Ripcord

Or we need 'blank' FARPs that are essentially little more than start points. Basically it would be just a plain flat area, with no landing pad or anything in terms of visible scenery. We could call it an LZ instead of a FARP, but it should behave more or less the same. This would be good because it would also allow for the ME to track the LZ as an objective that could potentially be captured by enemy forces, as well as function as a good place for AI helicopters to land and take off.

Grimes, please digress -- if Bagher doesn't mind. I'd like to hear that idea for yet antoher AI enhancement script. Bagher, I think your work-around solution is actually not bad. OK not elegant but still functional and not something that the player might otherwise notice either. Another method might be holding them somewhere behind a hill otherwise out of LOS, until the conditions are met and they are ready to move out into firing position and open fire. Of course all that depends on the terrain, I realize.

This is a really really good post for anybody building missions in the ME. Probably this explains a lot of wierd AI behavior in missions that many of us are working on, or have been working on.

By eccentric, do you mean wearing those funky-cool checkered ascots while flying? Only thing that I can even think of here that MIGHT be even remotely useful would be the speeds of the Mudhen flights at the various altitudes. Maybe they are having trouble hitting the speeds being assigned, at the assigned altitudes, or maybe the opposite is true -- maybe they want to go faster and cannot and therefore act wierd.

Matt Wagner was the producer for Janes F/A-18. He knows what carrier ops is supposed to look/feel like.

Remember also the forefathers of the naval security group, or crypotologists, who broke the Japanese code at Midway. Radio transmissions, callsigns, simple sitreps, all of those things are very minor but the sum total, when analyzed, can tell you a lot -- just like electronic emissions intelligence or sonar signatures can ID a platform. All of that is of course super crazy classified stuff, of course -- for obvious reasons. Still today that is the only 'sensor' onboard any ship or aircraft that can tell a commander what a potential adversary intends to do next or in the immediate future.

Something like an LCAC even? We need some naval infantry/amphib capabilities. LHA / LHD class helo carriers would be super.

It does help in fact, thanks. I will be sure I am getting the most out of my arty, going forward. Damn sure will keep the armor in reserve a little longer, until the arty has done their thing, along with the air assets.

+1 I also made the same observation -- although I'm still learning how to play this, so I thought perhaps I wasn't using my arty correctly. Maybe my fire radius was too wide or too narrow. Usually I start with myself before I immediately get critical of something. But sure enough -- those T-80 tanks didn't bother to reposition at all when under arty fire, even when the MRLS barrage came and I actually killed a couple of them.

Gee, thanks for that helpful insight Nick. You know, mate, I am pretty sure nobody here made the statement that the M1 tank is somehow superior to the Russian armor. Some struggle with the concept that it is really that much inferior to the Russian armor of any kind or of any era. Thought I would offer up that brief synopsis for you, in order to save you the time of actually reading the thread.

I recently played a CA scenario where 4 M-1s rolled up behind some BMPs and surprise attacked them. Still 3 of the 4 Abrams got waxed. Again it was ATGMs that got them. Pretty unbelievable. For me it's almost like the US armor is a liability in CA engagements. You just want to move them and hide them until you can work over the area with artillery and air assets.

Open a ground unit and see where it is says 1 of 1 unit. Click on that second box and make it one of 2 or one 3. That's how you add units to the same group -- and no, they do not have to be the same kind of unit. In fact you can even mix armor, artillery, and unarmed, etc, in the same unit. They do have to be from the same country. On to the triggers question -- you can set up a trigger to fire when a group is ALIVE LESS THAN X %. Use this if you need the fire for just some of the units in the group getting KIA. Otherwise, if you want ALL units to be KIA for hte trigger to fire, then you use GROUP DEAD.

Yes, I would like to have a handful of different patterns, for example. Then I could mix and match them. Gotta think this would be a really simple thing to implement.

Yeah, that is right -- these landmines are useful too. They need to be added to the "mobile" unit list as 'fortifications', similar how to armed house, blockpost and watchtower were implemented. They won't move, obviously, but they can be grouped that way on your ME map -- and they can be activated & deactivated, etc. Hadn't thought of this, but it would allow a mission builder to simulate army sappers/engineers going out there and setting and/or clearing minefields, to allow or prevent troops from passing thru, and so forth. This probably needs to be added to the wishlist for CA.

Hmmm, I can see that, yes. But still I didn't know about the LAND command. Actually I did see it there in ME, but I thought that meant go land at airfield/FARP and not just set down on a point. Another thing to test and play around with, which is cool.

Yes Seil, can you believe it? Wow! Boy am I ever a big dumb-dumb. There you have it. Already I know I was not the only one here using this CG thing from Comcast, so maybe this thread this helps somebody else.

I wonder if Russians do much of this sort of helo air-mobile troop insertion kind of thing...? I would imagine so, particularly the VDV airborne units.

Yup, just make it hover at 1 foot. You would probably be unable to tell the difference anyway, if watching it from the air. I suppose if you are in an enemy ground vehicle at the LZ you might notice -- assuming this will be an MP mission. You can actually do some cool stuff that way using that hover method, like 'landing' on a flat-roof building for instance, provided you bring the helo in real nice and slow and don't make it try to drop too much speed or altitude too fast. I'd been planning to incorporate that into a few missions myself -- had not considered AH-64 gunship cover however, that is really going to be a nice touch.

Yeah Bahger, really I think you aren't going to really need the follow or escort features for these helos. Just give them the same waypoint route, or close to it, and let those apaches roll in a minute or two ahead of your chinook flight. Gotta think that is how it would likely go down in reality -- they would want the gunships to get there first and hose down the LZ area... before the slicks arrive with the troops on board. And depending on how that goes, I would imagine the gunships might hang around a bit to cover the troops on the ground, particularly if any enemy contact takes place. The chinooks, on the other hand, would get in and get the hell out. Not an expert, just going off common sense.

Hmmm AFAIK no release date -- pretty much sticking with the 'when it's done' mantra, and probably rightfully so. I think Wags did mention recently that the theater itself is more or less done, just waiting on EDGE to get finished up.

Very cool screen shots, he did a lot of good work. Search for those threads if you are interested.

Good well-considered responses, sir. Thank you Yes it will be interesting to see how much 1.2.3 improves performance on 'larger scale' missions, if at all.

Amigo, your colloquial english is so good that I fear I am too old to fully comprehend it :noexpression: Or in other word, what in the hell does this mean?

One guy in France was making one for FC, a couple years ago. He never finished it. Probably he is waiting for new theater SDK to come out. Similar work was being done on the Russian Far East and the Chinese border area out there.

Hamblue, this is a really good question. And a good response from Chromium, thank you! Some related questions: 1. What if we had only 8 MP players? Could we double the amount of ground units? Or triple them? Or would it even make a difference at all? 2. What if half of my ground units are located sufficently far from the battlefield? Say I have 300 units engaged around Poti - active combat there. Would I be safe with 300 units elsewhere, far away, in Russia, in Tbilisi, etc? Here I mean SAM sites, supply areas, and of course units near airfields. Maybe only 100 of them could ever make it to the front lines, as reinforcements, and then it would be later in the mission. 3. Does it matter what kind of MP players we have? In terms of frame rates, is 16 players flying aircraft basically the same as 4 players flying aircraft and 12 driving tanks/APCs or other vehicles?