Ripcord

Pretty sure he also talked about naval ops somewhere in one of those snippets of online interviews. But there is reason why his forum signatures states everything is subject to change! I think the real message is that a lot of things are possible (not that they are all planned and locked in with an operating budget and a target release date).

They are a bit busy right now, I think we can all agree. I don't think it isn't that CA isn't a priority or that it is not a huge success, but they have to focus on some areas to keep pushing the overall vision/effort/product line forward. IMHO, I would say the biggest thing for them was getting some third party aircraft developers up and running. Seems we have one or two dev groups now that can and have produced something tangible (other than discussion threads), so they have made that milestone. Now we have NTTR and two versions of the sim are co-existing. So I have to believe that getting both theatres up to speed with the new technology is the main focus now for ED. Then adding new theatres like Straits of Hormuz, and Normandy and so forth. At some point they need to lay the groundwork for third party devs to create new theaters. Can't do that without having all the technology and underpinnings in place. Maybe that effort is somehow linked to some plans for incremental improvements for CA, who can say at this point? Same probably goes for CA. Even if they do plan this overhaul, I would guess that it would have to come a bit later after we have all the theatres brought up to current version.

I play CA as tactical commander much like I used to love to play Jane's Fleet Command. It is like a tactical chess match (one that I am not good at). I agree that it is already quite good in this regard, and it only needs a few rounds of incremental improvements to really make it shine. That said it is fun to get into the tank or the APC to play some of the ground units that are involved at a critical juncture. Don't need dozens of players online, playing mega tank battles. A good mission can have small micro-conflict set inside a much larger battle on a macro level, where air is called in to support what is happening on the ground. The mission objective is happening there, and it is fun to be where that is happening in first person mode. As decisive as air power is, every war is ultimately won on the ground (that's where we all live at the end of the day), so the overall objective is almost always some function of defending your turf to repel an enemy attack, or to go take over some real estate from enemy. There can be and should be some critical pieces on the ground, such as JTAC and some forward recon guys that can be controlled better by a human than by an AI unit. The biggest downer is the poor AI behavior of air units when playing CA as a single player. Big disappointment there. Improve that and we have something. After that, I really think the biggest improvements lie in incorporating some things like Air mobile units and amphibious ops, as well as tactical command and control logic, particularly with air defenses and various types of radars. Also agree that there should be some command functionality to allow ground troops to enter, occupy and defend buildings.

Actually I get this. Two different creative visions often lead to nobody really in control. It might seem like having two people trying to drive the bus.

Using the existing scoring system? Or some new method of transferring flags or persistent data from one mission to the next? EDIT: Probably we should move some of this discussion to a new thread and stop hijacking this fellow's announcement thread (I am at fault here). I very much support what this guy is doing.

Anyway, for the author of this project, big respect and keep going. I might buy it anyway, just to support. Just would LOVE this thing (and would fly the hell out of it) if we could actually recreate a 1950's Korean theater.

I think we have the talent. There could be some additional features added to the mission builder engine to expand/improve scripts, etc. but we have some guys that are very good. I don't think that is our issue. Honestly, I believe that once we see third party devs start pumping out new maps/theatres then this platform is going to really going to go HUGE. And I think it is a question WHEN this happens, not if. I will say this about multiplayer campaign functionality. F4 is not going to be reborn here ever, but there is one small improvement that is simply BEGGING to be incorporated into these missions, and that is campaign persistent mission outcome flags. We have them now but the values are not persistent from mission to mission within a campaign, and so the values are not read by the following mission. As it is now, you can only use 'mission score' as the sole determinate of which mission is flown next. Needs more than that. If village A & B are overrun by BLUE, then red units in A & B would be scripted to not appear in villages A&B. Hell, a really ambitious mission builder could even script in a couple burnt out tanks or trucks in those two village, per that condition. That alone would allow us to have dozens and dozen of possible combinations of outcomes for each level of the campaign ladder, which would in turn allow a good builder to create a living moving FLOT on the battlefield. I promise folks would pay for that and it in fact, over time, it might become the standard by which add-on campaigns are measured. Right now all we have is "next mission selected by overall score of previous mission". That is adequate but nothing compared to what could be with just that one little improvement.

None of these artificial/arbitrary campaigns capture my interest without the local theater. If there was a way for third-party devs to create 'new maps' to fly over, then I'd be all over this. That is needed even more critically than are new aircraft to fly IMHO. Hopefully we will get there soon.

Agree with this. Really emphatically agree with this.

Will it have wing-flex? Oh wait, I'm on the wrong forums.... Actually, what munitions are planned for this? Have never heard of this HOT missile so that sounds intriguing.

put me down for a copy, sir.

+1 for these as well.

The Mighty Orion.

.... nothing can stop the U.S. Chair Force.

They are busy with their first aircraft right now. Don't ask me why these dev's seem to think they need to announce a handful of projects so far in advance, but there you go. Doesn't mean, though, that this F-15E project will never happen. You just cannot do them all in parallel and they take time, sometimes longer than expected. Remember NTTR was at one point going to be part of the A10C project -- now 4-5 years later we are just starting to enjoy it. As Wags says, everything is subject to change. Took way longer than originally thought, but it still got released. Actually compared to some of the other projects we've seen, 2 years really isn't all that long. Might be flying your Strike Eagle in another 2 years. Who can say?

Kinda thought you would have saddled up in a hummer with a machine gun mounted on top and headed out for the strip for a little rampage action in the CA module.

Hmm I think I'll go play a little GTR while this is downloading....

Oh how nice -- ACC smack in an ED thread. Wasn't expecting to run across that here.

Agree we do need more callsigns. Possibilities are endless. Some Russian callsigns would also be useful.

Sabre good gouge, thanks for posting. I could certainly benefit from that kind of training.

Has anybody been working on a good campaign for CA? This thing would be fun as hell, just operating as a 'field general' with moving front lines, etc.

So this is the second campaign -- I have not flown any of them, are they all SP missions?

First I have to say congrats. Just getting selected to a service academy is no easy feat. It is an achievement by itself. Find ways to prepare. Prepare your mind, prepare your body. Find some rigorous activities that you are not good at and/or have little interest in and go train in those. Run like a deer and swim like a fish. Do crossfit. Then do more. Preparing your mind will be harder. Probably you have mental toughness in your make-up or you do not, but find a way to prepare as much as you can. Find a way to be positive when everything sucks (it won't suck for just you, it will suck for all of you in your class/team/group/whatever). You aren't going to be able to 'research' that, but the main thing is to have the desire. You are going to need to observe and take in the traits that you see in others that you think are 'good officers' and try to identify and avoid the negative traits demonstrated by the clueless ones. Like Cali I worked with some real gems and some real buttheads (US Navy) and the difference is astounding. Some humility and some concern for your troops will get noticed and will serve you well. Here is where you start - use every chance you get to gleam knowledge and wisdom from your senior enlisted. Find some senior master-blaster in your squadron and pick his brains. Don't interview him, don't try to build a relationship with him, but do not dismiss what he has to say. He didn't get to be an E-9 by being a dumbass and he probably forgot more about real leadership then many Captains ever attained. I remember a day on a mission when my chief stood up for me on an important tactical discussion, when the skipper questioned my analysis of some intel and I turned out to be right. But my chief didn't waver. I want you to know that I still keep in touch with that guy, years later, and I would drive all freaking night to go help him if he ever needed it. Enjoy every single day of it man. Even if you never get to fly, you are doing a great job, and every day is a new opportunity to earn the respect you will be given. Good for you, buddy. Make us all proud.

Is it ANY good in SP? Sure, it is good in SP. Maybe even quite good. Some aspects are done way beyond your expectations, and some other things are still not quite there, but definately it is good fun. And for certain it is WAY more value than what they are charging for it.

Is this still running? Need to recognize the mission builder community... my votes go to Speed, Grimes and Bagher, though I am sure these probably already have the Mig21 module up and running by now. EDIT: and this is an incredibly cool idea, in the theme of 'random acts of kindness'. Very nice to see this.