OK, What's wrong with spawning where you want and using the sim as you wish?

Yes! And if you’re using an Xbox to fly with, you probably don’t even have a keyboard hooked up.

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How about having say a 45 second max waiting time allowed on the runway to take off ,after that your plane becomes invisible on the runway until airborne,too complicated maybe ?

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This thread seems to have divided itself into two aspects, (sub-threads):

  1. The original topic which was:

    • It’s not fair to gripe at how others do things if you’re willingly going into a known “sandbox” open multi-player environment - or even if playing in single-player mode.
    • Belittling people because they don’t fly the way YOU want them to fly is a Bad Thing, (IMHO).
  2. The present implementation of multi-player in MSFS is a poorly controlled, (a “sandbox” and/or “The Wild West” as someone else called it), environment.

    • If you really don’t like a poorly controlled multi-player environment like the one MSFS provides, then VATSIM and/or IVAO are better suited for a more rigid rules-based flying experience.
    • There’s also flying without multi-player turned on, with AI turned up if you want traffic to keep you company.

Perhaps someone should open a thread on “What needs to be done to fix the present MP implementation in MSFS” - assuming that it should or can be fixed.

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I think it’s a natural evolution of the thread, because your initial question was ‘what’s wrong with spawning where you want and using the sim as you wish?’ and that invites people to both suggest what they think is wrong with it (assuming they think there is anything wrong with it) and also what they think can be done to fix it.

But if there were a thread to talk about specific changes / improvements to multiplayer, I’d be happy to contribute to it…

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I’ve been simming for a bit less than a year. I had no idea you could instantly start/configure any plane with a keyboard stroke (can’t wait to try this next flight though :smiley:)

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FYI, (at risk of being accused of advertising my own posts), I opened a generic “How do you. . .” thread here:

. . . that might be useful for folks to use to ask generic questions about how to do something specific, like using the drone, taking pix, etc.

The idea was to create a place where people who wanted to know “how to [do something]” would have a list of prepared answers to their questions, all in one place - like a “FAQ”.

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These 2 things are inseparably linked. You can’t really discuss one without the other. Point #1 is a direct consequence of #2.

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That’s great!

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What the heck do you mean “using the drone” one might ask :slight_smile:

If you go into the camera in the toolbar at the top, you can choose “Showcase” which will switch to a “drone” camera. You can control it’s position with key strokes, the W, A, S, D, R, and F keys move it in three dimensions, and the numeric keypad arrows rotate it about an axis. The problem is, at the default speed, it’s wicked slow :flushed: but, yay!, you can fix that in the options menu by increasing the “Drone speed” (wish you could make that option persistent. Maybe you can? I don’t know.), at which point now you can move quickly around the landscape.

Hopefully someday Asobo will allow click spots in “External” view. Ant’s Airplanes Tiger Moth has gotten around this shortcoming by creating other camera views in “Cockpit” mode that take you outside the airplane and thereby bring you to locations that have click spots so you can perform tasks outside the airplane like spinning the propeller and checking the oil, etc.

And I’m all for allowing having the sandbox Wild West implementation, if they would only bring back the ability for individuals (and therefore groups) to have locked servers, too, just like FSX. It’s fun to go into the Wild West area, but, yeah, I like flying with like minded people, too. For instance, I’ve been a user of Boston Virtual servers since they opened. I used to also belong to one of the Bomber squadrons as well that sponsored flights.

I have yet to learn how to use and try the Reno stuff, so, I don’t know how that works. Maybe that’s a start of a system there?

And of course FSX also had the ATC radar station you could sit at and control flights and watch others fly into and out of airports from a control tower viewpoint, which was really awesome, as well as a voice system that even included a click to talk button (complemented by other third solutions that could be used, too).

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I don’t have it. I’m not much for competitive stuff overall. And I already knew that unless they introduced some kind of anti-cheat (which they didn’t), the cheaters would immediately be in there ruining it for everyone else. And lo and behold, within a day people had already figured out multiple exploits. Outside of a small hardcore group of air racing enthusiasts, Reno DLC is pretty much dead these days.

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Its a cheat to start the plane ready for taxi…

Im sorry, I just keep forgetting the high influx off new people to this hobby that MSFS brought in. Im just used to be part of a very niche(dare I say elite:p) communety where pretty much everyone know the basics of the sim:p.

Refreshing, that we now actually have people like you:)

Its just that, yeah I know vatsim etc etc, and Im actually started dabbling with vatsim myself, took me 12 years to get to the stage of asking for radio check:p. But sometimes I want something like a casual multiplayer enviroment, but still something with atleast a few basic rules, so an airport enviroment atleast can look a little bit plausible and where people respect traffic, when they can… Im not expecting anyone to fly perfect patterns, or anything, just the small parts, like taxiing, not just park on the runways and just idle there for lols, or flying upside down over the runway at 100 feet lol.

Maybe like someone mentioned allowing private server possibility maybe, where rulebreakers can be kicked when not following simple rules. Dunno, just something I crave for…

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“If I had my 'druthers. . . .”

I would like to see a very common “game” feature - peer-to-peer gaming - where you can “pick your friends” and fly with whomever you choose.

Or, at least the ability to create a self-contained controlled group - I think one person called it a persistent server connection/context, that would work like a private chat-room, but within a flight simulator, where you would have to be invited to attend, and could be un-invited if you were a pain.

That is the one thing I see lacking here. Not as extreme as VATSIM or IVAO, but not as free-wheeling as the current multi-player implementation, more like something in between.

I have actually been with the simulator since the first Atari MSFS cartridge came out back in the '80s.

However, I’ve only done a very small amount of buddy-flying, (in X-Plane, on IVAO), as I don’t feel qualified to impose my abysmal skills and even less skillful procedural (lack-of) knowledge on others, no matter how forgiving they might be.  IMHO, I think it’s rude to join a rodeo if you don’t know how to mount the bull or how to ride it.

The more I mess with it, the more I learn how little I really know about it.

You actually can do a closed group flight. If you select “Group Only” from your MP options. But you’re limited to only flying with people on your friend list, and you’re limited to only a few members in the group (I’m not sure what the limit is exactly).

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And group functionality is unreliable. I created a group with a friend in the early days of the sim and we flew together for a bit one day and then we finished and I (the group owner) left the group first, after which both of us were then stuck in the group and unable to leave and couldn’t fly MP at all. We finally got that sorted, but since that day I can’t see him online and he can’t see me so we cannot fly in groups any more and there seems to be no way to get this sorted, and this happened to others at the same time IIRC.

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I wonder if that ever got fixed?

It would be interesting to pal-around with friends who could teach me things in a closed environment.

The ability to have someone “sit in the co-pilot’s seat” would be invaluable too.

Indeed. Like many other parts of the sim, group multiplayer is buggier than week-old road kill on the side of a Florida highway. There are a lot of issues with the group only option. I never said it worked well. I just said the option was available.

And that goes back to what FlyingsCool5650 said earlier in this thread…

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:rofl:

Pardon me while I try not to pee myself laughing. . .!

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That’s what we had in FSX years ago. I was a part of multiple communities where events were created and ATC people were available for a realistic flying experience at any level from simple GA VFR flight where you might ask for flight following, and if you decided to fly into a Class D airspace you could work it just like in life, to they handled tubeliners in IFR as well. And there were training documents available for people who were unfamiliar with procedures and even classes. BVATC is one of those groups that survived from that time, and eventually merged with the VATSIM ecosystem.

But you could log into the servers at any time, and if there happened to be other people flying, too, great!

Back then, yes VATSIM was very strict, and these groups were more lax, much like you want. It took a lot of work on the organizers of the groups, but they thought it was fun, and so did we.

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The only thing I “Ctrl+E” is the Guimbal G2 because the Starter is in a horrendously inconvenient location. :laughing:

Even then, I have my button mapped to Starter, so it’s not “completely” Ctrl+E.

Hell, I’ve got individual keyboard mappings for all the lights but don’t remember the last time I used them…

…because doing a complete C&D start is more fun. Learning the startup procedures for every single plane I fly on a regular basis and clicking things is just…fun!

Lastly, doing a “hard-spawn” in the air or on a runway has lead to a few CTDs in my case.

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Bees do it, Flees do it, even educated fish do it, so you spawn where you like. It isnt an issue surely.

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