Flying help

[GunnerIke]

Hey, just got the game a couple days ago, flying was beating my ass like a red-headed stepchild. Dug out my old joystick, works like a champ. Flying has improved drastically (damn keyboard piloting). However, it seems I'm having trouble with stability, landing and over all smoothness of flight. I can get from A to B, but staying in one spot to strafe with rockets or provide my gunner a clean shot is difficult to say the least. I haven't gone onto a populated server yet to fly A) because it's embarrasing and B) I don't want to waste my teams support. So I've been practicing on an empty local server but still having difficulty smoothing out the bumps. Any helps/tips/advice would be greatly appreciated.


Ok, smacking myself in the face a couple times here for this one. Recallibrated my joystick...

[Samoth]

I'm no pro or anything, but the old cliche rings true: practise makes perfect. Me, I went from not being able to stay in the air for 5 seconds without crashing (in 'nam), to being able to fly, strafe, land etc. I'm far from perfect and my... situational awareness sometimes lacks (damn chimneys!) but I'm much better than I was.

You get a certain... nack for when to do what. Like riding a bike. When you tilt one way, you know which direction to steer into to pull out. If you can come to a complete stop-hover, ie no movement at all, straight from 100% velocity, then damn, you dont nead any help. I still cant, and wish I could.

Moral of this useless post is to practise, use finesse, tap various keys often to adjust direction when it is needed, and practise some more.

Oh, I use a keyboard though, so that might'nt be as useful to a joystick pilot. Sorry.

[Phelan Ward]

Less joy, more stick is a general policy I follow. Over compensating is what causes most people problems.

I can't fly the planes for battle, but I do have fun jumping out and jumping back in before we hit the ground. Helicopters on the other hand...yeah I'm pretty damn good in a heli. The Cobra is superior in agility, while the MEC gun is powerful enough to destroy APCs and probably even tanks after a bit. Think of it as a rapid fire grenade launcher, it will tear through any infantry, buggies, vans, and boats. It's also actually helpful against enemy helis.

The goal of a chopper pilot is to provide the gunners with a stable firing platform first and foremost also call out targets whenever you see them. This is true of both attack helis and the Blackhawk. (Don't worry about the AirBusses, the MEC and PLA transports are only good for getting from point to point.) For now we'll stick to the attack choppers, he guided missles are one hit kills and can be fired from relative saftey. Use pop up techniques to stay safe from return fire. Don't stick to the same place, have a couple different firing positions. The rockets should be used mostly against enemy helicopters. 7 rocket hits will kill any attack helicopter.

USMC Cobra - Agility, okay gun. (You might consider strafing runs with this, but really those guided missles are crazy powerful.)

MEC Mi-28 - Slow as hell, evil gun. (If the rest of your squad is on foot consider using this for close air support. They will never have any infantry problems ever again. In fact the only problems you'll have is AA and aircraft.)

PLA Z-10(?) - Not quite as sluggish as the Mi-28 but still slower than the Cobra, which is the only thing it will ever fight against, and the gun sucks. Just flat out sucks. (Use this pretty much exclusively for a TV Missle platform.)

I'll share MilesTeg and I's secrets to TV Guided Missle Sniping once we figure out what the secrets are.

[GunnerIke]

Yeah, after re-callibrating my joystick, things went amazingly smoother. Nice flying a helo that isn't constantly pulling to the left and spinning to the right...

Practiced for a while last night/this morning did pretty damn good I think, but it was 4am and I was pretty tired. Thanks for the tips fellas. I think my only real troubles now are landing (just coming in slow and hitting the mark), over compensating (on big turns and after pulling up again) and hovering (can stay in the general vicinity).

[Meat_Drapes]

I use mouse and keyboard. I set the sensitivity very high for the least movement possible for my mouse. This has taken practice.
I have spent some time on empty servers flying around.
Your best bet.... practice practice practice. Experience will get you what you want.

[StrikeFear]

There is an octagonal shape on your HUD when you are approaching a hover. It is, I believe, your drift indicator.
Once, I was working on a hover over the carrier, and it was very informative. It seemed to move in the direction my helo was drifting. Cool!

However, later on, I was near the shore trying to hover again, and the drift indicator seemed to be moving exactly backwards. For instance, from all camera views I could clearly see that I was drifting forward, but the indicator was moving slowly down my HUD.

Am I missing something? Anyone have any experience like this, or any explanation?

[Phelan Ward]

Is that what that is? Well I need to try that out.

[Telorn]

It sure is, Phelan. But I haven't been able to figure it out. And the stupid Prima guide only states that it is used for hovering...not how it is used for hovering. Guess they couldn't figure it out, either

In my married life I don't have time to tinker around to figure things out. Let me know if you find how it works

[Phelan Ward]

Will do.

[Phelan Ward]

Here's what happens. When you enter a hover the little thingie will pop up on your hud. The thingie tells you the spot where you originally entered the hover. It tells you how your drifting in relation to the original spot you hovered in. When you take off you start in a hover. Then as you move forward the octagon drifts down, Idicating that your moving forward from that spot.

[Telorn]

So it indicates what direction you are drifting in, and you compensate by moving in the opposite direction.

[Phelan Ward]

Think of it like if you were seeing it from top down. When you start hovering thats where the spot shows up on the ground. when you start drifting that spot stays at the same place while you move of in some other direction. So if you start drifting straight forward, pull back a bit on the stick and drift back to that spot. It's basically to help you stay in one spot while your hovering.

[duckilama]

It's a HUD-within-a-HUD. Your regular HUD is projected forwards on the world, the hover indicator is projected down.
Intelectually, I get it, but in practice, it's just a distracting moving green blob. I need more practice.

[Mishkan]

I land without using it... and I can land on the crane