Will Gliding in X Plane 11 become more realistic as the game gets refined?

Question

Hi, I am wondering if Laminar Researches will ever make gliding in X Plane 11 a better experience as the game develops further because at the moment it is not the best. The Vario is affected by Airspeed and pitch of aircraft when in real life it is not. Thermals are next to non existant and there isnt any lift along ridgelines on hills or mountain ranges like there would be in RL.

Answer 1

In general, we're always interested in making X-Plane more realistic. We are already aware of a potential issue with the default ASK's total energy instruments and are looking into that for an update. 

If you have any info on how the flight model may be wrong, or info on formulas to improve the thermal modeling, please feel free to send a bug or improvement request through the bug reporter. Having hard data or comparison examples will be the most helpful.

Comments

Sorry, I dont have any data or formulas to improve the thermal modelling. I am just mentioning from experience in real life of flying a glider. When flying along a ridge line of a mountain range ingame it feels doesnt feel right and you are still getting sink when IRL flying along the front of a ridge line you can gain speed without losing altitude because of the wind over the summit causing an updraft and on the rear of the ridge line will be turbulent air and downdrafts along with sink. Also the thermals ingame dont feel as though they are strong enough and could be modeled a little better. Sorry im not of much help on the programming side.

In general though I love the game so far and look forward to seeing the game evolve as updates are brought out. Good job Laminar Researches.