MIST and ground patrol. Can't get it to work and it's actually doing my head in.

[dotChuckles]

Right I am trying to do something which I am assured is very simple with MIST.

 

I just want the two vehicles to patrol but I have been trying for three hours, I don't really understand scripting but I've followed as much as I can on the forum and everything I have tried doesn't work. The vehicles get to the end of their route and just stop.

 

MIST is set to run at mission start and mist.ground.patrol is on each unit's last waypoint using the vars as specified in the documents.

 

Can someone take a look? This is beyond aggravating. I am about ready to put my PC through a wall!

 

Thanks!

Patrol_v2_0.miz

[Panthir]

Any news

[dotChuckles]

Nope :-(

[yellow_jacket]

Dot, I'm just reading through references and starting out with missions. So I definitely hope you get the answer you need here.

Flying pixels since someone asked 'why would anyone want a computer?'

[Wrecking Crew]

Looking at it, first off I switched to Mist 4.1.61...

Edit -- there is a newer Mist, getting that.

 

I think it was the old Mist version - it is v4.3.73 now. I'm on DCS v1.5.4.

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1622305&postcount=3

 

Those patrols around the airbase are going to mess with flight operations!

 

WC

Edited July 17, 2016 by Wrecking Crew

[Panthir]

Thanx

[dotChuckles]

Thanks Wrecking Crew. I updated to mist_4_3_73 unfortunately the vehicles are still stopping at their last waypoint. I am stumped :-(

[Grimes]

It appears to be working if you assign it via triggers, but not at the end of the route. So just make a trigger that executes once shortly after mission start that does the script. Also in terms of formatting your syntax is a little off. You have a number value, I'm guessing for the speed, in the spot that is used to define the formation. Really you just need only the groups name and can ignore the other variables as it will inherit the speed and formation as defined by the route in the editor.

 

I gotta add that the script occasionally didn't work when I was testing it out. I'm trying to narrow the problem down, it might be a bug with the scripting engine.

[Ramsay]

Thanks Wrecking Crew. I updated to mist_4_3_73 unfortunately the vehicles are still stopping at their last waypoint. I am stumped :-(

 

I created a similar mission in 1.2.16 with mist 3.5.37 and your syntax/logic -

 

• 
  
• patrol 1 always stopped at the last waypoint (9)
  
• patrol 2 worked as expected
  

Although I have created a couple of missions with enemy convoys (10 vehicles), I couldn't create a working patrol using 1.5.4 and mist 4.3.73 for some reason.

 

What did work was using mist 4.2.66 but the result is imperfect.

 

A simple road patrol with no change in "On road"/"Off road" seems to have few if any issues.

 

Patrol 1 always stopped at last waypoint (except once), despite using the same logic as Patrol 2.

 

Patrol 2 with 1 vehicle would stop.

Patrol 2 with 2 vehicles would loop (but they go line abreast when changing from "on road">"off road".

Patrol 2 with 1 vehicle and slowing the speed of the last waypoint made it loop once and stop despite using the same logic as the road convoy/patrol.

 

Hope this can give you some pointers.

 

Once a patrol is working, updating mist to 4.3.73 doesn't automatically break the mission, so I'm not sure what's going on there.

 

So just make a trigger that executes once shortly after mission start that does the script.

Unfortunately the patrol will only loop once and then stop at the last waypoint i.e. Trigger Once, no event\Time more than 10\Run script "mist.ground.patrol('Patrol3')"

 

Running the script, at the last waypoint refreshes the action, and the patrol loop is continuous.

 

YMMV

 

Edit: Unfortunately I'm not getting consistent results, one solution using mist 4.3.73 seems to be to run a timed trigger to initialize the patrol as Grimes suggested and then refresh it at the last waypoint but I still can't get Patrol 1 to behave.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Ramsay
I'm not getting consistent results, remove old .miz

[dotChuckles]

Thanks for looking into this guys. I will correct my vars as I didn't realize it inherited from the mission editor.

 

It's just hard starting out as the extent of my programming knowledge is a bit of python so I'm never sure if i'm doing something totally wrong or if it's a wider issue.

 

Many thanks.

[Grimes]

The mist version shouldn't matter because the code used for this function simply hasn't changed between the two versions.

 

Unfortunately the patrol will only loop once and then stop at the last waypoint i.e. Trigger Once, no event\Time more than 10\Run script "mist.ground.patrol('Patrol3')"

 

Running the script, at the last waypoint refreshes the action, and the patrol loop is continuous.

 

Thats exactly what the script does. It creates a new route for the AI and on the last WP it creates a task to run a script with all of the waypoint data embedded within. Both groups are being commanded to patrol initially. The problem is for some reason the task on the last WP isn't running for patrol 1 while it is for patrol 2. Further adding to the strangeness of this I've added a simple outText script to assorted waypoints for patrol 1 and it routinely fails to execute on the last WP. Adding new waypoints the message will display just fine for what was previously the "last WP" but again fails on the new last WP. I've tried replicating it with new groups and in new missions but have so far been able to do so.

 

So you could delete the unit and remake its route... and it might work just fine.

[dotChuckles]

Guys, apologies, was out for the evening. I'll try deleting and redoing the patrol and let you know what happens. Again, much appreciation for your time on this.

[dotChuckles]

Ok, so deleting them and redoing the patrol routes hasn't fixed the issue. Vehicles both stop at the end of the route. :-(

[FlightControl]

I am experiencing the same issue within the moose framework.

 

@Grimes,

 

When you initiate a new task using Group.setTask(), and the Task string (command) contains exactly the same route as you have defined within your mission group template, the group will not move at all. On top, if you have added this re-route task at a waypoint, the task will be called, before the units have gone back to the waypoint you routed them to... In other words, they'll go into an endless loop...

 

In a nuttshell, I am afraid we are looking here again to a DCS routing defect, that needs further investigation. I will revert my system back to the last "stable" version of DCS that i know where the routing worked (1.5.3.74...) and retest this function. If i can document the defect, i will raise an error report to DCS.

 

Sven

[Grimes]

Thats not exactly the problem that is occurring. Simply put upon reaching the last WP there is a command to run a script and for whatever reason the script isn't guaranteed to execute. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't, its extremely difficult to nail down what exactly is causing it. The fix from a mist perspective is straight forward and obvious, but I'm more concerned with figuring out why even a basic script on the last WP isn't working.