F-14B : OPERATION CAGE THE BEAR

[IronMike]

Well, I finally successfully completed OCA west.

 

Key was to fly the ingress high to save fuel, I got there at 25k, dropped down to 12 to avoid SAMs launched at us, then striked the airfield with a couple of passes and egressed. I still lost my wingman and all the Hornets, everything went as you see in the tacview files I posted.

 

Kaba, one more thing you might wanna check is wingman behaviour: despite being ordered to "Engage: mission and rejoin", he never drops his bombs, making him an easy prey for the MiGs on our way back. Don't know if you can fix it (very likely a DCS problem), but I think you wanna know.

 

 

Unfortunately there is nothing much Kaba can do about that kind of AI behaviour.

[Gianky]

Yeah, I imagined that, IronMike, but I thought he would wanna know anyway.

 

 

After all, since the only targets that matter for completing the missions are the aircraft that the player has to hit, he could retask the wingman as TARCAP, a role in which it should be more effective (feels weird to have a mission without A2A escort).

 

 

Up to Kaba, anyway, just a suggestion!

[kaba]

Thanks for the feedback Gianky - I've never had the issue with AI not dropping their bombs so will log the issue. Maybe it's something brought on in a new version.

 

Worth noting that this mission is intended to be a self escort strike after the SEAD flight turns cold. Ideally I'd like to keep the wingman as a striker as planned. However if DCS bugs prevent that then your suggestion of a TARCAP role is good.

 

Glad that you did make it through the mission in the end, thanks again for the feedback and do let me know if you have any further comments on the rest of the campaign.

[IronMike]

We are happy to announce that we officially added

the CAGE THE BEAR Campaign to the F-14 Build

 

THANK YOU KABA FOR THE OUTSTANDING WORK!

 

This means that from now on you do not need to download it anymore and all future fixes will be included in the official F-14 patches.

 

COOP and different start versions will be added later.

 

Please continue using this thread for all reports regarding the campaign.

[QuiGon]

Congrats @kaba! You really earned this! :thumbup:

 

COOP and different start versions will be added later.

I hope it won't take long for these things to arrive (cold starts & coop). Don't like hot starts :pilotfly:

[Gianky]

That's great news, thanks IronMike!

 

 

Congratulations, Kaba!

[LanceCriminal86]

Has anyone else experienced an issue where on mission 3 (airfield strike), as soon as the SA-6 comes online and starts firing their frames go to a slideshow? I've done all kinds of other missions with SAMs firing all over the place, never experienced anything like this. When the SA-6 was out of missiles the frames came back.

[IronMike]

Has anyone else experienced an issue where on mission 3 (airfield strike), as soon as the SA-6 comes online and starts firing their frames go to a slideshow? I've done all kinds of other missions with SAMs firing all over the place, never experienced anything like this. When the SA-6 was out of missiles the frames came back.

 

 

This seems more related to AI spawning in, than the SAM firing, I would guess.

[kaba]

Sorry to hear, sounds annoying. Not something I've ever noticed. Could you please send me a track or (preferably) a tacview?

[uri_ba]

Any guesstimations on the COOP version of the campaign?

 

 

I've go a version for server use (restart, Next mission, prev mission in cooms menu). but the official version would be preferable.

[LanceCriminal86]

Sorry to hear, sounds annoying. Not something I've ever noticed. Could you please send me a track or (preferably) a tacview?

 

I ended up fiddling with the mission just to see what happens when the SA-6 was taken out of the situation, and the issue seemed to go away. I didn't delete it, but I did add an M4 Sherman right next to its spawn point who quickly wiped the site out. No FPS stutters after that.

 

I think I will clear all that stuff out and give it another run with the latest beta patches, just in case. I've done other missions with SAMs galore, whole fleet shooting at incoming bombers, AAA everywhere at low level, and never had a problem.

 

Another thing, it could also have been the Iglas that you had placed around as well. Those killed me a few times when I loitered too long. It seemed to me though that when the SA-6 was reloaded and started to fire again, slideshow came back.

 

Basically with all AAA/SAMs eliminated the mission was glass smooth.

[kaba]

That's really bizarre and I can't see anything in the mission (editor or in game) that should be doing it, nor can I reproduce. Is it possible it's a local issue?

 

Keen to squash this one if possible, and without removing the SAMs/AAA - can't have a strike mission without air defenses!

[Tuefelhunden0311]

Finally

 

Thank you! Can't wait to jump right in!!

[QuiGon]

Any guesstimations on the COOP version of the campaign?

 

 

I've go a version for server use (restart, Next mission, prev mission in cooms menu). but the official version would be preferable.

+ 1

+ different start versions please

COOP and different start versions will be added later.

[kaba]

Glad to hear that you're looking forward to the coming versions of the campaign.

 

An updated cold start version is going through final testing and should be ok for beta release soon.

 

The CoOp version needs some thinking - mission triggers and scripts need to be revised for proper CoOp operations, and additional features need to be scoped, set up and tested - I'll let you know when I have concrete info to give you.

 

In the meantime, it'd be great to get your thoughts on exactly what features you'd like to have in CoOp missions. How many craft, cold or hot starts, additional features, etc. - the Restart/Next/Prev mission comms options are a great suggestion!

 

Thanks

[Gianky]

An updated cold start version is going through final testing and should be ok for beta release soon.

 

 

Glad to hear that!

 

 

I don't know if this can be considered relevant any longer, after the above news, however, with the Hornet TGP frenzy exhausted, I went back to your campaign, the 1.2 cold start version, and found another bug in mission 4.

 

 

I started the mission and, instead of being dropped into the cockpit, I found myself staring at the F10 map. Pressed F9 and my flight wasn't on the Stennis deck: no player aircraft. Pressed esc and "quit" to go back to the lobby and DCS crashed to the desktop. I tried this 4 times, every time I got the same result. If I open the mission file in ME, the player flight is there and the spawn time is the same as the beginning of the mission.

 

 

Again, I don't know it can be relevant any longer, but since it crashes DCS, I thought it was better to report it any way.

[kaba]

Thanks for flagging - I'll double check this is not occurring in the current version of the cold start mission. This is possibly due to the Stennis spawn points being a bit unreliable, especially with a busy deck.

[QuiGon]

An updated cold start version is going through final testing and should be ok for beta release soon.

Awesome, great to hear!

 

The CoOp version needs some thinking - mission triggers and scripts need to be revised for proper CoOp operations, and additional features need to be scoped, set up and tested - I'll let you know when I have concrete info to give you.

 

In the meantime, it'd be great to get your thoughts on exactly what features you'd like to have in CoOp missions. How many craft, cold or hot starts, additional features, etc. - the Restart/Next/Prev mission comms options are a great suggestion!

Well, I would like the coop version to be cold started, but that's just my opionion. Apart from that I can't think of anything that should be special in the coop version. Having a human wingmen (which means up to 4 players -> pilots/RIOs) and cold starts is all I need, but if the campaign provides for it I would also take 3 human wingmen (which means up to 8 players) :)

[WindyTX]

Please don't force cold start though, some of us only have limited time available so wasting time waiting for an INS just makes the mission less useful/playable.

 

 

Sent from my GM1915 using Tapatalk

[ataribaby]

Don't think it will be forced. As I understand it there will be two campaign versions - one for you guys in hurry and other for us INS align wasters ;)

[Black Assassin]

I am stuck on the Maykop airbase bombing mission. I've tried it like ten times and I can't pass it. I know it's cheating, but is there anyway to skip the mission?

Cheers!

[kaba]

I am stuck on the Maykop airbase bombing mission. I've tried it like ten times and I can't pass it. I know it's cheating, but is there anyway to skip the mission?

Cheers!

 

You can skip campaign missions by editing the logbook file out of game. Or you can play the later missions as single missions.

 

Can I ask what it is that goes wrong for you in the Maykop mission?

[Nealius]

Would changing liveries, tail numbers, or the deck configuration break anything? I'd like to tweak the campaign missions to have a coherent CVW with realistic modex numbers.

[kaba]

Would changing liveries, tail numbers, or the deck configuration break anything? I'd like to tweak the campaign missions to have a coherent CVW with realistic modex numbers.

 

 

Should be of no issue as long as this does not result in spawn positions that collide with static objects.

 

Would welcome your feedback on the changes you make too!

[Nealius]

I took a look and probably not much to change, depending on how the parked F-14s on the aft end of the ship impact my VR performance.

 

I mainly just wanted realistic tail numbers (100/200 for Tomcats, 300/400 for Hornets, 600 for AWACS, 700 for tankers) and all matching tail codes. Hard part about the matching tail codes is that the only way to get a totally matching CVW on deck is by using downloaded liveries. Might do CVW-7.