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TROOPS IN CONTACT! (V10 released, now on github)


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You can kind of do this as-is by just manipulating the contents of the enemy groups.  

I wanted a light and a heavy deliberately because sometimes you want to roll with just rockets and guns, and I didn't want such a shooter to encounter hard armor that would prove impossible. Or when I go out in the 24, I go heavy until I'm out of ATGMs, then I choose a couple lights before I RTB to spend out the rest of the payload.

Wouldn't be hard to do a "random" where it chooses for you.

Just got done taking counsel on 5-line stuff with someone whose job that literally is.  I'm moving the comm structure over to the 5 line format to see how that goes.

 

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Just messed with it a bit. A few questions!

Can I change the friendly groups to a coalition other than USA? For example without changing their name could I change the coalition to Joint Blue Task Force (or whatever it's called) and still not break the mission? Will it break the mission by changing the number of units in the groups too? (I assume not but figured I'd ask). Will it ever spawn more than one group vs one group or will it sometimes spawn multiple? Is there also a set distance the units spawn from each other? Thanks for the info this mission has a lot of potential. 

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44 minutes ago, Krasniye said:

Just messed with it a bit. A few questions!

Can I change the friendly groups to a coalition other than USA? For example without changing their name could I change the coalition to Joint Blue Task Force (or whatever it's called) and still not break the mission? Will it break the mission by changing the number of units in the groups too? (I assume not but figured I'd ask). Will it ever spawn more than one group vs one group or will it sometimes spawn multiple? Is there also a set distance the units spawn from each other? Thanks for the info this mission has a lot of potential. 

 

Thanks,

You can't change the coalitions (color: blue/red/neutral) but you can change the COUNTRIES that make up the coalitions.

You are blue, bad guys are red. Whatever you decide that means country by country.

Number of units can be whatever you want.

The heavy setting spawns a "heavy" group, and also a supporting element, of the type in the "support" zone. It's more targets, and harder opponents.

The distance is random, but within a radius (inner/outer). Basically enough distance that you can safely engage on the inside without hurting friendlies, but on the outside, still shooting distance of each other (by a DCS average). 

 

 

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vor 7 Stunden schrieb fargo007:

 

Thanks,

You can't change the coalitions (color: blue/red/neutral) but you can change the COUNTRIES that make up the coalitions.

You are blue, bad guys are red. Whatever you decide that means country by country.

Number of units can be whatever you want.

The heavy setting spawns a "heavy" group, and also a supporting element, of the type in the "support" zone. It's more targets, and harder opponents.

The distance is random, but within a radius (inner/outer). Basically enough distance that you can safely engage on the inside without hurting friendlies, but on the outside, still shooting distance of each other (by a DCS average). 

 

Basically it would be a good idea to use "JointCoalition.BLUE" and "Joint coalition.RED" as "Countries", by default. This way, you can create opponents that have access to the same equipment and all liveries.

The countries like USA/Russia/Insurgents usually limits the assets available, but often makes it unnecessarily hard to, if you need a bit of variety, or specific assets, say ISIL fighters with access to a T-72 or a captured Iraqi Humvees etc.

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Planned for version 4:

  1. Switch to a CAS 5-Line format for voice and messages. I worked with a professional who both does and teaches this to get it right.
  2. Easier group management. Instead of a fixed number of rigidly named groups in each category, you control them by simply naming them by a convention. e.g.
    1. "HEAVY-"  Groups with names beginning with this string spawn when heavy TIC is called for. 
    2. "LIGHT-" Same concept.
    3. "SUPPORT-" Same concept for support elements to heavy units.  Think trucks/troops that support a tank platoon, or provide recon/anti-air. Your choice.
    4. "FRIENDLIES-"  These no longer need to be immortal or hold fire (now handled in code).
    5. "FRIENDLYSTATIC-" These must be blue coalition statics.
    6. There is no maximum, but you must have a minimum of 1 correctly named objects in each category or you will break it.
  3. Default coalitions will be Combined Joint Task Force blue or red (e.g. country.id.CJTF_BLUE)

Thank you for all the feedback, this should be a big improvement.

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I have started to play this mission in Syria and it is very impressive.  The foundation this script provides is really exciting.  Thank you.

Neal

 

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7 hours ago, fargo007 said:

Planned for version 4:

  1. Switch to a CAS 5-Line format for voice and messages. I worked with a professional who both does and teaches this to get it right.
  2. Easier group management. Instead of a fixed number of rigidly named groups in each category, you control them by simply naming them by a convention. e.g.
    1. "HEAVY-"  Groups with names beginning with this string spawn when heavy TIC is called for. 
    2. "LIGHT-" Same concept.
    3. "SUPPORT-" Same concept for support elements to heavy units.  Think trucks/troops that support a tank platoon, or provide recon/anti-air. Your choice.
    4. "FRIENDLIES-"  These no longer need to be immortal or hold fire (now handled in code).
    5. "FRIENDLYSTATIC-" These must be blue coalition statics.
    6. There is no maximum, but you must have a minimum of 1 correctly named objects in each category or you will break it.
  3. Default coalitions will be Combined Joint Task Force blue or red (e.g. country.id.CJTF_BLUE)

Thank you for all the feedback, this should be a big improvement.

This is very exciting! How will we set these units onward? Are we still putting them in a box in the corner or will they somewhat dynamically spawn with a random number of them? Can't wait! 

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1 hour ago, speckfire said:

Now I find out about this?? Where have I been? Excellent work Fargo !!!!

It's already in our campaign!  I broke it out into its own mission to get feedback and ideas on how to improve it and I haven't been disappointed here. 

10 hours ago, Krasniye said:

This is very exciting! How will we set these units onward? Are we still putting them in a box in the corner or will they somewhat dynamically spawn with a random number of them? Can't wait! 

You could put them anywhere since they are late activated. It's just handy to keep them all in one place. One of your groups is chosen at random for each category, each time.

@Wood Way to go!

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1 hour ago, fargo007 said:

It's already in our campaign!  I broke it out into its own mission to get feedback and ideas on how to improve it and I haven't been disappointed here. 

You could put them anywhere since they are late activated. It's just handy to keep them all in one place. One of your groups is chosen at random for each category, each time.

@Wood Way to go!

That sounds great! It's been fantastic seeing how fast you've made progress. I'll wait for V4 to drop before making my Vietnam variant. 

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On 11/9/2021 at 8:14 PM, fargo007 said:

Attack aircraft, CAS, Helicopters....   We always hear that:

"It's about supporting the guys on the ground..."

So in that spirit, I've adapted a "Troops in Contact" scenario I came up with at BSD (I'm a mission/scripting gremlin there) for more general usage. Fixed wing, or Rotary wing, no matter.  

 

This is just hours of fun.

 

You check in on station via F10 menu:

Screenshot_2021-11-09_13-03-04.png

Then decide if you want light or heavy enemy.  Light are APC class, infantry, artillery.  Heavy will see BMP's AAA guns, and hard armor.

Screenshot_2021-11-09_13-03-17.png

Enter into, and remain in a grid area. You'll receive some tasking.  

As you begin your runs, if you are getting good hits on target, the guys on the ground will cheer you on.

Screenshot_2021-11-09_12-52-42.png

The friendlies may take some hits if it takes you a while to get there.....  But they'll just hunker down until you start bringing some hurt.

Screenshot_2021-11-09_12-54-54.png

I tried to make aspects of the mission editable/tunable to suit.  

The concerned zones can be moved, reshaped, or otherwise manipulated to suit. 

 

Screenshot_2021-11-09_12-37-12.png

Top left of the map, you can control the makeup of the enemy and friendly groups to suit.  You must keep the groups names the same, and must keep all of the groups or it will break.  You can change their makeup to any types of ground units you want though. 

 

Screenshot_2021-11-09_12-35-39.png

Instructions, also contained in the briefing inside the mission:

TROOPS IN CONTACT! 

BY [BSD] FARGO OF BLACKSHARKDEN,  A.K.A. BSD.

FREE TO RE-USE PUBLICLY WITH @ATTRIBUTION. 🙂

PILOT INSTRUCTIONS: 

1 - PLACE YOUR AIRCRAFT OR USE THE ONES PROVIDED.
2 - USE THE F10-OTHER-TROOPS-IN-CONTACT MENU TO GO ON STATION WITH EITHER LIGHT, OR HEAVY (HARD ARMOR, AAA).
3 - ENTER ONE OF THE CHOSEN GRIDS AND REMAIN IN IT.
4 - YOU WILL GET A CALL FOR SUPPORT WITH RADIO TRAFFIC.
5 - PROSECUTE, AND WHEN READY, REACTIVATE TIC IN THE MENU.

---------------------------------------------------

MISSION DESIGNER INSTRUCTIONS:

1 - IN THE TOP LEFT CORNER OF THE MAP YOU WILL FIND A SPAWN FARM. IF YOU WISH TO MODIFY THE MAKEUP OF THE FRIENDLY OR ENEMY GROUPS, THIS IS WHERE YOU DO IT. 

** DO NOT CHANGE GROUP NAMES **

2 - THE MISSION IS SCRIPT DRIVEN. THE NAMES THEREFORE, MUST BE MAINTAINED CORRECTLY OR THE MISSION WILL BREAK. 

PORTABILITY:

1 - THE TIC AREA (YELLOW)  ZONES CAN BE ANY SIZE, AND MAY BE MOVED ANYWHERE ON THE MAP. YOU MUST MOVE THREE THINGS:
THE SQUARE, PRESENTLY A 20X20KM GRID ZONE. 
THE INDIVIDUAL ROUND ZONES WITHIN IT.
THE MAP LABEL ARTIFACTS IF DESIRED.

IF YOU WISH TO PORT IT TO A DIFFERENT MAP, RECREATE ALL THE ZONES, GROUPS, ETC. AND LOAD THE SCRIPT AS IS DONE IN THIS MISSION.

 

---------------------------------------------------------

 

Give it a try and let me know if you like it.

 

/Fargo

 

----------------------------------------------------------

 

CHANGELOG:

V3: 11/27/21

- Fixes to handling of fixed wing aircraft.

- Transition to a three map release in one archive.

 

V2: 11/11/21

- Cleanup option added, shutoff removed (was superfluous). Cleanup removes the friendlies from the map entirely.

Added by request:

- MGRS grid reference added in displayed messages.

- New radio message indicating enemies are all down if none are still "burning but not exploded" after :60.

 

Caucasus, Persian Gulf, Syria are all in this package:

 

V3:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HmPMLkWJPR9aAVuQmUBnbZ7qAVDHxTqh/view?usp=sharing

 

 

 

awesome piece of software! kudos

are you considering to host this on github by any chance, so that others can create feature requests, report bugs and overall contribute to it. Also give other the option to fork and modify as they see fit. classic open source approach

cheers

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4 hours ago, maxl said:

awesome piece of software! kudos

are you considering to host this on github by any chance, so that others can create feature requests, report bugs and overall contribute to it. Also give other the option to fork and modify as they see fit. classic open source approach

cheers

 

Thanks,

Yes, I do plan to do this. I want to first wrap up a lot of the loose ends, such as converting the ME triggers to scheduled functions in the code, and offering a set of configurable parameters that a mission designer can tune, similar to other scripts. Tunable params I envision include:

  • Time delay between TIC calls.
  • Distance radius from friendlies enemy groups will appear (min,max)
  • configurable flag numbers the script uses (so a  mission designer can manually trigger events using flags)
  • configurable zone prefix names for where they TIC events occur.
  • Heavy class enemies can optionally split off from their support, and conduct a flanking maneuver after some time (this is coming in v4, and it is SUPER cool😉. The probability that they do this (expressed as a percentage) and the min/max distance to the friendlies is configurable, as will be the formation they travel in.

There is a decent amount of work here. You all are helping me to test. 🙃


Edited by fargo007
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  • fargo007 changed the title to TROOPS IN CONTACT! (V5 released)

Version 5 released. 

TROOPS IN CONTACT! is now entirely script driven, and requires no triggers other than to load moose, itself, and the sounds. 

Tons of new configuration abilities are available.

Request new smoke, Cleanup, Distances, times, Heavy enemies possibly trying to flank the friendlies, all of this is fully controllable.  

See the script itself. 

Stub missions are just examples with knoob ME options turned on, and are meant for you to add your own aircraft, and move things around.

 

 


Edited by fargo007
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vor einer Stunde schrieb fargo007:

Version 5 released. 

TROOPS IN CONTACT! is now entirely script driven, and requires no triggers other than to load moose, itself, and the sounds. 

Tons of new configuration abilities are available.

Request new smoke, Cleanup, Distances, times, Heavy enemies possibly trying to flank the friendlies, all of this is fully controllable.  

See the script itself. 

Stub missions are just examples with knoob ME options turned on, and are meant for you to add your own aircraft, and move things around.

 

 

 

Did I miss the new link? Can't find it. 

Shagrat

 

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Just started testing V5 and I seem to have encountered a bug. Flying around the zones after I had edited the units (but did not change any of their names) while using the F10 menu to select Troops in Contact I get nothing. It spawns in smoke and friendly units but the enemies never spawn. I used a player controlled air start huey that flies into the zone. Any ideas? 

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1 minute ago, Krasniye said:

Just started testing V5 and I seem to have encountered a bug. Flying around the zones after I had edited the units (but did not change any of their names) while using the F10 menu to select Troops in Contact I get nothing. It spawns in smoke and friendly units but the enemies never spawn. I used a player controlled air start huey that flies into the zone. Any ideas? 

Try downloading it again and don't edit anything.  If it works, your edits are messed up.  🙂

Especially statics. When you change a static unit, the name reverts to something like "Static-this-and-that-001" or something. 


Edited by fargo007

 

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18 minutes ago, fargo007 said:

Try downloading it again and don't edit anything.  If it works, your edits are messed up.  🙂

Especially statics. When you change a static unit, the name reverts to something like "Static-this-and-that-001" or something. 

 

The statics were definitely the issue! Thanks! 

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Hey fargo Thanks for this. awesome!! FYI, I've been trying to transfer this to our missions again with no success of the script working. I can see it been activated but nothing in the F10 menu. I also noticed you have the sound as for country. Is that a requirement because in the previous ones I used coalition and not country and it worked perfectly. Suggestions?

 

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

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This version should be the easiest of all to port in. 

If you are talking about the loading of the sounds in the trigger, that doesn't matter at all. coalition, country, group, etc.  All the same.  

So look in the Saved Games\Log\dcs.log file.  

At the start, you will see:

**** TROOPS IN CONTACT LOADED ****

After that statement, look for errors.  They will likely start with "Mission Script error" or "Mission Scripting error."

Like Krasniye, check the statics if you have renamed any.  For some reason both the static's name, and unit name have to be the same, 

FRIENDLYSTATICS-1, FRIENDLYSTATICS-2, etc.

 

Statics always get me.


Edited by fargo007

 

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1 minute ago, fargo007 said:

This version should be the easiest of all to port in. 

If you are talking about the loading of the sounds in the trigger, that doesn't matter at all. coalition, country, group, etc.  All the same.  

So look in the Saved Games\Log\dcs.log file.  

At the start, you will see:

**** TROOPS IN CONTACT LOADED ****

After that statement, look for errors.  

Like Krasniye, check the statics if you have renamed any.  For some reason both the static's name, and unit name have to be the same, 

FRIENDLYSTATICS-1, FRIENDLYSTATICS-2, etc.

 

Statics always get me.

 

See the instructions - you're supposed to put your OWN aircraft here!  Anything you want, set up just the way you like it.

my apologies, brother.

"You see, IronHand is my thing"

My specs:  W10 Pro, I5/11600K o/c to 4800 @1.32v, 64 GB 3200 XML RAM, ASUS RTX3060ti/8GB.

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3 minutes ago, Steel Jaw said:

my apologies, brother.

No problem, it's really just a script I'm furnishing, so I want people to sort of "make it their own." 

The hot starts and air starts are there primarily for me to test the code. I didn't intend that people would fly them, but you could.

Enjoy!


Edited by fargo007

 

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