Comrades in Arms Discussion Board

Coming around 2000CET!

(05-21-2016, 07:12 PM)Sithis link Wrote:I am online now for the rest of the night so if anybody wants some flightlessons just hop on TS

Thanks. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sick, my voice is pretty bad (So bad it would probably sound good for doing voiceovers for my mission... hmmm), and speaking hurts my throat... might hop on next weekend.

Alright get well soon, if you feel bored in the meantime the A10c tutorials are the best one sin DCS.

AAR time:

Finally we had five pilots in the air again and in the first mission of the night it was one Mirage as CAP and 4 A10c as CAS.
Manuel in the Mirage
UnNamed Hawg 1
Sithis Hawg 2
Misha Hawg 3
Etzu Hawg 4

On the way to the target area the Mirage engaged 2 Mig23, but was only able to shoot down one. Hawg 1 and 2 immediately dove to terrain flight, while Hawg 3 and 4 were still at the airport. The Mig23 shot a missile at Hawg 1, but missed. When it came into dogfighting range the Mig 23 almost placed itself behind Hawg 2. A quick scissor and the Mig 23 had to fly a quick circle to loose me. Now I was scrambling to get a missile of but even though I was relatively close behind it I couldn't get a tone and the distance was increasing with the Mig 23 giving it full afterburner. The Mig 23 has completed its circle and is now coming for Hawg 1 again. Missile launch Hawg 1 pulls Gs towards earth and sprays Countermeasures everywhere. The contrails of the missile are closing on Hawg 1, fast. More countermeasures are filling the air and Hawg 1 has already pulled a 90° turn as the missile shoots right past his rudder.
The Mig 23 overshoots Hawg 1 and again I am dying to get a tone. Somewhere in between Hawg 1 has already shot one of his missiles now he got tone for the second time. I realize that I got to be right between Hawg with his heat seaking missile and the target and I got two huge heatsources strapped to my back, but it is too late. I hear "Fox2" and instantly see the white contrail zoom past just meters above my canopy. The Mig 23 turns into orange mist.

Back at the target area we identify one target cluster at a time and the AA is easy to deal with. We loose a lot of coordinating attacks, but that was to be expected, since we did not fly the A10c as regularly in the last couple weeks.
I didn't even think the targets were to hard to see and Manuel shooting past as a wild weasel helped as well.
However when the Mirage was back at base for refuelling, two Mig 23 popped up on RWR and they were closing fast.
We quickly realized that we could not outrun them and that there was no way to hide in the wide valleys. So we turned to fight. Hawg 1 with just his gun was hurrying to get the right gunsight activated, while I still had two Fox 2. Hawg 1s plan was to act as bait so I could score the kills with my missiles. A plan that depended on me getting tone real quick, which I had not achieved at all earlier, and scoring 2 kills with 2 missiles, which seemed unlikely with 4 fox 2s being fired in the last engagement and only 1 hitting. In other words, the odds were against us.
On Hawg 1s orders I dropped behind and we were now closing with the 2 Mig 23s head on in the same formation. We both switched to guns. As soon as you could make out the details of the approaching plane Hawg 1 pulled the trigger. White smoke rises up disperses behind Hawg 1. My eyes dart to the approaching Mig 23 which is instantly reduced to an orange cloud of fire and metal. To close to shoot at the second bogey Hawg 1 dives down. My gun is now lined up on the other Mig 23. Just one second before I can be sure to hit him. In an instant the Mig 23 inverts and pulls towards earth following Hawg 1. I try to readjust and shoot but now I am way off. I invert as well pull behind him and switch to Fox 2. Now our survival depends on me getting the damn tone that has been so elusive during the last fight. I am chasing the Mig 23 in a level turn but he is gaining distance. I hear a quick peep and loose it again. The Mig 23 stops turning. That can only mean he is lining up on 1. I get him in my sights. Struggle to get tone. Quick beebs, but no solid solution. It feels like ages, because I know he is trying the same on Hawg 1 right now. BEEEEEEEEP, tone finally "FOX 2" and the contrail leaps towards the Mig 23.
Now he is defensive hard right turn, pulling Gs, flares flying left and right. I am following in case the missile will miss, trying to get a tone for the second one, but the first one connects. Boom goes the dynamite and the Mig 23 hits the mountain.

Back to ground attack we killed everything that had a weapon using all kinds of guided and unguided munition, including a tank kill with the gun and a Grad kill with HEAT rockets.

Due to some mysterious server crashes we could not finish the Helicopter insertion phase and replayed canyon carver instead, which was quite relaxed in loose formation. Just for some reason the Mavericks hit their targets about 10s after they should have and simultaneously even though they were fired at different points in time.

The Mirage, Hawg1 and Hawg2 ready for take-off



Hawg 1 and 2 diving for cover


Hawg1s right weapon station is empty after the first engagement


The amazingly relaxed Misha with the quote of the night "It is a little warm"


Hawg 1 inspecting the AO with the Mk1 eyeball after it was cleared.

Not much to add to Sithis AAR,  only that he was no where near my hud when I fired at the first mig23,  the intercept course the missile decided to use just sent it 30m over his canopy but he was at least 30-45° off to the left of my nose when I got the tone.  It was a shame we weren't able to complete the mission but I am up for retrying it.
Unfortunately the replay tracks are bugged and have completely different come outs from our experience yesterday.  I really would have loved to take some more Screenshots as I wasn't able to do so in the hot phases of the mission

I have a theory about the server crashes, although we'd have to test it to be sure. The problems started once we started ordering infantry to board the helicopters. Maybe it has something to do with that. I'm not sure though since it didn't seem to be reliably reproducable at the same moment (sometimes on sending the order, sometimes a seemingly random amount of time later...).
If that turns out to be true it would suck hard, I really like that feature even though we had problems on multiplayer before :/


First Air-Battle from my pov:
I entered the battle alone since some issue caused my (AI) wingman to wait quite a while on the apron before deciding to join me... Nevertheless I could get my radar onto the bogeys quickly and engage one of them with FOX1 (semi-active radar guided). Quick exposition: semi-active means that the missile has no radar emitter, just a receiver. That means that the shooting aircraft needs to keep the target lit until the missile hits. Consequently I could not follow the second Mig while engaging the first one. Luckily the first missile hit (those R530s are not the most reliable). In the meantime the second Mig was engaging the two airborne A10s. My previous fight had led me into the opposite direction, I struggled to find the Mig again. I eventually found some airplanes on my radar, but at that point the A10s and the Mig were close to each other, the risk of shooting the wrong plane on BVR was too high, so i had to get even closer before doing anything. The A10s were faster however and took out the Flogger.


Second Air-Battle:
(i'm paraphrasing)


A10 - "Mig 23 on the RWR, Manuel where are you?"
Manuel - "Just about to start refueling/rearming"


A10 - "Migs are getting close, we need to do something"
Manuel - "Done refueling, I'm taking off"


A10 - "Splash!! That was the second Mig!"
Manuel - "...you'll be glad to hear that I'm back on station and ready assist"


That was just really bad timing. The M2000 has very short on-station time (like many fighters). During the first battle I had to drop my external tank early, so even less time to hang around. The second Mig flight litteraly popped up as a was reached the end of the runway to refuel.




After that I kept myself busy by patroling and observing the target area. I could at least identify some AAA positions and serve as bait to expose the remaining ground threats (at full speed it's fairly safe to pass over AAA, much safer than it would be in an A10 at least)




Once the A10s decided that it was safe for the helicopters insertion I swapped my jet for a Huey. How that turned out was already discussed...

Quote:A10 - "Splash!! That was the second Mig!"
Manuel - "...you'll be glad to hear that I'm back on station and ready assist"

That was gold

time for a full AAR from me.

all in all It was an awesome mission
(Hawg 1)
Soon after taking off all we saw of chevalier was his contrail headed for two Mig23 coming to intercept us.
while Chevalier engaged Hawg2 and me went on to follow our waypoints to the AO. Chevalier splashed one of the Mig23s but the other one came for us and had gained some distance from him so he was not able to engage. We dropped to ground level hoping to loose the mig flying through the valleys and the city below us, but it was no use and the Mig was soon on top of us and I already thought we were toast. Soon enough the Mig was Tracking us with its radar and we were trying our best to evade it, popping occasional chaff and using our jammers hoping to throw it off, but at one point it fired at me but thankfully missed and afterwards overshot us, we were booth trying to get a tone on the Mig that was now running popping flares every half second trying to throw off our sidewinders, but I got a Tone and fired. I was quite stunned when the rocket decided to go about 30° to the left to intercept the Mig which made it fly directly over Hawk2 and pissed him off a little xD. But the AIM9 flew true and splashed the Mig.
We went on to the AO following our waypoints and climbing to FL20 until IP from were we diverted from our given Flight plan to keep our distance while we took our first look.
We spotted a first group of enemys and started engaging only noticing more groups while we were taking out the armed vehicles of the first group.
I was standing off a bit coordinating Hawk 2-3 anchoring 10nm off at FL20 when my RWR showed two spikes for Mig23. I Called Chevalier to learn he was Still RTB for rearm and refuel. I called Hawk 2 to regroup with me while Hawk 3-4 continued attacking the targets in the City. When it became apparent Chevalier would not be back in time. I decided 2 and me where going to try something stupid  and charge at them keeping them away from 3-4 and hopefully buy time until Chevalier would come back. When we came into visual range I had 2 drop behind me so the Migs would go for me and he would have time to shoot.
I was out of AIM9 and only had my gun and had 2 talk me through on how to bring up the AA sight for the gun. I was sure we were toast.
When the first mig became more than a small dot in my HUD I brought my sight into position and gave it a short burst. with our combined velocities the Mig got quite close so I was able to clearly see the impacts and that it was a kill. the second mig fired a missile that missed by inches. I was too close to engage so I told 2 that I was going for a dive.
as planned before the encounter the Mig took the bait and I had to keep it busy until 2 got the shot on him of which I had no doubt. I kept maneuvering, popping the rest of my flares and most of my chaff, but 2 got his tone and splashed the Mig.
after that it was mostly mob up duty in the city. unfortunately the chopper part did not work, but I would glady try again .

I just wanted to note that Manuels custom of equipping A-10's with two AIM9 saved our asses in this mission as I would not have taken them along If they had not already been equipped.

Saturday it will be time to fly!
If lady luck smiles at me I will even have my pedals ready to go by then.
As far as I know Manuel still has at least one mission with helicopters ready and I will prepare an A-10/Su25 CAS mission, which is still work in progress so I am open to requests.

Sweet!
Yes, I have a helicopter-only mission ready to play (2-4 Hueys, 1-4 Gazelles). Also, the mission from last time is technically not completed. I made some adjustments. I'd want to verify that infantry boarding is really working in MP now before we play it again though.
I think I'll have some time to make a new mission until Saturday, please let me know which aircrafts are desired.
I'll try to come up with some combined ops stuff (planes + helos), I hope to give the Gazelle a proper debut.


Also, I might have time to finally pick up my A10 campaign again. No promisses that I'll have a new episode ready this weekend though. Anyways, if I'm not mistaken we are 5-6 people by now (Varanon?). I'll adjust future mission design for that player count.

I will try and make a few missions -- I also highly suggest everyone download Starways DLC (its amazing and free!)


https://starwayblog.wordpress.com/

I will not  be able to play saturday

Finally got my pedals! It is such an amazing feeling to be able to nail the Bf109K landing every time

I can't fly tomorrow because I have to go to the airport at that time. Makes sense?!