Missions, Instant Missions, Campaigns, Trainings ... where to store them?

[TheBiggerBass]

*** Note to moderators: I don't know where to store this question correctly. Please feel free to move to appropriate forum. ***

My issue is where to store Missions, Instant Missions, Campaigns, Trainings ect. correctly? Saved Games or DCS world, in Missions subfolder or Mods/aircraft/Missions subfolder ? When to generate a .lua inventory file?

Edited Sunday at 07:59 PM by TheBiggerBass

[draconus]

Built in missions come with the modules and are in the installation folder \mods\aircraft\[aircraft_name]\missions\ (or \tech\ for CA and SC)

Paid DLC campaigns are in the installation folder \mods\campaigns\[campaign_anme]\

Your own missions (or ones you download from DCS user files) are meant to be saved to \saved games\dcs\missions\ because that's where "My missions" shorcut will search for them but frankly you can put them anywhere you want - you just have to find them when opening the mission from the ME.

If you want to have user created missions added nicely to your aircraft missions same way as those built-in you'll have to mess with respective .lua files in the subfolders - otherwise they will not be visible there, even when the .miz file is already right there.

[MAXsenna]

2 hours ago, draconus said:

If you want to have user created missions added nicely to your aircraft missions same way as those built-in you'll have to mess with respective .lua files in the subfolders - otherwise they will not be visible there, even when the .miz file is already right there.

Quick and training yes. Not ordinary missions, they will show up if you drop them into the single mission folder.

I'd really love it if we could place anything in the Saved Games folders folders, in the same file structure, and DCS would read both.  

Cheers! 

Edited Tuesday at 01:49 PM by MAXsenna
Spelling

[TheBiggerBass]

Ok, understood for paid campaigns, missions and modules. But it's confusing for user generated modules, missions, trainings, quickstart, campaigns ect. I would like them to show up with their module they are intended for. I also do not understand the logic if and when a .lua inventory is required and how they must be named. Atm it's try and error for me.

Edited Tuesday at 01:18 PM by TheBiggerBass

[silverdevil]

3 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

Ok, understood for paid campaigns, missions and modules. But it's confusing for user generated modules, missions, trainings, quickstart, campaigns ect. I would like them to show up with the module they are intended for. I also do not understand the logic if and when a .lua inventory is required and how they must be named. Atm it's try and error for me.

here is a screenshot of my DCS folder in Saved Games. anything can go in the missions folders, including folders that can group together similar missions.

null

[draconus]

41 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

Ok, understood for paid campaigns, missions and modules. But it's confusing for user generated modules, missions, trainings, quickstart, campaigns ect. I would like them to show up with their module they are intended for. I also do not understand the logic if and when a .lua inventory is required and how they must be named. Atm it's try and error for me.

We can just tell you how it works atm. Here're some instructions: 

Basically you add another chuck of code in curly brackets, including the mission name (whatever you want it to show) and the exact mission file name. Of course you have to own the aircraft, map and mods used in the mission.

Otherwise it's a wish - you can make one here: https://forum.dcs.world/forum/207-dcs-core-wish-list/

1 hour ago, MAXsenna said:

Quick and trading yes. Not ordinary missions, they will show up if you drop them into the single mission folder.

Ah, yes, right.

Edited Tuesday at 01:59 PM by draconus

[MAXsenna]

Ah, yes, right.

Actually, I don't think it was like this when I started in DCS. I was fooling around with the luas once. IIRC, made the same mod/mission file structure in my Saved Games, and made custom luas. Guess what. They took precedence over the Core missions! So I guess the system is sort of in place. Maybe I'll fool around with it some more for testing.

Sent from my SM-A536B using Tapatalk

[Rudel_chw]

55 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

But it's confusing for user generated modules, missions, trainings, quickstart, campaigns ect.

 

The easiest way to handle user created missions, particularly those not made by oneself, is to place them at /Saved Games/, the paths are these:

1) For user campaigns: C:\Users\your user\Saved Games\DCS\Missions\Campaigns\en\  ( be careful, as you may have a customized location for saved games and the DCS folder may be named differently, like DCS.openbeta ) ... each Campaign can be stored on a separate sub folder, to prevent file naming conflicts if you place every campaign on the same folder. On the disk it looks like this:

 

 

Within DCS you will see these campaigns at "My Campaigns":

 

 

2) For every other type of User mission, the path would be: C:\Users\your user\Saved Games\DCS\Missions\  ... this includes quick start and training missions. As you can literally collect hundreds of missions over time, you may employ sub-folders to organize things a bit, so the desired missions are easier to find.

 

 

Within DCS you will see these missions at "My Missions":

 

 

55 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

I would like them to show up with their module they are intended for.

 

Then you would have to place them within the DCS Program folder, which is more complex since ED did not intend it to be touched by the user, and thus any Repair or Update process may delete your custom missions if you are not careful.

 

55 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

I also do not understand the logic if and when a .lua inventory is required and how they must be named. 

 

Both Training and Quickstart missions employ a LUA file to provide descriptive names, you would need to edit them if you want any extra mission to appear on the DCS listing. Standard Missions and Campaigns do not need any LUA file.

 

Eduardo

[sthompson]

3 hours ago, TheBiggerBass said:

Ok, understood for paid campaigns, missions and modules. But it's confusing for user generated modules, missions, trainings, quickstart, campaigns ect. I would like them to show up with their module they are intended for. I also do not understand the logic if and when a .lua inventory is required and how they must be named. Atm it's try and error for me.

Personally I create module specific mission folders in the Saved Games file tree in order to deal with this problem. That works until you come across something like Bankler's Case 1 practice mission, which is for multiple aircraft types.

[Rudel_chw]

18 minutes ago, sthompson said:

Personally I create module specific mission folders in the Saved Games file tree in order to deal with this problem. That works until you come across something like Bankler's Case 1 practice mission, which is for multiple aircraft types.

 

For that case, I have a separate folder tree for "MP Missions".

I used to separate the missions by map folders, but since DCS added the "Map" column to the mission listing I opted to consolidate all my missions by aircraft type instead. Once the sheer quantity of Modules grew too much, I divided them for Helo, WW2, Cold War, and Modern .. just to keep the listings at a reasonable length.

Edited Tuesday at 04:51 PM by Rudel_chw

[TheBiggerBass]

As I have all maps, almost all modules and lot of commercial campaigns I am looking for a method to organize them and get resonable directory lengths. Saving just all missions in Saved Games/missions works, although results in a long inventory listing. I was looking for a way to list the assigned missions and trainings only to appear when their modul and map is selected. I  understand that missions, campaigns, trainings, quickstart ect. rather have to be placed in their Saved Games/DCS/mods/aircraft/<module name>/missions subfolders to achieve that. For Trainings subfolder I need a lessons.lua inventory file (lessons=...) and for QuickStart i need a quickstart.lua inventory file (planes=...). Single does not need another inventory file.

I hope that summarizes it correct.

Edited Tuesday at 05:41 PM by TheBiggerBass

[MAXsenna]

@TheBiggerBass I place all the user campaigns in the core folders, and the missions I use the most. I leave quickstart missions alone, so I don't need to mess with luas at all. That way they will show up under the correct module. For some some user training missions, for modules that don't have them, I just make a lua based on other modules like FC A-10A and F-15C. I do however use a mod manager for this. For other missions, I organise them like Rudel does. 

Cheers! 

Edited Tuesday at 05:34 PM by MAXsenna

[Rudel_chw]

22 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

have to be placed in their Saved Games/mods/aircraft/<module name>/missions

 

Are you sure? I've never used that kind of path for any official Module, only User Mods would employ such a path.

[TheBiggerBass]

Gerade eben schrieb Rudel_chw:

 

Are you sure? I've never used that kind of path for any official Module, only User Mods would employ such a path.

That's correct. If I like to achieve that for a commericial mod it has to be placed in  DCS world/mods/aircraft/<module name>/missions which might break IC test as far as I understood.

[MAXsenna]

37 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

I  understand that missions, campaigns, trainings, quickstart ect. rather have to be placed in their Saved Games/DCS/mods/aircraft/<module name>/missions subfolders to achieve that.

 

6 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

That's correct. If I like to achieve that for a commericial mod it has to be placed in  DCS world/mods/aircraft/<module name>/missions which might break IC test as far as I understood.

You are confusing us! Make up your mind! Are you actually talking about core folders or Saved Games folders?

If you add anything in Saved Games\DCS\mods\xxxx\missions with luas. They might override and make missions in Core invisible. I tried that several years ago. As @cfrag has suggested many times, we should get rid of the luas all together, and have missions contain meta data and have them placed anywhere, preferably in Saved Games in whatever structure and let the missions be populated by module mission type.

If you add custom missions to the core, they will never break IC. Actually, you can add any file you want, as long as it's a custom file, not an altered original, and they will not break IC. 

Cheers! 

[cfrag]

While I believe this discussion to be helpful and interesting, I also believe that it would behoove ED to lend a hand and bring mission organization out of the 1990s: by only listing missions (and not merely showing files ending on .miz, they do more and make sure it’s a zip format), they show that they have that ability; they could offer filters for map, aircraft type, multiplayer, and maybe even time of day, to make choosing a mission much more accessible. And yes, that mission dialog should find any mission inside saved games. We live in the second quarter of the 21st century, for crying out loud! What we have today is IMHO pathetic, and probably (hopefully) no longer represents the abilities of ED’s talent…

 

Edited Tuesday at 06:23 PM by cfrag

[TheBiggerBass]

vor 28 Minuten schrieb MAXsenna:

You are confusing us!

Well, that's what I understood so far - and it's confusing for me too . All I would like to achieve is that missions, trainings, campaigns ect. gets listed with their selected module and map only to achieve reasonable directory listings and find the best way how to achieve this.

Edited Tuesday at 06:25 PM by TheBiggerBass

[MAXsenna]

39 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

Well, that's what I understood so far - and it's confusing for me too . All I would like to achieve is that missions, trainings, campaigns ect. gets listed with their selected module and map only to achieve reasonable directory listings and find the best way how to achieve this.

Yeah, but you contradicted yourself in what I quoted.  

You're already using a mod manager, right? Then you can easily push single missions into the relevant modules single mission folder and do the same for user campaigns. Just make sure you keep campaigns in seperate folders. No Lua involved!

If you want to add additional training missions. Edit the Lua file, and just add the missions. It's really easy, then you push that Lua with the additional missions with a mod manager. The same can be done with quick missions, but why bother.

For missions and campaigns you don't really care about have them in Saved Games. For single missions, make a file structure at your leisure, while add campaigns to the campaigns folder. 

This will be my recommendation as the easiest way, if you want missions and campaigns to populate the various modules, without clicking the "My missions".

Cheers! 

[draconus]

6 hours ago, Rudel_chw said:

any Repair or Update process may delete your custom missions if you are not careful

It will move any additional or modded files to the backup folder.

Edited Tuesday at 08:42 PM by draconus

[TheBiggerBass]

No, I still don't use a mod manager. Although it's more work I prefer to manually track which file is going where.

However, I guess I understand the logic now and I don't mind to manually edit inventory .lua files. I just would like to understand how DCS lists missions, campaigns, trainings etc.

[silverdevil]

46 minutes ago, TheBiggerBass said:

No, I still don't use a mod manager. Although it's more work I prefer to manually track which file is going where.

However, I guess I understand the logic now and I don't mind to manually edit inventory .lua files. I just would like to understand how DCS lists missions, campaigns, trainings etc.

i suppose you could try to use Process Monitor when you run dcs. it will keep track of files that are accessed when the sim runs. 

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/procmon

[Rudel_chw]

1 hour ago, TheBiggerBass said:

I don't mind to manually edit inventory .lua files

 

Here is a tip for the "lessons.lua" file used for the training missions: you only need to specify the filename of each mission, in the order you want them to appear on the DCS list.

The mission name and description are taken automatically by ED from within the MIZ file, like this:

 

 

On the pic you can see that the standard missions (I show only the first mission, for clarity) specify all three fields, while the ones I added for Nevada and Kola (also show only the first mission of each set) make use of this tip.

 

 

Eduardo

[MAXsenna]

1 hour ago, TheBiggerBass said:

No, I still don't use a mod manager. Although it's more work I prefer to manually track which file is going where.

To be honest, that's exactly what you do with a mod manager. When you make the mod you specify where the files go. It will not randomly put them elsewhere. I cannot count how many times users have put mods in the wrong place. With a mod manager, you have full control. Doing it manually will actually give you a false sense of control. One drag and drop where one accidentally let go of the mouse button, and off to the repair it is.

I use mod managers even for my Saved Games Mods. I can easily disable them during updates and for tracking down conflicts. A mod manager like SLAM will apply mods in seconds and not wear out your SSDs with the writing to disk.

These are just recommendations of course.