I fly with mouse and keyboard, it is more work to sustain turns and control throttle.
As for which is better, I believe it mostly depends on what you're used to.
Also if using a mouse it helps to have a decent one with sensitivity buttons so you can set it to max when turning and minimum when strafing.
I am curious about how the sensitivity of a mouse compares to a joystick.
Truism wrote:It was highly impractical for fixed wing aircraft to capture them, and so the game was about establishing air superiority so that helicopters could hover at the point until capping it.
I disagree that it was impractical. It was definately a bit harder to cap the flags in a jet then it was in a helicopter, but the majority of the time I still witnessed jets doing it.
Personally I'd rather maintain a tight circle around the cap radius in a fighter then fly a helicopter into a jet battle.
I think your idea of forced jet/helicopter teamwork would probably involve the helicopters capturing points with a smaller capture radius then the jet's turn radius, or points on the ground.
I keep in mind that DC flight physics are significantly different to PR's, but it might be possible for the capture radius to be adjusted appropriately.
Truism wrote:1: Air combat doesn't work very well in PR. It's very complicated, but doesn't have very much depth. For the most part it's just a question of being behind the guy at the right time and spamming missiles at him.
Agreed, although I consider it more of an engine problem then PR's. In my experience with BF2 mods only DCon seemed to resolve this, and that's because they ditched heat-seeking missiles for proximity fused missiles. It was unrealistic of course, but it enabled more interesting dogfights.
Truism wrote:2: Flares are too effective.
Can't relate to this point.
Truism wrote:3: Helicopters aren't very much fun to fly in PR compared to DC - evasive maneuvres are mostly too easy because of the extremely good accelleration on PR Helis and their miraculous ability to pull out of inverts.
DC choppers were demanding in their own way, but I've never found PR's to be as boringly easy as you imply.
Anyways, I like the base concept of 2 runways at either end.
The objectives of the map could be either:
- Fighting merely for air superiority (large cap radius or asset-ticket based).
- Airstrikes against high value targets below.
- Capturing areas at sea level using helicopters/little boats/amphibious vehicles with heavy air cover.
- A mix of all the above.
Concerning the massive air maps being water based I think static oil rigs, ships or islands as targets/flags might be a solution if someone wants to create the assets. Not sure of the availability of placeholders for such an ambitious project but I presume the Essex could be one of them.
Unsure as to whether I'd support much AA (or any at all) on the map as it could just interfere with the air combat.
IMO such a map scenario would be unrealistic (2 airfields so close together with balanced air power is far fetched) but could be very fun.
Considering some other PR map scenarios aren't much more realistic either (understandably due to the engine limitations and gameplay considerations) I don't see it being too radical in that aspect.
Seeing lots of jet action within the map area (whatever it eventuates to be) probably wouldn't be as strange to see in real life as a big red conspicious truck with an aircraft bomb stuck to the back.
Good luck to whoever has the will and the skills to create such a map.
