Tu-95MS16

[MichelleG 10]

I've read many promising threads on this, but have never actually seen one released (Hopefully mine doesn't end up the same). I'm working on a Tu-95MS6/16 (NATO: Bear-H), and have pretty much all of it done besides some texturing and a flushed out cockpit, even most of the animations are completed. Considering my problem is probably config.cpp related, I'm asking this here:

How the hell do I add the tail gunner?

As it currently sits, it has a pilot, gunner (Controls the 16/6 Kh-55 Missiles onboard), but I am completely lost as to how to add someone for the twin GSh-23's on the tail.

(Rendered, very poorly, in Blender)

And since it's somewhat on topic, whatcha think of my progress? ;)

[swot 10]

i have know idea but i do remember reading about how the tail gunner was added to the b52 statofortress, apparently it was a second vehicle that was tasked to follow the plane where ever it went, no idea how to do it, just read about it in a readme...

[guziczek101 11]

nice work michelle i can't wait for release this one:D

[Macser_old 0]

I assume It's held in with scripts.Using the setpos command no doubt.Set to

a relatively short loop.It's not by any means perfect.And comes with it's own set

of problems.I think it's easier to get away with it on a ground vehicle than an aircraft,

too.But even that can have problems with sharp turns, and going up hills.

An age old OFP limitation.

Impressive model by the way.I don't see anything wrong with a basic render.

A good model is a good model.Regardless of lighting/shaders etc.

Edited May 20, 2010 by Macser

[chops 111]

You can't have a turret on a plane unfortunately. Have a look at Gnat's B-52 to see how he did it.

Good luck with your project. Would be great to have this beast in OFP. Better to have it without a tail-gunner than not at all.

[sanctuary 19]

The T-22 Backfire from Footmunch had a tailgunner thanks to some scripting workaround.

Give a look into this addon to see how they did it.

http://ofp.gamepark.cz/index.php?showthis=8879&newlang=eng

[stgn 39]

Wow never been much into OFP airplane units but that looks great!

STGN

[MichelleG 10]

Thanks for the suggestions, looks like some sqs scripting will be the way to go.

I'll try my best to get it as bug-free as possible, but if all else fails, how about I just leave the gun as is and give it a flare package?

I didn't expect such an enthusiastic response on this, I was expecting to get hammered left and right on how it doesn't need to be in game at all :icon_lol:

Progress update: Most of the exterior is skinned now, moving on to the interiors and Cockpit texturing (My Source)

EDIT: Could an admin move this to Addons discussion section, please? Thanks :)

Edited May 21, 2010 by MichelleG
Request for thread move

[vektorboson 8]

I didn't expect such an enthusiastic response on this, I was expecting to get hammered left and right on how it doesn't need to be in game at all :icon_lol:

The guys who tell you what you should do/shouldn't do, are gone (they're playing Arma2 now). Beside this, we have the already mentioned Tu-22, we have the B-52 and other seemingly 'useless' vehicles. It's all up to the imagination of the player/mission editor to make them useful.

I have looked up your specific model and I understand the Tu-95MS16 could also double as a Tu-142?

A good mission editor/campaign editor can make good use of such a plane, though that plane would be rather grounded. I can already think of a scenario (for a campaign mission), which would interpret your plane as a Tu-142 (especially given the fact we are bound to islands in the OFP engine):

A SEAL team (or other countries' naval spec ops) is tasked to find the parking spot of the Bear and direct a sea-launched cruise missile attack on it. In case the Bear is destroyed, the own invasion force can land unhindered on the island.

PS: Don't throw that Blender model away!

[MichelleG 10]

Actually that exact .blend was of a Tu-142 (If you look under it's left wing, you'll see the radar dome). I had actually planned to include both as separate models from the beginning :)

And as to your mention of the island structure of the game, that's why I had assumed it would fit right in. We're dealing with islands somewhere in the northern Atlantic (According to the Biki, anyway), probably out of range of Tu-22 overflights, but perfectly in range for a few "Bears".

On a historical note, I heard that back in the Russian-Georgian conflict of 2008, Russia had used a Tu-142 overflight for a recce on Gori right before they landed forces in the port city. Would anyone be able to validate that?

[vektorboson 8]

Actually that exact .blend was of a Tu-142 (If you look under it's left wing, you'll see the radar dome). I had actually planned to include both as separate models from the beginning :)

Excellent!

And as to your mention of the island structure of the game, that's why I had assumed it would fit right in. We're dealing with islands somewhere in the northern Atlantic (According to the Biki, anyway), probably out of range of Tu-22 overflights, but perfectly in range for a few "Bears".

Addon islands can be anywhere; we're not restricted to the atlantic (one can specify the GPS-coordinates of the terrain in the island's config).

You're absolutely right that they make sense for those islands; unfortunately OFP does not simulate the electronic systems the Bear carries. It can be scripted (I'm experimenting with electronic warfare in OFP), but it also requires that all other addons/vehicles are included in the 'electronic simulation'.

On a historical note, I heard that back in the Russian-Georgian conflict of 2008, Russia had used a Tu-142 overflight for a recce on Gori right before they landed forces in the port city. Would anyone be able to validate that?

According to Wikipedia (and its references) a Tu-22M was used for Recce and was shot down; of course Russia could have used more stuff than is documented.

[-RuN- 0]

Hmmm.. A can already see some nice pics of that plane and a pair of F-15 flying by during an interception. Hopefully this will be released.

[AKM 0]

MichelleG: Beautiful work, the second I saw this I started contemplating airfield strikes on the VMF-AV. As to your tail gun problem, OFP only allows for one gunner per vehicle (unlike ArmA + ArmA 2) so the only possible solution, as implemented on other addons, is to script in a second vehicle (the turret) which follows the tail of the aircraft around like a dog on a very short leash. Unfortunately I have no idea how to do this.

Vektorbosen: The Russians took very low losses despite Ukrainian upgrades to the SAM systems the Georgians fielded. They lost the one Tu-22M to a SAM on what seems to have been a strike mission, and as far as I know they lost no reconnaissance assets. Interestingly, I didn't hear about AAA or MANPADS downing any Su-25s or MiGs, just the SAMs.

[sudayev 27]

Tu-95 for OFP,, this sounds so awesome. Excellent work, i'll keep my fingers crossed

[krzychuzokecia 717]

Little proposition: when you'll finish this, maybe you can make it compatible with Gnat's Virtual Bomber? It allows the bomber to act like a... bomber, because in vanilla OFP planes are diving to attack enemy.

[MichelleG 10]

@Krzychuzokecia: The Tu-95 and derivatives were never designed to carry conventional munitions. Everyone likes to equate it with the B-52, but the truth is, they both had separate goals. It's honestly best viewed as a Soviet equivalent of the US B-47 "Stratojet".

If your wanting it to be able to designate missile targets using Gnats' script, I can do that, but if you were thinking of "Carpet bombing", this probably isn't the aircraft your looking for (That would be the Tu-16).

The Soviet Union's defense forces, almost as a whole, discarded the ideas of conventional bombing in the early 60's. They mainly relied on Artillery and Ground Attack aircraft to fulfill much of the same roles, although on a far smaller (And arguably more precise) scale.

Edited May 25, 2010 by MichelleG

[kcmb 10]

Hi there MichelleG I think that it would be great for operation flashpoint to have a Russian TU 95ms6/16 .I have after thought of doing one myself but wasn’t to sure how you the animations, and the art work . so like the other’s out there we leave it to the one’s in the know .I hope that this isn’t one of the add-ons that disappear esp. if you have gotten so far but like I said I haven’t been able to do any add-ons yet but will start to learn cos I understand how much work you Modder’s do. So I hope those in the know help you out in this one because the add-on would be very useful

[MichelleG 10]

Due to certain circumstances lately (Read: Reality, lol), progress has been a bit slow. I've also encountered a few problems importing the blender model into O2. Somehow certain pieces of the wings aren't "Closed", so the model fails to display in Buldozer (And if I try to view it in Buldozer, it crashes almost immediatly). The real catch, is that when I first import, it's fine. It's only after I save the p3d in O2 that the problem shows up >_<

I hate to do it, considering this is the first ANYTHING I've posted here about, but if anyone is willing to give it a once over for themselves to help me nail down the problem, it'd be much appreciated.

[Darkhorse 1-6 16]

Well, Gnat is on vacation for a while longer, but I'm sure that if it hasn't been solved by the time he gets back he can help ya out.

On a side note, your doing an Ivan Rogov class?

[MichelleG 10]

I'm certainly going to try. Most of the projects in my sig are all tied in to it, actually. I've received some outstanding line drawings of it including the interior from a friend of mine who makes R/C ships, and what would be the point without it's Heli's and Rocket support, ya know? The main reason, though, is that the lack of the heavier Soviet/CIS equipment has frustrated me for a little over 7 years :lol:

[Darkhorse 1-6 16]

Yep. The same has frustrated me as well. Way too many "T-72" packs out there, imo.

[johansen_never 11]

Looks great michelle¡¡¡ nice work

[[aps]gnat 28]

Hi MichelleG

Nice project, my version (probably using the same base mesh) never got close to finished.

Turrets; As a few people have pointed out, in OFP you can only have aircraft turret(s) the way Footmunch and myself did it. Thats by making a separate addon thats basically a stand-alone gun and gunner, then using a constantly looping script, keep that addon "attached" (setpos) to the main plane. And as people have pionted out, its sometimes not the best idea because the scripts perform differently in different situations (upside-down! ) and on different computers.

Importing Problems:

Is the mesh got too many vertexes ?

Try deleting some of the high-mesh objects before importing.

Example, delete all but 1 of the wheels (you can copy it again in O2)

Unforunately I don't have OFP tools on my computer anymore, but may still be able to help.

[MichelleG 10]

I narrowed the problem down a little further, it's actually not Oxygen that's causing the problem. Thanks to an export script from Vektorboson, and an older version of Oxygen2 care of Chops ;), the problem has been the export from Blender. For some reason when Blender exported as 3ds, it would export the faces wrong, and they were overlapping. That is what's been giving me so much grief (And constantly causing Oxy to crash).

Now that I'm roughly back on track, I should be able to atleast post a screenshot or two of it actually in the game soon :D

Gnat: Why didn't your Tupolev ever get finished? I think I'll actually scrap the turret idea. On a plane this large, some weird things are bound to happen. I can see someone banking to the right, and suddenly the tail gunner is shooting from an aileron. I could use your scripting advice though, I'll send you a PM about it.

[krzychuzokecia 717]

I think I'll actually scrap the turret idea. On a plane this large, some weird things are bound to happen. I can see someone banking to the right, and suddenly the tail gunner is shooting from an aileron. I could use your scripting advice though, I'll send you a PM about it.

Personally, I doubt it. Footmunch's Tu-22 is really fast and (if you really want) it can do a barrel-roll :) And I never had any problems with tail gun, even with many units. Of course that depends on how much is many for you, but let's say 5-10 other airplanes, and the same number of land vehicles, and some soldiers if you want. But, I suppose that in most of missions, player won't be piloting your Tupolev - so you could add even more units in the mission, and nobody will see that tail gun is little slower than plane itself. So tail gun would be a nice addition, if somebody want to shoot this beast :cool: