Cumulus? Absolutely. It needn’t be a monster CB that towers up to FL600 and has the classic anvil top to be a lightning generator. Lightning can also strike in front of a moving storm as far away as 15 miles, which is why the weather guys and gals are constantly telling people that it doesn’t have to be raining for you to get your rear end off the beach if storms are headed in your direction. In fact, just last week or the week before, some people got struck by a bolt in that exact circumstance, at least as I understand it. Fortunately their injuries were mild according to the nooz.
I’ve even heard of "clear air lightning, but I don’t know if it’s real or one of those old wives tales that go around. But I doubt Asobo is modeling that (at least on purpose) in the sim.
And by constant, I mean it can happen literally any time of day, though it does tend to be brief, but intense. If we have westerly winds, the storms tend to come in the morning, if they are easterly, which is much more common, they’re an afternoon thing. At least for those of us on the west coast, it’s the opposite for those on the east.
But the REAL humdingers happen when an easterly Seabreeze collides with a westerly wind, the collision line makes the monsters. And that could occur on any day, no matter the prevailing winds. When that does happen, get indoors and stay there. But the sim isn’t modeling those either, just the results as reported in METARs and whatever other reports it uses to generate local weather.
Kev