Stealth in BMS
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Good Day, All.
If you’ve been following the the OFM Journal thread, you’ve seen that we are flight testing the F-35C, for flight model refinement. While we’ve been doing so, we have also experimented with Stealth.
https://militaryembedded.com/radar-ew/signal-processing/radar-cross-section-the-measure-of-stealth#:~:text=The 5G F-35 has,size of a golf ball.Here are some numbers for you:
RL Frontal RCS (square meters)/Values in BMS( if frontal and units unknown)
F-18C= 1-3/1.23
-F-18E=1 /1.059
F-16-1.2 / 1
F-35A= .0015(I’ve also see .005 ) / 0.169
F-22= .00015 / 0.21
J-20= 1-3 / 0.41
One important caveat to our discussion is that the BMS Editor’s unit of measure (square meters, square feet, etc.) is not given, nor if this is frontal RCS. A clarification of these would be much appreciated,
The point of all this that in our testing shows true Stealth has a significant effect on BMS play. When we flight tested the MQ-25 tanker we tried a RCS of .005 and you could not lock it up on radar! I’ve created a “Flight Test” TE . In it the J-20 keeps it’s 0.4 but our test F-35C has 0.5 Where before the J-20 is shooting from beyond AIM-120 range , now you can get close enough to get to shoot(even close enough to get burn through when they jam)
It may not be an exaggeration to call it a “game changer”. And that, my friends, is the point of this post. Some might say Stealth " takes the game out of the game" . What do you think? Do you want us to include Stealth in OFMKTO and perhaps the other theaters we help with? Or, leave it to you to adjust(which BTW is very easy to do)
Comments are welcome.
Joe -
@drtbkj
Stealth jets are very powerful… Even too powerful. Let’s just say that if the enemy has serious weapons against them, then yes. But more changes would be needed here than just adding a couple of squadrons. The enemy must also have powerful and modern weapons. But I still vote for it.Well, that’s my opinion.
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Very interesting. In my opinion, balance is key: If the J-20 is parameterized as stealthy, then F-22 and F-35 need to be as well.
From the values shown, I would guess that the RCS value in BMS for the F-16 is set to 1 as a “benchmark” or reference value. Then if some other jet is “twice as stealthy”, it gets 0.5.
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Thanks for the early replies. It should be pointed out that the intention, the question, is not to make either side " all powerful". So, I agree with you both, there has to be balance.
In this poll’s first 2 hours we have 4 pro and 7 con. I have an honest question for those 7-why no?
Do they indeed feel it “take the game out of the game”? If so, I’m confused as the J-20, etc. are already here.
Could it be there are people in our BMS Family who are all about realism? They won’t fly the Hornet because it isn’t “real” ( it has Viper avionics). Well, Stealth is real…
Could it be that we don’t want to get our butts constantly kicked? Well, as above, we would not fill the sky with J-20’s, F-22’s, or F-35’s
Or, do they enjoy the challenge of fighting a sheath jet with better weapons? If so, I get that. I have not brought the stealthy F-35 to Taiwan( actually I just fly the F-18 and occasional Viper) for that very reason.
I’m not trying to sway anyone’s vote, I am honestly curious. My initial response to Stealth was a positive “breath of fresh air”. Stealth is effecting the real world. We would get to explore that, too. I fragged an OCA Strike using Hornet, Super Hornets, and stealthy F-35’s. It brought a different thought pattern to the process . I’m really curious how my planned experimentation with DEAD will go.
So, given that, and that we want to give the Membership what it would enjoy the most, what are the objections? -
There is something to keep in mind: if you want to keep flying in F16s, which may not be your project then, moving the time window towards way too modern technology may not result in a very interesting context. But that’s almost off-topic.
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@drtbkj From my side at least, I was not sure what to vote.
Does “more stealth=Yes” mean that you would rescale the BMS values to be consistent with the RL RCS mentioned?
I would be in favor of proper values. So if the current values are “off” for some aircraft, then yes, please make them more correct.
Thanks,
JayB -
The Game Changer has been giving the opposition Stealth I think because the F-22A seems to be same as it was as far back as 2005 in that regards.
Is it more Stealth you want or a more accurate representation?
To me it is an adequate representation as long as there are campaigns where people can still blast away at the older stuff I guess… or they get an option to keep it out would be IMO.
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A peer stealth-v-stealth theater could be fun … take BVR weapons out of the picture. More close-range engagements.
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Lorik, Compadre, you have hit upon the main reason I started this thread. RL Viper, and other, pilots have to face the reality of Stealth. Our BMS Family doesn’t have to. I’m just asking if we choose to.
The subject is theater dependent, as well. KTO and Viet Nam are more old school, although even Nam now has modern campaigns. Korea 2012, Nevada and such are more “present day”.
However, I’m mainly asking about OFMKTO, and to give the Theater Devs a feel for what the membership wants.
Jayb and Mig, I am absolutely talking about accurate RL values . If we do this we do the homework and get the best data we can. So, once again I ask for someone to tell us the unit of measure for RCS in Editor, and if these values are frontal RCS.
Airtex, you have hit upon what has me personally excited about this. In our testing, making the F-35 more stealthy completely changed the dynamic. It went from dodging missiles from outside your range from a jet you can’t lock on to to the close -range engagements you mention. Plus, I haven’t even tested DEAD and such , yet
A stealth vs. stealth campaign is feasible. Chuckles does something like that in X-plane. A S v S theater is a bit more problematic. RCS values are theater, not campaign, dependent. So, you’d have to make a campaign that only contains Fifth Gen fighters. You couldn’t have a realistic mix of 4G and 5G. But, your idea is sound. If the Membership ends up really negative to an entirely “stealthy” OFMKTO, that is precisely what we would offer. “Fifth Gen Bear Trap”, or whatever. -
I’m for it. We now live in a world where we will see 4th Gen fighting alongside 5th Gen, with some 4th Gen + in the mix. It’s not the end of 4th Gen, it’s the beginning of new strategy and it’s the STRATEGY that bringing 5th Gen to BMS will add. The way air superiority is gained may change but wars are still won by putting a man with a gun on an objective.
I don’t particularly want to fly 5th Gen, but I do want to work my strategy around it being there. The J20 as an example keeps you well and truly on your toes and tactics need to change to deal with the threat.
The beauty of it I guess is the ability to tailor the sim to particular time periods, and find a solution that appeals to most.
An Israeli F35 squadron kicking the door down for the Sufa to deliver precision strikes? Hell yeah!!
That said, we’re at the mercy of those who develop the game, and regardless are extremely grateful for everything you guys collectively do for us. Just my opinion, and one of many
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For my part I want to continue to fly the best modeled aircraft from BMS. It turns out that it is the F16 which is a 4th generation aircraft. Making an effort, in this game, to put it in confrontation with 5th generation aircraft will inevitably reduce it to the role of a bomber (super A10 ), protected by 5th generation allied fighters, which are necessarily imperfectly modeled. Of course, it can be interesting to implement global strategies against invisible threats, but BMS is first a flight simulator before being a strategy game. Campaigns are one thing and the pleasure of “flying” is another. For my part, I hope that the versatility of the F16 and its role in air to air actions will be preserved.
Otherwise, I might as well fly on the A10 of DCS, or install F22 and other invisible aircraft modes in this same simulator… and that’s probably what I’ll do, because the F16 of BMS will have no interest for me in terms of gameplay : I don’t want to be only a ground attack “pilot”.
I’m even afraid that this evolution will “kill” BMS, unless it evolves into a 5th generation aircraft simulator. But if the increase of the invisible threat remains only related to your theaters and that it doesn’t engage the whole evolution of the game …
And I write this knowing how to kill in BVR any invisible plane, at least in BMS 4.36.1 …
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I am staying with the F-16 as well. However, if say, F-22 and J-20 are not modelled properly, then in campaigns where those two come up against each other in 2D battle, then the outcome might be biased.
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Hello,
The question of stealth aircraft in BMS is just the dome of the iceberg, in my humble opinion.
Beside the question of stealth aircraft, is the main idea of what we want in BMS.
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Do we want an early F-16C simulator (circa 1985) representing a cold war era high intensity environment (integrated a disputed dominance between F-16 and Soviet opponents)?
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Do we want a updated F-16C/MLU simulator (circa 2000), representing a post cold war era asymmetric warfare (where F-16 has the dominance of the sky against obviously inferior forces) ?
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Do we want a late F-16C/V high intensity disputed warfare between various serious forces ? (USA, Europe, China, Russia, North Korea, South Korea, Japan and Taiwan ?)
In fact, there is no good answer. It just depends on our personal wishes. By my side, I trend to feel that option 3 is the most realistic, because of the following reasons :
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Every software that does not offer evolution is going to die.
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BMS is a F-16 simulator. F-16V is the future of F-16 and it opens a door to serious 5th gen simulation (AESA systems, advanced jamming systems etc…)
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By moving to F-16V and 5th gen fighters, we will offer something new to our community, compared to what DCS for example gives in term of environment.
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Moving to a 2020s environment would not avoid people to fly legacy eras. Only campaigns would be different.
To conclude, yes, for me, we must enhance the implementation of stealth technologies in BMS. That being said, I feel most skeptical about open data, because the real ones are confidential, maybe not for F-16 anymore, but certainly for F-22, J-20, F-35, Rafale and Su-57 for example.
To get something realistic, we really need more than RCS figures, but a true critical and contradictory engineering job, to avoid as much as possible partisan bias.
Radium
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@Radium
There are probably ways to generate rcs maps from 3d models which might give consistency at least - despite everything being nothing more than guesswork.
Would need code changes probably. -
@drtbkj said in Stealth in BMS:
Good Day, All.
If you’ve been following the the OFM Journal thread, you’ve seen that we are flight testing the F-35C, for flight model refinement. While we’ve been doing so, we have also experimented with Stealth.
https://militaryembedded.com/radar-ew/signal-processing/radar-cross-section-the-measure-of-stealth#:~:text=The 5G F-35 has,size of a golf ball.Here are some numbers for you:
RL Frontal RCS (square meters)/Values in BMS( if frontal and units unknown)
F-18C= 1-3/1.23
-F-18E=1 /1.059
F-16-1.2 / 1
F-35A= .0015(I’ve also see .005 ) / 0.169
F-22= .00015 / 0.21
J-20= 1-3 / 0.41
One important caveat to our discussion is that the BMS Editor’s unit of measure (square meters, square feet, etc.) is not given, nor if this is frontal RCS. A clarification of these would be much appreciated,
The point of all this that in our testing shows true Stealth has a significant effect on BMS play. When we flight tested the MQ-25 tanker we tried a RCS of .005 and you could not lock it up on radar! I’ve created a “Flight Test” TE . In it the J-20 keeps it’s 0.4 but our test F-35C has 0.5 Where before the J-20 is shooting from beyond AIM-120 range , now you can get close enough to get to shoot(even close enough to get burn through when they jam)
It may not be an exaggeration to call it a “game changer”. And that, my friends, is the point of this post. Some might say Stealth " takes the game out of the game" . What do you think? Do you want us to include Stealth in OFMKTO and perhaps the other theaters we help with? Or, leave it to you to adjust(which BTW is very easy to do)
Comments are welcome.
JoeBecause Falcon never used anything similar to RL radar eq…
It has simply an substitutional abstract system.(In fact on my channel will be presented soon the radars vs stealth plane at least on basic level if you are interested to understand the topic.
)
Yo will see such calculation using the radar eq.
The BMS is simply not able to model these planes. In fact you do not have stealth fighter without PESA or AESA radar. Which also is not able to model the BMS4.
If you ask me just leave out the stealth planes from ANY campaigns.
n+1 times I have said. The engine of the Falcon / BMS is best for the late Cold War era until the early 2000s. Why so many ppl. whish to use the engine for such goals which are impossible? I simply do not get this.
The only possible very so-so modeled stealth plane can be the F-117.
- It is not a strategical asset.
- In RL it did not had radar or RWR.
So as an AI manned plane it is viable. But even for that modeling the not 100% omindirectional stealth is not possible. About only the F-117 is available a measured RCS value thanks to Dani Zoltan but only from a single direction.
By knowing the parameters of the S-125M the calculated RCS with ~ 60 degree azimuth is -29 dBsm. (0.0012 m2) The SNR-125M was able to detect the F-117 only from 14 km slant range.
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Falcon 4.0 is based on a 4th gen jet the F-16C Fighting Falcon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_4.0 and was hard coded that way… as for the rest of the aircraft mods add on’s well they are just toys and additional’s to the sim that add fun or the added function of dissimilar aircraft training. The focus however should be to keep the history of the sim, why Frankenstein it… is my take anyway.
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@Reaperdog1 said in Stealth in BMS:
Falcon 4.0 is based on a 4th gen jet the F-16C Fighting Falcon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_4.0 and was hard coded that way… as for the rest of the aircraft mods add on’s well they are just toys and additional’s to the sim that add fun or the added function of dissimilar aircraft training. The focus however should be to keep the history of the sim, why Frankenstein it… is my take anyway.
@Reaperdog1 so… instead criticize each time the additional toys that add only fun to BMS, because no one talking about new avionics for others ac in BMS ?.. sry but I cant resist … they are not "just toys that add fun to the sim " … I just want to see you working on a BMS 3dcokpit … after this I will talk willingly with you about toys !!!
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@Reaperdog1 said in Stealth in BMS:
Falcon 4.0 is based on a 4th gen jet the F-16C Fighting Falcon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_4.0 and was hard coded that way… as for the rest of the aircraft mods add on’s well they are just toys and additional’s to the sim that add fun or the added function of dissimilar aircraft training. The focus however should be to keep the history of the sim, why Frankenstein it… is my take anyway.
Let’s say, if you add an F-18 with modeled avionics and systems to the Falcon, for example, will it become worse and “lose its history”? As for stealth aircraft, it would be better to do block 60 and 70/72 for a start. Of course, I understand that there are a lot of limitations of the engine, but maybe someday it will be improved. (I know nothing about programming myself, and maybe it’s impossible.) Again, this is just my opinion.
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@Supernova well by all means add to the sim, I meant no disrespect or cause for argument. Just that coming in and out of the F4 sim world after so many years, I have understood that in past the answer was it is an F-16 sim that is hard coded, unsure if that is still the case as the devs would know more, but if the code has changed fantastic, but as I understand it messing with code and not rewriting the whole thing could pork the avionics code for the F-16.
So question has the avionics F4 code been rebuilt allowing for new air craft systems?
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So question has the avionics F4 code been rebuilt allowing for new air craft systems?
NOT… NOR OTHER “TOYS”
JUST “Stealth in BMS”