Alright guys,
Now i don't want to create any blood shed here, but i'm curious to know what your opinions are.
I love both these aircraft, and would probably give my left arm to fly one ... if i didn't need it. I'm a commercial pilot in real life, but only civilian (damn you childhood asthma ... daaaaaamn you)
Regardless, my goal is to build a nice pit for one of these two simulators. I've been making some control panels for IL2, and have really enjoyed doing that, but i'd like to do something for a more modern era flight sim. What do you guys feel is the better sim in terms of flight dynamics, mission assortment, manipulative cockpit environments, future development, over-all enjoyment of playing / flying, etc.
I see that there are a slew of products available for those who want to create an F-16 pit, but how about the A-10? are some of those items cross compatible?
Anyway, I'd really appreciate the feedback. Thanks guys!

- Apache

Uh oh.

I would vote for Falcon simply because it is a multi-role fighter. SEAD, CAS, CAP, OCA. The A-10, as much as I love it, is more of a one-trick pony. Mav-jp, the guy who does the FM of BMS, apparently modelled it to follow NASA's published results or something of the sort.

Plus Falcon has been going on for more than a decade now, while A-10 is just about 2 years in.

EDIT: I just voted and found 4 people went for DCS A-10. I'd love to hear how they think the A-10 is better than the F-16 at "mission assortment"? Especially when the A-10's response to any sort of air-superiority fighter is "Help! Help!!!"

What's the F-16's response to CSAR and CAS?

"Uhhh, Viper flight's winchester and bingo, see you guys later"

As for A-10's asking for help when faced with Air Superiority fighters, that's fine, but anyone who thinks they are helpless doesn't know what they're doing.

Campaign. Theaters. Platforms. Varieties of "fun". ----- Falcon

What Eugene said. And the Falcon is a multi-role platform. A2A and A2G. More the merrier.

I was about to go back and quote the original question to point out that he was asking for opinions on more that just "mission assortment" when I saw that you've got it in your own post! Now, I did not vote for A-10C, but if you consider each of the other points, there is a lot to debate and I can see people coming down on both sides quite easily. I didn't vote for Falcon 4 either; because the post has the stated goal of building either the A-10C pit or the F-16. I say build a modular pit with interchangeable panels so you can convert between the two if you choose.

My own "pit" (and I use the term loosely) is interchangable between a center (floor) mounted stick and a side stick controller -- for the very purpose of switching between F-16, A-10, and F/A-18.

A-10 is a realistic simulation of an aircraft.

Falcon is the better representation of a realistic aircraft in a theater of war.

I voted for Falcon because I had to choose between those two aircraft.

However, I think looking 5 years down the road, DCS will be better supported and if I had to choose one sim based on that criteria I would choose DCS. However, I still don't know that I'd build an A-10 cockpit, but rather a modular pit like Goblin said.

Right now, today, I still find Falcon the more entertaining of the two sims and if I was going to have a pit to play with tomorrow it would be a Falcon pit. If I was looking to invest $5,000 and two years building a pit for the long-term, I'd strongly consider building it for a DCS aircraft, if not the A-10 then one of the myriad others being talked about.

Thanks for all the feedback so far! please, keep it coming. I'd also be interested in knowing what people chose for when they selected the "other" category.
The "modular" pit would probably be a really good idea, and that's what i'm kind of doing for IL2 1946 and IL2 CoD. However, instead of building a pit, i'm just making custom control panels for each of the planes (since IL2 doesn't go into near the same depth of accuracy as F4 or A-10)

A-10 has the most potential. Falcon is using an engine from the 90's. It has nowhere to go. A-10 on the other hand has room for things like dynamic campaigns, extra aircraft realisitcally modelled, etc.

I'm sorry but have you looked at BMS lately? Aging graphics, I'll give you that, but everything else is "up-to-date" or thereabouts considering this is a community effort. DCS A-10 has potential, Falcon BMS is already tapping into its potential.

Falcon 4 is a sim about one plane, the F-16, the other planes avionics and flight models are based on it and it can't be changed, unfortunately. That's the difference in potential between the BMS and the DCS.

Well, it does say DCS A-10 vs Falcon 4, which means the Warthog vs the Viper.

I may be wrong a few years down the line when DCS World matures, and I hope I will be! But as of this moment, with the current state of both sims, my opinion is that BMS has a lot of that "potential" already covered, except for that annoying terrain graphics. I love me some low-altitude ingress screaming over the terrain at 500 knots at 300 ft AGL, and that brings that ugly terrain right up to my nose. I miss my DCS terrain and my lovely GAU-8, but the A-10 is a one-trick pony while the Falcon is more "all around" hence my recommendation.

As for the OP's question, well, the "panels" themselves are not really interchangeable since the side console layouts are different, but I think if you have the switches wired properly, it would be easy enough to un-screw the relevant switches and transfer them to another panel with a different layout.

Just go with a Helios setup for your pit and it will be as modular as you could ever desire...

BMS - 60 frames constant no matter the action, weather, day/night
DCS - 50 to 15 fps depending on terrain, ground units, clouds, sun, TGP,...

It's like FSX, where you have to wait five years for the mainstream hardware to catch up. I can't spend 500 euros every year to keep up.

For me the F-16 would win.
The A-10C was always a placeholder for the next DCS multirole Jet. Ok now, BMS was first.
Also the future of BMS looks promising because its still WIP (especially A-G avionics).




ps: I had to decide between a Ka-50 or a Viper pit. Because the Ka50 is still more fun and challenging then die A10.

I have both DCS A-10c, and have had every flavor of Falcon, for the last 13+ years. I always go back to Falcon.