Help Needed! Try your hand at commanding a brigade...

[DUSTY]

Dear community,

 

I need the help of someone who has just a basic knowledge of the Mission Editor and an interest in armored warfare. Specifically I'm looking for someone to place the REDFOR units on the map. That's it, nothing fancy, just placing units in a defensive posture.

 

The reason why I'd like other people to have a crack at placing the red units in this mission is that it will add to the immersion for myself and my fellow pilots. Usually in the scenarios we fly, one of us has had to create the enemy force and it's a bit of an immersion killer when you know where the enemy units are.

 

Concept:

The city of Pahrump is under imminent threat of attack from US air and land forces. Do you have what it takes to deploy your Armoured Brigade assets to effectively defend the city?

 

US Ground Forces of unknown size will be advancing on the city in an effort to destroy the REDFOR Tank Brigade and capture the city. US Forces are approaching from the South East from Vegas.

 

Within Pahrump there are several REDFOR Centres of Gravity which will need to be defended by the Brigade.

1. Brigade Headquarters and Barracks.

2. A rotary wing FARP supporting multiple attack helicopter assets.

3. An ammunition storage facility.

 

 

Execution:

(.miz file attached to this post)

I have created the units that make up a Soviet style Tank Brigade and placed them in a 'template' form to the each of Pahrump. This is just a basic although fairly realistic guide so please feel free to add other units as you wish. There are multiple Tank Battalions, Mech Inf and air defenses that replicate the desired threat levels for this scenario.

 

If you have the time or desire feel free to beef up the defenses around the various static object in the AO.

 

Directions:

1. Find the unit templates located to the east of Pahrump (Refer below image) and deploy them defensively around the city as you see fit.

2. Simply drag the units to your desired defensive locations (clicking on the top unit of each column which drag the whole group).

3. Once units are placed, select "Hidden on Map".

4. Please do not rename the groups as I need those specific names to be left untouched for the triggers in the final mission to work.

 

 

To the people who are kind enough to have a solid go at this I am willing to repay the favour in any way possible. For example, I will happily create a mission for you and tailor it to your exact wishes. I can build randomization and replayability into any mission and add tasks/voice comms if you like also.

 

If you have a little spare time and are able to help me out I will be very grateful!

 

Cheers

Pahrump_AO.miz

[ESAc_matador]

I would like to do it, but I am not an expert!! I made many missions and played thousands wargames.. does it works for you?

 

You gave me an idea of fixed topic. Help others missions to set up the initial situations.... actually, you can even put some wps and conditions to move! For instance. A reinforce unit.... if such group is damaged more than 50% go to that place, or the other.

[DUSTY]

Hey Matador - That's okay, not expertise required at all!

 

Please have a go and feel free to use your imagination. Mobile units and reinforcements moving to the front lines over the course of the mission is a great idea.

 

I would be very grateful if you would have a go.

[EasyEB]

Have you tried scripting so the units will be moved to a different location every time the mission is played? That way there is no need for someone to manually place units for you and the replayability is great.

[DUSTY]

Have you tried scripting so the units will be moved to a different location every time the mission is played? That way there is no need for someone to manually place units for you and the replayability is great.

 

Are you very familiar with scripting?

 

I'm only just becoming competent now in the use of triggers and scripting is next on my list to learn but I'm not sure even scripting can do away with my problem which is the lack of immersion when you have to create your own scenarios.

 

With triggers you can build tonnes of randomisation into missions which is great but as the actual mission designer there is no getting away from actually manually placing units. If you let the computer drive them around to random locations on the map, units will end up stuck in buildings and just generally not in realistic or very tactical positions. The AI is quite limiting in this regard.

 

If another human places the units however, then you really have no clue as to where they will be. The whole point of this thread is that I have issued a challenge to anybody and everybody to help me out and it will be really interesting to see each individuals take on how they would organise a force to fit in with the scenario that's been set out.

 

I just hope someone will be kind enough to help me out.

[EasyEB]

Not very familiar, but enough to make my own missions feel good enough (to me atleast) to the point that I have only info on probable enemy units and locations, but not their exact force strength, type of units or exact position.

 

You seem pretty passionate about doing it this way, and if you find someone to exchange missions with I bet the turnout will be great. Good luck with your endeavour!

[DUSTY]

Thanks EasyEB.

 

Not very familiar, but enough to make my own missions feel good enough (to me atleast) to the point that I have only info on probable enemy units and locations, but not their exact force strength, type of units or exact position.

 

This sounds good, if you are able to share how you're able to do that and if those practices could be applied to 'dynamically' placing a brigade sized force please let me know.

[EasyEB]

This is a bit off topic, but a very simple overview of one basic way of doing it is:

 

1. Place an enemy unit on the map, named Enemy1.

2. Make zones where you want the enemy units to possibly show up. Say Zone1, Zone2, and Zone3.

3. Use a script function (MIST) to randomly teleport your Enemy1 to either Zone1, Zone2 or Zone3.

 

So if this was three zones in a city, every time you play, Enemy 1 will show up at a different spot within the different zones.

 

You can of course increase the level of randomness by setting a probability of Enemy1 to show up at all, add more and/or different kinds of enemies and who also have a random possibility of showing up, and so on.

 

There are alot of different functions to make really tons of different ways a scenario can play out, like having units randomly select a route, patrol, and so on.

 

This is in no way a tutorial, only an overview of the theory behind it. If you find this kind of stuff interesting, I can highly recommend giving it a go. If it only sounds like a hassle, you are probably better of asking others to place units for you. :)

[feefifofum]

Hey Dusty,

Awesome concept but a terrifying number of units to hand-place and script. :lol:

Downloaded, I may take a stab at it if I have a couple hours to kill but I can't make any promises. :)

[DUSTY]

This is a bit off topic, but a very simple overview of one basic way of doing it is:

 

1. Place an enemy unit on the map, named Enemy1.

2. Make zones where you want the enemy units to possibly show up. Say Zone1, Zone2, and Zone3.

3. Use a script function (MIST) to randomly teleport your Enemy1 to either Zone1, Zone2 or Zone3.

 

So if this was three zones in a city, every time you play, Enemy 1 will show up at a different spot within the different zones.

 

You can of course increase the level of randomness by setting a probability of Enemy1 to show up at all, add more and/or different kinds of enemies and who also have a random possibility of showing up, and so on.

 

There are alot of different functions to make really tons of different ways a scenario can play out, like having units randomly select a route, patrol, and so on.

 

This is in no way a tutorial, only an overview of the theory behind it. If you find this kind of stuff interesting, I can highly recommend giving it a go. If it only sounds like a hassle, you are probably better of asking others to place units for you. :)

 

Okay that's very helpful, thank you! Looks like I need to put MIST reading at the top of my to-do list.

 

Just one question. During tests when using triggers to randomise unit location, I've come across a problem where AI ground vehicles drive through ground objects like buildings. It seems like they are not aware of their existence.

 

When using zones and scripting to spawn vehicles in an urban environment, would this be an issue? Or would you need to make the zones small enough so that no buildings were within it to avoid this? If so it might seem like I'm back to square 1 - placing individual units in appropriate tactical positions.

 

Either way, still appreciate the explanation.

[DUSTY]

Hey Dusty,

Awesome concept but a terrifying number of units to hand-place and script. :lol:

Downloaded, I may take a stab at it if I have a couple hours to kill but I can't make any promises. :)

 

Thanks for the reply feefifofum! It's a certainly a sizable force - I appreciate any effort no matter how big or small.

 

Hand placing the units is a drag but the end result can add an extra dimension to a mission unlike when you see a line of vehicles just whacked in the middle of an open desert!

 

Also, apart from hand-placing them there shouldn't be any need to 'script' them?

 

Cheers

[feefifofum]

Things like air defenses remaining offline until enemies are in their killzone, maybe armor or MANPADS moving to reinforce locations as they get hit.

 

Love the idea of a mission swap like this, though. I'm pretty swamped DCS wise but if I can find some time I'll play around with it.

[DUSTY]

Things like air defenses remaining offline until enemies are in their killzone, maybe armor or MANPADS moving to reinforce locations as they get hit.

 

That would certainly be going beyond the call of duty!

 

Please let me know if I can help you out with anything in return.

[Wrecking Crew]

gaak, I wrote a big reply but it went poofie on me. I can't see your mission in my DCS 1.5.3 version.

 

I'd make regular events to activate one of four groups at each site to be defended. Initialize a Random Flag at Mission Start for values 1-4. I would prolly have a random flag for each defensive position to really mix things up.

 

WC

[Wrecking Crew]

Oh, another option -- add a Combined Arms Tactical Commander slot to your mission to allow manual control of vehicle groups.

 

WC

[DUSTY]

Sorry WC, I should've made it more clear, this is on the NTTR map.

 

Those options are great but again for a mission that I want to put many hours into playing myself, it's going to kill the immersion a fair bit. With those kinds of randomised units, I will still know the possible locations because I placed them myself.

[ESAc_matador]

There are two tacit that I will use. One is te port to zone. Keeping original formation. And the other is group to random point in zones.. that will give you different places and different routes to achieve different goals. Mostly to reinforce.

 

Ie: if group is damaged more than 50%, other group will go to that place,

[SageOT]

Dusty,

 

Taking a whack at this. Your Blufor plan... around the mountains from Vegas and pushing up Sandy Valley or over the pass through Mountain View?

 

Cool idea by the way.

 

Sage

[DUSTY]

Thanks SageOT! Most likely BLUFOR advance will be along highway 160 though Mountain View and up Sandy Valley.

 

I'm thinking of implementing a recon unit including TACP which would set up on the high terrain near Mt Charleston but I think they would have to Helo insert as the terrain is pretty rough up there and the roads don't really exist on the western flank of the terrain overlooking Pahrump.

[DUSTY]

Also, just to clarify a point that I didn't make clear in the initial post.

I'm planning on placing identical but differently named Brigades so I can set up triggers that will randomly spawn 1 of the three possible units. So in summary the mission will generate a full Soviet style Tank Brigade but there will be 27 possible different force dispositions on each load.

 

This ought to give this mission some serious replay-ability for when it is released publicly.

 

Although there could be some 'doubling up' of companies or platoons using this method I'll just chalk it up to the OPFORs degraded command and control ability after having their IADS and C3 nodes slammed by TLAMS in the opening strikes. :music_whistling:

 

Now I just need to get myself a dedicated server so I can host this kind of thing and let it play out over hours. Hmmm.

Edited April 23, 2016 by |DUSTY|

[SageOT]

Ok units placed. They are tiered so if you random spawn they should hold up, I tried to keep A co supporting A co, B co with B co and so on. Units are pushed out as far as Mountain View (if spawned) and the North part of Sandy Valley. SAM and AAA units spread out as appropriate, same with Arty.

 

Hope it's what you were after.

 

Sage

Pahrump_AO_SageOT.miz

[DUSTY]

Legend! Many thanks for your help SageOT.

 

Please let me know if I can return the favour in any way.

[SageOT]

No worries. Like I said cool idea. Always sucks for the mission designer because they know what's going on.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk