Lexx_Luthor

Hunger Modders can go months without eating, drinking, etc...

Yea later F-4 radars had transitors but that's my way of saying advances in electronics. Sorry for that. I'm not too familiar with F-15 use in the various US/Iraq wars, so not much on close dogfights and AIM-9 use.

Good points C5. That 2nd seat in 1960s fighters were not because of close dogfighting, but that 2nd seat happened to come in spankin' handy when the aircraft engaged in such combat. Thus the importance of it here. I imagine the reason for a second seat went away as transistors replaced vacume tubes by the time F-15 was designed. USAF F-15 combat use was mostly if not entirely BVR where the second seat is filled with the more effective tranistors rather than the old vacume tubes. If not for that advance in equipment design, I'll lay odds the F-15 would have been a two seater. Think about it. I'd be interested in ideas lifted from Israeli or others' use of F-15 in close dogfights with guns and advanced IRM which I'm *not* familiar with -- thanks if so. Pilot:: LoL

Man yea Yellowstone is going to PWN someday. lol

Server:: SERVER THANKS for stepping up. I was going to poast simply Sprint did what it had to do in our system, but I didn't have the balls. You explained why too. Thanks. usafmtl, the two persons probably don't have much wealth to confiscate by the system. Sprint has wealth that can be stripped. We often like to blame "corporations" but we are afraid to talk among ourselves why our system defines persons as corporations. Thats why you always see me poasting the words "men and women." The system hates that. Myself, I prefer T-Mobile all the way. Please nobody poast that T-M is part of Sprint.

Capitaine, perfect point about small French carriers: F-8 > F-0. Gepard:: Why? The one thing apparently agreed upon here is F-8 has better handling at least for high angles of attack. I don't know much about that, but I can go with it. Enough to compensate for lack of second seat and merge disadvantage? Butt, I do know in all the cars I've driven, the one I most felt comfortable in, really the only one, was big Ford F-150 truck with only the limited power assist steering and 300-6 / 4spd granny stick, no AC no nothing lol it was made for Mis-sip state purchase but was sold to public. I could do insane things with that I guess because the limits were easy to know.

What is ACM? No eyes means no manuever. More skilled eyes means more ability to confidently manuever. That 2nd seat is part of ACM. If I recall(), the merge is the most important part of general ACM. With a hardware enthusiast in back, the F-4 with big radar and Sparrows can have some advantage here, as it did over MiG-21s in merges, although one often cannot set up the fight one wants. The back seater, big radar, and Sparrows with luck can change the numbers before close manuever begins, and so are part Air Combat Manuever, although not Air Dogfight Manuever, or ADM. I just made that up. In the end, did it work to bring F-4 crews up to F-8 pilot training for close combat, turning those extra scope reading eyes into extra trained dogfight eyes? c5:: I guess it depends on the F-8 having enough superiority in turning, handling, less visibility, etc... Enough to overcome the F-4's merge advantage, bonus eyes, and larger air-air weapon load, excepting gun for gunless Phantom? How did visibility out of the cockpit compare for both planes? I can go either way here. Another interesting question -- too many already I know: In disengaging from a close fight, which would have general advantage, under what relative conditions? I have not thought about this.

Little Boomer If it sets off Big boomer... I read something like that. Every time little boomber goes off, big boomer goes off later.

Yea its all "feeling" and I share it about the trekkie aerodynamics, especially Streak's #5 point on high AoA handling. The second seat and larger missile load is the winner for me. But that comes with a cost and if all you had is a small carrier the single seat F-8 is infinitely better than F-0 nothing. The thing to do is get F-4 crews as trained as F-8 pilots in close dogfighting. server:: lol hehe :good: SUMMARY ~> F-4 pwn F-8 Don't worry he's hungover now he'll read that as F-8 pwn F-4 so everybody happy

Man well said. But for offline, and online with AI components, the AI has to be programmed to use the FM, and it never is in any of TheSims I've heard of. That's why I gut the FMs I use for my campaign development, strip out most of the variables, or the player gets game crippling advantages, as far as I've seen in the game anyways. My focus on air war environment grafix is player oriented but the AI is not programmed for it. I guess my "skyterrain" mods are a wish that developers would treat it like ground combat games treat the ground environment, programming AI to use the objects and features of terrain and buildings. Recall Saburo getting the best of a Brewster Buffalo but the Buff pilot manages to get to a cumulonimbus cloud to escape -- a 3 dimensional as in "3D" cumulonimbus cloud not just "texture."

That's a good one.

What if she uses a golf club?

Go 76 that looks great. I did some hang gliding at one time, not much but its the neatest thing. Airplane = deep sea diving Sailplane = scuba diving Hang gliding = skinny dipping, all natural We should ask Jug if, under good summer convection conditions, one could thermal with an empty U-2.

Woa Streak that's a bunch to chew on. Thanks for the time spent. Michel in Clashes does tell about crews that were proficient at Sparrow combat, and units that could maintain them. What other Vietnam air books would you recommend? Pre-thanks. Clashes is the only one I've got.

Wow, I missed this. usafmtl:: hehe I love that fractional quote.

Thanks Gocad, that makes sense. I assumed driver and gold ballast were equally "trained." ie...the Ideal air crew for TheSims forum discussion. I enjoy the way Pilot put it last page... I probably need an F8U-3 thread (apologies to Streak). I recently got US Naval Air Superiority book by Thomason, but have not got there yet. Still mired in the Demon chapter, but not complaining because that is very interesing. Need F4D vs F3H thread. It never ends.

I *think* Michel's Clashes book described a similar situation, maybe the same. The friendly pilot out front was 'OK' with it. edit -- Not sure if I recall this correctly, and could just as well have been Air Force or NAVY I don't recall.

Interesting story in the new book Rainbow To Gusto, about stealth and the U-2 and the "follow on aircraft." Kelly Johnson had zero interest in Stealth, so CIA went to Convair. So Johnson had to look into it.

Shrike you can downsize the game Sparrow effectiveness if you like, using Weapon Editor, or in SF2 just editing text file maybe...? I don't have SF2. Gocad: Think beyond training, after Top Gun if you wish. Think well trained aircrew in second seat. Did the F-4's extra seat "help" make up for less "agility" or less well handling or some similar theme when compared to F-8? Streak's study of this field may be useful. Do the F-8 engagements indicate that 180lbs of gold ballast stashed behind the pilot would not have helped? I love this quote... George Spangenberg:: Put on thinking helmet. F-4 was meant to be used as an interceptor, also without guns. Single seat F8U-3: add gun and Sidewinders. No gold ballast. How would it have done? This can be a fun thread. Make it so.

I tawt I taw Attacker? I did, I did tee ATTACKER They *never* show up in screenshot threads. Spinners, polish that thing. Specular=1 Glossiness=0.1 Reflection=1

Okay Spillone You have come closest to modding 3D towering cumulus clouds and setting them loose into the sky. Notice the darkness on surfaces that face downward. 3D cumulus clouds, even without skinning, would play well with the SF sun, moon, and twilight colours. Skinning might add details that would otherwise require many more polygons. Something like this...czech the first out... ~> http://www.chitambo.com/clouds/cloudshtml/towering.html

lol -152 can't get near that. A bit earlier times. -152 vs improved up-J79'd B-58s, or Martin B-68 paper plane (twin J75 TAC bomber, not ICBM). MiG-25 I suppose would need perfect vectoring, and R-40, even then...? Granted a nuc R-40 hmmmm. ewww, 76 that's another thing. Have you ever seen the XB-68?

Good contrarian stuff streak. Assuming the F-8 had some advantage in "agility" or similar theme, did or could have the Phantom back seat (NAVY) help even that advantage in these engagements, before and after Top Gun? If you care to think about it, how would you predict Super Crusader in place of the F-8 in Vietnam? Would they have added a gun, Sidewinders? F8U-3 was the F-4 contemporary in design. pre-thanks!

Yea early to late 60s is prime Thud Time. Light weight un-refuelled B-29B from England *might* get to Moscow and back, but there may be better basing available. For best terrain game play, I assume USSR begins to disperse eastward again, far beyond the move made after June 1941. US will have to build a ring of fire; bases surrounding the Soviet Union. Some locations and rough time lines for use... Campaign start 1947: UK, West Germany, Japan, Alaska, southern Iran, Po Valley (nice terrain in game),... 1947+: Korea, Turkey, Northern India (RAF), Norway, Sweden (campaign variable, and don't forget SAAB), Finland (possible campaign variable), northern Iran, Aleutians if needed,... 1950s: Greenland, Canada? Most good targets might be in range of "traditional" bases in Europe in 1947, but not after USSR moves enough stuff eastward. There is only supporting ground warfare at the edges, mostly to gain or protect, or to deny, forward offensive bases to strike from. Shucks a whole campaign could be dedicated to local tactical air/ground warfare set up around the main strategic strike campaign. China's civil war, Eastern Europe, Iran, and Korea can offer ideas for this. I can't think much about this for lack of time, but others may find it more interesting, and ignore the SAC vs PVO stuff. I have been thinking of F-5C optimized for day escort to replace, or to accent, F-104. Good for protecting advance tankers against less advanced attackers, especially if something like EC-121 can tag along -- a topic that needs attention but I have not done so yet. F-5 can help maintain air dominance at lower altitudes, if the opposition is limited to smaller fighters (-21, -7) because of the bombing or sufficient continued attacks on larger PVO bases. PVO may get behind the curve, like Luftwaffe did in 1944. This is the Map I plan around. Fantastic terrain east of the Urals. Lake Baikal can be tiled on its own, at 455 meters, and doubling up exclusion regions.

Yea, its the missing link for this sim. Lowengrin made an "editor" for TK's stock dynamic campaign generator, but never could mod his own generator because of lack of map wide combat results record. This tells me Lowengrin was quite interested in the SF series, but hands were tied. I don't see the point in a game wiping a text combat stats file. DOS Su-27 Flaker 1.0 from 1995 allowed one to read the combat results in the mission editor, after mission end, and doing so let one study how the combat worked, especially AI, allowing somewhat more deep mission design. Very interesting stuff.