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A Quick Guide To Taking Off
By Roronoa Pronouns
A brief overview of how to get off the ground, for people who haven't played a lot of flightsims before.
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Created by
Roronoa Pronouns
Online
Category: Gameplay Basics
Languages: English
Posted
Updated
22 Feb, 2022 @ 4:15am
23 Feb, 2022 @ 6:26am
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Guide Index
Overview
The Basics 
Standard (Horizontal) Takeoff 
Vertical Takeoff 
Comments
The Basics
Getting off the ground is difficult. IRL, takeoff is the second most dangerous part of flying, with landing taking first place. Thankfully, we don't have to deal with that whole 'dying' thing in Tiny Combat Arena, but it's a tiny bit frustrating to crash before you've even properly started the mission.

Thankfully, I worked out some of the details for you.

What you need to take off:
  • At least 200 airspeed, as measured by the SPD KT indicator on the left side of your HUD. If you are going slower than 200 KT, your aircraft will stall out, and you will go down instead of up. By default, W increases your throttle and S decreases it.
  • Your flaps (F key by default) and landing gear (G key by default) need to be disabled. You can't really reach 200 airspeed without doing this, anyway.
  • The upside-down-T symbol on your HUD should be somewhere in the upper half of the HUD, indicating that your aircraft is in fact going up.

There are two broad types of takeoff: Vertical and Standard. Both of them involve angling your thruster nozzles, because your aircraft is a bit too heavy to do a standard takeoff without some additional upward thrust.
Standard (Horizontal) Takeoff
To take off like a normal aircraft, follow these steps:

  • Increase throttle to maximum (by default, the W key increases the throttle).
  • Immediately adjust your nozzle (Q and E by default) until it is set to about 45 degrees.
  • Use the stick (or your mouse) to adjust the direction you're going in. You want to be going upward, but not too far upward, because you need air flowing over your wings horizontally to keep flying.
  • Disable the flaps (F by default) and the landing gear (G by default). You can do this as soon as you're certain you're taking off.
  • Once you've hit around 200 airspeed, adjust your nozzle until it is set to 0 degrees. You are now flying like a standard aircraft.

If you're not sure that you're off the ground yet, don't disable the landing gear. It takes a little while for the landing gear to engage, and if you don't have the landing gear ready when you touch the ground, that's bad for you and your aircraft.
Vertical Takeoff
Your aircraft, the Harrier, is capable of vertical takeoff and landing. Vertical takeoff has the advantage of being easier to do on a short runway, but it can be somewhat counterintuitive the first time.

To take off vertically, follow these steps:

  • Use the thruster adjust keys (Q and E by default) to set the thrusters to 90 degrees.
  • Set the throttle to full (by default, the W key increases the throttle). You should see some dust clouds as the aircraft starts moving straight up.
  • DO NOT PULL UP. At this point, your aircraft is handling more like a helicopter than like an airplane. If you pull back on the stick like you would with a standard takeoff, you will flip over backwards and hit the ground hard. As cool as it sounds to do a backflip during takeoff, it's not a good idea.
  • Use the stick (or your mouse) and rudders (A and D by default) to keep your aircraft under control.
  • Adjust the thrusters to 45 degrees. At this point you can disable the flaps (F key by default) and the landing gear (G key by default).
  • Once your airspeed reaches around 200 KT, adjust the thrusters to 0 degrees.
20 Comments
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Daedooloos 17 Jul, 2023 @ 3:28pm 
if your at the start of the runway or near the start of it, you can take off without flaps.
this lets you start building speed even faster, you can use a bit of tilt at the end, or engage flaps
on the mission where you take off from shou/toramaru you can easily take off without flaps or nozzling, the shou runway is much longer
AAA Battery 20 Jun, 2023 @ 8:44pm 
One thing I forgot to mention: VTOL is only possible with a TWR >1.00
AAA Battery 20 Jun, 2023 @ 8:43pm 
There are some slight misconceptions in this guide that i would like to clear up.
1. For VTOL, set the nozzles to 85°. The aircraft is slightly tilted up while on the ground, so 85° is straight down. With 90°, you will slowly accelerate backwards once you take off.
2. For normal takeoff, 30° on the nozzles is more than enough to get yourself off the ground. With some lighter loadouts (TWR >1.00) you can even takeoff without the help of the nozzles at all.
3. Only tilt your nozzles at the last quarter of the runway, as having the nozzles at 0° allows you to accelerate faster, and with your nozzles tilted, you generate upwards thrust, which is useless, as you yet have enough airspeed to get off the ground.
MK_Regular 31 May, 2023 @ 10:32am 
Personally, I've found that the easiest way to take off is to do a normal ground roll (full throttle, nozzles at 0, flaps extended) and then move the nozzles down to around 45 degrees right before you get to the end of the runway. Once you're airborne you can retract your landing gear to reduce drag, then retract your flaps after a few seconds to reduce drag further. Stay low to accelerate faster. Once you get to around 160 knots you can put the nozzles back to 0.

If you do it right you won't need to touch the stick at all.
Roronoa Pronouns  [author] 7 Dec, 2022 @ 12:33am 
I figured this stuff out via trial and error, so the speeds aren't exactly precise values.
Nath 6 Dec, 2022 @ 11:20pm 
200 speed? 130 is enough to take off with VTOL at ~35 and heavy vertical pitch, once you reach 160 speed then you can reset your VTOL and fly regularly
Recipient Lumber 28 Feb, 2022 @ 6:19pm 
The F button 1,2,3,4,5,11 do stuff for camera this is standard in most games its pretty obv ngl
Damo 27 Feb, 2022 @ 1:54pm 
Are there no camera options? External camera? Fly By?
Will 26 Feb, 2022 @ 8:53pm 
It could be that the Logitech Extreme Pro 3D joystick could be holding the throttle at 100% since it has been plugged in for years but not used. I guess I’ll drag it out and try it
Roronoa Pronouns  [author] 26 Feb, 2022 @ 8:22pm 
Will: Do you have anything else plugged in? It's possible that another controller is being recognized as a throttle. Alternatively, it's possible that your Xbox controller is not being recognized correctly--I had an old 3rd party controller that wasn't always recognized as an xbox controller, so some games would assume it was a flightstick and map the L/R triggers as if they were one axis.