ME Wish List!

While the mission editor in Black Shark is still better in most aspects than that of some other games, like Falcon 4, it is still actually behind a couple mission editors I have worked with. If memory serves me correctly, Janes F-15 had a better mission editor, and that was 12 years ago!

I searched the forums, and didn't find a ME wish list thread. I think is important try to make our voices heard, especially since DCS is an ongoing project with the goal being steadily improved over the years. Since there is much that could be done to the ME to make it better, please post here any suggestions you have. I'll start:

3D Viewer: allow us to view the outside world without having to go into the game and try to use external views!

Time lapse viewer: allow us to increment the clock and watch how units move on the map.

Neutral units: allow sides to be NEUTRAL! In addition, add civilians as a side and allow us to place their units.

Allow any type of ground unit to be assigned to any side: basically, I would like to have, for example, Georgian military forces use NATO equipment, or insurgents hijack a T-80.

New Trigger- switch sides: Self explanatory. With this trigger, you could, for example, place a civilian vehicle on the road, and have it suddenly switch to insurgents side at the last moment and slam into a friendly convoy in a suicide car bombing attack. Many other uses for this trigger can be envisioned.

Frequency-specific triggers: Have a flag be set to true or false depending on frequency of the player's radio.

MORE UNITS: There are, for example, almost no crew-served weapons in DCS currently, which is ridiculous! We need mortors, machine guns, Javelins, working RPGs- without them, infantry is basically impotent.

Interactive radio: we need the ability to communicate in some form with the AI! For example, your mission is to clear the LZ for an Mi-8 which wants to insert special ops. We want to have the ability to tell the Mi-8 that the LZ is clear and to come on in. Well, first of all, we need a trigger that governs AI behavior (one of my next items on my wish list). But we most importantly need a way to talk to the Mi-8! The next paragraph tells how it could be done.

New feature added to game- radio communications list

The mission creator is able to define communication options that appear on the list, and when and under what conditions those options appear on the list. A player simply must select the radio option from the list, which sets a flag in the game, and then governs actions of the AI. For example, for the Mi-8 hip case, the mission creator enables the radio communications list for the player when the player is tuned to the right frequency are tuned to the right frequency. The mission creator further defines that if the Mi-8 has not dropped off its spec ops team and is alive, the options on the list are:

1) LZ is clear

2) Hold position

3) Abort mission

Advanced AI-related triggers: The following is a list of AI related behavior triggers that would be nice to have:

-Set waypoint route: When trigger conditions are met, have the AI follow a specific set of waypoints. If trigger conditions are not met, the AI might follow a different set of waypoints. This would be useful, for example, if the player is escorting a convoy and fails to stop the insurgents setting charges under the bridge ahead. Once the bridge is blown, the convoy will need to turn around, but if the player manages to save the bridge, the convoy can continue forward.

-Set detection/engagement rules: I'm a little fuzzy about how this would work. Basically, this is used to determine whether or not a unit is engaged by AI. You could make it so that at night, you are not engaged by enemies without night vision unless you come within a certain distance of them (closer than normal), or an air defense unit would prioritize engaging a ground unit near it over engaging a transport helicopter flying overhead (by setting some sort of engagement priority list). Yes, these are not well defined, but something like this is needed for realistic AI behavior! Setting this up could be as simple as setting a trigger that "unit X is undetectable by unit Y IF conditions Z are met".

-Stop/Start/Hover triggers- make a unit stop, start, or hover in the middle of executing its waypoints based on trigger conditions.

Debriefing screen: DCS really has a bad, bad, BAD debriefing system, ESPECIALLY in multiplayer. What is needed is better debriefing screen, and among the mission editor options should be options to define the text seen by the player during debriefing based on mission outcomes.

Finally, to address the objection that a bunch of complicated triggers like what I proposed would make the Mission Editor too hard to use and learn for beginners, I propose that the Mission Editor have two modes: Simple and Advanced. In simple mode, the capabilities of the mission editor will be pretty much the same as its current incarnation, but in advanced mode, all the new capabilities will be available.

Anyway, that's all I can think of right now, but I'm sure I'll think of more. Please, if you have any contribution, post away!

Brilliant idea for a thread - a sticky i suggest!

My wish list -

Number 1 - 3D misison editor.

Number 2 - As above, the start/stop/hover triggers, but with an inbuilt landing function- eg chinook lands at waypoint 2 for a set time etc

Number 3 to be able to set trigger zones as simple lines - i.e when player crosses this line trigger... etc. This is good when building missions and allows for players not passing through the exact area of the trigger zone to still cause actions.

Number 4 - Interactive comms ( as above). Just a simple trigger thingy would be fantastic, and completely enhance DCS for me.

Thanks for listening ED!!! :D

New condition: Unit of type X owned by side Y inside zone/moving zone Z: Bascially, the condition would read like:

"If unit of type (drop down menu with options of different unit types, NOT unit types, and an option of ANY type) owned by side (drop down menu of sides, NOT sides, and finally, any side) is inside zone (or moving zone) (drop down menu of zones)"

New Action- Spawn group of type or template type at zone or moving zone: Bascially like activating groups, except endless. Under template type, you would define the group's waypoints and composition beforehand. This might make it hard to reference these groups or units in triggers, but with ANY UNIT trigger conditions, it would be easier.

New options: AI behavior

Basically, sorta like the AI behavior triggers I suggested, except its a new submenu in the AI. Allows you to set overall AI behavior, like detection conditions or engagement priorites.

Unit engagable/not engagable- basically, a new flag or unit condition that makes it so that AI or specific AI units/groups will not engage a specific unit, but that unit is still able to move around, be active, or even engage itself. This is great for putting the factor of surprise into missions- for example, you could make YOURSELF not engagable to specific enemy units until a specific amount of time has passed after you first engaged, or you exceed a specific altitude, etc.

New condition: Unit is firing/not firing- Basically, a condition to detect whether or not an enemy unit is firing ordinance. You could have it so that this condition evaluates true if a specific unit has fired any ordinance within the last 10 seconds. To make this trigger even better, you would be able to specify the TYPE of ordinance too, and the amount of time after that ordinance was fired that the condition evaluates to true.

I have couple:

- UNDO option – how many times did it happen to you that by accident you move or delete something, and you have to spend extra time to get it back in order,

- satellite view of the map in the mission editor – I think this would also be good option, because often I want to place a unit on a specific place, and I doesn’t always manage to do it in my first try,

- GROUP IN ZONE – a good addition to UNIT IN ZONE,

- % OF GROUP ALIVE – then you can set for example a mission success to be 70% of group to survive as a mission goal, and if you combine it with GROUP IN ZONE would be very useful,

- MISSILE IN MOVING ZONE or AAA ROUNDS IN MOVING ZONE – you can attach your chopper as unit and create zone around you in which if a missile or AAA rounds enter, a sound and message can be triggered (for example a message from a FAC “501, SAM launch, break, break, break!!!!”).

Anyway, Speed_2, very good idea to start this wish list, since I think that there is A LOT of place for improvements in ME, and we are all witnessing that ED is listening to our wishes.

It would be great to implement some of Speed_2 and Warbird_242’s notes.