bush pilot Fly Tanoa Air [FTA]

[wogz187 1086]

To help new pilots get started in FTA I've started designing a guidebook. Check it out, and if I missed something crucial, gimme a heads-up.

 

Bush landings are fully implemented. Like I said in a previous post, you can steal the cargo from AdT and begin smuggling for the Old Man. You can also select the illicit bush sites for landing using the same radio code system for choosing regular destinations. Codes ~007 to ~009. Code ~000 is the Old Man's farm and finally code ~006 is a new feature "Playa Island". Playa Island is a home point for the player character and includes multiple bush landing sites. This feature is WIP but will round out the bush landings aspect and complete this design phase.

 

Have fun!

[Jnr4817 215]

Can you do the smuggling with helicopters yet? Any other missions cross compatible with helo's?

 

Thanks

[wogz187 1086]

4 hours ago, Jnr4817 said:

Can you do the smuggling with helicopters yet? Any other missions cross compatible with helo's?

 

Thanks

@Jnr4817,

@typhoontiger was working on helicopter missions. I'm not sure what's going on with that right now.

Helicopter Addon available on the main page.
Try replacing the plane with a helicopter in the editor. Most of the features should work just fine.
1) Grab the file from the mod page

2) Install the dev files to your missions folder

3) Fire up 0_tanoaAIR in EDEN

4) Copy the init properties from "playerJET" to your helicopter and move the co-pilot over

5) Delete the plane and rename your chopper "playerJET".

There are no "isKind" type scripts and most refer to "vehicle player".

 

Basically everything should work. You may need to fine-tune some variables in the Radar Warning System (or disable it). The "Speed UP" warning will be super-annoying. If there are any issues just message here. I have considered adding a helicopter now alongside the new feature "Playa Island", but I'm not confirming that yet.

EDIT:
One other consideration, the starting location. Tanoa 2-6 starts in a hangar so you'll need to move forward a few meters. Moving the starting position will skew the cameras. You'll need to move the camera markers around if you want to use them. Just put the marker where you want the camera and the target where you want it to point.

[Jnr4817 215]

Most excellent. I'd like to see both a fixed wing and rotor wing at the airport and the player gets to pick which frame he wants. I'd use the ghosthawk or hellcat.

 

Thanks

[wogz187 1086]

4 hours ago, Jnr4817 said:

Most excellent. I'd like to see both a fixed wing and rotor wing at the airport and the player gets to pick which frame he wants. I'd use the ghosthawk or hellcat.

 

Thanks

@Jnr4817

Here I made a mod of my mod for you 😄. Install FTA as per normal and just replace mission .sqm. I disable the auto-aws, you can still engage it manually on the Mission Controller. Play-test it and tell me how it works.

Have fun,

 

Use the new Helicopter Addon file on the main page.
Mission file

[wogz187 1086]

Helicopters are great.

 

With the next version a helicopter will be included in the main file as an option to choose at start-up. Like next Friday. Before that would be a good time for feedback.

I'm not good at it but I like it. I like it a lot,

Have fun!

[JohnKalo 657]

Sadly no time to test it but it looks cool! Awesome training too 

[Jnr4817 215]

Heck yea. I'm flying for real today. I'll check it out tomorrow.

 

Thanks,

[wogz187 1086]

In game helicopter transition

Soon...

[wogz187 1086]

Friday is update day around the FTA offices.

What's new:

* Helicopter: play the whole scenario in a helicopter

* Playa Island: Begin the scenario from AdT like usual or switch to Playa Island

* Earn money to pay for fuel and repairs

* New readMe and Guidebook
 

The mod is too big for me to effectively play-test the whole thing myself. Your quality feedback is what drives this project. Keep it coming.

Have fun!

[JohnKalo 657]

Feedback is often requested and rarely provided. Gladly some people at least provide feedback about bugs or glitches.

Cannot blame them. Once a person gave me feedback about a mission dependency and was suprised that I replied about it. 

[Arfour 31]

Great job with the Helicopter option. Only problem is that I don't seem to get any missions. I can ferry people around and if I click the emergency scanner I get the "pursue car" mission - and nothing else. And I am always missing the car. Where should I look for it?

[wogz187 1086]

@Arfour,

Quote

Great job with the Helicopter option. Only problem is that I don't seem to get any missions. I can ferry people around and if I click the emergency scanner I get the "pursue car" mission - and nothing else. And I am always missing the car. Where should I look for it?

Thanks for the feedback,

You can collect passengers, as you know. You can also collect cargo from AdT, it's at the north end of the terminal, some boxes. That one is supposed to be super-easy, you don't even have to stop to collect it, just go past that area-- the trigger is around the helo pad. The cargo is important because when you steal it for the old man it begins off airport missions. Surely you would never try to "steal" a passenger for the old man. Make sure to reassign your destination to the old man's farm with radio code ~000 after takeoff.

Click CHAD on the menu to begin flying with Chad. He gets a helicopter too.

As for the emergencies, you get Stolen Car and No Emergency, right? This is the reason for play-testing. There may be an issue with the Boat Rescue selection weighting (ie it's never selected). It may still be possible to get the boat mission but at a ratio of like 20 stolen cars to one missing boat. That'll be fixed.

Stolen Car
There are about a dozen random start and end points. The car travels between them. The task you get is the last "known location". Your job is to extrapolate where the car could be based on, say, how long it took for your to get there. Generally speaking just follow the roads around the last known location. Also consider, you will likely not succeed every time even when you get good at it. And this is an Arma mission so it's blurry between sim and game. A real search could go on for hours or days. Most of the time such a search in a game would not exceed ~5 minutes. In FTA the search could take the better part of 20 minutes or be over in less than 5 depending on the cars random starting point and random destination.

Don't forget you can set your own destination any time with the radio codes (HELP on the menu). This is good to practice bush landings over and over.

Go see the old man he'll keep you busy just make sure to take a shipment of stolen cargo with you. 

And there are four ring courses to find and master.

[Arfour 31]

Thank you for the hint about the radio codes. I was wondering how to use them, thinking it would be within the standard comm codes. Since they don't work I was confused. Turns out, I just have to press 0-0-0, even without the ~ (I was trying the ~ key without anything happening, which confused me even more.) 😄

 

One thing I did notice: My first fare registered as being dropped off at the right location but never actually left the chopper. He's still sitting in the back, enjoying the ride.

 

I am wondering though why you are seated in the co-pilot seat. Has this something to do with the AI autopilot? Being the pilot of the chopper would be nice to use the HUD. I don't get that as co-pilot. Since I don't have a track AR system it is quite hard to read the instruments while flying.

[wogz187 1086]

@Arfour,
 

Quote

to press 0-0-0, even without the ~

Oh. That's good to know. The flight control menu is also touchscreen compatible.
 

Quote

My first fare registered as being dropped off at the right location but never actually left the chopper. He's still sitting in the back, enjoying the ride.

I'll look into this.
 

Quote

I am wondering though why you are seated in the co-pilot seat. Has this something to do with the AI autopilot? Being the pilot of the chopper would be nice to use the HUD. I don't get that as co-pilot.

Your seating position doesn't determine the HUD, it's been removed for immersion. This probably makes helicopter flight a lot more difficult which I didn't consider. Restoring the HUD is more challenging than a toggle switch, it will require a new .PBO file. I'll figure some solution to this. You can download the Dev files version to fix the HUD yourself in the meantime, if you like. Just open the mission in the editor, alt-tab out, open the description.ext and change the second line,
showHUD = 0; to
//showHUD = 0; or change it to 1, or remove the line completely.
Back in the editor click "Export to Single-player". All done.

Thanks again for your feedback.

Here's a new PBO. Just overwrite and restart scenario.

Have fun!

[Arfour 31]

22 minutes ago, wogz187 said:

Your seating position doesn't determine the HUD, it's been removed for immersion. This probably makes helicopter flight a lot more difficult which I didn't consider. Restoring the HUD is more challenging than a toggle switch, it will require a new .PBO file. I'll figure some solution to this.

Great, thanks! It's not that bad though. It does add to the immersion, which is great. I guess the frequent landing makes watching the fuel less relevant anyways since you get fueled every time, right? A switch would be nice though. It helps getting a good feeling for the chopper but makes estimating speed and elevation a bit vague. 😉

 

What do you mean by "touchscreen"?

[wogz187 1086]

@Arfour,

Quote

...since you get fueled every time, right?

Should be anytime fuel is less than 40%.
 

Quote

What do you mean by "touchscreen"?

If your computer monitor is a touchscreen you can use the menu by pressing the buttons with your fingers. A novel gimmick, perhaps, but kinda cool.

The key benefit of splitting player files (PBO) and Mission files (DEV), is that it's super-easy (barely an inconvenience!) to upload a new PBO. So I'm gonna post a new PBO off release schedule to address the helicopter FARE issue (it's already fixed, thanks again). Check back in like 20 minutes.

FTA 0041 Fixed:
* Helicopter Fare stuck at destination
* Low probability of Boat Rescue

[.kju 3245]

Looks pretty cool @wogz187 👍 There are far too few plane missions available in A3, especially randomized/with task generator.

 

A few questions:

1) How much effort involved to port to other terrains?

2) How much airfields necessary? Can you add scripted/configured via the mission?

3) WW2 version please 🙏

4) How much effort to port to WW2?

 

thanks for your efforts!

[wogz187 1086]

@.kju,

Quote

 

A few questions:

1) How much effort involved to port to other terrains?

2) How much airfields necessary? Can you add scripted/configured via the mission?

3) WW2 version please 🙏

4) How much effort to port to WW2?

 

A few answers (I hope):
1) I don't know about custom terrains but FTA is designed for easy porting to BI maps. The system isn't perfect yet but the idea is that all the core components are grouped in layers which makes it easy to select all the necessary objects/triggers/modules and create a custom composition. The script files are also grouped in folders which more-or-less correspond to the editor layer-- but I said the system isn't perfect yet.
2) Adding and removing new airports in FTA takes 1 minute.
3) I can't make anything that requires outside assets. I made the decision that my mods should work with out of the box product. It's sad but true.
4) If you want to add your own plane to FTA it is super-easy. Drop your new plane on the tarmac beside Tanoa 2-6 in the editor. Drag the co-pilot out of 2-6. Copy everything (ctrl+A, ctrl+C) out of 2-6's init properties and paste into your new plane. Delete Tanoa 2-6. Rename your plane "playerJET" and stick it where 2-6 was. You may have trouble with the mobile phone not being in the correct position but you also shouldn't be using mobile devices in a WW2 plane anyhow.

If you want to see how FTA works check out the forum topic here.
😄

 

Have fun!

[wogz187 1086]

What's new: changelog

*Got rid of annoying stuff and replaced with awesome stuff, see changelog

New file Friday as per usual,

Have fun!

[wogz187 1086]

We here at FTA HQ appreciate your patience up to this point with the BETA state of Mod's mechanics. The latest version 0042 will be considered a Playable Demo-- pre-release BETA.

 

What's new:

* Terminal Services (paint, repair, refuel)

* 2 off airport cargo destinations for good guys

* Abort Challenge action, Warning System toggle action

* Engine Malfunction and Engine Diagnostics
*HINT button on the Flight Control Menu
*Karma, Money, Skill attributes for player
*AERO button on Flight Control Menu for Aerobatic Ring Challenge hint and search
*Completely redesigned and rewrote core scripts (functions)
*Improved user interface

Check out the changeLog for more details,

Have fun!

 

 

[wogz187 1086]

@Jnr4817, @Arfour, @.kju, @JohnKalo, @beno_83au, @stburr91, @Maff,

Make your own mission with an easy to configure network of airports. Use the vehicle functions with pretty much any vehicle.

Have fun!


This week's update isn't a FTA update at all!
There is a new version of FTA which uses the above framework coming soon.

[wogz187 1086]

I have a little bit more to do before tomorrow's update but here's the changelog,
 

0050
*Created FTA framework for mission editing

*Integrated Framework

*Added air traffic
*Added traffic warning
*Added ADS-B button to toggle ATC communication
*Revamped triggers and AWS (yet again)
*Added “EXIT” button to disembark (wip coming soon)
*Moved “ABORT” action to GUI
*Moved “TIME” change GUI button to action menu (terminal services)
*Removed “Playa Island”
*Removed Bush landing sites 2 and 5 (they are still there but unmarked)
*Added Bush Landing site 4 (research facility) to regular cargo delivery
*Added passenger dialog
*Redesigned destination assignment with “FTA_fnc_towerCall”
*Reorganized folder structure (now with about 60% fewer files!)
*Optimized performance by about 50% (compared to an empty scene)

*Tonnes of minor fixes

Currently I'm unsure of the functionality of helicopters because I have had too much to test just with the plane. Helicopter seems fine but if you spot any problems report it here.

 

The extra-vehicular missions will likely not make it into this release. I'm open to ideas about the missions outside of the vehicle. So far I plan:

Hero: Land in a remote location and exit the vehicle to find a lost hiker. Escort the hiker back to the plane, board, return to AdT.
Smuggler: Grab a gun and help GOM defend his farm from rival smugglers.

[wogz187 1086]

Version 0050 is now posted on the main page and I launched a Steam Workshop page for FTA here.

Although there have been many changes very few of those changes are "player facing" changes. Mostly behind-the-scenes improvements.

These are the things you may notice,
* ADS-B button on the GUI: toggles ATC updates
* EXIT button on the GUI: WIP
*"FARE" has been removed from the GUI and replaced by "Load Passenger" in the terminal services menu

Have fun!