PlannedAssault web based mission builder

[_William 0]

Couldnt resist trying this out immediately. My GOD its impressive! Have just played through my first, extremely hastily thrown together mission but even that had an incredible and believable atmosphere I rarely find in missions. It really did feel like being part of a large battle where both sides had a clear plan and I was caught in the middle. I was absolutely gobsmacked when the OPFOR AI called in a fire mission on the centre of the village I was defending prior to their assault, even more so when a BLUFOR squad commander called in some IDF on an enemy position on a ridge. I can't wait to delve into this deeper.

One possible fly in the ointment - the AI artillery seemed outrageously acurate, taking out two LAV-25's with one short barrage from a single D30. I'll check again though as it might have been a BMP that got round a flank and was in direct fire (the LAV-25's didn't so mutch as twitch so I suspect it was IDF).

For those interested I was running ACE2 and ZEUS AI (turned of GL4 though as I was pretty sure it would interfere with AI carrying out the plan).

If some British Forces become available in the future i'll be as happy as a pig in the proverbial!

_William i've been playing since OFP was first out and I honestly think this rates as one of the probable greats the community has delivered to us. In particular for those people who struggle in the editor it will be gold dust. Congratulations, thankyou and I look forward to this developing further in the future.

Joe, thanks for your feedback.

Would it be OK if I quote you on the site to provide a user's perspective on the missions?

Wrt AI: the generated mission relies as much as possible on vanilla Arma constructs (waypoints, triggers, ...), in order to be compatible with the widest range of mods. The exceptions are:

- defense AI using a trigger on hostile spotted to call in CAS/artillery, and fire support controller script to ensure that CAS and artillery aren't called in simultaneously

- some scripts to deal with mounting a single group across multiple vehicles or empty guns

Most of the AI I wrote is busy during mission generation to figure out where and how to attack/defend with whom. From there, I try to make things as standard as possible for compatibility reasons.

So feel free to enable GL4 and see what happens.

The extreme artillery accuracy you've suffered is most likely due to SADARM munition being the default mission for M109/D30 guns. SADARM is smart munition, targeting vehicles. The mission is fired using the default Arma 2 artillery module.

---------- Post added at 08:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:44 PM ----------

I love it. Will it be possible to, in the future:

1 - Use the Independent faction?

2 - Use all or most of Chernarus?

3 - Use other Islands?

4 - Increase the amount of units per side?

Yes, no, yes and yes. Don't know when, but these are on my list.

I've experimented with other parts of Chernarus: however, most of the terrain isn't very suitable for vehicles and Arma's vehicle AI, due to the mountains and woods. I've generated missions for the Larenga area only to see units getting stuck or refusing to move to a next waypoint.

However, if you know good and interesting tank country elsewhere on Chernarus, please let me know.

---------- Post added at 09:06 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:55 PM ----------

Tremendous effort!

Had a quick go yesterday and everything went smooth, took a while for the .pbo to get built but from a usability pov it´s most excellent!

Testing ingame revealed to me that some precautions have to made before designing the mission, in my scenario i had to walk for 20 minutes (infantry lameassing at every single bush) and by the time i arrived at the destinations there we´re only some stray enemies left. Tanks had arrived way before any unmounted element came even close, so all of them got toasted by AT. Also most of the town´s defenders were obviously killed in the mortar strike and CAS that opened the attack. When all the stray enemies were gone the mission still didn´t end, but i knew it was due to the east arty element i had put some hundred meters outside of town - i advanced towards it and to my great amazement, got owned by a russian MLRS with 100m direct fire :p

Thanks for the feedback. I don't compile downloaded missions to .pbos but instead copy the mission folder into c:\users\william\My Documents\ArmA 2. Then I launch the game with all mods required, and load the mission into the editor. Shift-click on preview to start the mission with the briefing.

Your 20 minute march gave me a good laugh. You won't forget to add some transport next time!

The downside of coordinated assaults is that you often rush to stand in line again (hurry up and wait). For some that's realistic, for others that's boring (hint: speed up the game).

---------- Post added at 09:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:06 PM ----------

Goodness me, I've just realised why the name William van der Sterren sounded familiar to me. I remember your Computer Generated Forces for AQ2. Computer gaming has come a long way in a decade but you've obviously continued your interest in AI problem solving, good job! Google reveals a mirror is still up; CGF for Action Quake 2, well worth a peruse people, especially knowing what William has gone on to create here.

I'm surprised you remember that. Impressive! Between AQ2 and this, I've worked on tactical shooter AI; the most visible result was a presentation at GDC2005 with the folks from Guerrilla Games on 'Killzone’s AI : Dynamic Procedural Combat Tactics'. That presentation explains how to create (or compute) terrain specific small-unit tactical behaviors.

In PlannedAssault, I'm exploring AI solutions for larger scale combat behavior.

[joeanorak 1]

_William. Please feel free to quote away! Thanks for the explanation about the artillery as well. I've really been enjoying using the planner over the last few days and i've got a few observations to make:

In terms of calculating likely axis of attack and blocking positions are these calculated in isolation or does one influence the other? My thinking is that I've seen defensive zones allocated in areas that whilst good assault routes, did not correspond to the enemies deployment. To make that clear in any given battle you would be aware of a rough disposition for OPFOR (even if its as simple as they're to the North / South / East / West / we're surrounded). I've played some scenarios that despite the enemy attacking South sectors have been allocated to cover a northern approach to the objective.

However, only a fool would disregard rear and flank security so the problem appears to be that sectors and forces used to defend them don't appear to be weighted. For instance a sector covering a main road or track that leads in the direction of a known enemy would be prioritised over a zone that covered rocky, difficult terrain. Similarly a full strength Infantry Section / squad would be tasked with holding the likely enemy axis of attack whilst a recce section would probably screen less likely flank and rear sectors. I guess the problem here is how the engine puts 'troops to task' and if it takes into account the combat power and role of that unit. An example of this is whilst the cargo capacity of an LAV-25 is certainly useful for ferrying troops around its role and combat power in an infantry based force (defensively) is probably adding mobile firepower, potential attack from depth, flanking or in the initial stages of an attack screening in front of the main line of resistance. Similarly I'd really like to see a M240 team used as fire support in the attack rather than moving forward with assault troops.

Its a huge area to delve into but it would be lovely to see a defensive plan where the defense is more integrated and includes an element of depth. By this I mean infantry holding static positions overwatched by heavier weapon systems such as HMG / GMG / AT teams and finally mobile reserves. The current defensive option is geographically based however so I guess this explains it! Even so in most military doctrine defence is rarely a single line of troops or 'ring of steel'. Attack plans could feature direct fire support from vehicles and MG teams and reserve elements that would be dynamically used to reinforce a successful breakthrough.

I realise this is probably beyond the scope of what your trying to achive at the moment and I hope you in no way read this as a criticism of something I find hugely impressive. In ARMA 2 its all too often easy to want to see the micro strategy improved (getting the AI to take cover, fire and manouvre properly). This is something quite different and I see it as adding an entirely new level to the game; tactics above the single unit. I think it will be very interesting to see how your work progresses and how you introduce new tactical options. If you can marry up realistic tactical deployments with the correct usage of units in particular roles this would be fantastic.

Hopefully I havn't misunderstood what your trying to do here. Whilst i've read many of the documents on the site I admit the the complexities of AI, let alone the mathematics behind it is something completely beyond my understanding. Thank god military doctrine isn't so complicated in the real world!

[_William 0]

In terms of calculating likely axis of attack and blocking positions are these calculated in isolation or does one influence the other?

Defensive calculations are done with very rough indication of the enemy's position (center-of-mass calculation). Other than that, plans for the attacking and defending force are constructed separately, without any knowledge of each other.

Using the rough enemy approach direction, all approaches from 2km out within 120 degrees of the main approach direction are considered. The result is a weighted set of enemy approach sectors.

See the image on this page (requires login).

This result is in concept comparable to your idea:

For instance a sector covering a main road or track that leads in the direction of a known enemy would be prioritised over a zone that covered rocky, difficult terrain.

Defensive planning allocates the most suitable type of unit to the right sector, and can assign multiple units in depth. This all is done depending on the expected threat type (vehicles or dismounts) in the sector and unit capability available.

Its a huge area to delve into but it would be lovely to see a defensive plan where the defense is more integrated and includes an element of depth. By this I mean infantry holding static positions overwatched by heavier weapon systems such as HMG / GMG / AT teams and finally mobile reserves. The current defensive option is geographically based however so I guess this explains it! Even so in most military doctrine defence is rarely a single line of troops or 'ring of steel'. Attack plans could feature direct fire support from vehicles and MG teams and reserve elements that would be dynamically used to reinforce a successful breakthrough.

Dynamic multi-group behavior currently is hard to create with vanilla Arma II primitives: you can place 'guarded-by' triggers on areas to be defended, and put units on stand-by using Guard waypoints. What you cannot do is control which units respond to what 'guarded-by' trigger. And dynamically creating or removing 'guarded-by' triggers doesn't affect the 'guarding' groups.

If BI would be able to improve here, it would be great. Currently, I'm unable to have forward defensive units fall back once the enemy penetrates the outer sector.

What would be possible for mission planning is to put mobile reserve elements deep in the objective's rear area and trigger their counter-attack when spotting hostile elements in certain zones in front of the defensive sectors. That's on the list.

Thanks for raising this discussion.

[joeanorak 1]

Thanks for replying so quickly William. After I wrote my last post I realised that a lot of what I was talking about was in practise already implemented. It also occured to me that what PlannedAssault does is deal with a particular type of Combined Operation; a deliberate attack or deliberate defence. Interestingly looking at the diagrams on the PlannedAssault site they are very close in some cases to real world planning tools used by the military for organising and synchronising units and effects at Platoon / Coy Grp level.

Would it still be possible to add in a direct fire, fire support behaviour especially on the offensive? The old saying that you 'find 'em, fix 'em and strike 'em' is pretty much the foundation of all military tactics. There are some wonderful AI mods out there now (I personnaly use a combination of ZEUS AI, GL4 and ACE2) that I've found give me highly realistic engagement ranges with weapons like the M240 and pretty decent suppression within the boundaries of the game engine. Could planning (and the editor) create the following activity for a three man MG team for instance.

H-15 = Board transport move to FUP

H-10 = Arrive at FUP Dismount, move to Fire Support position (FSP, identified in planning phase for good LoS to objective)

H-5 = In FSP, go firm, hold fire, identify targets.

H hr = Fire on targets

H+5 = If targets eliminated and breakthrough achieved move to objective or continue fire support.

H+15 = Reorg on objective

With the some of the information sharing that exists in several Mods / Scripts and the ability of Planned Assault to analyse terrain I would imagine something like this would be possible?

If nothing else i'm finding this a very interesting subject to discuss, and not one I really anticipated having about ARMA 2!

[Arma-2-Guru 55]

Everyone having trouble signing up, check your junk folder. I found my activation email in there. I'm generating a mission now, will give feedback pretty soon.

---------- Post added at 12:46 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:30 AM ----------

Tried it and it worked really well, created a simple seek and destroy mission and was really fun and unpredictable, thanks man.

[major woody 11]

AMAZING...!!! - no more, no less...! - But where're the other factions - CDF, ChDKZ and NAPA...?

[pAuthority 10]

I tested a quick search and destroy mission, but... Doesn't work in Coop mode. Crashes my game on loading. Single player does work. I'd really like to play these missions also in coop, so what part of the mission needs editing to get this working in multiplayer? Some script maybe?

[manzilla 1]

Wait, I need to sign up to a website just to DL or use?

Edited April 22, 2010 by Manzilla

[killswitch 19]

Note on account creation

At this time (Apr 17), Hotmail/MSN is blocking account activation emails from the server. Please use another email account to create an account (gmail, yahoo work fine).

It's likely this happens because there's no SPF record for the domain "plannedassault.com".

Read up on SPF and create a SPF record and get that into a DNS TXT record for the domain. More here help and a SPF wizard here: www.openspf.org

[andersson 285]

Wait, I need to sign up to a website just to DL or use?

Its web-based, the tool-interface is an internet-site.

[Darkhorse 1-6 16]

Wait, I need to sign up to a website just to DL or use?

Yes. You create an account on the website to use the editor, and it will save all of the missions you have created in your profile.

[Villain. 11]

Wow!

This is an excellent tool, great work William. Very user friendly, i'm loving the simple step by step process to get a mission thrown together in a few minutes.

Never thought i'd be able to be creating missions while i'm stuck at work. :D Can't wait to get home and test them out.

Thanks for creating and sharing this.

[Lucan946 10]

Has anybody told you you're awesome yet today?

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Omg omg omg omg.... What a concept. I'm just blown away. Speechless.

[Lucan946 10]

A bug (?) to report: I placed to batteries of Russian artillery in a map. They're in the little grove not too far from Chernogorsk. The objective is to take Chernogorsk. For some reason, I am being told in the support tab in the map screen that they will not be able to provide support, despite the fact that they appear to be well within range.

EDIT: Okay, I tried another mission. I started out as a Russian rifleman but was killed; I then switched to a gunner of a MLRS (on the Russian side; the codename was ANDREI. This is a bug too I think) but I had no option to use the artillery targeting thing. Do I need to set up an artillery module or what?

Edited April 24, 2010 by Lucan946

[_William 0]

A bug (?) to report: I placed to batteries of Russian artillery in a map. They're in the little grove not too far from Chernogorsk. The objective is to take Chernogorsk. For some reason, I am being told in the support tab in the map screen that they will not be able to provide support, despite the fact that they appear to be well within range.

EDIT: Okay, I tried another mission. I started out as a Russian rifleman but was killed; I then switched to a gunner of a MLRS (on the Russian side; the codename was ANDREI. This is a bug too I think) but I had no option to use the artillery targeting thing. Do I need to set up an artillery module or what?

The artillery module is automatically set-up. Targeting is done via the radio menu.

All artillery units have minimum ranges, as defined by the Arma II artillery module and physics. The guns won't be able to target positions within this range:

- mortars: 0.1km

- howitzers: 2.4km

- missile launchers: 3.3km

The minimum range and maximum range are in the mission editor as part of the unit descriptions. They also are shown in-game when targeting an artillery mission.

If the artillery unit is closer than minimum range to the objective to attack, PlannedAssault cannot use it for pre-planned artillery missions against that objective. This seems the case for your ALPHA M119 unit in 'Rolling Thunder'. To fix this, simply move ALPHA in the bottom right corner of the map.

All map areas available in PlannedAssault currently are 4km x 3km. This effectively restricts the use of MLRSs to artillery missions from one of the map's corners to the opposite corner (map diagonal length is 5km).

Myself, I'm unable to properly target a gun (mortar, howitzer or MLRS) as a gunner in vanilla Arma II. Targeting as an observer, using radio calls, works fine.

Please let me know if you continue having troubles getting the artillery to work as part of your mission.

Edited April 24, 2010 by _William
Corrected mortar min range.

[Lucan946 10]

Ah, right. Thanks for the tip. I figured there was a problem with the missiles.

[Hammer_RLG 10]

how long do the activation e-mails take to get sent? thx.

[=kct=blackmamba 44]

im having difficultys with the AH64D.

when i start as pilot and we get the order to engage,

my gunner wont engage.

so the only thing i can do is manual engage for exsample a T72 or similar armored units with a 30mm cannon..

why doesnt the gunner engage the enemy.

i give him the fire command, and we are ordered to engage.

but he just aims at the enemy and reports they are there but he wont fire

am i missing something ??

[kremator 1065]

^^ I doubt this has nothing to do with the mission. You haven't told us if you are running any mods. If you are I suggest searching the mod information.

[=kct=blackmamba 44]

yes.. i forgot abouth that im using ACE.

thnx for the heads up...

[_William 0]

I've updated PlannedAssault with HEXAgon Team's French units (infantry, tank, helicopters and fighter jets).

More importantly, I've added mission editing guidelines for two types of missions:

- tank gunner in a large tank battle

- Forward observer in support of a mechanized attack

These guidelines might answer some of your questions or point you towards different mission set-ups.

In the past two weeks, PlannedAssault has seen you create over 300 unique missions! Keep the missions and questions coming...

[Villain. 11]

how long do the activation e-mails take to get sent? thx.

I received mine pretty much instantly, via gmail. There may be issues with certain providers that have junk mail filters, some might send it to the junk folder but others might simply delete it, so it might be worth trying another email.

Thanks for the update, William. :) Good to see this tool getting additional mods to play with.

[KNac 10]

William could you add off-map arty in the future? Thanks for your excellent job.

[nubbin77 0]

Hey, any plans to have a repository for the created missions? At least the one's authorized by the maker (as more than likely the first few might not be that great until they get the hang of the tool). I would love to have a full folder of these types of missions. Of course I intend to create some myself, but its good to play other's missions because you don't know what to expect.