying and weapons employment. RADAR, TCS, INS, and ECM/countermeasures are all handled by Jester or your human backseater. This lessens the learning curve a lot. Jester is also coming together very well and is already very useful for both WVR and BVR (even with further improvements on the way).

So overall, both these aircraft will be exceptional modules and the experience of flying them will be very different. Its a bit like comparing shirt and pants - you really need both.

If you love flying then the Tomcat will offer more of that. If operating systems is your favorite then the Hornet is the clear choice. Even novice pilots will be able to fly the Tomcat well with some practice (especially the F-14B). It just takes some time and effort, but learning is really fun and rewarding.

Best,

Nick

F18 or F14, which is easier to fly

@BlackLion213

@El Pilotto

But flying F-14 some times can be a pain. If you stuck in a dogfight you should be very careful about pulling the stick. No, you will not blackout, likely you will have a compressor stall, Hornet don’t have such a problem. Hornet even have the Departure recovery program if you over do (home ED emplement it in some time). Well this this opinion was based on my expirience, and I hope that ED and HB will make much more accurate modules.

The Heatblur module will be far more accurate FM-wise than the A/S rendition, plus you don’t have to worry about compressor stalls in the F110 powered F-14B that is being released first. It was an incredibly robust engine and never developed a compressor stall while installed in the F-14.

The F-14A is another matter, but even the TF30 in the A/S Tomcat is not very accurate. From the F-14A pilots I’ve spoken to, not one has seen a pure AOA related compressor stall in 1200-1500 hours of Tomcat flight time. In fact, of the three only 2 of them had any form of stall and only once each in their career. While it was possible for high AOA flight to cause a compressor stall in an engine at zone 5 or mil, it was very rare. The much more likely scenario was some form of throttle transient while at high AOA (like backing down from zone 5 or trying to come in or out of burner).

Also, the engine was far more susceptible to stalls at lower RPMs, so high AOA flight with engines at ~80% N1 was risky.

The A/S F-14 module only has one form of stall that actually didn’t exist in the F-14A - the engine pops then flames out (which actually would have been preferred to “hung stalls” of the real F-14). Instead the TF30 compressor stalls come in 2 flavors: “the cough” and “the hung stall”. The cough is a transient stall that spontaneously clears. Generally a loud bang with perhaps a very brief decrease in thrust. These coughs were much more common than hung stalls.

Hung stalls were the bad ones - a fully developed compressor stall that could lead to fire and loss of the aircraft. But the engine doesn’t actually flame-out, the RPMs and thrust slowly decay, internal engine temp rises, and the engine does not respond to any throttle inputs. In order to avoid fire (which will develop in about 30 seconds), the engine was be manually shut down via the throttle fuel cocks and the engine cooled by windmilling till TIT falls to safe levels. These events were more rare.

Anyway, all this drama can be easily avoided by flying the F-14B and enjoying its epic power.

But for those (like me) who want some additional, but very manageable challenges, they will be available too.

-Nick

F18 or F14, which is easier to fly

@BlackLion213

@Buzzles

Where’s BlackLion213 when you need him?

I somehow missed this post and had to finish planting some trees this afternoon.

In any case, players will be able to proficiently operate the weapon systems from the pilot seat only with the help of Jester. Jester is actually very useful even at this stage and things are working better than I expected.

At current state, the F-14 module is fully combat capable with all A-A weapons without the need to enter the RIO seat. There are several more features coming, but currently Jester has a solid breadth of functions: target spotting, target ID using IFF and the TCS, electronic emissions/RWR reports, ability to STT targets (pilot specifies which targets), manages chaff and ECM (once ECM is implemented), and can assist with functions like aircraft start-up (coaching the pilot in addition to performing the RIO component of aircraft cold start).

For BVR with AIM-54s, Jester currently uses TWS auto, but IFFs targets (which helps TWS auto properly sort targets). This allows pilots to employ the AIM-54 very effectively and you can see on the TID repeater which targets are the priority, which have AIM-54s inbound, and which targets had missile misses. With the AIM-54, the pilot can also request a STT lock which adds more range to a launch. This current arrangement works pretty well, but more functionality is planned to support multi-aircraft engagements and maximize effectiveness.

For AIM-7s, the pilot has a few options: he can request a STT lock from Jester via the menu or employ the pilots auto acquisition modes for the radar. These are PAL, VSL, and PLM. PAL is a horizontal scan mode with 10 nm and is the most handy for AIM-7 employment against bandits when time is tight. PLM has less range, but is more focused (better for grabbing a specific target if you can see it) and VSL is a vertical scan mode used for ACM. These modes really complement Jester since they allow you to rapidly acquire a target if you don’t have time to ask Jester for STT. Between these modes and Jester’s skills, employing the AIM-7 in the Tomcat is no harder than the F-15C imho.

For ACM, there is the gun and AIM-9s - using these is similar to other DCS aircraft. Jester proves to be very handy for spotting targets and keeping your 6 clear. He also manages chaff (pilot manages flares) and tells you if an enemy missile or SAM is inbound, plus notifies you of missile misses and successful missile hits against your targets. For ACM encounters, Jester is quite mature and functions very well. There are more functions planned for BVR, but you can comfortable go 1v2 or even 1v4 against Soviet fighters right now with the current functions.

Jester will never be as good as a human RIO (servers would be silly to deactivate him - basically the same as saying “no Tomcats allowed”), but single player employment of the Tomcat’s impressive capabilities will be very feasible. Things work well now and will only improve as we more towards EA (and probably still improve after).

-Nick

F-14 single player with pilot only

[Gunnyhighway]

interesting stuff. i’d like to see some videos of Jester working. Even though I’m more excited about being a RIO while someone else drives.

[Bogusheadbox]

It really does sound great. And its sounding to me like implementing voice attack to control jester will be a very rewarding and immersive addition.

Just wondering if jester will get an Aussie voice when the f-111 gets released.

[schurem]

Of course he will. Because you will be recording a realism voice mod for it

[near_blind]

I do hope you can record custom voices for it at somepoint because, as anyone who grew up watching JAG in the 90s will tell you; Skates is bae.

[JediMaster]

Yes, I prefer Hugh Jackman in back over Anthony Edwards any day!

[schurem]

Imma get my woman to say/scream all the lines for me. Would be so fun to have her sweetly murmuring there’s a bunch of missiles inbound.

[Tankerwade]

I want Jarvis to do my voice alerts.

“Sir, I do not think popping the airbrakes so they go by us is a viable plan…”

[near_blind]

LANTIRN!

GENTLEMEN

[Toppometer]

[komemiute]

[Navynuke99]

You guys, there’s a clue on Jeopardy tonight that pertains to the Tomcat!

[near_blind]

[BeachAV8R]

@nearblind preparing for release day…

[near_blind]

RACHEL!!!

Replace “Rachel” with “Tomcat”

[near_blind]

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?p=3391600#post3391600

[Gunnyhighway]

2019?

[Fridge]

In case you can’t get to that link:

---

Dear All,

Since our last update just before Christmas; the team has been focusing on hitting several major milestones in the F-14 project. These are actually some of the last major milestones to be completed prior to early access release, and they primarily involve the completion of the new, rebuilt art assets, and their integration into the existing codebase and aircraft.

While our main development branch is still occuring on the “chromecat” - we’re now very close to completing our work on several major visual areas of the aircraft and merging these together. While this feels like it has been a long journey; we’ll be clocking in at just under a year to build the most detailed rendition of an F-14 Tomcat ever created (and perhaps, any digital aircraft ever!)

This has required the full attention of all of our artist resources and has come at great cost - but there is nothing quite like a Tomcat, and we need to make sure that we do the best job that we can.

This process is not yet complete and will still take some time, but we’re very excited to show off what we’ve been working on and are pushing ourselves to the brink to get it done. Once this is complete, we can finally begin to record in-depth gameplay videos from the F-14. You should expect with great certainty for these to start dropping sometime in March. There is a ton to cover!

Late last month we’ve also announced the inclusion of LANTIRN into our F-14, making the Tomcat a formidable Bombcat. You will be able to use a full gamut of guided bombs to strike targets. Somewhat contrary to it’s initial role in the fleet, the F-14 is actually a very potent ground attack airplane, and flying strike packages in a coop scenario is incredibly fun. The Tomcat has plenty of range, and can carry a large payload, while remaining combat effective. No doubt, it will be one of the most capable aircraft in DCS on launch. We’ve always been committed to ensuring that our products are packed with value - and the LANTIRN being a part of the DCS F-14 is a move in the right direction for that to be the case.

We’ve also continued working very closely with our SMEs (F-14A, B and D pilots) to tweak the final elements of our flight modeling and control systems. Every time we iterate over a new build with our SMEs, we get closer to achieving satisfaction with both our SMEs and maintaining consistency with our data. We really can’t understate how satisfied we are with what we’ve achieved with the F-14 flight model.

Multiplayer is a big focus for the F-14, and for the Tomcat and other future products, we’ve written custom networking code to ensure that the multiplayer experience is consistent and smooth. Flying and fighting in the F-14 together is incredibly fun and rewarding.
Multiplayer is not only important for the aircraft itself, but also for all of our included content. The F-14 will eventually receive two free, full campaigns - one for the F-14A and one for the F-14B, of which one the -B campaign is currently deep in production. We’ll be adapting both of these campaigns to work in Co-operative - something which no doubt will be a ton of fun.

Concurrently, we’ve been organizing our future roadmap and plans. While our main focus during 2018 will be the full completion of the Viggen and polishing the F-14, we’ll be ramping up production on our future product roadmap as well. Jester AI, Navy assets, and other advanced, in-house technologies will be integral to ensuring that Heatblur products will be one of a kind moving forwards.

Fret not over the lull in updates - in this particular moment - silence is golden.

As always, thank you for the support!

Heatblur

[near_blind]

2018

[Gunnyhighway]

I hope, but every time I read one of these updates, I feel like you could basically find a similar one from a year ago. I swear the FM has been complete since 2016.