Local guide? Sounds more like a tour guide 
. And when looking to your right you won’t see anything on your left anymore.
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Thanks to Filippo20032222 and Ninjntje91 for your both input ! I have written my own template guide thanks to both of you.
Would it be possible to also have a simple template guide of Unicom ? I’m never too sure what pilots are expect to say on unicom on the different stages of the flight.
I just found this thread myself, and will likely go through and give some other tips as a VATSIM Staff member that I think beginners should be aware of!
Generally speaking, I tend to discourage people from using cheat sheets and scripts when starting out. This can seem very natural, but phraseology varies from where you are in the world; even from country to country. So while it can help you get going, it can really throw you off when ATC tells you something that isn’t included in the sheet (not to mention that you can sound like you are experienced in phraseology and give ATC the impression that you are experienced, so he will be less lenient with you).
Everyone learns in their own way and I’m sure scripts have helped a ton of people, but just use them with caution! 
As for your question though @NixonRider, we have a guide on our Pilot Learning Center that covers the general concept on UNICOM communication.
In short, you are required you report your intentions and actions briefly when other users may benefit (VATSIM Code of Conduct article B5). That means if you know you’re there alone, you technically don’t need to broadcast on unicom. However, just like indicators/blinkers in roundabouts – I tend to use them anyhow, just for good habit.
If anyone has any questions at all about VATSIM, phraseology or similar, never hesitate to reply to me here, DM me or tag me.
Enjoy the network!
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Not necessarily, most countries in the world stay quite close to ICAO phraseology, noticeable exception (of course) are the Americans and I believe Canada is also close to FAA phraseology? In Europe we have part SERA which doesn’t differ much from standard ICAO phraseology. UK has a couple of odd things but other than that the rest of the world is pretty much in-line.
Don’t know if this is an official VATSIM thread on Steam but this is quite bad, its full of mistakes:
You are correct! However, it’s the confusion between ICAO and FAA phraseology that gets most people confused. Most tutorials are a mix of the two, which makes it confusing. While European phraseology is quite standardized, you have local differences in pretty much every country.
My main point is that when you rely on scripts for flights, you tend to follow that script which can reduce how much you learn independently. Everybody learns differently, and the end goal is the same. Depends on who you ask really!
It’s not an official VATSIM thread at all. The PLC which I linked above has some pretty good tutorials, otherwise, it’s the usual Youtube videos. We are working on redoing and improving the Pilot Learning Center to make it more accessible and helpful to beginners though!
Wow, Thank you, I started with sim flying last December (MSFS), and studied lot of material about ATC communication since then, but this is simple and looks easy and helpful.
Total noob in flight community.
Very detailed and nice!
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I have question so if you’re land for example at Chicago Midway and they have 0 ATC online but O Hare has Tower or Approach online do you call them for landing clearance?
Towers are specific to an airport, so Ohare tower would not control Midway.
If Chicago Approach is online, then I think they would control Midway, and other airports within their airspace. As you approach the airspace as shown on map.vatsim.net, they should send you a “contact me” ping on VPilot (with three quick beeps).
If in doubt, you can tune their frequency and say “Chicago approach, are you controlling approaches to Midway?” Or even sent them a private message in VPilot (right click on their callsign on the left menu).
Here’s a good website someone posted a while back with an interactive section showing the “Top Down” structure of VATSIM:
ATC on VATSIM (dottycomma.com)
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