Jug

I still watch them all. It is an exercise on catching them out. I, also, still learn a lot like how to reconstruct a German Panther tank that has been on a riverbottom for 50 years. The 24/7 mandate leads them into making mistakes, but as we pick out our stones to throw, observe carefully the glass house within which we live............................ I've seen some mistakes here too!

I had forgotten just how funny that scene was. Still lying on the floor gasping for air............................

Sat nuke alert in Buffs at Loring for 4.5 years during the Cold War. Only place I know of where you can hit a golf ball out of the country from the golf course (of course it is only open 2 weeks per year and, yes, being the great golfer I am, it took me three tries). Does the Lobster man still peddle lobster near the front gate? My eldest daughter is a Mainiac, born in Presque Isle in January 1977. Lots of good memories of that real northern tier base, but I don't even want to go back for a visit.

Proper T-6 duly noted. I didn't know about the mud movers coming back home. It's the way it outta be! Good on 'em.

I would suggest the Pilotus or the Tucano rather than the T-6. Love the old bird too, but the PC9/Tucano was made for the job in these modern times. When the USAF went to a two part training, I thought then that it was a mistake to put the bomber drivers in with the tanker and cargo types as an accomodation to the BUFF. The BUFF drivers in our CA program must be able to move to fast movers and formation and other flying stuff. Sooner or later the BUFF will move out of the inventory and the BUFF drivers will move to the next industrial capacity mud mover. Chances are pretty good that it will be BONE-like. Mud moving is mud moving and weapons delivery is weapons delivery. Put the bomber drivers through the same course as the fighter dudes. Cargo drivers can return to Microsoft's dull flight sim world.

Sweet stuff, Klavs. Don't you ever die, you good lookin' dawg!

Easy to say, but as a programmer, tying scenario changing events and changing mission accomplishment events to sim radio calls that may or may not be responded to by the user is a fluid reality very difficult to create in a flight sim. Granted, if possible, it would be much closer to reality, but what you would have is a branching campaign/mission with several results/reactions/paths to accomodate. Probably exactly the way the real military sims are, but difficult to do for a $50 package. The idea is a mission in a mission in a mission in a mission with links dependent on user choices. Gives me a headache to conceptualize and, maybe, beyond the scope of what we have here. I recommend that we do is adjust the level of enemy reaction to our sorties' accomplishments. We can do this in our mission building. The branching mission idea is pie in the sky for now.

Generally, a combat mission is a complex thing. Hopping into the jet and burning out to take the enemy head on is what makes flying flight sims fun. In reality, most of your flight day/week is composed of study, planning, coordination and review. Many make light of military intelligence, but a good intell guy is your best friend in the combat area. The standard litany of "where are the air defenses, how good are they, how good is the equipment, what is their stores level, how does our ingress and egress route avoid known threats, what are the possible threats, and on and on. All of this plotted to your map and studied until you know it without looking at the map. That is just the analysis of your particular threat environment. On to support activity, good guys in the area, communications, emergency procedures and on and on. Of course, Murphy's law, it will all go to hell in a handbasket, so what can I plan ahead of time when it does. It is hard work and worth every minute. It is amazing how many times I have forgotten to enjoy the view from 80K because of dealing with mission details from the time I strap the jet on until I shut the motor down in the chocks upon return. Specifically, I will address #1 Recon. Recon is divided into two missions strategic and tactical. Strategic recon is keeping an eye on the other guy to see what he is up to or to validate what he is saying in the political arena. It is a world unto itself and missions involve avoiding detection and threat avoidance. If the other guy knew you are looking, his activities will be different than what might be going on without that knowledge. The fun part of flight simulators is confronting the enemy. If you get in that position in strategic recon, you have defeated your purpose. Long, boring and uneventful missions are the desired outcome in reality, but not much fun in a flight sim. Tactical recce is divided into pre-strike and post-strike missions. Pre-strike is usually some time before a strike package is unleashed on a target to get as close as possible a look at the target prior to finalizing the loadouts on the strike package and mission assignments within the package. We've all been on sim missions where the loadout did not deal with the threats encountered. Makes for a frustrating and dangerous mission. Pre-strike recce is very important and sometimes it is as close as hours before the strike package (a strike package is the mix of countermeasure, bomber, and MiGCap aircraft, what they are targeted against, and what their mission timing is) is committed. Pre-strike recce missions are usually not near as exciting as post-strike. The bad guys don't know you are coming. Post-strike is equally important because it is a BDA (battle damage assessment) of the work of the strike package. In theater, additional strike packages are staging up and target objectives are prioritized in the theater ATO (air tasking order). Usually there is a very good reason why the first target is hit first and if obliteration is the objective, a BDA recce sorties is required to ensure the target is no longer effective. If not a staging strike package will be diverted from their primary mission to finish what the first strike package was tasked to do. That means the timing for the BDA sortie is at the worst time for the recce aircrew. Everybody, and I mean everybody in the target area is really pissed off. Every gun, rocket, RPG, missile, and rock in the area is up and aimed at you. One of my best friends was a RF-4 GIB and showed me some photos taken to the side of his Phantom in a hot post strike mission over Hanoi and the enemy ground fire tracers looked like rain (I mean the southern toad choaker type of rain). Very unfriendly and a mission not generally sought after. OK, how can we simulate that in, for instance, WoV? Yankee Air Pirates (YAP) has some real fun recce missions to fly, but for those mission makers here, I would recommend that you consider air defenses as fixed or mobile and place them as such. Planning maps should show fixed positions and effective radius and ingress and eqress waypoints should avoid them. Mobile defenses are the threat to deal with as they occur. Deployment should be in gaps in the fixed asset coverage. They should come up fast and shoot fast. The bad guys have good communications too. Best chance to catch them napping is the first one on target. Everybody else due in on the target area should be ready for everything the bad guys have. Campaigns should have re-directed strike packages. New waypoints and new targets to deal with enroute. All of this points to my main criticism of missions here. If you're not the first one across the target, every bad guy should be awake and shooting at you. If you come back around and take on a AAA site, he should be alive and shooting at you. If you crunch him, then successive flights should not have to deal with him including post strike recce. MiGs should be more common and ready to engage post-strike recce. Post strike recce is all about escape and evasion and success should affect theater objectives. If you don't get home there are serious effects on the theater ATO and if you do get home, mission effectiveness should go way up. Anyway, those are some of my thoughts. If I have any others, I'll come back to this thread.

Heartist congratulations to the Voodoo Team. Sweet, Sweet, Sweet!!!

In truth, aviators share more in common than we do differences. Excellent story, but I am not sure the MiG-31 can cruise behind a U-2 at 80K. Those wings that give the MiG the MachMach speed at lower altitudes are not enough to create lift at 80K unless the MiG is approaching its Mach limit itself (I would guess around 2.5). The U-2, meanwhile is motoring along placidly at around 0.8 Mach. Visual acquisition of the U-2 at altitude is virtually impossible. USAF flew U-2s together in their black livery and outside of 1/4 mile it was impossible to see the Dragon Lady. Has to do with the funny effects of black sky, pure undistorted bright light, and the Lady's elusive paint job. I am, also, not sure if any missile can hit a U-2 at that altitude if the U-2 turns just a little bit. Think about the tiny wings on the missile and the density of the air at 80K and it doesn't fit unless the U-2 driver was asleep. The Dragon Lady rules in her high environment and other jets enter only by chance with the maneuverability of a bullet. The U-2 has been flying since 1954 and never suffered an air-to-air loss. That is some 54 years of keeping an eye on the enemies of the US. Most nations do not know she has paid them a visit. She has been smacked by missiles, but that was before the inclusion of onboard ECM. Once again, great ficticious story...

Vunderbar!! Very well done and thanks for one of the jets sorely missing from the century series. Any hope for the single seat recce version used in SEA with a camo skin???

Ditto

No doubt there is a new conspiracy theory out there................

Been there, walked around the place.....it's empty.

Cannot join in the MS bashing. I am running Vista Ultima on a machine I built (2.4Gig Quad, 8 gig memory) and it is fast, smooth and reliable. I, also, transitioned from XP and the only complaint I have is the tendency of MS to attempt to make things easier and end up making familiar things more difficult. Overall, cannot get aboard the bash VISTA train.

Muslim clerics sound quite a bit like Catholic clerics of the dark ages. They need to lighten up. Never know what a good belly laugh might do for their attitude.

Hurts to say, but good job, Navy. Maybe there's hope after all.......................

Hopefully his new cellmate, "Bubba" will have an unhealthy and voracious appetite. A quick visual there just gives me a real warm fuzzy on behalf of his victims.

Well said and I agree. Thanks in advance!!!

Lighten up a little. This kid will make a great Marine............

Happy Birthday, Piloto!

mppd, I'll vote for that. Great work.

It is worth every cent you contribute. Much, much more here at CA.

FastCargo, I may have missed something here, but does this solution speak to the problem of the canopy being closed on the ground and opening when you accelerate to takeoff. In other words working opposite from the way they should work? I have had this problem with several add-on aircraft in WoV with the new patch. (clean install/patch and working my way through my favorite add-ons)

Toss the comments and stick to the pics. That is the name of the contest, right?