cfrag

Goodness - that engine sound! No turbine wheezing nor whining, just an authorative rumble, like Santa chuckling while looking at the other helos: "ho ho ho, kids, let's get some!". This thing sounds like god wanted flying contraptions to sound. Turbines may rule the world in aviation, but this grizzled radial gets all the smiles and love. Let's hope it comes to DCS some fine day.

You will also find that any options you set at WP1 (for example ROE weapons hold) are gone, so upon reload the AI can behave entirely different. In effect, this is NOT a save state. What we have looks to me like a cheap leveraging of existing, decades old tech: take a snapshot of the current mission, and use Mission Editor's save module to encode that snapshot as a miz file. It fails 99% of all relevant points that a player would expect a save state to have. I would call this a good 5% start of the "real" thing. Hopefully ED agrees.

Dang!!!! And ambulances/fire trucks with working/flashing lights too! Please make them available as objects, so we can finally build exciting medevac missions with objects to match. pleas, please, please!

Agreed - TBH, I'd really like most of the objects seen in the map to be available as statics: Litfassäulen, buses, cars, airport utils (even better than the venerable virpil pack), the works. These Ugra maps (IMHO) are chock full of fantastic objects that I'd just love to place myself to touch up my mission's focus scenery. Here's hoping for a 'Germany Scenery Pack'.

MegX currently do not support eye tracking, and that's fine with me. If we set aside the product inherent differences, what would be the actual experience in DCS, the pros and cons pertaining to DCS -- as that is where I spend most of my quality time -- gaming: how does it integrate with DCS, how difficult is it to set up to run with DCS, what are the pitfalls (for example, I was deeply disappointed to find out how crappy Vive Pro 2's night flying was with LCD VR as opposed to OLED which I used before), what works really well (I think that Lighthouse tracking is so much superior to other forms that it's not even funny any more). DCS can't ad-hoc switch between flat and VR, and I think that's game-inherent, but if one of those headsets find their way around that, it'll be a game changer (I develop missions, and the MegX can snap up, an incredible QoL jump over my current HMD and a leg up over the BS2, which may deliver a halo strap some time later). So (and thanks @speed-of-heat for reminding me to be more precise in my question): what are your current QoL pro/cons for either? Both seem to fit my bill, and it's up to how it integrates with DCS now, the little nuts and bolts of everyday flying.

And so, with much of the world's stock market in freefall, I've decided that I can burn my money more productively and invest in some more awesome VR tech. I'm coming from a Vive Pro 2 (which has served me well), and I've decided to go all in with OLED (I'm tired of 'foggy grey nights') at a good resolution. AND, getting older, I want some lightweight HMD. So it'll have to be either the MegX (8k) or Bigscreen Beyond 2. I'm aware that the MegX aren't hipping in quantity, and I also know that if there are people who have them, they'd probably be DCS pilots So, if there is anyone who can share experience/recommendations, I'm all eyes. Let's not look at the price tag too much (the tariff imposed on a US product may be applied soon, I'll factor that in later). As everyone in DCS world, I'm used to painful experiences. So, if you have specific DCS experience with either VR, what can you share so I can make up my mind? I'm planning to upgrade my VR in May/June. Oh, and I'm running this on an R9 9950X3D with an RTX5090, 96GB main mem.

Tbh, Altona, Dammtor and Holstenstrasse along with Hauptbahnhof where big stations with vaulted, rounded roofs: they were built for steam locomotives, as the rails north of Hamburg weren’t electrified until the late 60’s. I remember standing awestruck (and a little frightened) when my grandmother took me to Altona station to pick up me grandpa, and I stood in front of this hissing, ticking machine. Then I knew what a dragon would look like. So, no Köhlbrandbrücke, no classic train stations. But the Michel, Rathaus and Nikolai-Kirche look jawdroppingly good, even though theMönkebergstrasse looks a bit timid, and Binnen- and Aussenalster look positively strange. I’m really looking forward to the full product. Wondering if the Dom (free place) and Bunker will make into the map.

To change the heading of a group that is already in-game, you usually need to assign a new task, with a new course. This is one of the least fun things to do in DCS via scripts. There are currently no modules in DML dedicated to achieving this.

It requires some strong understanding of both Lua scripting and MSE, in particular the env.mission table. DML does this routinely, as it uses named properties to pass values to its modules, so you might get some strong hints from there. In essence, you need to look at the array env.mission.triggers.zones which contains all trigger zones that are placed with Mission Editor, and of which you are showing element index 3. For example local myZone = env.mission.triggers.zones[3] That contains a table with many attributes, among them the "properties" attribute. Access that to get all properties for that zone local myProperties = myZone.properties The properties are arranged as an array (not a dict as that obviously would have made too much sense) of tables that all have a "key" and "value" entry. You are interested in the table that has a key attribute equal to "PROPERTY_1", and would then fetch and return the value attribute. To do that, you'd normally iterate all property array entries. Since we know that in your example we are interested in the first array entry, we can simply return the value like so (without checking that the property's name is "PROPERTY_1"): return myProperties[1].value For a more in-depth solution, please look at DML 'cfxZones' module's methods readFromDCS (general ME zone parsing) and extractPropertyFromDCS (retrieving a named property with and without case sensitivity)

That would be antithetical to DML. The idea if DML to be enable mission crafters to create missions without Lua. It would also require you to be able to write flawless code to return an altitude for a unit: there is no code validation in DCS so even the smallest typo will halt the mission when the code is invoked. This would IMHO make DML a worse tool. If you can develop flawless code using a dinky 20 char value field, it would usually be far easier if you wrote the entire code to launch a flare in a text editor, and execute that code when you invoke a menu.

Thank you for taking the time to ask this question. You appear to not be using DML, and may want to ask this question again by starting a thread of your own in the scripting forum above this thread (you appear to have gone down one level too far )

I have to ask: In 1974 the Köhlbrandbrücke (Köhlbrand Brdige) opened (my granddad took me to the opening) to the public, and became one of Hamburg's easily recognizable landmarks, and it's smack dab inside Hamburg's port. Will it be in there? Please? Please?

Talking about learning to swim in the deep end of the pool -- DML becomes a lot easier when you feel somewhat comfortable around Mission Editor, as that application comes with a lot of, uh, "idiosyncrasies". It hates you. That being said... Check Chapter 4 of the manual. I believe @DD_Friar was already kind enough to provide you with a very elegant way to do what you want - it also underscores my adage "when in doubt, try a cloner" Have fun, and don't be discouraged by Mission Editor

While certainly possible, I can't see a good interface for DML, and this appears to be an extreme edge case. How is this used in your mission, what is the objective of such a an ability (besides firing off a flare)?

Unfortunately, the F2 menu is clipped by DCS. Depending on your setting it should say "(You are carrying xx Infantry; land to deploy)" or "(You are carrying xx Infantry; fast-rope or land to deploy)" It's only a comment not a valid menu option (the brackets were intended to signify that) but that menu manager screws with it. So while airborne, only F3 is viable, provided that you are slow enough. Looks like I'll have to simplify the menu options.

You are too fast. Story of my life, I know

You did notice the date when this was posted? In many cultures there's a lamentable tradition to be not entirely forthright on this date, and there are people wo think that this can be the cause of great mirth. Yeah, people tell me I'm great fun, too - especially on this date.

I would hazard a guess that there is very little engineering in DCS for modelling this kind of damage for ground units. To me it seems ground units are merely there to serve as targets and provide some form of hazard (hence the infantry soldier that can one-shot a pilot with their rifle), nothing more - and damage modelling is simplistic at best. A realistic damage model is a complex can of worms, though. It's not merely the way how a munition hits, it is how it interacts with the target and target's surroundings, how the munition works. A blast wave, a kinetic impulse, a kinetic transfer that transforms into a blast wave, heat (as in napalm) etc. -- all have different properties, and interact differently with a vehicle, it's armor (none, reactive, ablative, ... ); especially larger vehicles (and I think naval damage modelling is minimal if present at all) and more. From what I see it *seems* to me that there is very little damage modelling beside deducting a number of points from a unit's 'hit points' based on the centricity of the hit, plus some "resistance" to some ammo types (like in role-playing games: tanks are resistant to small-arms fire). So how hard would it be to model damage? If you want it to be accurate, immensely. But maybe that is not what ED are aiming for (ooh, pun!), and they are merely looking for something that makes a game playable. And there I think is some room for improvement. For example, I'd like some better damage modelling for naval units: take out their radar or receivers, and you take out their missile capability etc.

You forgot the Manta mit Fuchsschwanz. Only that guarantees a genuine 80s Wehrdiensterlebnis.

That may be a future ambition of state save, it is currently very far removed from that ability. The current version to me appears immature, rough and incomplete. I'm not sure if it will ever support save/continue for individual flights, we are waiting for ED to announce planned capabilities. At this moment, my experience with save state has not been positive, so I will withhold further comment, except that you should make very, very sure that when saving a state you do not accidentally overwrite your original mission (currently it is the default, be careful).

The deployment formation can be set at any time and is applied to any subsequent deployments. If not set, it defaults to a circle around the helicopter, troops facing out. That may be part of the issue. Menus are set and updated triggered by the 'take-off' and 'land' events. Ground units do not receive these, and this may contribute. I suspect something else though: Fully exiting the 'Other' menu (through 'back' and going to the top level) should cause DCS's notoriously unreliable menu structure to re-load, so I'd like you to try and see if that changes anything. Does that make a difference? DCS sound for clients in multiplayer has been hit and (mostly) miss for a while. Let us hope that the kind people at ED fix the client audio issues one fine day.

Version 2.30 - 20250329 - Maintenance update FOR GOODNESS SAKE, DO NOT USE DCS' NEW "SAVE MISSION" - THAT WILL DESTROY THIS MISSION. PLEASE DO NOT REPORT BUGS FROM A SAVED MISSION. IF YOU SAVE A MISSION IN DCS, IT IS DCS THAT IS F***ING UP THE MISSION. HARD. DCS'S "SAVE MISSION" FEATURE IS NOT PRODUCTION-READY. This is no joke. DCS' "Save Mission" feature should not have been released and is not ready to be used. It makes DCS a worse game, a worse experience for the players. Shame on whomever released something of this low quality to their customers. Have you no pride in your work, Sir? -ch

So I understand that you aren't a rotor head?

Version 2.4.6 - 20250327 The good news: DCS State Save has arrived. The bad: it's <expletive>. Really, really <expletive>. I deem it unusable for even the most simplistic missions, that it's an embarrassment for ED, and can only serve to make people angry at ED because it is most definitely not what 99.9% of players expect. Most Players expect that when they save a mission, they later can continue *exactly* where they left off. DCS doesn't deliver. Not even 1% of that. IMHO it would have been much better if it hadn't been delivered at all. For mission designers, this is worse because not only is a saved state a much worse, broken version of the original mission, it also by default overwrites the original (the UX people must have been absent here). The result? Mission creators will be blamed for the Fuster-Cluck that ED delivered. Oh, and support for mission scripting? You must be new here. How about saving flag values? Good one, who uses flags? That little 'ABSOLUTE TIME' thing that just came out? An ill-conceived Fuster-Cluck. Worse than useless, because it exacerbates a bad solution. To me it looks as if nobody at ED with experience in mission creation was involved. DCS has become a worse game, and judging by this, to me ED seem completely out of touch with their players and content creators. So, I spent the last two weeks submitting proposals to ED for a rudimentary Save State API, testing what is there, and finally resorting to serious drinking to forget what I saw. It's bad, and no-one in their right mind should use it. Mission scripters will now have to live with the fact that they'll invariably be blamed for this incomprehensible disaster. How do I know? By looking at my inbox: "Bug in Expansion", "Angels Caucasus doesn't work", "Can't seem to continue". ED: please pull Save State from DCS until it is more mature, I believe that you are trampling your own reputation with it. Don't get me wrong: Save State is an important and fantastic addition to DCS. Its current incarnation is a carnival of ineptitude, though. No serious software developer would have released something of this low quality to production. ED, I think you can do better. When sober, I managed to add a requested feature to heloTroops: the ability to let troops fast-rope to the ground, i.e. have them disembark without the helo on the ground. So, nothing much in this release except a cool new heloTroops addition. Documentation Main - Fast-Roping for heloTroops QuickRef - heloTroops Demos - fast-rope from helo (not yet documented) Modules - autoCSAR 2.2.2 - DCS bug hardening - heloTroops 5.1.0 - fast-roping ability - playerScore 5.2.3 - fixed a bug in victim category Enjoy, -ch

Understood. What is the intended functionality if you set the starting point at 08:00:10 (ten seconds after mission start at 08:00:00) and then advance the mission start date by 1 hour? ME does do something to the conditions, and what it does seems not consistent. Phrased differently: what is the intended functionality given: you set an absolute time condition that happens to be 10 seconds after mission start time you then move mission start time forward by one hour (e.g. from 0800 to 0900) Are absolute time trigger conditions updated, and if yes, when and how? I assume that there is some intended functionality to auto-update ABSOLUTE TIME conditions, else they are just marginally less useless than the pure absolute time we have now. Mission designers need their conditions to trigger relative to mission start time. I believe everyone agrees that no automatic management of ABSOLUTE TIME condition with respect to changing mission start time wouldn't be helpful at all. I believe it's obvious that mission designers need some QoL management with their trigger time condition, hence the somewhat quirky, non-standard way that ME behaves now when you click on an ABSOLUTE TIME condition now after a change in mission start time, and it auto-updates that (and only that) time by the amount of time that the mission start time was moved. The idea looks good, the execution looks flawed.