Angels of the Levant - Syria [Helicopter Rescue Sandbox] - Single and Multiplayer

[cfrag]

ANGELS OF THE LEVANT: SYRIA 

=== HELICOPTER RESCUE ===

Version 20250505 (fixed show-stopping DCS bug, more quality of life) 

Download: here

Before we begin, a Warning: whatever you do,

DO NOT USE DCS' "SAVE MISSION" FEATURE. THAT WILL FUBAR THIS MISSION.

 

You are an "Angel", a member of the Levant's elite Air Rescue organization. Your task is to evacuate injured people from all over Haifa, Beirut, Adana, Nicosia and Tel Aviv, and deliver them to Hospitals in the area.  

Since the Angels operate in metropolitan areas, and accidents happen, there will always be more people requiring your assistance than you can provide - so bring a friend or two if you can: this mission is fully multiplayer capable, and keeps track of your accomplishments, even between mission restarts. 

There are multiple slots available (hot and cold) for Hueys, Hips, Hooks, Gazelles, Kiowas and Hinds, allowing for more than 40 pilots simultaneously per city (more than 100 pilots total). 

[There are also slots for the Apache and Black Shark, but those helicopters can't perform SAR]

You perform SARs by flying towards the evacuee (they all have locator devices for your ADF). Pearly Gates, your Command Authority can vector you towards your target. Once you get within 1km, help on the ground marks the spot with smoke, and you'll be guided by your chief for the last 100m.

Land close enough to pick up the evacuee. If landing is not possible (too densely populated, roof-top rescues, open water, steep inclines or inaccessible ground or forest), you can winch-rescue by hovering within range and altitude for some 20 seconds. 

Once the evacuee is confirmed on board, you then transfer them to the closest Hospital for triage. Which hospital you choose is your decision. All hospitals are marked with red smoke for easy identification, and Pearly Gates can vector you to the closest hospital on request.

At all times please be mindful of other traffic, both fixed-wing, rotor wing, and - of course - other Angels. Be mindful when entering controlled airspace - although you have priority clearance, try to avoid those congested areas.

Difficulty:
The difficulty level of this mission is a marked step up from "Angels of Caucasus": metropolitan areas often require very precise control of your helicopter, and big helicopters like the Hip may not fit into the claustrophobic warrens where some of your evacuees wait for your help. Use winch-rescue procedures in those cases. That being said, this map offers multiple areas of operation with varying levels of difficulty:

Haifa
The classic. Mind the inclines. Two hospitals with stand-alone landing pads.

Beirut
A dense city, drop dead beautiful, and full of evacuees waiting for your assistance. There is only one hospital here, and it requires roof-top landings.
 
Adana
A sprawling, beautiful city. Many evacuees to rescue, with a diverse mix of difficulty. Two hospitals: one with a stand-alone helicopter pad, the other with roof access only.

Nicosia / Kyrenica
Ah - Nicosia! The jewel of antiquity, and capitol of Cyprus! A split city on a split island. Since the Angels are one of very few groups that both sides trust, the Nicosia Base serves both Kyrenica and Nicosia. Missions can require longer flights. There is one easily accessible field hospital at Nicosia, and another make-shift hospital at Kyrenica harbor.

Tel Aviv 
Notorious for their drivers and with an accident rate to match. A breath-taking waterfront. A single hospital downtown with an easily accessible pad.

A note about fog:
Fog can be enabled through communications. Fog's ceiling is 100 ft MSL, so any location above 100 will not be affected by fog. Nicosia, for example, will not experience fog, while Haifa's and Tel Aviv's lower regions will.

Other notes:

• This mission is entirely non-violent, flying-skills only
• If you also have one of the other "Angels" missions (e.g. "Angels of Caucasus") and persistence is enabled, the missions share all player's accomplishments.
• If run on a server, this mission auto-restarts every 8 hours. It's an endless SAR sandbox mission 
• This mission can persist all your accomplishments (landings, time, rescues) per airframe if you have persistence enabled (this requires that your DCS is 'de-sanitized').
• When run on a server, install 'stopGap GUI' on the server to allow static scenery occupy open player slots.
• If you are a fan of the Blackhawk, you can add it to the mission and it is immediately supported.

Acknowledgements

• PearlyGates and other voice acting by ElevenLabs
• Created with DML
• Uses StopGap 

Enjoy,

-ch

Edited May 5 by cfrag

[cfrag]

Version 1.4 - 20240302

This update fixes a rare bug where weight can accumulate when you crash a helicopter after picking up evacuees. So if you are a good pilot, you don't need that update  

 

[Hotdognz]

Our squad is really enjoying this mission on the Syria map, we have added in the UH-60L and made a separate night version and also versions with rain and wind, we also changed the wind to 310 so it blew away from most of the hospital landing zones stopping the smoke from covering the landing pad.

My only suggestion would to reduce the smoke size and maybe make the smoke colors random for MP so you can call out what color smoke your going for.

Other than this minor things this is great fun.

[HungryCoyote]

"Make the smoke colors random for MP so you can call out what color smoke your going for."  That is an excellent idea. I have seen three pilots trying to pickup the same guy.

[cfrag]

Version 1.5 - 20240606

Changes:

• Added Kiowa to ADA, HFA, BEY and Nicosia
• Updated Rescue Core

[charliefox2]

Not sure what I'm doing wrong, but I can't seem to pick up evacuees no matter how close I land. Winching seems to work fine for me, but I'm unable to pick up the evacuee if I land next to them. Perhaps I'm doing something wrong, or missing some F10 command that is needed, or something else? I took a hot start Huey out of Batumi in single player for this screenshot, but experienced the same issue on Syria in Nicosia with the Huey and Kiowa (also single player hot starts).

[cfrag]

5 hours ago, charliefox2 said:

Not sure what I'm doing wrong, but I can't seem to pick up evacuees no matter how close I land.

I've had similar reports of unrelated function stopping to work that involved aircraft landing, and they all started appearing after the Jul 11 update, so I'm guessing that there may be a similar cause. Thank you for reporting this, I'm looking into it.

[cfrag]

6 hours ago, charliefox2 said:

experienced the same issue on Syria in Nicosia with the Huey and Kiowa

The root cause is that DCS no longer sends take off (ID 3) nor land (ID 4) events for helicopters. Now it sends 54 (Runaway takeoff) and 55 (runway touchdown) instead.

Is this a known issue? Was this announced and silly me simply didn't get the memo? I'm guessing that no longer supporting events ID 3 and 4 is going to mess with a lot of scripts.

[charliefox2]

It seems like you got a response in your other forum post about the issue, but I just heard that yeah, it is in fact a known issue. Here's hoping for a quick fix!

[cfrag]

13 minutes ago, charliefox2 said:

I just heard that yeah, it is in fact a known issue. Here's hoping for a quick fix!

Thanks! With some luck, all this is soon straightened out  

[charliefox2]

Off-topic, is there an easy way to adjust the acceptable landing radius? I'm not a dcs mission editing guru, but I am comfortable working with lua. I saw in the csarManager script that it seemed like there was a property at the top for setting it (set to 50 but then the comment says it's 30?), but then 50 seemed hardcoded in cases where a unit was unloaded to be loaded later, or where a player ejects. Does editing the value at the top suffice or will I need to edit them all? I have some friends who aren't that great at helicopters yet so I'd like to make it a bit easier for them

Another question: I don't run a dedicated server - when I play with my friends, I typically just use the Launch Multiplayer Server option in the mission select menu. As such, I'm not clear how to add the script for StopGap (or I'd be fine just removing it entirely too).

It's awesome to see CSAR being brought back, by the way - I loved the old CSAR server and was sad to see it disappear.

 

 

[cfrag]

11 minutes ago, charliefox2 said:

Off-topic, is there an easy way to adjust the acceptable landing radius?

The maximum distance within which you must be in order to pick up an evacuee? Yes. Since Angels is based on DML, there is no script editing for this, everything is done with trigger zone attributes. Look for the trigger zone named "csarManagerConfig" (I usually color-code them yellow). If there is no attribute named "rescueRadius", the module defaults to its standard value (70 meters I think). Make sure the attribute exists (i.e. add it when it's not there), and enter your desired value (e.g. "50") in the value column. That's all.

11 minutes ago, charliefox2 said:

As such, I'm not clear how to add the script for StopGap (or I'd be fine just removing it entirely too).

I think you mean the stopGap server GUI that helps DCS synchronize client launches. Simply add the stopGapGUI file to the "Scripts/Hooks/" folder in the "DCS" main data folder that also contains the "Missions" directory. Since server scripts are only read when DCS starts up, you then need to restart DCS entirely (just starting a server does not do it).

Edited July 15, 2024 by cfrag

[charliefox2]

Much appreciated!

Do you plan to release a temporary version of the mission until the scripting issue is fixed? Or is there anywhere I can change the event IDs being monitored (assuming it would be that simple)? No worries if not

[cfrag]

13 minutes ago, charliefox2 said:

Do you plan to release a temporary version of the mission until the scripting issue is fixed?

I'm hoping that ED, knowing that they left a lot of issues in their last release, will go the extra mile and close some of the easy fixes very soon. Methinks re-adding the event that was always part of DCS's event system isn't that difficult, and therefore hopefully part of that fix. Going in and fixing the csarManager module isn't that big of a deal. It's regression testing the whole thing (DML and all missions that have dependencies on it) that increases effort. So if DCS reverts within the next two weeks, fixing, regression-testing, documenting and releasing some 15-20 missions isn't a worthwhile effort.

18 minutes ago, charliefox2 said:

Or is there anywhere I can change the event IDs being monitored

It's the csarManager module, look for the onEvent method. Add the new landing id, and - as long as the old landing event doesn't return - you should be set. Also test on server, because DCS has an unfortunate habit of working differently in SP and MP; and MP Dedi. If they work, you are golden until the "return of the Landing event". Frankly, I don't think that they compete with each other, but better safe than sorry.

[charliefox2]

7 hours ago, cfrag said:

It's the csarManager module, look for the onEvent method. Add the new landing id, and - as long as the old landing event doesn't return - you should be set.

14 hours ago, cfrag said:

take off (ID 3) nor land (ID 4) events for helicopters. Now it sends 54 (Runaway takeoff) and 55 (runway touchdown)

So taking a look at the lua code as-is in both Angels of Caucasus and Angels of the Levant, something isn't quite adding up:

if ID == 4 then  -- landed
    csarManager.heloLanded(theUnit)
end

if ID == 3 or ID == 55 then -- take off, postponed take-off 
    csarManager.heloDeparted(theUnit)
end

I would expect to see `ID == 3 or ID == 54` here - it seems odd to me that the departed check is 3 or 55?

Edited July 16, 2024 by charliefox2

[cfrag]

5 hours ago, charliefox2 said:

I would expect to see

Indeed. Try 

if ID == 55 then  -- landed
    csarManager.heloLanded(theUnit)
end

if ID == 3 or ID == 54 then -- take off, postponed take-off 
    csarManager.heloDeparted(theUnit)
end

The real issue is that heloLanded() is time-critical, and a second event happening soon after, may disrupt the timer. That being said, the timer is currently disabled.

[charliefox2]

Yup, that's what I went with (also did 4 or 55 in the first conditional) and it worked fine in multiplayer. Appreciate the help!

[cfrag]

BUG NOTIFICATION: DCS 2.9.6.57650 and 2.9.6.57656

Please be advised that DCS 2.9.6.57650 and 2.9.6.57656 (updates from July 22 and 11) completely breaks this mission. A 'fix' for a previously reported bug has rendered central functionality of this mission inert: the mission can no longer detect if a helicopter has landed. Until this is fixed by ED this mission is unplayable.

Hopefully a fix in the future can restore this mission back to working condition.

Edited July 22, 2024 by cfrag

[cfrag]

UPDATE 20240812 -- V1.60 -- Back from the dead, Chinook and more

It took some time, but here it is, thank you all for your support and patience: The Angels are back in town to rescue people in need all over Haifa, Adana, Kyrenica and Beirut. And they brought along a new toy: The Hook (Chinook). Not being outdone, Pearly Gates have improved their locale reporting, so "Angels" has become an all-round more enjoyable experience.

Details:

• Fixes for the bugs introduced with DCS releases Jul-11 and Jul-22
• Chinook (player controlled) at all airfields, hot and cold
• Better locale information for evacuee position
• People on the ground now smile at you more often

Enjoy,

-ch

Edited August 12, 2024 by cfrag

[cfrag]

Update 20240816 - small bugfix

I overlooked adding a bugfix to Angels Syria. Now it's there.

 

[kalter72]

Hello!
Thank you for your work in creating this mission! Missed the original Search and Rescue server a lot, and here I found your version. Sweet honey for the peace loving helicopter pilot! )) However, noticed that the server is not always available in the game's server list. Like today. Got up in the morning in anticipation of many hours of fun and got such a bummer. (( And spent all this time searching for the author of the mission and the possibility of feedback. Result! ))
  Maybe many will throw rotten tomatoes at me, but after the original version of SAR selection of “victims” from hovering became kindergarten.  While I was carefully trying to squeeze Huey between the houses, the patient himself jumped into the helicopter. )))  Is it possible to complicate this task by reducing the pick-up radius to 5 meters instead of the current 25? If we could also return the possibility to choose the length of the cable, it would be a complete chocolate! ))

Another time I got so carried away that I suddenly noticed my Huey didn't want to get off the ground.  I looked “in the cabin” and found 13 victims stuck together in the cabin like sprat in a can)))) It would be good to limit the pick up to a reasonable number for each helicopter.

Edited September 7, 2024 by kalter72

[cfrag]

35 minutes ago, kalter72 said:

However, noticed that the server is not always available in the game's server list. Like today.

My apologies for being obtuse. I developed this mission so you can run it yourself (as single-player) or host it (local or dedicated) so you can play it with your friends any time that you like. You can freely download the mission (in its Caucasus, Syria and Sinai flavors) from ED's user files (just follow the link in the OP).

That being said, you can occasionally find the mission hosted on my development server ("cfrag's DML Testbed") if and when I'm performing maintenance or feeling like taking a spin myself (I really like these missions myself, even if I authored and tested them to death). Usually, though, that server hosts some other mission I'm stress-testing (Expansion, COIN, Firestarter etc.) for release to public later. Some tests are open to all, some are closed. So, should you feel the urge to rescue some souls, download the mission, and run it.

35 minutes ago, kalter72 said:

Is it possible to complicate this task by reducing the pick-up radius to 5 meters instead of the current 25?

If you have downloaded the mission, all you need to do is open it in mission editor and:

• click on the trigger zone "csarManagerConfig" (you may need to show all trigger zones first). It's color-coded yellow
• You will find a sort of spreadsheet list of 'attributes' with their values (eg "addPrefix" -- "no"). Click on the ADD button below the list. A new line will appear with a name "PROPERTY_?" and an empty value. Change the "PROPERTY_?" (with ? being some number) to  "rescueRadius" (without quotes) and enter a number like "5" (no quotes) as value. The value is in meters (we don't do silly units in DML  )

That's it. You now set the radius in which your helicopter's center of gravity must land in relation to the evacuee to perform a pickup to 5 meters. You may find that a bit too close for comfort (I believe in Angels it's currently set to the default 70 meters), so experiment a bit. 

Edited September 7, 2024 by cfrag

[kalter72]

I appreciate your response!
I downloaded the mission and found out that for some reason my computer is not pulling it up. The FPS is catastrophically low for a comfortable VR game. ((( Can you tell me what the reason is? After all, on the server flies quite comfortable! 

[cfrag]

Just now, kalter72 said:

The FPS is catastrophically low for a comfortable VR game

I found that DCS is quite terrible at loading (I'm assuming you are running the MT preview for VR). Meaning: you'll need to keep it running for some 2-3 minutes after you start the mission until it becomes stable. You can try and offload some of the work to other threads by starting the game as multiplayer even if you fly solo. But yeah, having the server handle the strain (especially for the Sinai and Syria versions) takes some of the performance issues away from your machine. It's one of the reasons I'm now renting a dedicated server (from the kind folk over at Fox3) for most of my DCS playing. And I'm about to throw in the towel and upgrade my GPU - in DCS, once you go VR you can never go back - and that is especially true for rotor heads, so we are doubly afflicted and affected

[kalter72]

4 минуты назад, cfrag сказал:

как только вы перейдете в виртуальную реальность, вы никогда не сможете вернуться назад - и это особенно касается голов ротора, поэтому мы страдаем и страдаем вдвойне

Абсолютно согласен! Это особое удовольствие для мирного пилота вертолета, когда не нужно пытаться разглядеть мелкие детали на мониторах, землю и небо, а пространственное управление вертолетом идеальное! ))