SP Campaign: Operation Earnest Will

[RaisedByWolves]

Like this campaign. I agree, it is the best one so far. Will you be making this for the -14A?

 

On the mission where you bomb the oil rigs at night, I can’t get the rest of the flight to drop anything. Any suggestion?

[SpikeGondorff]

Like this campaign. I agree, it is the best one so far. Will you be making this for the -14A?

 

On the mission where you bomb the oil rigs at night, I can’t get the rest of the flight to drop anything. Any suggestion?

 

Unfortunately, getting the wingmen to actually drop bombs was completely hit or miss for me and all my hours of testing it (mostly miss). I tried putting the IP closer, farther, different altitudes, same group, different groups, etc. I couldn't get them to consistently drop their bombs, if at all. The best I got was 2 of them would drop the bomb, but only after flying 50 miles away before turning inbound to do it, and you were feet dry by the time they dropped. Next mission, I tried putting the IP 50 miles back, but then they just didn't drop them (again). I'm pretty sure there are a couple of grey hairs in my head from the AI in this mission.

 

To complete the mission, it doesn't matter what the wingmen do, only that you destroy your rig. I don't know if there's something screwy because of the LGBs and having a separate JTAC instead of their own TGP. Next time I look at the mission I can load up the wingmen with TGPs to see if that helps.

 

It should be pretty painless to swap the -B with the -A when it comes out. Glad you're enjoying it so far. :)

[GunSlingerAUS]

So I'm on mission 2, the BARCAP next to AWACS. After about 75 minutes of flying back and forth between waypoint 2 and 3, wingman called Bingo fuel, so I called him home.

 

To be honest, I got pretty bored so quit out - I'm guessing I didn't do something right, as there was probably meant to be something going on while I was there? I think I may have called on station before I initially reached WP2 - could that have broken the trigger? Was I meant to do anything with my radios to hear Overlord, as I also just left them on default settings (did the cold start version of the mission).

[SpikeGondorff]

So I'm on mission 2, the BARCAP next to AWACS. After about 75 minutes of flying back and forth between waypoint 2 and 3, wingman called Bingo fuel, so I called him home.

 

To be honest, I got pretty bored so quit out - I'm guessing I didn't do something right, as there was probably meant to be something going on while I was there? I think I may have called on station before I initially reached WP2 - could that have broken the trigger? Was I meant to do anything with my radios to hear Overlord, as I also just left them on default settings (did the cold start version of the mission).

 

Hah, yeah, you let the AWACS get shot down! I think that's what happens if you do nothing. :lol:

 

When Jester tells you to check in with Overlord he should also tell you to tune 133.000 (which is on Jester's radio, so you'll have to order him to change it). Overlord is on that channel and all the instructions from him are only heard if you're on the correct channel. It's one of the preset radios, so you should be able to just order him to swap to Channel X (I think it's Channel 3, but I could be wrong, but the correct one is on the kneeboard).

 

I couldn't figure out how to script Jester swapping radio frequencies, so you'll have to order him to swap channels. If your next mission is the mid-air start one for mission 2, you'll still need to tell Jester to tune 133.000. There isn't a way to get Jester to start the mission on a different frequency than the Group frequency.

 

When you communicate with anyone through the F10 menu, you should always see chatter within the next 3-5 seconds. If you don't, make sure you're tuned to the correct frequency.

[Roosterfeet]

Looks great. If I switch from cold start to "takeoff from parking hot" in the mission editor, will that screw up the timing of events in the missions?

[SpikeGondorff]

Looks great. If I switch from cold start to "takeoff from parking hot" in the mission editor, will that screw up the timing of events in the missions?

 

It shouldn't. There's only one mission where the timing is critical, and that mission starts you already hooked up to the catapult. There are a few missions where there are other flights of your package taking off when you spawn. I'd allow them to launch first just to avoid any weirdness, as the expectation is they're waiting for you at the form up point.

 

I hope you enjoy it!

[GunSlingerAUS]

Hah, yeah, you let the AWACS get shot down! I think that's what happens if you do nothing. :lol:

 

Please send my deepest regards to the families of the crew of Overlord/Magic. My training failed me at the most urgent time, and I have since grounded myself until I can learn proper radio doctrine.

[Castor Troy]

Can someone tell me where the optional IRIAF Blue-Grey folder goes. There isn't any install instructions on that folder, nor is any instructions on the main thread for that download.

Edited July 10, 2020 by Castor Troy

[SpikeGondorff]

Can someone tell me where the optional IRIAF Blue-Grey folder goes. There isn't any install instructions on that folder, nor is any instructions on the main thread for that download.

 

I put it in my Saved Games folder:

 

C:\Users\*UserName*\Saved Games\DCS\Liveries\f-14b

 

UserName is whatever your user account is on your computer. Just put the "IRIAF Blue-Gray" folder in the path above, and you should be good. If not, let me know and we can figure it out.

 

Please send my deepest regards to the families of the crew of Overlord/Magic. My training failed me at the most urgent time, and I have since grounded myself until I can learn proper radio doctrine.

 

Haha, it's ok. I never liked Overlord anyway. Always too bossy and sending me into areas with a Weapons Hold ROE. :music_whistling:

[GunSlingerAUS]

Quick question - have you updated the mission brief text to reflect the Teddy Roosevelt Radio Frequency? It says Stennis on 127.500, but I'm getting nothing on that frequency. Hitting F10 to find out the frequency of the Roosevelt doesn't display that info, as far as I can tell?

[GunSlingerAUS]

Aaand, 2.5 hours of flying later, I've failed mission 2 after landing on the Roosevelt. I'm guessing it's because my landing wasn't given a grade due to no comms. Sigh. Think I'll stick with official campaigns for the time being, even though I loved the structure of this mission.

[SpikeGondorff]

Aaand, 2.5 hours of flying later, I've failed mission 2 after landing on the Roosevelt. I'm guessing it's because my landing wasn't given a grade due to no comms. Sigh. Think I'll stick with official campaigns for the time being, even though I loved the structure of this mission.

 

Sorry it's not. working for you. I'll take a look later today, but you should be able to land anywhere and complete the mission (assuming all the other objectives were completed). The only thing the mission should check is if your AGL altitude is under 50 feet or so, your speed is under 30 knots, and your vertical speed is between - 3 and +3. It doesn't matter where that happens, which should allow you to land at the alternate AB or belly land in the desert if you lose a wing or something.

 

The Roosevelt carrier is on the same frequency as the Stennis was, but I didn't update all the chatter references to the Stennis. Whenever they release the Stennis SC, I'll update the campaign to that model. I didn't have any issues when testing with the Teddy on 127.500, but that was on Stable.

 

Are you on OB or Stable?

 

Minor spoilers:

 

Did you intercept the F5s, turn on your radar, and get confirmation from Overlord that they're bugging out?

 

Did you fly within 500' of the F4s and get confirmation form Overlord that they're running away? I'll confirm later, but those are really the only 2 things needed to finish the mission. Once you do both of those, you should be able to land anywhere and get a score of 100.

 

This is all assuming nothing's borked with the mission, which is entirely possible and I'll check tonight.

[Castor Troy]

I put it in my Saved Games folder:

 

C:\Users\*UserName*\Saved Games\DCS\Liveries\f-14b

 

UserName is whatever your user account is on your computer. Just put the "IRIAF Blue-Gray" folder in the path above, and you should be good. If not, let me know and we can figure it out.

 

 

 

Haha, it's ok. I never liked Overlord anyway. Always too bossy and sending me into areas with a Weapons Hold ROE. :music_whistling:

 

 

Thanks. I didn't have a Liveries folder within the DCS folder. So I made the two missing folders and placed the file in the f-14b folder i created. Thanks for the info!

[Roosterfeet]

Flew the first 2 missions and really enjoying it so far.

 

I also encountered an issue with not getting credited for my "landing" on mission 2. I successfully completed the CAP and was cleared back to the carrier. I then proceeded to ignore a wave-off and got a snide remark from Jester once I came to a halt. Didn't get a grade at all from the LSO. I quit the mission and had a score of 50. I fixed the issue by editing my pilot log so I can move on but next time I'll check the score before I exit and fly a quick Cat and Trap to get credit if I don't have 100 points.

 

Also Haven't seen any chatter from GasCan. I've got my pilot radio set to 1 and he takes orders but no messages from him. Am I missing something?

 

Flying SC version in stable release.

[GunSlingerAUS]

Sorry it's not. working for you. I'll take a look later today, but you should be able to land anywhere and complete the mission (assuming all the other objectives were completed). The only thing the mission should check is if your AGL altitude is under 50 feet or so, your speed is under 30 knots, and your vertical speed is between - 3 and +3. It doesn't matter where that happens, which should allow you to land at the alternate AB or belly land in the desert if you lose a wing or something.

 

The Roosevelt carrier is on the same frequency as the Stennis was, but I didn't update all the chatter references to the Stennis. Whenever they release the Stennis SC, I'll update the campaign to that model. I didn't have any issues when testing with the Teddy on 127.500, but that was on Stable.

 

Are you on OB or Stable?

 

Minor spoilers:

 

Did you intercept the F5s, turn on your radar, and get confirmation from Overlord that they're bugging out?

 

Did you fly within 500' of the F4s and get confirmation form Overlord that they're running away? I'll confirm later, but those are really the only 2 things needed to finish the mission. Once you do both of those, you should be able to land anywhere and get a score of 100.

 

This is all assuming nothing's borked with the mission, which is entirely possible and I'll check tonight.

 

I landed on the Roosevelt, didn't get a landing rating though as the landing was failed for not doing any comms. Could that be the issue?

 

Running latest OB.

 

Yep, intercepted F5s and got confirmation from Overlord. Yep, flew formation with the F4 and got confirmation they were bugging out.

 

Guessing there's some kinda bug with landing on the SC. Note that I tuned my radio back to 127.500 to radio inbound to the carrier at approx 60nm range, no response.

[SpikeGondorff]

Flew the first 2 missions and really enjoying it so far.

 

I also encountered an issue with not getting credited for my "landing" on mission 2. I successfully completed the CAP and was cleared back to the carrier. I then proceeded to ignore a wave-off and got a snide remark from Jester once I came to a halt. Didn't get a grade at all from the LSO. I quit the mission and had a score of 50. I fixed the issue by editing my pilot log so I can move on but next time I'll check the score before I exit and fly a quick Cat and Trap to get credit if I don't have 100 points.

 

Also Haven't seen any chatter from GasCan. I've got my pilot radio set to 1 and he takes orders but no messages from him. Am I missing something?

 

Flying SC version in stable release.

 

Not sure about GasCan. Unless you're communicating with him through the F10 menu, I can't control what he says. He's part of your group, and I double checked and Channel 1 is the correct one.

 

EDIT: I completely forgot about the Silent setting. GasCan was going a little goofy calling out every “civilian“ aircraft from RAT, so I set him on Silent for the first half. I'll look at it again and see about tweaking it. Sorry about that...just forgot I told him to shut up. :)

 

I think I found the issue with the landings (check below).

 

I landed on the Roosevelt, didn't get a landing rating though as the landing was failed for not doing any comms. Could that be the issue?

 

Running latest OB.

 

Yep, intercepted F5s and got confirmation from Overlord. Yep, flew formation with the F4 and got confirmation they were bugging out.

 

Guessing there's some kinda bug with landing on the SC. Note that I tuned my radio back to 127.500 to radio inbound to the carrier at approx 60nm range, no response.

 

The lack of comms wouldn't be a problem for triggering the landing/completion (see next paragraph). I just tried it and communicated with the carrier just fine. Are you using the ARC-182 (RIO's radio) to talk? That's the only Radio that can tune to the carrier, while the ARC-159 (Pilot's Radio) can't. Even if Jester tunes to it, you have to push the correct button to talk to the carrier. Getting the correct carrier comms isn't something I can control, provided you're tuned to the correct frequency (127.500).

 

I think I found the issue with the landing trigger. The speed trigger I mentioned earlier is set lower than normal (9 kts instead of the 30 kts listed). With the carrier moving, if you don't get pulled back by the wires after landing, you might not trigger it. I'll tweak the value and test it tomorrow, and after checking all the other missions for any lower values, upload the changes.

 

You should be able to land at the alternate field to complete the mission, if you don't want to wait for the upload. Just make sure you stop completely (which apparently you can't do on a moving carrier, according to the mission editor).

 

Sorry for the hassle. I'll upload the changes once I get all the versions of that mission sorted. Thanks for the patience.

Edited July 12, 2020 by SpikeGondorff

[overalien]

I loved this campaign! Thanks for alleviating my onsetting boredom with SP missions and non rewarding, laggy online play with the Tomcat. This campaign has some really charming moments and is top notch for storyline richness. Well done! If this is your first, you have a bright future ahead of you, man. Voiced dialogues would be brilliant as an improvement as well as a few more missions with some more of that unpredictable and original action. I'm sad it's over after completing mine in 3 days flat. Looking forward to Version 2 or a new one entirely from you!

[gabuzomeu]

Hello

The campaign is very good , with nice weather/Time of day variations, and missions are quite interesting.

One point :

 

in mission 7 OCA, there could be more feedback on the reasons for failure , as it seems to include timing in addition to damages done or apparition of the F-4 not allowing last guy to bomb??

And I do not know where as a player you can see damages done to an airbase

 

 

[SpikeGondorff]

I loved this campaign! Thanks for alleviating my onsetting boredom with SP missions and non rewarding, laggy online play with the Tomcat. This campaign has some really charming moments and is top notch for storyline richness. Well done! If this is your first, you have a bright future ahead of you, man. Voiced dialogues would be brilliant as an improvement as well as a few more missions with some more of that unpredictable and original action. I'm sad it's over after completing mine in 3 days flat. Looking forward to Version 2 or a new one entirely from you!

 

Glad you liked it! It was my first, which is probably why there are no voice overs. I really have no clue how to record the voice, and with learning all the mission editor stuff and minor scripting, it wasn't something I wanted to add to the list of things.

 

Not sure if I'll do any more campaigns, at least anytime soon. I'm kind of burned out on creating missions, but I'll probably get the itch again. Thanks again!

 

 

Hello

The campaign is very good , with nice weather/Time of day variations, and missions are quite interesting.

One point :

 

in mission 7 OCA, there could be more feedback on the reasons for failure , as it seems to include timing in addition to damages done or apparition of the F-4 not allowing last guy to bomb??

And I do not know where as a player you can see damages done to an airbase

 

 

I'm happy you're enjoying it so far!

 

For your mission 7 question: success is only determined if you destroy the runway. It doesn't matter what your wingmen do.

 

More spoiler info below:

 

 

If you succeed and destroy the runway, the F4s won't launch. If you fail to destroy the runway, the F4s will launch, and Jester will tell you at the same time that you failed to destroy it. As I mentioned, your wingmen have no direct impact on the success of the mission. Literally, if all your wingmen crash on the way to the airport, it won't matter as long as you bomb the runway.

 

 

When I was testing it, I think I needed about 12 out of the 14 bombs to successfully hit before it triggered the Runway Destroyed event. Are you setting up the bombing parameters correctly so you can get all the bombs off in one run? It should be a one pass, haul ass mission. If you need some more help feel free to respond or send me a message.

 

[Roosterfeet]

I think Kaba may have used some kind of text to speech program for Cage the Bear. Might be worth experimenting with if you really want to add voice overs. I'm 3 missions in and the quality of the writing is top notch. I really appreciate that there is a strong narrative and more to do than go to waypoint 2 and blow stuff up. It's also very instructive and teaching me how to fly the F-14 better.

 

Also the refueling "checkpoint" is brilliant.

[GunSlingerAUS]

 

I think I found the issue with the landings (check below).

 

 

 

The lack of comms wouldn't be a problem for triggering the landing/completion (see next paragraph). I just tried it and communicated with the carrier just fine. Are you using the ARC-182 (RIO's radio) to talk? That's the only Radio that can tune to the carrier, while the ARC-159 (Pilot's Radio) can't. Even if Jester tunes to it, you have to push the correct button to talk to the carrier. Getting the correct carrier comms isn't something I can control, provided you're tuned to the correct frequency (127.500).

 

 

That would indeed be the problem - I asked Jester to set the radio, and then used Bailey's Voice Attack profile to activate ATC - which I'm guessing would use the wrong radio? How do I ensure I'm using the correct radio? Or should I simply enable easy radios?

[gabuzomeu]

Hi,

Thanks for the answer, I’ll try again with more bombing accuracy , I likely did not manage to put enough bombs on target!

Edit: indeed it worked 14/14 on target does it.

And again many thanks for this excellent campaign.

Edited July 13, 2020 by gabuzomeu

[SpikeGondorff]

I think Kaba may have used some kind of text to speech program for Cage the Bear. Might be worth experimenting with if you really want to add voice overs. I'm 3 missions in and the quality of the writing is top notch. I really appreciate that there is a strong narrative and more to do than go to waypoint 2 and blow stuff up. It's also very instructive and teaching me how to fly the F-14 better.

 

Also the refueling "checkpoint" is brilliant.

 

I poked around at some of the free text-to-speech engines out there and I thought they were pretty bad. I even uploaded the first half of the Mission 1 with it, and hated it. I heard some better voices on a few engines, but you had to pay for those, which sucks.

 

Glad you like the writing. Aside from learning how to script, that was the longest part of mission making, but hopefully makes some of the boring transits a bit more enjoyable. The checkpoints were something I always wanted in missions, too, so I'm happy to see I'm not alone. :)

 

 

That would indeed be the problem - I asked Jester to set the radio, and then used Bailey's Voice Attack profile to activate ATC - which I'm guessing would use the wrong radio? How do I ensure I'm using the correct radio? Or should I simply enable easy radios?

 

I'm not sure, as I've never really used Voice Attack. I think it would just work normally if it's as good as the reviews say, but I can't say for certain. Did it work fine in the first mission? It's the same radio frequency and everything. Only difference is the time of day for Mission 2 is close to dusk when landing and it might be a CASE III. Or it might just be a weird bug.

 

I have the 2 radio buttons bound to my HOTAS, and I think they're just called ARC-182 and ARC-159 in the bindings if you want to slum it like us normal people. :) And to be honest, I don't know how Easy Radios would work with F10 radio calls in the missions.

 

I updated the campaign with a better speed check for the landings. I specifically tested the whole 2nd mission with the Super Carrier and landed without calling the carrier, and it triggered just fine. You should see some Jester chatter about 5 seconds after you land, which means the trigger fired. If you really don't want to fly that mission again, shoot me a PM and I can tell you how to edit the mission so you can bypass it.

Edited July 13, 2020 by SpikeGondorff

[draconus]

How do I ensure I'm using the correct radio?

Check for PTT or Mic Button in the bindings.

[Castor Troy]

I have the 2 radio buttons bound to my HOTAS, and I think they're just called ARC-182 and ARC-159 in the bindings if you want to slum it like us normal people. :) And to be honest, I don't know how Easy Radios would work with F10 radio calls in the missions

 

If you want Easy Communications to work, you have to enable it yourself in the Mission Editor. As the author did not allow (I am assuming unknowingly) EC in this campaign. So if you try to use EC, nothing will happen, even if you have Easy Communications checked in the difficulty.

 

To enable the use of EC, open each mission from the campaign in the ME, go to the CUSTOMIZE tab, select MISSION OPTIONS. When you open MO, a tab on the right will appear. In that tab, select the EASY COMMUNICATION box that is on the right hand side.

 

I can confirm, that the f-10 options do work with EC enabled.

 

If the author could include EC in future builds, it would be appreciated. Thanks for this campaign!

Edited July 13, 2020 by Castor Troy