Aircraft skills...

It seems like a good idea to know what everyone here is good at flying so we can actually organize our squadrons.

For me:
I can fly and train on the SR-71, XB-70 (and Vostok if we actually want it). I'm fine with fighters - redneck you'll just have to show me the specific maneuvers. I'll assume transport planes and rescue planes are all relatively easy for everyone. I'm getting there on helis... I should be fine by the time we get going. I can't train on them (ever) because I really don't think anyone else is trying to trackpad it And except for the XB-70 to my knowledge the bombers are relatively easy. I can also do carrier landings (really only done it with F-14 but I'll figure it out).

Tell me if this is a good pattern/idea and if so, we can evaluate skills this way...

Josh

This actually does NOT evaluate skill. The only way to evaluate skill is to observe actual displays of skill. This topic can only evaluate everyone's confidence in their abilities. However, confidence is not necessarily equal to skill. Everyone is either too arrogant or too modest. Everyone wants to be good at something, or at least think they are, even if they aren't. It's all a matter of opinion this way, and, what's worse, it's our opinions of ourselves, so it's definitely going to be biased.

I've seen it happen before. A while ago, back when I was online nearly every hour of every day, I would have cadets say, "Oh, I'm an awesome pilot. I don't need this training stuff," and then I get fed up, and say, "fine, let's do the flight exam," and then they get up in the air for a few minutes, if that, and then crash, either by stalling or nosediving into the ground at high speed. They say, "Oh, the plane is too hard to control." Well, of course! It's the F-4E. It doesn't have any computerized pilot aid stuff. You can't just yank the stick back and expect it to just turn. Obviously, they didn't know anything about how to not stall, and fly the plane through combat maneuvers. They wouldn't have had any problems at all if they went through the whole training course.

Anyway, if we're going to really be able to evaluate members on anything, it should be their knowledge. The skill required to fly an aircraft is always based on knowledge. Military or civil, wherever you learn to fly, there's going to be ground school, in which students learn the theory, before any flight lessons, in which students learn to actually fly, and get a feel for how an aircraft behaves, etc. So, the easiest way to do this, is by having members take an entrance evaluation. Just a short, multiple-choice exam. Those who pass are exempt from training, except for those who wish to become flight instructors.

As for figuring out what sort of aircraft the EAF should fly, we should probably just set up a poll, and then eliminate any with insignificant scores. I don't expect anyone to vote for something they either don't know how to fly at all, or have no interest in flying.

Fair enough... I wan't looking for full placement or anything like that. I was really only referring to (sorry I wasn't too clear) the current 4 or 5 people currently setting this up. Since most training will be done by staff/original members we need to decide where to place ourselves (which is kind of hard...) but if you can think of any objective criteria that would be good...

I REALLY wasn't referring to anyone other than the people currently active on the forum

For all purposes beyond that I agree that observation is the only answer. We need to be able to see pilot screens...

Well, we should probably also consider the following issue that I forgot to add as well:

Almost forgot... without any means to share any bombable AI scenarios over mp, how exactly are we expected to do any airstrikes? I should have just mentioned this first, but I wasn't considering the current limitations of FG at the time. Wouldn't it make more sense to just limit EAF to only fighter/multirole jets? At least then, it will be easy to prove a kill by screenshot, video, etc., whereas, if you have multiple pilots attacking a base on the ground, you can't even keep track of which units (assuming a base surrounded by several SAMs, AAA, tanks, radar stations, etc.) have been destroyed, and which haven't during the mission. This will be a HUGE problem for those flying planes with realistic ammo limitations. Just imagine how frustrating it would be to bomb some targets, and start heading back to base, just to find out that someone else had already destroyed those targets, and you could have taken out the last few, but you can't now, b/c you're out of bombs. And, when you return to the combat zone, after re-arming, there will be more that may have been killed by allied units, but you have no way of knowing, and will inevitably waste another whole loadout.

cervelo wrote:For all purposes beyond that I agree that observation is the only answer. We need to be able to see pilot screens...

That is why I suggested the entrance evaluation. Since skill is (for the most part) directly related to knowledge, we can just evaluate their knowledge. Of course, if you really must see their screens, you'll have to find some way to convince everyone to get an account on twitch.tv or something like that, and download, and install VHScrCap, and hope they have a good Internet connection, and a good enough graphics card, such that they can still fly at half the framerate they usually run FG at, while broadcasting.

How about instant replay or a video of the screen (I now I'll crash at half framerate) - but maybe knowledge is the only answer... but still its hard to know without actual flight observation. Other than that I've got no answers so whatever works will have to do.

I'm still having major issues with bombable but I'm working on it... But you're completely right on the targeting issues.

And what do we do with ourselves?

Well althougth this discusion, i`ll tell you that i practice almost all the time with the F14, and i can perform carrier landings in a safe way without aborting with this plane. i think that if i could with the F14 i`ll could with any other military aircraft, with some practice.
I really suck at close range flying (formation). I intercept decently but i`m unable to control the aproach speed to the other plane. Aniway some trainig with the rigth knowledge will fix it.
I can just fly some helis, not in a secure way at all, but i think this is very much using the mouse and a stearing whell`s pedals as tail rotor.
Transport and ligth planes are not realy dificult, exept by the specific systems of each aircraft (as autopilot, engines, COM, etc). I know the basis of ATC and VFR as well as navigation systems as VOR, ADF and ILS.

Pablun - exactly what I was talking about earlier

Like I said - we need flights... Are you available right now? I can show you formation.

Josh (just use Pablun as callsign and I'll know its you).

cervelo wrote:How about instant replay

That's not gonna work. Replays have a tendency of failing to accurately replay aerobatic flight. What I used to do before was just fly in a loose formation behind students. I can't remember any exact distance for the separation. I just needed to be able to see what the plane was doing. It's easy to tell just by looking if it's stalling. You'll see wing vertices, the plane will go belly into the wind, and begin to fly in more of a ballistic trajectory, rather than a controlled one. At least, when training fighter pilots, that's the main thing to look for.

Pablun wrote:i can perform carrier landings in a safe way without aborting with this plane.

Too bad we're the European Air Force. We're not a naval force, and, therefore have no ships, nor carrier-capable aircraft. And while the F-14 can be used on land, we won't use it. It lacks the agility we need for combat, and there's no place for it in fighter training, either.