BeachAV8R, Fearless Frog, Wrecking Crew, raven, Lucky812, Bast, USMC Beans - I know I forgot somebody, chime in below, please! - and I got together tonight for a little DCS World multiplayer action. We used my machine as the server (20 MB/s down, 8 MB/s up connection) and I used a modified version of the stock MP-US Company Day Advance - Kislovodsk mission.

Screenshots and video to follow, but it was a blast! Wrecking Crew and I took JTAC roles and started smoking up the place, identifying threats for the A-10Cs to take out (no one had taken the P-51D, Ka-50, or Su-25 slots)*. At first, the SA-9s and SA-13s were pretty brutal, eating up the Hawgs as they came in, but between Wreck and me picking out targets and the Hawg pilots putting weapons on them, we gained control of the air pretty quickly. Then we started taking down the rest of the air threats (ZSU emplacements), and then starting picking off tanks. Even then our ground forces never made in a single tread's length past the original FEBL, but the air pilots had a good time.

We kept the game comms very informal (nobody was reading from a 9-line) which was fun, but did lead to a little confusion and loss of situational awareness from time to time: nothing that really took away from the game experience, IMHO.

The immersion in the JTAC position is pretty good. I'd like to see some better view controls (zooming in and out is awkward) and view modes (toggle HUD/gun sight off/on, smoother transition between vehicle view and monocle), integration of the Link 16, ability to place waypoints/markers/notes on the F10 map, ground unit AI/control improvements, and a bit more of that good ol' ED physics (smoke should be launched towards the intended point and land with some error, not just magically appear where pointing), but all in all it was a very satisfying experience: especially for a beta!


*Frog started with a P-51D but had to bail due to a system failure before even getting to the battle, and Bast eventually brought his Black Shark to the front to plink some tanks. He was able to take out a few tanks before getting mashed by a tank-launched guided missile.

Scoping the scene.


Rifle!


Bringing in the troops.


Can you see what's wrong in this picture?


Any landing you can walk away from...

Looks like fun. I haven't played MP since World and CA. Sounds like its time to start.

I don't know how to load replays...but I had great fun tonight! it all came together...I the jtac smoked the targets and I crept with in range of my missiles in my KA52, popped up and hit a few remaining tanks...then approached an artillery position..I destroyed some of the AA while the hogs took the remaining AA out, then I hit a few artillery units before moving in and shooting the support trucks with my cannon...I flew on to another tank platoon and destroyed some more tanks, a linebacker and a few Bradley.

I should have RTB as I only had a few rockets left.....Instead I went for glory....flew to a town where a convoy had been smoked..I lines up for a gun attack and shot up the convoy..no major damage to the armored units but the soft stuff was hit...I was receiving some AA fire....but really pushing my luck I spun the shark around came through for another attack....missed quite alot as I was jinking to avoid the AA fire...took some damage and was out of ammo so I nursed my wounded shark back to base! immense fun!

If there is a way to load the multilayer replay ill take some screenshots...but it was real fun! we need to try and run another SimHQ event.

Had a great time. I'm still a rookie at getting weapons on target..but I managed to kill a few things with some Mavericks. Fun stuff trying to put together the verbal picture combined with smoke to figure out what is going on.

So Erik - are you vulnerable to attack by the enemy in that JTAC vehicle? I thought I had read the DCS World enemy AI had magic abilities to engage you even though you are in some cover..? I didn't hear you get hit all night..

I wonder if there is any thought by ED to integrating some sort of UAV sensors to the suite of available tools..

Had a great time though.. Looking forward to the next MP session...

BeachAV8R

The default MP missions have the JTAC HMMVs set as "invisible" to the enemy AI, so Wreck and I were immune to the AI snipers while in those units. Not tactically reasonable, at all, but it suited our purposes for JTAC playtime. In fact, in another session, I was driving the HMMV around the town and parked near some enemy artillery while a friendly A-10C did gun runs: it was pretty cool.

Making the JTAC vehicles visible would certainly improve realism, but, as you mentioned, the incredibly observant enemy AI makes that option unreasonable.

So you are invisible to AI enemy. What about an enemy controlled by another human player (sort of like their JTAC).. Would you then be able to be engaged?

There is an "invisible" option and an "invincible" option. I assume that "invisible" just means that the unit isn't included in the AI decision logic, hence invisible, and that "invincible" means that all damage dealt to that unit is reduced to zero.

A human player doesn't have their logic filtered by the sim options, so they should be able to put rounds on an "invisible" target. If an enemy human JTAC sent a tank my way, for example, the AI tank would just roll on by. I could even shoot at it and it wouldn't fire back. But if that same JTAC had their artillery start a fire mission on my position, the shells would still damage me, so long as the unit I was in wasn't "invincible".

Ah..cool.. That could definitely make things more interesting in a red on blue scenario with humans on both sides of the battle..

BTW temperature of the little guy dropped to 98 earlier today..but now it's back up to 102... He's enjoying a cool tubby right now. Would have stuck around longer last night but we had to watch Shaun the Sheep together... <grin>