Just Finished It. Thanks! .... but mission 9

[artao]

First let me say, I don't often get so into a campaign as to play only it fully to the finish.

But this is mostly what I did with Paradise Lost. EXCELLENT campaign. I did play UN Pilot a bit here and there (as well as Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis) but mostly have just been trying to get thru Paradise Lost.

The campaign SERIOUSLY improved my Huey flying. If only ED would address the performance issues of the Marianas map, but they get no money out of it so that's unlikely <sigh>

Mission 9 tho. ... Mission 9 ...
I've been thinking about what to say about mission 9.
I flew ahead of the convoy, not just orbited overhead. If I saw a good likely ambush spot I'd zip ahead and check it out then zip back to the convoy.
Well, I checked out the woods around those warehouses and saw nothing, so proceeded further ahead. When I got the call about the ambush I was pretty surprised and figured I'd missed something. But finding out where they were? I was like like, "Uh, why didn't I see them when I flew over a moment ago?" Roof colored tarps over themselves maybe? I dunno. <shrug> lol
At any rate, they got very very rapidly slaughtered by my gunners. I took almost no hits. SO! Thinking this may be a decoy ambush since it was rather weak, I rushed as fast as I could to catch back up with the rest of the convoy, which was approaching heavy jungle areas where larger ambushes would be easy.
I got to them, but was exceedingly surprised to be called back to orbit over the casualties to protect them, even tho I'd already taken care of that.

At any rate, proceeding on ... Went to FSB Berlin. .. Let me tell you, I freakin HATE FSB Berlin!! LOL (not complaining, it's the pilot) Landing there is the worst. Took mortar rounds to the face. .............. I crashed there trying to land.
Suffice to say I crashed several times not just at FSB B but before and after that as well. Which meant I had to replay that beginning convoy protection over and over. IIRC five times.
And obviously, I knew each time exactly where the convoy would get attacked. I decided not to "cheat" and preteneded I didnt' know that at first, and did my escort patrol as normal. But eventually that became tiresome so I'd just wait at the buildings til the bad guys popped into existence then annihilate them immediately.

Pehaps it would be possible to randomize the location of the ambush so the player doesn't end up in a situation like I did?
Of course, with ED's "save mid-mission" feature upcoming, that will be less needed. But still. ...

Gotta say, I was VERY surprised there wasn't a further, larger ambush waiting ....

Thanks for a great campaign! I'll definitely be considering your others. I'm likely to create a new mortal pilot to see if I can get thru the campaign without dying. (only 20 deaths registered, 68% mission success .. but easily twice that many including "refly"ing missions) But I would say in general that if you can finish Paradise Lost then you can fly the Huey.

It was also during this campaign + UN Pilot that I realized that DCS's logbook is f-ed up. For one thing, it doesn't record flight hours and other stats if you "Refly" a mission. You have to end the mission and then fly it again as the next campaign mission. 76 campaign missions but only 36 flight hours? uhhhhh no LOL Far more deaths as well.

Edited October 8, 2024 by artao
corrections, additions

[Reflected]

Hmm, good call on checking for a larger ambush! I never though of that. FSB Berlin…what happened there is something I read about in many Huey pilot memoirs so I just had to include it in the campaign

Randomization is difficult because then you need a whole new set of voice overs, new rescue helo to land somewhere else, etc…the more you randomize the less details you can add, it’s always a tradeoff. 

[MAXsenna]

14 minutes ago, Reflected said:

Hmm, good call on checking for a larger ambush! I never though of that. FSB

Whaaaat?! First thing I did too, and the divertion was not expected as well. All good fun!