Up-to-Speed Guide for the A-10

While there are the LOMAC Tutorials, it's good to get your plane in the air and then look around. For the hard-core simmers there's a great pleasure in mastering all the stuff to come. This Guide allows the returning or new simmer to get a handle on the necessities and to know what's to come ahead to start the process. Also print out the KeyCommands file in the C:\Program Files\Ubisoft\Eagle Dynamics\Lock On\Doc folder for a full list of commands.

For consistency, do NOT to choose EASY RADAR.

This document begins with your ass on the ground ready to fly.

Getting off the Ground

Usually you're starting from the Taxiing Area for Engine-start. PageUp (RightWIN-HOME for FC1.1) is the command to get the engine spooling up. I wait by playing around with the Lights and looking around the cockpit and looking on the outside.

• SHIFT-L turns on/off your whole electrical system. Some people start on the ramp with systems totally off. Your dials should wiggle about and fuel info increase.
• PAGEUP(RWIN-HOME for FC1.1) spools up the engine - Keep holding it down. The RPMs will start to advance.
• Most people have a throttle on their joystick. Otherwise change the engine thrust with Page Up and Page Down. Keypad Plus/Minus for incremental changes.
• Canopy opens/closes with CTRL-C. Mid-flight you're likely to lose the canopy altogether.
• W applies wheel brakes as you move around the taxiway. You need to keep press them down to slow down. Tapping them once will not do the job.
• Z(left) and X(right) are used for turning as you taxi about the airport. I've also have the rudder /nose-wheel on an Rotater axis with my twisting joystick - so I've got good control..
• L turns on the cockpit lights for night viewing. CTRL-L turns on the on-board lights.
• ALT-L turns on the taxiing or gear light - it can toggle between lowbeam, high-beam and off.
• CTRL-H allows you to change the colours on the HUD

After careening wildly about the airport like Crazy Taxi, and ending up on the runway, you should be stopped and ready for takeoff.

Access the Tower by hitting Backslash( \ - right above the Enter key). The Comm Menu will appear. Choose F6 for Tower and then F3 to request take-off.. It's not required to actually take off.

Turn up the throttle and then, when above 120 knots on the HUD, pull up and hit G to lift your Gear. Take note of the 3 flashing symbols on the left-side panel.

Looking around

Whatever you're viewing the most important keys are the Keypad-*Asterisk and the Keypad-/Slash. They Zoom in and zoom out in All views. The mouse can be used for the view rotation but I'm fond of using the hat switch. At first I found it slow but the speed can be changed. CTRL LEFT-SHIFT speeds up the view speed..

Outside Views The Function keys (F1 to F10) are different world views.

• F1 is the most important as it puts you back into your cockpit and in touch with your instruments and weapons.
• Secondly is the F2 key which allows you to see yourself from the outside. I use this along with the Keypad-/Slash and the mouse to position a good view around me. And when you return to it , the view is set up as it was before. You can hit F2 again to cycle through to your wingman and other air assets to see their types and current flying.
• I rarely use the F3 which is the cinematic Flyby view. But play with it to see if it's any use to yourself
• The F4 allows a rear view to see what's behind you. Good to view any bombs you're dropped but cheaterish in a dogfight.
• If you shoot off a missile or bomb, F6 follows it to its final destination.
• F7 shows all the ground units. F8 - the mission targets. F12 - the Static Objects.
• F10 gives you the Theatre Map that shows the current available air units with icons
• F11 flips through the airports that are available. Remember where you're starting from in the mission. It's cool to see yourself on the airport.
• SHIFT-F10 turns labels on/off mid-flight. Shift-F2 - Aircraft labels toggle, Shift-F9 - Ships and ground units labels toggle
• Padlocking
  • You need to be in A2A mode if you want to padlock an aircraft with KEYPAD-DEL,
  • If you're in A2G node, a point on the terrain is padlocked.
  • For toggling all missiles: SHIFT-KEYPAD-DEL and for only serious Threat missiles: ALT-KEYPAD-DEL
  • KEYPAD-NumLock - Disables all padlocks.

Cockpit views Smoothly working here is a big step in keeping control of your plane and target even without padlock or TrackIR as an aid.

• Key-Pad 5 Centres the view
• Key-Pad *(Asterisk)- Zoom IN view
• Key-Pad /(Divide) - Zoom OUT view
• Key-Pad Enter - Resets the Zoom
• Key-Pad 0 - Allows you to look down. You can tap on this for a temporary view change. Coolness.
  • Key-Pad 0 + another Key-Pad 1-9 (at the same Time) allows a quick zoomed view of cockpit Sections. Again Coolness
• Look at the View Modifiers in the KeyCommands document for some tricky things.

Running the Program and flying about

• Esc will pop up the usual mission exit menu but with the choice of RCVR. This allows you to rejoin the same mission from where you started.
• S stops all current activity but allows you to look around with different views.
• For long Missions - CTRL-A accelerates the sim and SHIFT-A resets it back to normal. ALT-A slows the sim down.
• J sets the auto-throttle on allowing you to maintain the speed you're at.
• ' QUOTE in a mission gives your current mission status.
• To record your mission, CTRL-R starts the recording when you OPEN a mission but not in flight
• and for graphic geeks, CTRL-BACKSPACE shows the frame rate
• On-line you can chat to everyone with CTRL-M, your team only with ALT-M, and QUOTE gives the current list of players online and your ping.
  

I've been hit or am about to get hit

I've been hit

• Please lady, stop talking about it! SHIFT-N silences repeated Warnings(except those that haven't announced yet).
• CTRL-E several times(3) and you've ejected. But only if your ejection system is still working.
• The Fire Extinguishers are staring right at you in the face, but are not functional. Sorry. For 1.1 - you can turn off flaming engines - ALT-RWIN-END for the left engine. SHIFT-RWIN-END for the right engine. It will allow you to struggle back to base or finish the mission.

I'm about to get hit

• Q dumps just one set of Chaff and Flares.
• E turns on ECM Electronic Counter-Measures. But that requires ECM pods in your loadout.
• SHIFT-Q sets out a steady pattern of Chaff and Flares until you run out.
• Insert pumps out Chaff each time you hit it. You're not unlimited in chaff and flares. Delete pumps out Flares.
• the RWR on the left tells you about your missile and radar threats - see pages 95,(for pic), 183 - 187 of the manual. Beeping indicates a radar(enemy or friend) is pinging you and is displayed with a number or letter. As shown in the following pic, the radar signals can also lock onto you. Most times they are enemies. In the RWR you can see 23 and 25 are locked onto you: 23 is a Shilka-23 Anti-aircraft tank and the 25 is a MiG25 fighter. You should also note the Inner and Outer circles - these are not distance based but a Threat Level. Anything in the inner circle is about to smack you hard.

  

Dog-fighting

For the A-10 it is very limited.

• Hitting 6 will give you an Air-to-Air missile Mode - Usually a AIM-9.
• C unCaps the Cannon and displays a firing funnel on the HUD

Bombing and Shooting

Selecting the weapon and pinpointing the target - For the A-10 it is very busy.

• Hitting 7 will put you into Air-to-Ground Mode
• D Cycle through weapons selection OR
• C Toggles cannon(guns)
• - (Minus) Multi-Functional Display (MFD) Zooms-in for AGM-65 missiles
• + (Plus) Multi-Functional Display Zooms-out for AGM-65 missiles
• CTRL-SPACE Change the Ripple Quantity(number of bombs being drop with just one Release). It goes up to 12 then cycles down to 1 again.
• ALT-SPACE Toggles through the Release Modes(bombing types) - Single, Pair, etc. because sometimes you'll only want to drop 1 bomb at a time.
• V sets the Dropping Interval that gives you varying bombing spread

TDS Target Designation System - Bombing designates the target using a symbol(called the TD or TDS) on the HUD to mark missile and bomb targets. The basic keyboard options for moving the TD around are:

• SEMI-COLON - TDS up
• PERIOD - TDS down
• COMMA - TDS left
• SLASH(/) - TDS right
• If you've have a joystick, you can remap them to the 4 ARROW keys. Or hold down ALT+ Hat-switch to move the TDS about the HUD.

Finally, you have to lock on to the target and release the weapon:

• TAB locks the target up
• O If you are dropping bombs rather than shooting missiles, O toggles the bombing sight Electro-Optical System (EOS) on or off. This is what gives the bombing line. It is calculated by the bombing computer, so there is no need to release the bomb with Enter.
• ENTER(re-mapped) Releases weapon - firing missiles or, for bombing, it releases with only the pilot's best guess of hitting.
• SPACEBAR(re-mapped) Fires cannon.

Combat/Navigation Modes

With the A-10 you get limited modes.

• 1 will switch around the NAVigation modes
  • There's the default NAV route with waypoints, and when you hit 1 again you'll get...
  • the Instrumental Landing System (ILS) mode, or as I call it Return-to-Base mode.
  • ~Tilde will change waypoints for you
• 2/6 will switch to Aircombat modes. With fighters there are many more
• 7 will switch to Ground Attack mode
  • ~Tilde will change targets. They show up as diamonds if the target itself is in the HUD view.
• A gives Auto-pilot. PATH HLD on the HUD and a small green light in front lights up with "Auto PILOT. Setting auto-pilot does reset your trimming so when you exit, you might want to hit CTRL-T which clears trimming. In NAV mode it follows waypoint otherwise staright and level on the same couse.
  • Trimming your plane just requires you to be in near-level flight. And then tap on CTRL-SEMI-COLON, CTRL-PERIOD, CTRL-COMMA, CTRL-SLASH(/), and see the magic of level flight.

Landing

• B Toggle airbrake. Take note of symbols on the left-side panel Airplane diagram
• F Toggle flaps up/down - Airplane diagram
• G Toggle landing gear up/down - Airplane diagram
• Ctrl-W jettisons weapons in pairs(in-flight) or re-arms(ground).
• Ctrl-R Dump fuel (in flight) or refuel (ground) (Note: Hold down key)
• Alt-R Jettison fuel tanks
• W Engage wheel brakes (ground) (Note: Hold down key)
• T Toggle wingtip smoke
• R Toggle refueling boom

Suggested Remappings

There are heavy-duty joysticks and controllers with many button options that can be programmed in. But I prefer a basic joystick plus keyboard. The top commands to be remapped are Enter, BackSpace, TAB, and Z,X for twisty handled joysticks. And I prefer to remap the TDC movement keys(SEMI-COLON, PERIOD, COMMA, SLASH(/)) to the 4 cursor arrows.

I've also compiled some Mission advice. There's a lot more than pushing buttons to get the mission done.

The best Manual is the the latest manual that came with Flaming Cliffs add-on. Sign up and Download here

For LO:MAC version 1.02/1.1. Page created and provided by John "ZoomBoy27" Thomas.

Look here for some MISSIONS and to - Sims Main Page