[SP] Close Air Support (A Random AH-6 Assault Mission)

[sxp2high 23]

Close Air Support

A Random AH-6 Assault Mission

In this mission you are flying an AH-6 Little Bird equipped with M134 heavy machine gun and Hydra rockets. Your task is to defend a squad against the enemy forces approaching them.

The mission is different each time you start it, ensuring high replayability...

Random ...

... Location (34 positions available)

... Time of day

... Weather

... Wind

... Amount friendly units

... Amount enemy units

... Enemy vehicle types

Goals

Starting at the FOB, you have to fly to the target area and protect the squad against the enemies.

Mission fail: If all squad members die, you die or your helicopter gets immobilized.

Mission success: If all enemy forces are dead.

To finish the mission you have to return to the FOB, land, and shut down your engine.

Features

To repair, refuel and rearm you have to land on the Helipad inside the FOB and wait 15 seconds. You do not have to shut down your engine for that!

Installation

Copy the *.pbo file to your Take On Helicopters \ AddOns folder. (Or use a Mod Folder)

Restart your game.

It will show up under Singleplayer > Challenges

Known issues

-

Changelog

v1.1
***********************************************************************
Various small fixes and optimizations not listed here
FIXED: Task position was sometimes on water
FIXED: Units, vehicles and objects sometimes spawned on water
CHANGED: Speeded up task setup
CHANGED: Enemies are now approaching a bit slower, more wave like
CHANGED: Reduced maximum task distance from FOB to 45km
CHANGED: Friendly vehicle types and amount are now random as well
CHANGED: Mission is now packed in Addon format ([url]http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Mission_Export#Addon_Format[/url])
CHANGED: Rain is now dynamic (based on rain value at mission start)
ADDED: Loading screen during task setup
ADDED: Note "Environment" (Showing overcast, rain and wind information)

Download

Here or Here

Hope you enjoy it... I'm looking forward to your feedback and ideas to improve the mission!

Edited December 7, 2012 by sxp2high

[-DirTyDeeDs--Ziggy- 0]

Thanks for sharing!

I think task 70 or 80 km away is too far to call it CLOSE air support ;)

I get my ass kicked when I play it, so I will say no more until I beat it :cool:

[sxp2high 23]

Yea i guess :D

Please download again, i slightly changed it. It's now 46 positions instead of 61. I removed the ones that were really far away. Still about 60km in some cases. (Damn that map is huge!)

If you're not in the mood and think the task is too far away you can just restart the mission until it's located somewhere you like it.

I also reduced the amount of enemy vehicles, to make it a bit more "easy". Got my ass kicked too. My flying skills are somewhat okay... but aiming, hiding and shooting is tough. + Pressure of the squad dying slowly but surely... :D

[Derbysieger 11]

Sounds like an awesome mission.

Downloading now.

Thanks

[manzilla 1]

Sweet, a new mission! This looks great. I'll give it a go for sure.

Hooray for the community! The missions are coming folks. And begin........ :D

[virtualvikingx 19]

Ooohhh. Thanks! Just tried out "Workhorse" for the first time last night. Excellent, will try this for sure.

[jedra 11]

Yeah Workhorse is one of my favourite Arma SP missions (and absolutely gorgeously scripted - such neat work in that pbo!). I'll be trying this one later!

[moricky 211]

- Overview.html doesn't work. (Not my fault)

Bug, gonna be fixed in next patch. Thanks for finding it ;)

Yet I recommend to avoid using obsolete mission format and pack mission as an addon instead. See Mission Export article on Biki.

Among other benefits are automatically structured overviews and ability to sign your mission.

(Obsolete) Mission format:

Addon format (including signature):

- Sometimes it takes up to 30 seconds until the task is initialized and the marker, notes and tasks show up in the briefing. Just be patient.

Consider using startLoadingScreen and endLoadingScreen to prioritize scripted init.

- Sometimes the target location is on the water. Seems like surfaceIsWater doesn't work properly on the South Asia map (Units can walk on the water surface too :confused:). If you see the task location is on the water, simply restart the mission. (Problem occurs not very often)

Use also following code to check for water presence:

surfaceType _pos == "#SAWater"

surfaceIsWater not working on South Asia map is known issue and we're working on it at the moment.

I converted the mission into addon format and added loading screens, so you can see how is it done.

sxp2high_close_air_support.pbo

Edited November 8, 2011 by Moricky

[manzilla 1]

Gaia,

Great info there. Much appreciated!

[-DirTyDeeDs--Ziggy- 0]

great info, thanks for updating the Biki!

Yet I recommend to avoid using obsolete mission format and pack mission as an addon instead. See Mission Export article on Biki.

Ingame download of mission

does this mean they will no longer be saved to MPMissions cache?

that's a negative :j:

In the past I've acquired many missions when visiting dedicated servers. Will I be able to get them if servers are using addon format? Or is this primarily intended for client users only?

Edited November 8, 2011 by [DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-

[sxp2high 23]

Thanks a lot Gaia for your very helpful reply. Great info!

For SP missions it seems to be a good thing, packing as addon. I'll take a look at it and try to put it in action.

And thanks for the compliments on Workhorse - I'll maybe do something similar in the future for the South Asia map. Too bad we don't have a Chinook (yet) :D

I'm also thinking about splitting the CAS mission into two. North and South, both using just one half of the map - To reduce the long flights to the task location...

[.kju 3245]

@Gaia

Addon missions don't work in MP (as long as there is no ingame addon download).

[-DirTyDeeDs--Ziggy- 0]

a gameplay video will be uploaded over night :)

[sxp2high 23]

Cool :) Looking forward to it!

Update available

Thanks to Gaia, i was able to fix all known issues and packed the mission in Addon format.

Links updated in the first post!

Changelog

v1.1
***********************************************************************
Various small fixes and optimizations not listed here
FIXED: Task position was sometimes on water
FIXED: Units, vehicles and objects sometimes spawned on water
CHANGED: Speeded up task setup
CHANGED: Enemies are now approaching a bit slower, more wave like
CHANGED: Reduced maximum task distance from FOB to 45km
CHANGED: Friendly vehicle types and amount are now random as well
CHANGED: Mission is now packed in Addon format (http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Mission_Export#Addon_Format)
CHANGED: Rain is now dynamic (based on rain value at mission start)
ADDED: Loading screen during task setup
ADDED: Note "Environment" (Showing overcast, rain and wind information)

Edited November 9, 2011 by sxp2high

[-DirTyDeeDs--Ziggy- 0]

I'm posting this at 2:30am my time, I must have been hypnotized by the frog! :rolleyes: :D

Close Air Support - gameplay

[sxp2high 23]

Nice video! ...and nice flying, your skills are quite impressive! :butbut:

One thing though, the helicopter you destroyed was on your side - As of yet, there are no enemy air units. Just 55% chance that a friendly heli spawns in the area.

Maybe i should add a hostile heli as well? Looks like fun killing them :D

[-DirTyDeeDs--Ziggy- 0]

LOL! really? I shot a friendly down? Imagine air being slowly let out of a balloon, the sound it makes... FPDR

thanks for the compliment :o

[jedra 11]

Wow, this is hard! Great mission, but I think I had better learn to fly properly before I have to shoot as well!

EDIT ---> Just completed it - what a hoot! Great mission, my effort is currently chugging it's way up to Youtube!

Edited November 9, 2011 by Jedra

[lNTRUDER 26]

-Ziggy-;2053802'] I'm posting this at 2:30am my time' date=' I must have been hypnotized by the frog! :rolleyes: :D

Close Air Support - gameplay

The best music :)

Nice flying too!

[sxp2high 23]

Wow, this is hard! Great mission, but I think I had better learn to fly properly before I have to shoot as well!

Thanks... and yeah, that's what i thought. But after a few rounds of playing it you get better at shooting and flying at the same time... :)

-Ziggy-;2054024']Imagine air being slowly let out of a balloon' date=' the sound it makes... FPDR[/quote'] :D

Well it's a bit confusing that the units are not complaining about friendly fire like in ArmA ...

So, i wrote that myself using Event Handlers. Will be included in the next update:

[jedra 11]

Here's my effort...

W_LAgkrOBhU

if the embed doesn't work! Edited November 10, 2011 by Jedra

[sxp2high 23]

Nice! :)

I see you guys are constantly moving, which is generally a good thing.

My style is a bit different though, i usually go into hover (preferably behind a hill or something) and observe the area. Once i spotted something i go for an attack run, then back to cover, hover and repeat. (Maybe i'll make a video too)

More easy to evaluate the situation and spot targets that way, especially infantry groups are hard to see while moving and focusing on the heli controls.

On the down side i'm an easy target while hovering and there is not always good cover present in the AO. (Like in your video - all flatland).

Just used to that style from countless hours of Apache/Viper/Cobra flying in ArmA... :D

[jedra 11]

I tried the hover approach, but in the terrain I got it was suicide! The friendly helo didn't last very long - and it didn't succumb to friendly fire like some ;-)

EDIT ----> sxp2High, I keep meaning to ask what you use for recording radio communications. I have tried a few (admittedly free) voice to text apps and they don't sound as good as the ones that you produce even with editing in sounjd software.

Edited November 10, 2011 by Jedra

[Orford 10]

video removed due to copyright, did you use some music? Any chance or a new upload.

edit: 20 seconds later it works. Ty.

Edited November 10, 2011 by Orford

[jedra 11]

video removed due to copyright, did you use some music? Any chance or a new upload.

edit: 20 seconds later it works. Ty.

Yeah - I forgot my in game music would breach copyright somewhere. I got an email about it from youtube, but they seem to still be allowing it. Perhaps EMI think Meatloaf needs the publicity! They advertise the album on iTunes next to it so I guess that's fair!