Comms and Brevity

In the fast world of modern fighter combat, brevity in comms is key. Although as seasoned veterans of online flight combat our comms are excellent generally, Falcon introduces some new comms issues and for multiplayer co-op play (with or against other virtual squadrons) we will need to make sure our comms are up to NATO standard so we can understand what others might be trying to tell us.

Call Signs -

A flight (as part of a package, a group of flights set to achieve a specific task or tasks) will be given a call sign, and each member of the flight will have a unique ID in that flight. So referencing each other by callsigns is not really the done thing, instead if our flight was 'Mike 1' then the pre-flight briefing will assign flight numbers as follows -

Skip has lead, will be Mike 1-1
Si is number 2, will be Mike 1-2
MJ leads second section, will be Mike 1-3
Speedy will fly number 2 to MJ and be Mike 1-4.

It might be an idea to make a mental note of who is who, so when you hear

"3 engaged defensive 2 Migs!"

you'll know who is talking.

For Inter-flight comms you can use your ID instead of the full call sign, but inter-package or other external comms calls need to be made using the full flight call sign and ID.

There are two types of comms calls, Directive and Descriptive.

Directive calls are orders and should be acknowledged. They are formatted as

To; From; Message

For instance

"2, Lead, Fuel state?" (Lead is asking #2 what is his fuel state)

Descriptive calls are simply formatted as

From;Message

"2, Fuel 5000."

(Lead can be reference as '1' or as 'Lead').

If an acknowledgement is all that is required, just replying with id is expected.

"Mike 1-2, go spread"
"2"

Where flights are more than 2 a/c, responses to flight calls should be made in sequence e.g

"Mike 1, head home."
"2"
"3"
"4"

more to follow...