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| Fighter Ace Combat Manual | |
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Realistic Flight!
Or, How to Play with the Big Dogs So you've been around the Arcade block and you find that the kills are coming much easier. While it's still a lot of fun, the keen-edged challenge that used to be there has lost a little of its edge. What do you do to bring it back? Or perhaps you are new to Fighter Ace , and from the get go you want the ultimate challenge in multiplayer air combat? Where do you go? The High Ground Go Realistic, young flyer; go Realistic. Realistic flight is the ultimate high ground of Fighter Ace combat. A top ace in Realistic not only can think in three dimensions and shoot accurately but also can pilot his plane on the ragged edge of the flight envelope. This requires skills and talents that Arcade just doesn't call for. Additionally, more maneuvers from real combat pilots work in Realistic, as they depend on real plane behaviors and actual pilot physiology. For instance, you may have found it difficult to evade a pilot once he has latched onto your six in Arcade, because he basically has no limitations. Both he and his plane can pull maximum Gs at any time. But in Realistic, you can pull right to 5.5 Gs on the edge of the blackout; if he wants to shoot, he has to pull more than 5.5 Gs to pull lead to hit you. Once he does, you change direction, and he won't be able to see it, because he has blacked out. Voila! You're free! Realistic flight is about discipline and control at a level that Arcade cannot approach. The Arcade flight model is forgiving of exuberant control styles. Get sloppy in Realistic and you'll find yourself spiraling into the ground without a shot even being fired. Realistic physics gives no quarter and no allowance for good behavior. You either fly your plane within the limits or find your plane departing from controlled flight at the drop of your virtual hat. Sounds daunting, doesn't it? Well, it can be if you enter the Realistic arenas expecting that "Realistic is like Arcade, only different." By adjusting your expectations toward the reality of Realistic, you can eliminate the unpleasantness associated with making the switch. Instead, you can become a rompin', stompin', keen-and-mean Realistic killing machine. So What's Different? Realistic flight introduces several flight phenomena that Arcade flyers don't encounter. The key to staying alive in Realistic is to recognize what these phenomena are, and what conditions induce them. If you have blundered over the line, understanding what they are and what you've done can help you to recover in a minimum of time. Stalls Low-Speed Stalls Stalls come in two basic flavors: low-speed stalls and accelerated stalls. Both are the result of airflow being discontinued over the wing of your airplane. In Arcade you are familiar with a form of the low-speed stall, which occurs when you go nose up for prolonged periods or in some other way slow your plane down to the point where it stalls, and the nose gently drops through. This type of stall characteristic has much more in common with a Cessna 172 than it does with high-performance WWII aircraft. World War II fighter aircraft represented the ultimate development of piston-engine aircraft, and as such, they are fire-breathers! Accelerated Stalls The accelerated stall occurs when your plane is in an accelerated state, that is, hauling patootie! The cause of it is over-enthusiastic yanking on the stick. When you haul back on the stick hard, it yanks the aircraft into a nose-high (to the relative wind) position until the air can no longer follow the wing's surface. Then it starts to
or, Why Is the Ground Going in Circles? When one wing stalls before the other one, it means that one wing is still flying while the other is dropping. This is a bad thing. This is also true of accelerated stalls, so the results are pretty much the same. When one wing drops, it snaps downward, rotating the airplane. The other wing stalls and the whole plane falls, still rotating. (This is a simplified explanation but will work for purposes of our discussion.) It is not spinning around the nose as it would in an aileron roll, but rotating about a point just forward of your wings. You will discover, as did early aviators, that if you pull back on the stick to get the nose up, the spin will just accelerate. Keep pulling on the stick, and eventually you will smack into the ground. So how do we get out of this? Be Smart! Well, the first and most obvious solution is to avoid conditions that result in a spin. That is, avoid getting too slow in a climb or when pulling over in a loop, and don't yank on the stick at speed. Unfortunately, a lot of the fighter pilot's craft involves maneuvers that are right on the edge of the flight envelope, so it is nearly impossible to avoid stalls all the time. So once in the spin, what do we do? In answer to this, think of what causes the spin. The spin starts with a stall, which is loss of air traveling over the wings. So the key is to get air traveling over the wings again. But isn't the plane falling? you ask. Isn't the air traveling over the wings? Close, but no cigar! Remember that the plane is rotating around a point just forward of the wings, which means the airflow is really approaching the wings from below and not flowing over them the way it does in flight. So how do we get the air flowing over the wings properly again? Fortunately for us and every other aviator, the tail plane and rudder do not stall at the same speed as the wings (in fact, airplanes are carefully designed so they don't). So the elevators and rudder still work, even though the wing is completely stalled. So just as when we are in a gentle stall, the first order of business is to get the nose down so that air can start flowing over the wing. Shove the stick full forward. This deals with the stall, but how about the rotation? Normally we use the ailerons to control roll, but they are on the wing and the wing is stalled. As we get air flowing over the wings, the ailerons will start to have more and more effect, but we want this sucker to stop, NOW. So we turn to the rudder, which is not stalled and still effective. So we boot in opposite rudder to the spin, that is, if you are spinning right, then it's left rudder, and vice versa. Just stop putting in rudder the moment the spin stops; otherwise you'll start a spin in the opposite direction. Remember this: For the standard upright spin, it's stick forward, opposite rudder. Inverted Spins. Yuck! Fighter Ace also models the most deadly type of spin known to man, the inverted spin. In this case, everything is the same except your plane is spinning upside down. Not much fun. We want to do the same thing to recover, but because we are upside down, everything is reversed. For inverted spins, it's stick back and rudder in the direction of the spin. Since sometimes it's hard to gauge the upright/inverted state accurately, it's a good idea to try the first recovery procedure and then try the second if it doesn't work. Another good rule of thumb is: Initiate the recovery at the earliest moment you recognize the spin. This will help immeasurably and reduce your altitude loss, which means you will also reduce the amount of energy you lose. Since the spin commonly happens while turning, the first thing you are likely to notice is that the turn rate will look like it's suddenly increasing. Blackouts and Redouts or, Why Does My Screen Keep Changing Colors? Blackout Blues The other major phenomena associated with Realistic physics are blackouts and redouts. When you start traveling at 400 mph and change direction suddenly, this does things to human physiology, some of them quite unpleasant. When you pull back on the stick, you and the airplane experience a force that tries to continue driving you in the direction you were going. The faster you are traveling and the harder you pull on the stick, the greater this force is. This force or acceleration is measured in Gs, or gravities, and as far as you and the plane are concerned, it's just as if you both weighed considerably more than you do right now. All parts of your body are affected and anything that can move will attempt to do so, unless held in place. Having your behind parked in the pilot's seat keeps your body there, but your blood will flow downward toward your feet and away from your head. Since your brain needs blood and oxygen to continue its processing, this is a bad thing. If you pull more than about 5.5 Gs, the blood will drain completely from your head and you will lose consciousness, or black out. If the situation continued long enough, brain damage would occur, but fortunately, when the pilot loses consciousness, he generally is unable to keep pressure on the controls and the turn will relax. So how do you stay out of it? First, recognize the first signs of blackout, the gradual graying of the screen. As soon as that occurs, back off of the control input gently. You can ride the gray successfully and this will mean that you are getting the maximum turn rate out of your fighter. Recognize the blackout and ride the gray by easing off on your control input. If you have blacked out, then immediately relax the stick until your vision returns. In some cases when your plane is headed down and you are close to the ground, you have no choice but to maintain some stick pressure. Here, you must estimate when the nose would be above the horizon and then relax the stick gently. Releasing it too quickly would make your plane travel in a straight line, which will make your opponent, who is trying to get a shot on you, very happy. Redouts Are No Fun A redout is the opposite condition, where you have pushed the stick forward, creating negative Gs, and blood is flowing to your head. In this case, blood is engorging the vessels of the eyes and they can eventually burst, causing a redout. In severe cases, they result in permanent blindness, but generally the person comes out looking as if he pulled several all-nighters in a row. There are several ways to avoid these, and realistically there are very few situations where you should have to deal with redouts. Your airplane is more efficient turning under positive Gs, and so for reasons of efficient control, you should avoid negative Gs. About the only positive effect of negative Gs is that your plane will accelerate faster under negative Gs (it in effect weighs less), and you can use them when you need to accelerate in a hurry. In any case, when you encounter the redout, just relax the control input. When you redout, just relax the forward stick control input. Armed with this information, you should find Realistic flight far more doable and enjoyable. Good luck and good hunting! |
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