General Flight Model

[BKLronin 10]

First post :)

I thought it would be helpful to discuss the current beta fm of tkoh as BI still has some time to get it eventually right.

My experience:

-1 Choppers tend to roll too much

-2 Permanent partly heavy stick input needed

-3 not responsive enough independently from the sensitivity settings

-4 Heli feels like loaded to heavy or cg too far down

-5 Almost no pedals required to fly

-6 pulling the collective hard results in an unrealistic climb

-7 etc

At the moment its´s not much fun to fly for me. Everything else seems perfect for a good civil task game (sim). And yes I got plenty of experience in other heli sims over the years.

Hope BI can improve it a bit more so that Tkoh can be a great success.

Thank you! :rolleyes:

[helifool 10]

Yes loving the game in a whole, but...

The excessive right roll in forward flight and in the hover is really annoying. Im a real Pilot and helicopters do not automatically roll hard right with no cyclic pressure.

Also the 500 collecting needs work full down and it take forever to start descending and needs to have its ROD adjusted.

Apart from that though I can tell im gonna love this game and it looks great. The ground textures are to be expected for a sim and are better then FSX.

---------- Post added at 04:41 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:26 PM ----------

Update to my previous post. The excessive right roll only happens when turning the difficultly to Expert. Go back to trainee and its gone. Not sure what setting making it. A bit of a right roll is expected after going through ETL. But this is an excessive right roll.

[BKLronin 10]

Interesting, will also try that tomorrow.

As a real pilot can you quickly have a look at the other points I´ve mentioned? Would like to know your opinion on them as well.

[Chris CDN 10]

First post :)

-1 Choppers tend to roll too much

-2 Permanent partly heavy stick input needed

-3 not responsive enough independently from the sensitivity settings

-4 Heli feels like loaded to heavy or cg too far down

-5 Almost no pedals required to fly

-6 pulling the collective hard results in an unrealistic climb

-7 etc

At the moment its´s not much fun to fly for me. Everything else seems perfect for a good civil task game (sim). And yes I got plenty of experience in other heli sims over the years.

Hope BI can improve it a bit more so that Tkoh can be a great success.

Thank you! :rolleyes:

1 - Yes, the helicopters do tend to roll for no apparent reason. The is especially noticeable with collective changes. I have no idea where the devs got the idea that lowering the collective will induce a severe bank.

2 - Yes, but can be offset with force trim. (I never fly with force trim on IRL and rarely have to use the amount of cyclic I do here, but at least there's a workaround)

3 - I have no idea what you mean. Can you be more specific? I had to set my sensitivity settings all the way to max, but I'm not sure if this is what you're getting at.

4 - In all honesty, the helicopters seem to be way to light. This is especially noticeable when slinging, but there's a whole other thread for that.

5 - Yup, but since you have no idea if you're in trim or not, it's a moot point for now. That being said, the pedals are not nearly sensitive enough in the hover, especially for right pedal input.

6 - Probably true, but the helicopters seem to be designed to have lots of performance, so just roll with it.

7 - These issues and more have been addressed ad nauseum here so feel free to add constructive criticism there.

I'll agree that I haven't had much fun flying the pre-release beta. It's difficult to see that all the hard work and input from the community appears to have been (largely) neglected. I bought the game to support a company I like and a concept I love. Here's hoping the community can save this project.

[BKLronin 10]

Thanks!

I was very surprised that the FM didn´t changed from the Preview Version.

7. - It seems everthing has been said already.

Anyway I will explain what I meant with point 3 and 4

What I felt as too heavy: I had sensitivity almost turned fully up for a while but even there I had moments where I needed a full movement of the cyclic to the edge of the stick. (TM WH) THe heli banked over a certain degree and I wasn´t able to get it back from there like a Plane with giant wingspan with too small ailerons :P

Centre of gravity thing: When the chopper seems not to hang on a rotor but stand on a pole. Many FSX addon helis had that which looks funny when the roll axis seems to be in the height of the skids.

BI please don´t rely on the community to get the most important thing of a heli game right (FM). If you got any ressources left to get it right of course.

I for myself wouldn´t release it in that state. :(

[Trigen 10]

Have to agree with all the above.

My first impression sadly was horrific.

The worst being the helicopter taking a left bank and nosedive on lowering the collective and the other way upon raising it.

Not much feel of light skids, tends to jump off the ground.

One thing not so much FD would prefer to be able to use the zoom out without holding it down

[.kju 3244]

Did you try optics key for permanent zoom out? No idea if it works in ToH helos though.

[Trigen 10]

Have to double tap - my mistake thanks

[_YoYo_ 10]

About rolling interesting opinion and from real pilot too? But do You know that the helicopters can be trimmed? Im supriced opinion like here, anybody wrote about trimm but all wrote about strange banking? Try this. In expert mode You can set up copter for flying self without of stics and pedals.

[Chris CDN 10]

About rolling interesting opinion and from real pilot too? But do You know that the helicopters can be trimmed? Im supriced opinion like here, anybody wrote about trimm but all wrote about strange banking? Try this. In expert mode You can set up copter for flying self without of stics and pedals.

It was covered briefly, but since there were bigger fish to fry, I think most people just moved on.

2 - Yes, but can be offset with force trim. (I never fly with force trim on IRL and rarely have to use the amount of cyclic I do here, but at least there's a workaround)

[BKLronin 10]

Yes I´m aware of the trim function and I know how to use it :)

[twisted 128]

this flight model feels different than the preview model. less responsive in general. i hope most of the points the real pilots took the time to add are incorporated. if i wanted a general flight model i'd still muck around in arma2 and not bother with tkoh. i was kinda hoping TKOH would be the ultimate heli simulator sort of like its heritage of arma2 being the military simulator.

i reckon the devs will get it right, give then time and feedback. they've mostly come through in the past and they're smart enough to do so now. after all the success of this new splinter brand in the arma2 worlds depends on it.

[helifool 10]

Anyone else feel that full down collective on the 500 shouldn't take over a minute to respond in forward flight?

[OMAC 254]

I only have flown on Expert using kb/mouse, and ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE when collective (analog) is raised. The light heli pitches and yaws all over the place, and is an absolute bear to get under control. So, gaining altitude along a smooth path is very difficult indeed; raising collective while trying to keep the nose up and maintaining adequate speed is damn near impossible. I dread in the 06 PMC support challenge when the obnoxious PMC leader yells, "Crest that hill!" Brutally hard; I have only made it by largely circling the hill instead of going over it. But the training session dedicated to altitude changes is awesome - and very much needed. An awesome flight model to master; quite difficult indeed, but FUN!

[meach 10]

Real helicopters can roll when pulling collective.

If you imagine flying along at more than transition speed, the downwind rotor will have more pitch than the upwind. This is caused by the swash plate which is generally set up for a balanced trim at default cruise. At other times, it is non-horizontal.

Anyway, pulling on collective will increase pitch on all blades differently, depending in where each blade is in the rotation over the swashplate. (Pitch is not linear, nor is the drag, the lift and all the consequent effects it produces)

Yaw is also induced when adding collective, of course. This due the the increased counter-torque produced by a higher rotor pitch making more drag.

Also Sperry's rule produces precession at 90 degrees in the direction of rotation, so any force applied to a spinning rotor (Read gyroscope) will not necessarily come out where a programmer, or pilot, might expect it :-)

These effects differ with each helicopter. Some produce a pitch effect on increase of collective because the centre of the rotor mast is not exactly aligned with CG. Of course, positioning of payload also affects this, as most pilots have been surprised enough to find out at some time in their career.

Thus, it is possible to have a pitch effect caused by the rotor mast/CG offset translated into roll when changing collective.

Sorry to be so technical, just thought I'd try and help.

Kind regards,

Meach

[MD500Enthusiast 10]

Anyone else feel that full down collective on the 500 shouldn't take over a minute to respond in forward flight?

it's not that it takes a minute to respond, it's dependant on speed. i noticed that you really only start to descend when you go below 40 knots or so when you're full down collective, or any amount of collective for that matter.

---------- Post added at 03:09 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:08 AM ----------

I only have flown on Expert using kb/mouse, and ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE when collective (analog) is raised. The light heli pitches and yaws all over the place, and is an absolute bear to get under control. So, gaining altitude along a smooth path is very difficult indeed; raising collective while trying to keep the nose up and maintaining adequate speed is damn near impossible. I dread in the 06 PMC support challenge when the obnoxious PMC leader yells, "Crest that hill!" Brutally hard; I have only made it by largely circling the hill instead of going over it. But the training session dedicated to altitude changes is awesome - and very much needed. An awesome flight model to master; quite difficult indeed, but FUN!

it'll get easier when you get a proper stick and throttle with pedals and track ir will help a lot too.

[zentaos 10]

I too think this FM is much improved over the preview. The descent rate is speed dependent. It's getting better.

You can't just drop the collective going 120knots and expect to stop on a dime.

The collective, torque effects and anti torque rotor still need some work.

The cyclic feels good though. the Heli's seem to jump in the air without ever getting light on the skids, and at only 20-30% collective. And you can pull aft cyclic with no collective pitch at all and set the tail on the ground.

There doesn't seem to be enough torque induced yaw(nose turning right) with added collective, you barely have to give pedal input at all, or release it when collective is lowered. The pedals are sensitive enough, but not effective enough at full deflection, heli should spin much faster with full pedal.

All in all, I'm very impressed with the beta.

[OMAC 254]

There doesn't seem to be enough torque induced yaw(nose turning right) with added collective, you barely have to give pedal input at all, or release it when collective is lowered.

I get massive amounts of torque-induced yaw when increasing collective in light heli on Expert. Putting any more in there would be a mistake. I think it's good where it is now. There is also quite a bit of roll induced by collective increase in some situations.

[zoog 18]

I get massive amounts of torque-induced yaw when increasing collective in light heli on Expert. Putting any more in there would be a mistake. I think it's good where it is now. There is also quite a bit of roll induced by collective increase in some situations.

Strange. I barely have to use the anti-torque rotor at all. Even when raising collective. And am also running on Expert difficulty :confused:

[helifool 10]

I too think this FM is much improved over the preview. The descent rate is speed dependent. It's getting better.

You can't just drop the collective going 120knots and expect to stop on a dime.

The collective, torque effects and anti torque rotor still need some work.

The cyclic feels good though. the Heli's seem to jump in the air without ever getting light on the skids, and at only 20-30% collective. And you can pull aft cyclic with no collective pitch at all and set the tail on the ground.

There doesn't seem to be enough torque induced yaw(nose turning right) with added collective, you barely have to give pedal input at all, or release it when collective is lowered. The pedals are sensitive enough, but not effective enough at full deflection, heli should spin much faster with full pedal.

All in all, I'm very impressed with the beta.

Trust me full down collective going 120kts or any other speed makes you descend and descend fairly rapid. Im not talking about stopping but descending at speeds above 40kts.

[EagleEye-GER- 0]

Strange. I barely have to use the anti-torque rotor at all. Even when raising collective. And am also running on Expert difficulty :confused:

Strange indeed. I´m on Expert and light helicopter and need left pedal when raising collective, otherwise it would turn clockwise(as it is the correct behavior).

Don`t know for medium helicopter, as my problem is it that it is heavy rolling to the right when giving collective and I have to give much left cyclic. Yes, trimming helps a bit, though is that the right behavior?

[eddix99 10]

I have done some real world fixed wing flying but this is my first foray into sim helicopters.

Some of the comments on this post are quite technical, but from an average joe's perspective I find the flight model enjoyable and rewarding. I am flying on trainee level with a stick with slider collective control. I also have track IR.

I have noticed that the ground effect on landing seems quite severe. It may be just me being a noob but getting the heli on the ground requires a severe drop off in collective.

When I do get on the ground I find that even though I have reduced the collective to zero the chopper still rolls over to the right and flips upside down. Perhaps this is a real world occurance requiring me to hold down opposite bank?

The flight model is great and I have noticed that it is so much more involving than Arma 2 OA.

I can see that alot of people are unhappy with the beta. My opinion is that at the moment it is enjoyable to play and fly,in time it has has the capability to be a great game,which is the whole point. I do doubt however that the game will be entirely stable on release. It does feel unfinished and the timeframe left before release is quite small.

[zentaos 10]

Trust me full down collective going 120kts or any other speed makes you descend and descend fairly rapid. Im not talking about stopping but descending at speeds above 40kts.

I do agree. the collective is not right. You do descend with flat pitch, but not very quickly with any forward airspeed above 40knts. you can lower the collective to flat, and then have to cruise around a bit to bleed off speed to begin a descent.

I also am using expert difficulty and don't have to use the pedals much at all. Seems odd that the FM is not behaving the same for everyone.

Like I said. It is getting better. It is improved over CP8444.

[OMAC 254]

;2033508']Strange indeed. I´m on Expert and light helicopter and need left pedal when raising collective' date=' otherwise it would turn clockwise(as it is the correct behavior).

Don`t know for medium helicopter, as my problem is it that it is heavy rolling to the right when giving collective and I have to give much left cyclic. Yes, trimming helps a bit, though is that the right behavior?[/quote']

Same for me. Left pedal required when raising collective. Same with preview. I'm used to it, and it feels realistic.

[_YoYo_ 10]

Yes, trimming is right behavior. Trimm is a tool for corrections and wind effect. FM is here very well done, some to improve like fast strange descend when the speed is above maximum, the rest is very ok or for small corrections. I fly on the expert level and Im very happy with this fm but good quality joystick like hotas of saitek, logitech or thrustmaster is nesessery with Tkoh plus pedals, not 3d stick!