Lockon Operation Red Flag/Combined Air Exercise

I would like to propose an inter-squad match up, a sort of Operation Red Flag or Combine Air Exercise.

The point of this would get the squads to know each other and improve the community camaraderie.

What I am proposing is a series of missions each with a BlueFOR and RedFOR. Each squad sends three members or four members to fly in each mission.

TEAMS:

Teams will be determined before the exercise starts. Please let me know how many pilots you want to dedicate to the exercise, but ensure you will be able to staff those positions come mission day. Please also let me know what aircraft you wish to fly, so for example: Our squad wishes to dedicate 4 pilots to Fighter wing, 4 pilots to strike wing. Our Fighter pilots fly the F-15 and our strike pilots fly the A-10, whatever the case may be.

We will be preserving NATO vs Warsaw as much as possible. Determinations on whether smaller countries (i.e. Germany and the mig-29) are Warsaw or NATO will depend on the number of pilots and squads we have apply.

MISSION BUILDING:

Each Squad will get the opportunity to build one mission. This will allow us to sample each other’s building skills. It will also change it up a little bit and keep one person or squad from having an all knowing participation through the whole exercise.

SCORING:

Numbers will be tallied from each mission and we will put together a grading rubric that factors loss and kill ratios. It will be different for Strike Wing and Air Wing Pilots.

SIGN UP:

Please post here if your squad is interested. The length of the exercise will be dictated by the number of squads that are interested.

SERVERS:

If you’re willing to host please let me know.

This is a "rough draft" of an idea, so let me know what you guys think:

S! :joystick:

I like the idea:) We've been doing something similiar to this with the 44th for quite a long time now, and it has been one of the best and most valuable exercises i have experienced in LO.

So yes, we are interested!:)

I would suggest additing some ROE's to test skill levels as well. For example, require the aircraft to return to their bases (this will force people to manage fuel while fighting and not dump their gas for a BFM advantage). Also, put in a hard deck that you can't fly below .. .just suggestions.

Are the scenarios going to be fairly realistic - ie. Su-33's doing A2A to protect the fleet exclusively, MiG-29A's used in large numbers, etc etc?

Flight should also come in 2's or 4's, and I don't think we should settle for 4-8 aircraft per side ... if you really want a red flag type exercise, I'd think you'd be looking at a minimum of a total of 40 player aircraft. Not easy to pull off, but.

You could have various cold war scenarios (F-15's with sparrows, Russians without R-27(E) versions in operation, large number of MiG-29's, few flankers, etc) ... add to that the possibility of LOTATC and a few other things; strike aircraft outnumbering fighter aircraft by some given ratio (2:1 is not bad, 3:1 might be better if chaff wasn't such a bomb) and so on and so forth.

I am personally more interested in realistic scenarios than a series of matches.

The Virtual 9th Air Force is interested! :thumbup:

My team and I were considering setting up a Virtual 'Mutha' event and have the same sorta concept. ;)

well the Virtual VF-31 is interested!!!!

Are the scenarios going to be fairly realistic - ie. Su-33's doing A2A to protect the fleet exclusively, MiG-29A's used in large numbers, etc etc?

 

Flight should also come in 2's or 4's, and I don't think we should settle for 4-8 aircraft per side ... if you really want a red flag type exercise, I'd think you'd be looking at a minimum of a total of 40 player aircraft. Not easy to pull off, but.

 

You could have various cold war scenarios (F-15's with sparrows, Russians without R-27(E) versions in operation, large number of MiG-29's, few flankers, etc) ... add to that the possibility of LOTATC and a few other things; strike aircraft outnumbering fighter aircraft by some given ratio (2:1 is not bad, 3:1 might be better if chaff wasn't such a bomb) and so on and so forth.

 

I am personally more interested in realistic scenarios than a series of matches.

well if you host it i'll sign up :)

Are the scenarios going to be fairly realistic - ie. Su-33's doing A2A to protect the fleet exclusively, MiG-29A's used in large numbers, etc etc?

 

Flight should also come in 2's or 4's, and I don't think we should settle for 4-8 aircraft per side ... if you really want a red flag type exercise, I'd think you'd be looking at a minimum of a total of 40 player aircraft. Not easy to pull off, but.

 

You could have various cold war scenarios (F-15's with sparrows, Russians without R-27(E) versions in operation, large number of MiG-29's, few flankers, etc) ... add to that the possibility of LOTATC and a few other things; strike aircraft outnumbering fighter aircraft by some given ratio (2:1 is not bad, 3:1 might be better if chaff wasn't such a bomb) and so on and so forth.

 

I am personally more interested in realistic scenarios than a series of matches.

There will be some criteria for the mission builders, and that was what this thread was aimed at, getting ideas from people.

I want each squad to have a hand in mission bulding, it will allow for creativity and keep one person from being bored to death from creating a campaign of missions

I hosted something like this back in the day with Flanker.

We us to call it the World Squadron Range Operations Program.

I would be more then willing to pull out the old mission book.

It was a lot of fun. :pilotfly:

If you have a Yahoo account... you can find my old group for the World Squadron.

http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=808th

But yep I would love to do something like this again.

Two years ago there was something called CAW (crimean airwars) around. It was something like a dynamic campaign, moderated by admins who managed intel, campaign progress, and mission building.

I loved it, unfortunately the project went on hold in the very beginning.

Good Idea, anyway. The LLTM 2007 also brought the feeling of a little red falg competition, because all members were randomly put on either blue or red team which gav me some Red Flag feeling, althoug there could be much more Lock-On pilots at the event !!

Let's hope for some more combined inter-squad air exercise events, whatsorever!

3Sqn is in, great idea! We're in a good position at the moment with squad activity, and would be able to contribute up to a dozen members to flying and planning. Our primary time zones are Australia and US, so on average from 0000Zulu on Saturday mornings we'd be able to present a minimum of 8 guys. Generally 0000Z-1400Zulu Saturday and Sunday is the time we could give max attendance, however we can flex on that a bit.

We have a server that I think can handle 16-20, which might be a bit small.

GG Tharos, I like your thinking.

159th Fudd, just let us know, either in this thread or via our forums, what you need us to do, and we'll get on it. Mission building, organising rosters etc assisting in any way to get this going, let us know and we'll do it.

504th and 44th are very experienced in this sort of match up, for ease of invention you might want to consider just expanding on the format they've already got going.

Thank you to everyone for their input.

I'll wait a couple days to see if there are any other squads that are interested and then I will be contacting you indivdually to get exact numbers and other things. I am looking forward to working with each of you on making this a success.

Once missions are created, warning orders will be posted on this forum. It will give exact information including SMEAC, mission objectives, what time the mission will kick off, etc. This will also be the time for you non-squad members to apply for flight status. As stated before, more information will be posted in the next few days.

V interested.

I also like "rlogue's" ideas for ROE's "Dead is Dead" is a good leveller.

~S~

Whoohoo! Can't wait!

Sweet! If you need any mission building help... Holla back!

:pilotfly:

The vJaBoG32 is generally interested in prjects like this!

But we're gonna have lots of probs get our guys along in the european night hours (the time the aussies and us-guys come along). So if there would be some kind of time-zone-splitting we might take part with about 4-6 bomber-pilots and 4 fighter guys.

So for now better don't count us in... :(

Update:

It looks as if teams may be fixed. Too many people want to fly specific aircraft (I completely understand), so it looks as if it will be turning into a Nato vs Warsaw thing. Once I get a rough idea of the number of pilots each squad will be sending to this exercise, I will tally a list of squads and the side they are on.

The rough draft on basic rules and ROE are as follows:

1) There will be no respawn

2) There will only be two airfields available to each side. Those airfields will be the only airfields that you can rearm, repair and refuel at. I am going to set a minimum for mission builders on how far away blue and red bases can be. This will force fuel conservation.

3) Landing at other airfiedls is prohibited unless it is an emergency.

-If you land at an airfield behind enemy line, it will be counted as a loss. (In other words, getting the $hit kicked out of you in POW camp and donating your aircraft to the enemy is not a desired end result).

-If you land at a airfield behind friendly lines (other than the two designated for refueling and rearming) it is not considered a loss but you must leave the mission and cant respawn.

As far as ROE goes, it has been suggested that we not engage each other until a hostile act has been observed. I am open to test this on the first mission, and we will see how it goes from there.

Please post any suggestions you have for ROE and basic rules. I will have more info as time progresses.

The vJaBoG32 is generally interested in prjects like this!

 

But we're gonna have lots of probs get our guys along in the european night hours (the time the aussies and us-guys come along). So if there would be some kind of time-zone-splitting we might take part with about 4-6 bomber-pilots and 4 fighter guys.

 

So for now better don't count us in... :(

We are going to look into the time zone issue. I want to allow as many people as possible to participate.

1400 Zulu on Saturdays is a good place to start, let me know if any squads are completely against that time for missions.

Hi every one!

How many pilots squad must have in that operations?

We have, MiG-29, Su-27 and Su-25 pilots.

When it started...and where will be situated server?

Thx.

As far as ROE goes, it has been suggested that we not engage each other until a hostile act has been observed.

This is a good idea. I flew a Red Flag with the 504th back when I was in the 44th (used to go by "Rockeye"). In that excercise, we had peace-time ROEs.

One word of caution on this (and this seems obvious): The ROEs need to be spelled out and both sides need to understand them the same way. The ROEs should specify as much as possible so that there is little or no ambiguity. In Red Flag I flew, each squadron had their own interpretation of the ROEs which led to misunderstandings and frustrations.

But I still managed to do my recon and take my pictures! :)

Well, in our events, we usually have no re-fuel, no re-arm or no repair, considering that the times are not realistic. Basically, one take-off/pilot only. It works very well!

Well, in our events, we usually have no re-fuel, no re-arm or no repair, considering that the times are not realistic. Basically, one take-off/pilot only. It works very well!

Thanks, I'll take that into consideration.

Well, in our events, we usually have no re-fuel, no re-arm or no repair, considering that the times are not realistic. Basically, one take-off/pilot only. It works very well!

no mid air refueling though? cmon that requires skill and ability to make it to the tanker.:pilotfly: :joystick:

... and then one guy warps and takes the tanker out. Not to mention the tanker AI is not particularly good at giving you a good track (Actually, it doesn't give you a track period) and pretty darned useless as refueling what - 8 aircraft before it starts doing aerobatics.

Or, some ditz from your side will shoot it down 'cause he's bored, or another guy from the other side will do it because he thinks its cool. There's almost never a case where there are enough assets to protect a tanker even if you want to put one in, not to mention it's unlikely that you will fly a route requiring a tanker, and if you do, you have to deal with the unfortunate fact that the enemy can easily reach your tanker, shoot it down and go home since the poor thing doesn't have half a brain with which to think of when it needs to defend itself (it does so far to late) and call for help.

Of course, we can put ROEs in for such a thing, but really, air refueling ends up an exercise in frustration due to varying skill levels of players as well as the AI's lack of competence.

Ah yes and ... G switch set to 'Reduced G' ;)