DML - Mission Creation Toolbox [no Lua required]

[Panthir]

33 minutes ago, cfrag said:

That is probably because I stupidly named it "cfxPlayerScoreUI" in the modules folder. If you can't find it in modules, simply copy it from the attachment below. I think I never got around to properly documenting it, but it should be quite self-explanatory and requires no setup. Add it after PlayerScore in your mission.

I could add something like that if I have the time. IIRC (haven't looked at the code in over a year), the UI module gives you access to that at any time during the game already, so it shouldn't be too difficult. 

cfxPlayerScoreUI.lua 8.78 kB · 1 download

Many thanx for your reply. Now it seems that I can check the total player score via F10 menu.

Unfortunately I get an script error when I kill a unit (general or specific). Do you have any idea what the problem is? I attach you the mission file as well. There are two airborn F-16 for chacking purpose in Blue side.

I get similar script error when I try your relevant demo mission

 

 

PvP_Persian_Gulf_On_Fire_2023_v6_Old_Era.miz

Edited April 5, 2023 by Panthir

[cfrag]

8 minutes ago, Panthir said:

Do you have any idea what the problem is?

Thank you for attaching the mission, but it's using the A4 mod, so I can't open it. If possible, please remove the Skyhawk and re-post.

Still, from the error message it would appear that you are using an outdated version of PlayerScore - version 1.5.1 is current. Can you check which version you are using? If you aren't current, please update and try again. With some luck, the issue is already resolved.

 

Edited April 5, 2023 by cfrag

[Panthir]

5 minutes ago, cfrag said:

Thank you for attaching the mission, but it's using the A4 mod, so I can't open it. If possible, please remove the Skyhawk and re-post.

Still, from the error message it would appear that you are using an outdated version of PlayerScore - version 1.5.1 is current. Can you check which version you are using? If you aren't current, please update and try again. With some luck, the issue is already resolved.

 

 

I will remove it and I will attach you the mission asap but the same issue occurs with both relevant demo missions of yours 

demo - more score.miz demo - player score.miz

[cfrag]

Just now, Panthir said:

I will remove it and I will attach you the mission asap but the same issue occurs with both relevant demo missions of yours 

Ouch! Thank you, I'll of course investigate!

 

[Panthir]

4 minutes ago, cfrag said:

Ouch! Thank you, I'll of course investigate!

 

Playerscore version was 1.2.0. I replaced it and checking it and I will report you ASAP

[Panthir]

11 minutes ago, Panthir said:

Playerscore version was 1.2.0. I replaced it and checking it and I will report you ASAP

 

20 minutes ago, cfrag said:

Thank you for attaching the mission, but it's using the A4 mod, so I can't open it. If possible, please remove the Skyhawk and re-post.

Still, from the error message it would appear that you are using an outdated version of PlayerScore - version 1.5.1 is current. Can you check which version you are using? If you aren't current, please update and try again. With some luck, the issue is already resolved.

 

 

1.5.1 version works ok 

Thanx

 

[cfrag]

10 minutes ago, Panthir said:

1.5.1 version works ok 

That's good news indeed, thank you for verifying. I'll see to it that I update the lagging demos  

 

[Panthir]

4 hours ago, cfrag said:

That's good news indeed, thank you for verifying. I'll see to it that I update the lagging demos  

 

Everything works fine. Player score via F10 menu is excellent as well. BTW, I have some questions:

a. Is there any way to have the individual score for all participants by the end of a mission for example to a log file?

b. Is there any way for the player to get the score only if he manage to land?

I attach you my mission and the briefing. I deleted all A-4 aircrafts in order to check it if you wish. This is a modern era mission converted to old era. I will proceed with applying DML to the modern version as well. There are three airborn F-16s for checking.

Many Thanx

PvP Persian Gulf on Fire 2023 V6 Old Era.pdf PvP_Persian_Gulf_On_Fire_2023_TEST_1.miz

[cfrag]

Just now, Panthir said:

a. Is there any way to have the individual score for all participants by the end of a mission for example to a log file?

I could add that to playerscore - it would require the persistence module present to create such a file and the mission to be de-sanitized, but that surely would be possible. Export wouldn't happen on mission end, because that would be difficult to detect in-mission, but when a flag is raised, so I can leave it up to the mission designer. That way, mission designer can even keep a log of how the score went. I'll cook something up.

9 minutes ago, Panthir said:

b. Is there any way for the player to get the score only if he manage to land?

That's an interesting idea, thanks! It would require some re-engineering, but in principle, yes. I'll put it down on my list and see if I can get both ideas implemented with a good, sensible interface for mission designers.

 

[Panthir]

6 minutes ago, cfrag said:

I could add that to playerscore - it would require the persistence module present to create such a file and the mission to be de-sanitized, but that surely would be possible. Export wouldn't happen on mission end, because that would be difficult to detect in-mission, but when a flag is raised, so I can leave it up to the mission designer. That way, mission designer can even keep a log of how the score went. I'll cook something up.

That's an interesting idea, thanks! It would require some re-engineering, but in principle, yes. I'll put it down on my list and see if I can get both ideas implemented with a good, sensible interface for mission designers.

 

Excellently 

[cfrag]

16 hours ago, Panthir said:

Is there any way for the player to get the score only if he manage to land?

While I'm engineering this, I've noticed a consequence for this type of scoring (award score only after a landing, erase score when player ditches plane, is killed or crashed):

When you use this in PvP, you are virtually forced to rtb immediately, lest your score be erased in subsequent fights, and at least one of the participants in a pvp fight is guaranteed to not receive any point and have their previous, not-yet-logged kills erased. This is likely going to create the following behaviours: 

• fresh planes engage each other
• after the first kill, the winner will immediately rtb to preserve the kill
• time between engagements will rise drastically since victor will rtb and victim needs to re-ingress

So this kind of scoring will be very unpopular on pvp servers. 

That's just an extrapolated observation. I'm continuing developing this aspect anyway   

[Panthir]

8 hours ago, cfrag said:

While I'm engineering this, I've noticed a consequence for this type of scoring (award score only after a landing, erase score when player ditches plane, is killed or crashed):

When you use this in PvP, you are virtually forced to rtb immediately, lest your score be erased in subsequent fights, and at least one of the participants in a pvp fight is guaranteed to not receive any point and have their previous, not-yet-logged kills erased. This is likely going to create the following behaviours: 

• fresh planes engage each other
• after the first kill, the winner will immediately rtb to preserve the kill
• time between engagements will rise drastically since victor will rtb and victim needs to re-ingress

So this kind of scoring will be very unpopular on pvp servers. 

That's just an extrapolated observation. I'm continuing developing this aspect anyway   

Very interesting point indeed. On the other hand we want to avoid kamikazi behaviour “I don’t care about my aircraft or my life”. 

In our Squadron, Lock on Greece, we setup our PvP missions in such way, that air to ground tasking gives you more points than A2A kills give. If you manage to effectively fly air to air, then you will create favourable conditions for your strikers to destroy their targets and get the team points. In this context, initially we adapted the following philosophy for the air to air kills “You don’t get points if you kill someone. If they kill you the team loses points.”

Of course, someone could ask, why don’t you limit pilot lives instead? Eventually, we are gathering in a week basis to fly a PvP for two and a half hours. We have many experienced pilots that can stay alive without any lose and many guys that will get killed 5 to 6 times during the PvP. In this context, by applying life limitation, suppose that we are 30 when we start the PvP most probably in one hour we would be less than the half. 

We want our guys to get experience by flying more and more. In this context we decided not to adapt limited lives.

Since the day we adapted this philosophy our PvPs became very challenging. In the past the vast majority of the players wanted to fly only air to air. 

We are convinced that such an option “you will get points only if you land” will gradually teach our members to improve mission risk assessment and make easier to find/create windows of opportunity to achieve the PvP objectives. It will work as a major initiative for our guys to do their best to do their mission without being killed.

Many thanks
 

 

Edited April 6, 2023 by Panthir

[HungryCoyote]

Using DML, would it be possible to have a mission, each time it is run to spawn random trigger zones, each with a single static object? Something like Pulsing Fun but only using certain zones on each mission restart.

Edited April 7, 2023 by HungryCoyote

[cfrag]

26 minutes ago, HungryCoyote said:

each time it is run to spawn random trigger zones, each with a single static object?

Something similar to this, yes. You must place all possible spawn zones when you create the mission, DML does not randomly spawn zones across the map. And you must tell DML which objects to choose from. That being said, you can use the random module to a) choose randomly from all possible spawners, and b) choose spawners a random amount of times. 

The spawners themselves, when activated, choose one random template from the set of given clone templates (that all tell it which object(s) to spawn), and the spawner can randomize the position inside the zone where it should spawn. A large spawner can cover quite a large are area, so the results of this will be entirely unpredictable: randomized umber of spawns, random locations inside spawn zones, random objects from list of possible objects per spawner.

 

Edited April 7, 2023 by cfrag

[HungryCoyote]

Thank you.

[Ingemar]

Have added CSAR missions, really great function!  Flying the Huey i can´t tune in to the ADF frequencies.  The Huey works in khz, are you sure the frequenzies are set to khz?  If not can i change this?  

[cfrag]

Just now, Ingemar said:

The Huey works in khz, are you sure the frequenzies are set to khz?

Well, that depends on how you set up the mission, but usually yes. If you go to communications-->Other and list all active missions, what ADF frequency is listed for the evacuee? If it's 1.04 MHz, that's 1040 kHz, 0.5 MHz is 500 kHz (multiply by 1000 to get Kilohertz from Megahertz)

 

[cfrag]

17 minutes ago, Ingemar said:

i can´t tune in to the ADF frequencies

Ok, I've looked into the code. If you used the 'freq' attribute in a CSAR hand-placed mission, you have discovered a place where I screwed up. That value there is multiplied (unfortunately) with the wrong constant (use 43 instead of 430), and I'll fix that asap.

Sorry about that, and let's forget about my previous post

 

[cfrag]

And here's the corrected version, will also be part of the next release. Use correct KHz numbers in your CSAR zones with this version

 

csarManager2.lua

[cfrag]

On 4/5/2023 at 8:48 PM, Panthir said:

Is there any way for the player to get the score only if he manage to land?

I'm almost done with that feature, but I have run into a problem (as was pointed out by one of my testers): "Just land anywhere (including enemy airfields, open fields), or specific, faction-owned airfields/zones?". Helicopters can land anywhere, and getting your plane down in one piece does not necessarily mean that they landed, as (probably) intended, at a friendly base to 'bring home' the score and prevent risky behavior.

So, for the time being I have half a feature - the principle is defined, but the specifics aren't clear enough for an implementation. Also, in order to be practical, the constraints shouldnot require too specific set-up. Any ideas / recommendations? 

[Panthir]

1 hour ago, cfrag said:

I'm almost done with that feature, but I have run into a problem (as was pointed out by one of my testers): "Just land anywhere (including enemy airfields, open fields), or specific, faction-owned airfields/zones?". Helicopters can land anywhere, and getting your plane down in one piece does not necessarily mean that they landed, as (probably) intended, at a friendly base to 'bring home' the score and prevent risky behavior.

So, for the time being I have half a feature - the principle is defined, but the specifics aren't clear enough for an implementation. Also, in order to be practical, the constraints shouldnot require too specific set-up. Any ideas / recommendations? 

In LimitedAirframe you setup pilotsafe zones. Is it possible to implement something like this, such as scoresafe zone?

 

Edited April 11, 2023 by Panthir

[Ingemar]

6 hours ago, cfrag said:

And here's the corrected version, will also be part of the next release. Use correct KHz numbers in your CSAR zones with this version

 

csarManager2.lua 53.89 kB · 2 downloads

Thank you!  Fantastic and quick  support!  

[cfrag]

Version 1.2.7 - Maintenance update - 20230412

This update brings a veritable bevy of small updates and enhancements, most prominently for OwnedZones, which has gained a number of QoL outputs to create signals whenever a zone changes ownership, and the ability to add more refined rules that determine when an owned zone is captured, if and when if becomes contested, and when it is lost. I'm also preparing this module for some refactoring to separate zone ownership from production, to better focus these very different behaviors, and make them easier to use. This will happen in an upcoming release, though.

I added much of the enhanced capabilities as a response to a request from @Panthir who was in the progress of developing some advanced mission - so thank you for your ideas and feedback! A forthcoming demo mission "3 Ring Circus" that condenses the fruits of our discussions, and shows how to create a mission where, to win, a side must hold a number of zones for a certain time, will be part of one of the coming releases.

All Changes
Documentation 
    - Main 
        - updates and corrections to various modules
    
    - Quick Ref
        - updates and corrections to various modules 
        
Demos
    - ADF and NDB fun (update)
    - CSAR of Georgia (update)
    - The Zonal Countdown (update)
    
Modules
    - cfxNDB 1.2.1
        - NDB now correctly use the terrain's altitude 
        - optimizations to location update on moving NDB 
    
    - cfxOwnedZones 1.3.0
        - new zone outputs! for capturing and losing zones 
        - new capture conditions 
        - new keep connditions
        - new contested condition 
        - ability to play a sound when capturing or losing a zone 
        
    - cfxPlayerScore 
        - inactive code: preparation for next version 
        
    - cfxZones 3.0.7
        - getPoint() also optionally includes terrain height 

    - countDown 1.3.1
        - improved verbosity 
        - new clock? input synonym
        - new reset? input to restart the count down 
    
    - csarManager 2.2.5
        - CSAR missions now use "freq" attribute correctly 
    
    - dcsCommon 2.8.5 
        - improved getGroundGroup() stability 
    
    - pulseFlags 1.3.3
        - re-starting a pulse now works correctly 
        
Enjoy,

-ch

Edited April 12, 2023 by cfrag

[Panthir]

23 hours ago, cfrag said:

Version 1.2.7 - Maintenance update - 20230412

This update brings a veritable bevy of small updates and enhancements, most prominently for OwnedZones, which has gained a number of QoL outputs to create signals whenever a zone changes ownership, and the ability to add more refined rules that determine when an owned zone is captured, if and when if becomes contested, and when it is lost. I'm also preparing this module for some refactoring to separate zone ownership from production, to better focus these very different behaviors, and make them easier to use. This will happen in an upcoming release, though.

I added much of the enhanced capabilities as a response to a request from @Panthir who was in the progress of developing some advanced mission - so thank you for your ideas and feedback! A forthcoming demo mission "3 Ring Circus" that condenses the fruits of our discussions, and shows how to create a mission where, to win, a side must hold a number of zones for a certain time, will be part of one of the coming releases.

All Changes
Documentation 
    - Main 
        - updates and corrections to various modules
    
    - Quick Ref
        - updates and corrections to various modules 
        
Demos
    - ADF and NDB fun (update)
    - CSAR of Georgia (update)
    - The Zonal Countdown (update)
    
Modules
    - cfxNDB 1.2.1
        - NDB now correctly use the terrain's altitude 
        - optimizations to location update on moving NDB 
    
    - cfxOwnedZones 1.3.0
        - new zone outputs! for capturing and losing zones 
        - new capture conditions 
        - new keep connditions
        - new contested condition 
        - ability to play a sound when capturing or losing a zone 
        
    - cfxPlayerScore 
        - inactive code: preparation for next version 
        
    - cfxZones 3.0.7
        - getPoint() also optionally includes terrain height 

    - countDown 1.3.1
        - improved verbosity 
        - new clock? input synonym
        - new reset? input to restart the count down 
    
    - csarManager 2.2.5
        - CSAR missions now use "freq" attribute correctly 
    
    - dcsCommon 2.8.5 
        - improved getGroundGroup() stability 
    
    - pulseFlags 1.3.3
        - re-starting a pulse now works correctly 
        
Enjoy,

-ch

 

Mate in zip the cfxZones version is 3.0.6

[cfrag]

2 hours ago, Panthir said:

Mate in zip the cfxZones version is 3.0.6

Thank you for the heads-up! Unfortunately for me, it was a stressful day, and I forgot to update the version string. Luckily for me, the version I packed with DML 1.2.7 is 3.0.7 (as can be seen from the version history - the change for getPoint() is in). Since the changes in Zones is for the next release anyway (no modules uses the new function), I'll be lazy and keep the entire lib as as