swarren@convex.com (Steve Warren) (02/07/91)
This file is compiled from the many responses I received from this group
to my request for FA/18 spoilers. There are no attributions, so any
personal pronouns can refer to anyone. ;^) There is lots of stuff here.
If you see an error let me know and I will try to fix it.
I did not write any of these hints myself. They were all contributed.
FLYING TIPS:
The best advice I can give is to practice lands on the carrier.
Some key info is:
1) when you line up on the carrier approach from the south at at least 10
miles out. You'll know your about right if the dot on your radar is
centered and when you can see the carrier on visual it is centered also,
and your heading is due north.
2) Bring your aircraft to an altitude of 160-175 ft. and hold it steady there
3) At about 5 miles slow craft to 160 - 170 knots watching your
altitude carefully.
4) Lower gear, and hook.
5) Hit the brakes after you cross the rear of the carrier.
It's been my experience...
That landing on the sub deck was essentially just like any other carrier
approach...except a LOT lower.
I guess, to throw in my two cents, I think the big thing to work with here
is airspeed control. As in landing anything (be it C-152, -172, flight
simulators and even F/A-18) 95% of a good landing is a good approach. Just
remember the following rules of thumb:
1. When approaching to land PITCH controls your AIRSPEED and THROTTLE
controls your ALTITUDE. After you first couple of approaches mumbling
this phrase, you will find that it sort of sublimes into your attitude
about the entire approach procedure.
2. Pick a spot (in this case, the aft sub deck) and keep it one spot on
the screen. If the spot starts moving TOWARDS YOU, you are too high.
If the spot starts moving away from you, you are too low.
3. HE WHO HESITATES IS DECK PIZZA. If you feel like the approach is getting
out of your control (i.e. the airplane is flying you, you are not flying
it,) then initiate a go-around. You can always left-teardrop away from
the carrier and set up another initial approach. After all, unlike
the real thing, we aren't paying by the hour. (NOTE: Even if it
was the real thing, the advice still stands. Take it from me; after
you rotate you forget the cost of the airplane. AT least I do. Makes
for some real eye-openers when I tie down afterwards...:-)
My favorite technique for dealing with an IR and MIG on my tail is to
arrange it so when the engagement starts I'm at about 7000 ft; when the
MIG fires, I immediately go into an outside loop (negative gees). Usually
I hit the bottom of the loop a few hundred feet above the surface (after
getting the warning bells about imminent crashes), the IR slams into the
ocean and the MIG too if he's stupid enough to follow!
Bridges: The bridges have no substance. Try to taxi across them and
you'll drop right through and into the bay.
Blacking Out: Supposedly, by pulling enough G's you can blackout for
a few seconds. I don't know if this is true, however.
STOLEN AIRCRAFT:
It ain't easy, that's for sure. I launch, go to afterburners and race
to where the MIGs are, and blow both of them out of the sky even if
they don't attack me (I know it's against the rules of engagement, and
I'd get courtmartialed in real life, but it's sooooo much fun!). This
gives me enough time to get the stolen planes turned around before they
are "beyond recovery" or whatever the message is that comes up if you
take too long.
Now the hard part. By now the F-16's are usually headed due west on
course 270. I line up also on 270 and use afterburners until I'm about
5 miles from them. Get a missile radar lock on one of the planes to get
flight information on them (course, speed, and altitude). Match course
and altitude as close as you can.
Use the + and - keys (I think that's right) to adjust your thrust in
small increments until you have only a 30 to 40 knot speed advantage
on them. Creep up on their tails.
Once you have that done, use only the rudder (< and )) keys to
position your plane directly between both of the stolen F-16's. You
need to be real gentle here, because making changes too rapidly will
send you off course. Make sure your altitude is the same as theirs
within about 20 feet or so. They sometimes change altitude so stay
sharp.
Keep creeping up on them. Align your plane and then play with the
thrust only. When you get close to them, decrease your thrust till
you have only a 4 or 5 knot speed advantage.
Then - fly right between them (try the outside view if your
confident enough, it's neat!). You have to get ahead of them by a
plane length or so, and BINGO! you get the CONGRATULATIONS! message.
The stolen planes will climb and turn around (try the outside view
backwards so you can see them turn). Go back to 100% thrust and
fly back to the carrier.
If you keep your radar lock on them and fly slowly back to the carrier,
you'll notice the stolen F-16's turn back around to 270 after you
leave the area. First time I saw that, I did a vertical half-loop,
hit the afterburners, charged back at them, and blew them both up.
Later, I realized the game isn't smart enough to land them. Oops.
I took me several attempts to get them to turn around. I even smacked
into one once when I hit the rudder too hard. I only got minor
structural damage, but he crashed and burned. Ouch!
If you're quick enough on the spot, you can get the stolen F-16's to
turn around before the MIGs jump you. I've only gotten that to
happen once in all the times I've tried.
Sometimes I just line up on them and practice hitting them with the
canon, which is fun too, and they just sit there. Except for once
in a while after I've nailed one of the F-16's, the other one is
declared "hostile", it turns red on the radar screen, and he turns
to a new course and punches up the thrust. I got him with a missle.
SUBMARINE MISSION:
Like many others, I was unable to complete the carrier sub mission
because I couldn't destroy the enemy sub/carrier. I landed on it and fired
point blank into the tower, etc. Seeing no explosions, I just put the
game aside and more or less forget about it. Upon reading the recent
postings saying that it's sufficient just to hit the sub with a missile,
destroy the migs (& cruise missile, if present), and return to the
carrier, I went back to try and do this, and now for the life of me
I can't even find the darn carrier! I seemed to recall it was up the
coast a little way, so I fly up there, encountering usually 3 MiGs and
a cruise missile, but no sign of the carrier. Destroying the enemy planes
and the c.m. and returning to the carrier gets me re-armed and re-fueled,
but that's all. What do I do? Where's the carrier?
Hello everybody out in netland.. guess what.. You CAN'T SINK THE SUB... YOU
MUST DESTROY ALL ENEMY AIRCRAFT IN ORDER TO COMPLETE THE MISSION... SORRY
...but you could land on it...
Not true. Dump your ordnance (your AMRAAMs only, the AIMs don't work worth a
damn) on the sub-carrier's conning tower.Then go back and get another load
and do it again. If you can get 6 (not 5, but 6!) AMRAAMs to hit the tower
squarely, you'll be treated to a lovely explosion and a sinking vessel.All of
this can be done at just under 100 feet. I found that pulling up to 95 feet
when you're about to fire works well, and the MiGs never touch me.
It is really not that difficult to land on the submarine,ok ok.. so you stack
2 out of 3 times.. but it certainly is not a fluke thing..
all you need to do is come in very low,(below the level of the subs decking)
come in just below a stall heading on about a 45 degree angle from the sub
(you should be heading towards the conning tower end (ie land on the rear
of the sub and use the length of the sub to actually stop). Aim at just
missing the conning tower and come in nice and slow.. air brakes on at the
last minute, wheels down and put the brakes on. Now.. just before you fly
straight into the side of the sub pull up (effectively stalling) and you
should effectively do a controlled (non damaging) crash on the deck of the
sub.. if you try it a few times you will get it eventually..
also...
If you do it right you will also get refueled and rearmed.. which you can
then go and use against the sub..
But....
Taking off again is more difficult.. Switch to overhead view.. zoom right
back so that you can see your plane and the whole sub decking.. brakes on..
and throttle up to 5% or 10% thrust and put yourself at the extreme end of
the flightdeck, facing the right way..
Dont fall off.. after getting this far it is a real bummer :-(
go to full thrust,kill the brakes and everything else and you should make it.
DOWNED PILOT MISSION:
What you need to do is fly over him at about 40% thrust with your gear down
and brakes on at an altitude less than or equal to 100 ft. When you are just
about on top release the raft (Shift-F). If it's close enough you'll know.
"feel" for just when to launch the rescue pod so that it doesn't land
so far from the downed pilot, but that last mission still sticks in
Easiest way is to fly about 30 feet off the ground at stall speed (I can
get down to less than 130 knots and remain stable for a short time) and
select an external view from behind, switching to a down view when he comes
close.
LAST MISSION:
On the last mission, I always launch low off the carrier and fly straight
and level at about 40 feet off the water. The migs come in at about 2000
to 4000 feet. I lock onto them when they are almost overhead and fire
missiles at the two (usually). They almost never know what has hit them.
It is almost a cheat. ;')
WEIRD MANEUVERS:
You can do something which is quite fun actually. Press 0 as a starting
location (or 5 to 9 'cause they are also defined), anyway choose the one
which is the most near the border of the Map. Then take off and fly in on
the border of the map (try to come in on a 90 degrees angle with the
imaginary map limit). When you reach the limit your plane won't go any
further, that is, the background won't move any further. Now comes the fun
part. Switch to rear outside view and fly close to the ground. Since the
computer does not have to bother with background calculations, your plane
will move and feel very fast. You can take off like a chopper with full
afterburners. Well, play and experiment with it, you can do lot's of
things. (flying next to your missiles is fun).
... Additionally, you can land on the carrier from any direction (I've done
it crosswise)
Reverse thrust is the "-" key --drops forward thrust by 3%,increments reverse
thrust by 1%.
I managed to land sideways by coming in at 30% thrust (175 knots?)at 140 feet
altitude, and raising the nose just before hitting the side of the carrier.
As the plane stalled it climbed about 15-20 feet. I killed power, braked, and
stopped facing the con tower with room to spare.
... One of my flares took out the IR and I heard an alarm which I
thought was a damage indicator but was too busy to read. I killed power,
rolled over to turn the jet to face the other direction, and accelerated
again.
Falling tail-first, I attempted to reduce my downward trajectory while firing
on the MIG. Suddenly the grey shape of the conning tower loomed in my port
window. My velocity showed ~0 knots. Reacting quickly, I killed my accelera-
tion, lowered my landing gear, and dropped my nose. And landed on the deck
of the carrier.
I do not claim to have done this deliberately, nor have I been able to
reproduce this stunt, although my attempts have ended in some spectacular
failures :-).
How about shutting off your engines around 30000 feet then once you've slowed
To around 100-150 kts go into a vertical dive. Your speed will increase to
Around 600 kts. You can then climb back to an altitude above the one where
you cut your engines!! You can fly forever without any fuel. How's that for a
Glide ratio.
If you go into a long dive, when low on fuel, you can MACH-out (running
afterburners) and come to a dead stop the instant you run out of fuel.
This takes some practice, because if you have too much fuel, you
crash. :-) I've made it as low as 300 feet before stopping.
INSTALLING ON A HARDDRIVE:
I recently patched a my copy of the F/A-18 Interceptor
on my A1000's harddrive, and it works just fine!!!
Use a binary file editor like NewZap, and everywhere
the string "df0" appears, replace it with something
like "F18", and assign F18: <F/A-18 directory).
Unfortunately, after playing you have to re-boot,
as there is no way to return back to workbench...
By the way, If anyone enjoys hacking games a bit... F/A-18
is really easy you know those missions you do? Well, try
this out.. Qualify, and finish the first Mission, save and
quit.. Then goto your disk and open NewZap with the 'config'
file.. You will see a byte before your name.. a $01 (CRTL-A)
and then a whole bunch of NULLS ($00) - To make F/A-18 think
you've finished each mission simply change the next byte to
a CTRL-A ($01) and save..
THE SECRET AIRPORT:
The Secret Airport: Hit 0 when it asks you where you wish to
start from. The view will zoom south and farther south, all the way
to the very edge of the map. Your plane starts parked on the grass and
you must use afterburners to take off. Depending on who you ask, the
latitude and longitude of this place is either a real F-18 aircraft
testing ground or smack dab in the middle of Los Angeles.
Another thing to do is head south from here. Eventually the plane
will bang up against the edge of the map and come to a complete stop,
hovering in place.
Secret mission? I haven't seen any secret mission in F18. Do you know
how you get into it?
The only mission I know of that starts on an airfield rather than the
carrier is the very first mission (air recon). You can choose either
the F-16 or the F-18, and it starts you off from SFO (San Franciso
International). You're supposed to find and identify the bogey that
the mission information directed you to, and then return to base (any
airfield will do on landing). You're not supposed to engage the bogey
unless fired on. Is this the mission you're thinking of?
There is also free-flight mode, which allows you to choose to fly
either plane, and to start from any of the four airfields or the
carrier. There's no mission here, though. You just fly around,
enjoy the scenery, try out your acrobatics, and fire your missiles
into everything in sight for some fun.
Side-note: A couple of times I've done that mission, the bogey turned
out to be a commercial 727 airliner coming in over land from the
northeast. Looks an awful lot like the President's plane. Hummm...
--
_.
--Steve ._||__ DISCLAIMER: All opinions are my own.
Warren v\ *| ----------------------------------------------
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