"Condor Station": Highly-Dynamic Air Superiority Mission for the F-14 + Supercarrier

A highly-dynamic and always changing air-to-air combat DCS mission for the F-14 Tomcat (and friends). Operating off the "Big

Stick" (CVN-71, the USS Theodore Roosevelt; Supercarrier module needed) in the Black Sea, your primary mission is BARCAP (Barrier Combat Air Patrol) on "CONDOR" station, over the Kolkheti Plain and Gori Valley region of Georgia. Your objective is to protect Georgian and NATO air and ground transport from air attacks carried out by Abkhazia (and possibly Russia) who are trying to enforce a non-UN sanctioned "no-fly"/"no-drive" zone over Georgia. You have full authorization to engage and fire upon any confirmed non-friendly aircraft in Georgian airspace, but be careful not to violate Russian or Abkhazian territorial boundaries. In the event of an attack against the carrier battle group, you are to immediately switch tasking to carrier defense, and intercept and shoot down aircraft and/or missiles threatening the carrier. [REQUIRES: SUPERCARRIER

 

A carrier task force is tasked with enforcing a no-fly zone over Georgia to protect ground transport convoys from enemy attacks. Forced to operate in very tight confines on "Condor Station" in the eastern Black Sea, the task force has to not only carry out its mission, but defend itself from possible attacks as the situation escalates. Strap on an F-14 and step up to the ramparts.

 

(map generated using the EXCELLENT CombatFlite application)

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Features:

* Uses the wonderful MOOSE library for complex scripting of both allied as well as enemy asset deployment and behavior.

* Designed out-of-the-box for both SP or small number (1-4) of multiplayers, but easily scalable up for larger groups by increasing enemy activity levels. Players can also spawn escorting wingmen using F-10 menu.

* Randomized yet realistic enemy activity:

+ Enemy attacks launched either at randomized schedule or probabilistically in response to player/allied activity.

+ Enemy attack tasking randomized, covering, for e.g., ground interdiction, ground strike, air interception/interdiction, anti-ship strike, etc. Strikes have specific targets, while interdiction patrols are roaming/marauding patrols that attack targets of opportunity.

+ Enemy package compositions randomized (helos, attack, bomber, and fighter aircraft), and may or may not include escorts.

+ Attack mission profiles modeled with randomized (but at the same time realistic) take-off, marshal, fence/push points, ingress points, egress points, etc.

+ "Pop up" attacks are also possible, simulating package flying low or masked by terrain en route.

+ Enemy patrols come from random directions, at random speeds, and random altitudes.

+ Enemy aircraft drawn from limited inventory, that dynamically changes in availability (as aircraft go on mission) and allocation, which gets permanently depleted as aircraft are lost due to being killed or crashing.

* Automatic cycling allied CAP:

+ Four CAP missions: three to defend carrier against attack, one for primary air cover mission.

+ CAP mission deployment occurs automatically and in the background, drawing from limited inventory of aircraft. As aircraft run out of fuel, ammunition, or crash or are killed, they will be replaced, subject to the inventory availability.

+ BLUE side players can control CAP deployment by adding or scrubbing CAP sorties using F-10 player menu.

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[[[ GAME NOTES ]]]

* You are flying the BARCAP mission, "CONDOR".

* Your primary tasking is to intercept enemy (or, to be precise, non-friendly) aircraft over Georgia, especially over the Kolkheti Plains and the Gori Valley.

* You will take-off from the carrier and first head toward the rendezvous with the south mission tanker ("Shell 1-1" on 271.00 Mhz AM, TACAN: 103Y/MSN), just off the coast of Georgia south of Batumi, to top up your tanks.

* You will then proceed to CONDOR station over the Kholketi Plain in Georgia (see briefing map). Here you will monitor the airspace, identifying all contacts and shooting down any non-friendly aircraft, prioritizing those deemed to be a threat to NATO and Georgian air and land assets (i.e., attack aircraft, bombers, and fighters).

* You can consider any definitively identified non-friendly aircraft in Georgian airspace as "enemy" and subject to engagement, BUT be careful to:

- NOT shoot down any friendly aircraft; there will be a significant amount of friendly traffic (including other Tomcats assigned to CONDOR station, as well as NATO and Georgian aircaft, which you are charged with protecting), so definitive identification of "non-friendly" is required before firing.

- NOT violate Abkhazian or Russian territiorial boundaries. There WILL be consequences!!!

* A Marine tanker flying just over the border in Turkey will provide refueling support while on station.

* If you need to fly back to the carrier to rearm, you can summon a replacement BARCAP flight to temporarily take your place on CONDOR station. (You can do this by using the F-10 Radio Menu: call up the menu using the "/" key, choose the "F10 - Other" option, then "MISSION COMMAND ...", then select "CONDOR ...", then "Launch".)

* Russia will (probably) not threaten or attack the carrier group as long as Russian or Abkhazian borders are not crossed. However, it is possible that this might change rapidly (or even instantly) due to unknown and unpredictable political developments or due to actions of your battlegroup! If the carrier battlegroup comes under attack (which might be potentially massive!), your task is to DEFEND THE CARRIER! You will receive the signal "WHISKEY KILO TANGO" if a threat or attack on the carrier is detected. In this event you receive this signal, as long as you have fuel and ammunition, you will leave CONDOR station (if still there) immediately and head for and intercept any and all threats to the carrier group as per your judgement. If you are low on fuel or ammunition, head back to the carrier, land, refuel and rearm, and take off again to take up the defense. The carrier deck will be organized as a "flex deck" to permit both launching and recovery operations.

* Your success will depending on you depleting the enemy resources sufficiently to degrade their capacity to generate the interdiction sorties ... as long as your carrier is not sunk! In other words, you can win the game by knocking out enemy aircraft, but you will lose the game if you lose the carrier!

* Notes:

+ While spawning on deck will give you the most most authentic experience, it does involve making the long flight over water for some 15-20 minutes before the action begins. To bypass the long flight into your vul zone (in terms of after-work hobby flyer; in real life you would expect much longer "commutes"), you can opt to spawn in one of the air start positions instead.

+ The deck spawn slots include both cold and hot start slots

+ There are slots that give you a wingman (labeled "2-ship") and other slots that do not.

[[[ IN THE READY ROOM, AFTER THE BRIEFING ... ]]]

Tension is very high on the Roosevelt. We are operating in extremely tight quarters: the Black Sea, a veritable puddle for a blue water carrier battlegroup. Even worse, we are also less than a couple of hundred miles from several squadrons of dedicated marine strike Backfire and Bear squadrons, equipped with deadly giant "carrier killer" air-launched anti-shipping missiles, belonging to he world's second most powerful military, who have been rattling sabers with us more and more aggressively over the last few weeks.

That's not just "extremely" tight quarters.

That's INSANELY tight quarters.

We essentially have a potential foe with overwhelming lethal capability that can be launched from heavily-defended bases *within* what would normally be our outer defensive perimeter. As some snark muttered in the briefing: "Forget about doorstep! That's *inside* the house!" The higher ups have been told that we are not under threat of attack from Russian strikes, and we should focus on supporting suppression of hostile air attacks over the Kolkheti Plain in Georgia. But even they are not big enough chumps believe that. And down here we are not even pretending to. We can see the Backfires and Bears take off and land on exercises, ferry flights, and what-not on our AEW radar surveillance. At any time, any (or all) of those flights could suddenly turn around from their "routine peacetime activity" flights and swing into an attack run on us, and we will only have minutes to react. Of course, the sane course of action would be to take out the land airbases from which attacks against us could be launched, either by airstrikes or more likely Tomahawks, and only then turn our attention to counter-air over Georgia. But it seems that sanity is out of fashion. Appallingly crippled by a senseless ROE that endangers American life and assets, while making our assigned jobs not just difficult but almost suicidal (business as usual, I guess, since, oh, about Vietnam? Korea?), we are forced to make do the best we can. Fortunately, we *do* have authorization to attack any "perceived threats" over the Black Sea if not in Abkhazia or Russia itself, and you'd better bet that we are not just anticipating but actually planning for such threats!

We have set up three CAP missions: DURANGO, DALLAS, DIEGO, and CONDOR.

DURANGO (callsign: "Springfield"), DALLAS (callsign: "Enfield"), and DIEGO (callsign: "Uzi") will protect the battlegroup from anticarrier strikes, covering the northern (315 to 45 degrees), and eastern/southern sector (45 to 180 degrees), and western/southern (180 to 315 degrees) respectively. These missions will intercept and shoot down any aircraft that appear to be posing a threat to the carrier group (which, under the circumstances will be *any* aircraft in the air), *AS LONG AS THE AIRCRAFT IS OVER THE BLACK SEA*.

CONDOR (callsigns: "Colt" and "Pontiac") will discharge our primary responsibility of protecting the NATO aircarft and Georgian air and land transportation vehicles and infrastrcture against all and any attacks by any aircraft from any nation as long as they are in Georgian airspace. We know we will encounter Abkhazian Mi-24's and Su-25', as well as MiG-21's, as these are already operating in the area. We have assets on the ground watching the airbases from which they take off and land, so we can get advance notice of their patrols and some damage assessment, but frustratingly we are not allowed to attack their airbases, and, worse, cannot continue to pursue or attack the aircraft once they cross into Abkhazian or Russian airspace. It is also not just possible but, if intelligence reports are accurate, highly likely that we will encounter other types of attacking aircraft. These are almost definitely going to be Russian, and might be a mix of Su-17's, MiG-27's, or even Su-24's, and we can expect them to be escorted by MiG-23's, MiG-29's, or even Su-27's. We are not going to regard or acknowledge or explictily react to the national origin of these aircraft in any way. Instead, as long as they are in Georgian airspace and positively identified as non-friendly, we are going to treat them as hostile and cleared for attack. At the same, time, we recognize that there are a lot of friendly aircraft operating in the area --- the assets that we are supposed to protect, in fact! So we have to be absolutely certain of the non-friendly identity of the contacts before engaging.

All this missions are rotating CAPs: aircraft will cycle through these missions, with new flights replacing previous ones as these latter run low on fuel, ammunition, or, in the worse cases, get damaged or shot. Instead of the traditional lauch/recovery window cycles, the carrier deck will be set as a "flex deck", to allow for launch and recovery on a per-need basis: launches will be restricted to Cat 1 and 2, as Cat 3 and Cat 4 will not be used to keep the angle deck free for recovery.

*IF* the carrier comes under attack, then priorities change. Immediately. The code word for this condition will be "WKT" ("WHISKEY KILO TANGO"). If this is announced, then *all* resources and efforts --- I mean down to those paper airplanes sitting on top of the cookie jar in the ready room --- will be thrown into the carrier defense. This includes the CONDOR mission flights. On the Whiskey Kilo Tango call, we will leave CONDOR station and, as long as you have fuel and ammunition, head right for the carrier defense zones to swat down the incoming swarm. If you need fuel you can top off fro either the northern or southern support tanker, whichever works out better. If you need to rearm, then you will have no choice but to recover, and only after that head for the ramparts.

[[[ MISSION OBJECTIVES ]]]

The battle group is charged with:

(1) Protecting NATO and Georgian aircraft operating in Georgian airspace from any and all (air) threats.

(2) Protecting Georgian ground transport vehicles, infrastructure, supply, and other resources from air attacks. In particular, protect convoys delivering food, fuel, and other critical supplies to defensive forces in the Zugdidi area.

(3) Protecting US naval assets from land-based air attacks.

[[[ AIR TASKING ORDER ]]]

PKG UNIT MSNTYPE MSN CALLSIGN ACTYPE ACQTY

- VF-32 CAP DURANGO Springfield F14B 2

- VF-32 CAP DALLAS Enfield F14B 2

- VF-32 CAP DIEGO Uzi F14B 2

- VF-32 CAP CONDOR Colt F14B 2

- VF-32 CAP CONDOR Pontiac F14B 2

- VAW-124 AEW AWACS Overlord E2D 1

- VS-24 AR AR Arco11 S3B 1

- 22 ARS AR AR Shell11 KC135 1

- 22 ARS AR AR Shell12 KC135 1

[[[ RADIO NAVIGATION ]]]

USS Roosevelt

* TACAN: 71X / RHR

* ICLS: Channel 6

Tanker, Recovery

* TACAN: 101Y / RTR

Tanker, Support, South

* TACAN: 103Y / MSS

Tanker, Support, North

* TACAN: 104Y / MSN

Tanker, Support, Forward

* TACAN: 105Y / MSF

[[[ COMMUNICATIONS ]]]

* CAP, CONDOR:

- 313.050, Colt (Channel 1)

- 313.050, Pontiac (Channel 1)

* CAP, DURANGO:

- 301.250 Mhz, Springfield (Channel 1)

* CAP, DALLAS:

- 303.100, Enfield (Channel 2)

* CAP, DIEGO:

- 309.225, Uzi (Channel 3)

* USS Roosevelt:

- 228.150 Mhz (Channel 10)

* AWACS:

- 239.475 Mhz, Overlord 1-1 (Channel 11)

* Tanker, Recovery:

- 279.125 Mhz, Arco 1-1 (Channel 12)

* Tanker, Support, South:

- 271.100 Mhz, Shell 1-1 (Channel 13)

* Tanker, Support, North:

- 276.050 Mhz, Shell 2-1 (Channel 14)

* Tanker, Support, Forward:

- 273.150 Mhz, Shell 2-1 (Channel 15)

[[[ ROE ]]]

Clearance to attack any Abkhazian and Russian aircraft encountered over Georgian airspace or over the Black Sea threatening the carrier group *ONLY*. Under no circumstances are US aircraft permitted to engage any aircraft over Abkhazian or Russian land territories.

- Weapons free on any definitively identified non-friendly aircraft in Georgian airspace. Note that there is significant friendly air traffic operating in the area.

- Weapons free on any definitively identified hostile aircraft over the Black Sea approaching the carrier.

- STRICTLY NO CROSSING INTO ABKHAZIAN OR RUSSIAN (LAND) TERRITORIES.

An impressive effort. Well done and thanks for sharing!

I have played the mission a couple times and so far have enjoyed it. I particularly like the positioning of the carrier, CAP flights and tankers, as well as the time of day (dawn into early morning).

A couple questions/comments:

1. I know it is not your fault but the AI wingman is pretty useless and usually runs out fuel early in the mission. I have tried sending him to the tanker without much luck. Any thoughts on how best to employ the AI wingman?

2. I usually end up running out of missiles after 2 engagements. Is the idea that I should be spawning additional CAPS. I usually engage the AI flights coming down the coast and let the AI handle the russian fighters over the mountains to east. I haven't been able to shoot down the coastal Mig-21s and Su-25s quick enough and have enough weapons to then proceed to head east. The AI flights do better than the wingman but usually they get overwhelmed. Any thoughts/strategy/tips to manage the battle?

3. The other flights do better than the AI wingman but I have a issue where CAP chases aircraft down to TIBLISI and then get sandwiched between Russian flights. Or when I spawn new CAPs they are right in the middle of 1-2 mig-29s and then get downed quickly. Again any tips on managing the AI CAP flights over Georgia would be appreciated.

I know you are trying to balance the battle to make it interesting but the Russian flights spawn very quickly after each other. At least from my couple play through.

Anyway overall I enjoyed the mission but was unsure how to complete it.

Thanks!

Thank you for the feedback!

In response to your questions:

(1) YESS! That wingman is almost useless for sustained ops due to his poor management of fuel. I've tried commanding him to hit the tanker, and he does. But he always breaks off too early. In his defense, he takes so long that I often head off to hold the front while he's refueling, and he quickly joins up again. Possibly if I was more patient and stayed in formation with the tanker it might help. As it stands, I see him as, sadly, an expendable right now. I get him to fire his loadout, and then head home.

(2) If you can do air-to-air-refueling, then absolutely, your loadout is the limiting resource (for gas I top-up off the marine tanker to the south while on station). What I tend to do is have the wingman engage the coastal group and I proceed inland to help out the "Colt" call signs. This works out better for the wingman's poor fuel state. When I run out of ammo, though, then there is nothing to do but head back to rearm. If there is still a lot of enemy activity, I might call up a replacement CAP to the station, and scrub that when I return. Another approach may be to be to focus on just protecting the ground/air assets rather than area wide superiority: leave the latter to Colt, while you just escort the flights from the supply depot to the frontlines, or from bases to the supply depot. To be honest, ironic as it might seem, I'm still experimenting with the "winning strategy". The problem is my combat skills in implementing any particular strategy rather than the strategy itself.

(2b) There is nothing stopping you from landing/refueling/rearming at any Georgian air base. If you want to maintain the illusion/authenticity, you can restrict this to Batumi (though the short runway makes landings tricky!), where we can pretend that there is a skeleton Navy aviation support team in place. That's where the British Chinooks are based as well, and as it is, there actually is a ground spawn F-14 available there.

(3) Good suggestion. I can add alternate spawn zones and allow you to specify them -- e.g. CONDOR West / Central / East.

(4) The Lua code is extremely flexible in how the enemy sorties are generated. It can be conditioned on time (e.g., one every 5-10 mins or 20-25mins), to ensure a particular number of current active missions (e.g., 5-6), to launch missions based on player numbers / locations etc., or a background sortie probability. These can be combined for more tuning (e.g., time AND number and prob, time OR number AND prob, time AND number AND player/AI ratio, etc.). All of these can, furthermore, be dynamic -- e.g., the tempo can be faster after 20 mins of mission time, or the number of active missions can increase depending on the number of enemy shot down, or the probability can be higher/lower etc.. Fine tuning this is the for me, right now, an open book, so this is where the feedback is valuable. If it's not giving away too much of the "magic behind the scenes", right now the setup is a fixed amount of opposition, with rapid recycling of opposition as aircraft get lost. I used to have a slower tempo of recycling, but found that this meant that I often arrived on station in a lull (especially of Colt 1 has been very efficient/good LOL), and since the enemy sorties have to take off, marshal, fence it, ingress etc. from their bases, it was getting a little dull waiting around. I suppose that makes it realistic! I'm thinking for the next release, I will allow users to adjust the tuning parameters (tempo and number) via the radio menu, and set defaults in the ME.

(5) I probably should have made the victory conditions more clear. Right now, you can look at the mission status in the F-10 menu. There is this abstract "supply level" that needs to reach 100%. There is air and ground transport ferrying supplies from the depots to the frontlines that contribute to this supply with each successful delivery. Loss of these vehicles to enemy interdiction results in the frontlines taking longer (if at all) to reach 100%. In addition there are also flights coming in to the major air bases that represent the stocking of the depots -- loss of these to enemy interdiction results in loss of the standing supply. From my testing, with all enemy activity suppressed it takes about 45 mins to about a little over an hour for supply to reach 100%. With unsuppressed enemy activity it never gets there.

Thank you again for your feedback. When I have time I will try and add options to fine-tune the enemy opposition level. I have another version where the goal is to protect merchant shipping, but am thinking of moving that to the PG map for a different scenario.

I have played the mission a couple times and so far have enjoyed it. I particularly like the positioning of the carrier, CAP flights and tankers, as well as the time of day (dawn into early morning).

 

A couple questions/comments:

 

1. I know it is not your fault but the AI wingman is pretty useless and usually runs out fuel early in the mission. I have tried sending him to the tanker without much luck. Any thoughts on how best to employ the AI wingman?

 

2. I usually end up running out of missiles after 2 engagements. Is the idea that I should be spawning additional CAPS. I usually engage the AI flights coming down the coast and let the AI handle the russian fighters over the mountains to east. I haven't been able to shoot down the coastal Mig-21s and Su-25s quick enough and have enough weapons to then proceed to head east. The AI flights do better than the wingman but usually they get overwhelmed. Any thoughts/strategy/tips to manage the battle?

 

3. The other flights do better than the AI wingman but I have a issue where CAP chases aircraft down to TIBLISI and then get sandwiched between Russian flights. Or when I spawn new CAPs they are right in the middle of 1-2 mig-29s and then get downed quickly. Again any tips on managing the AI CAP flights over Georgia would be appreciated.

 

I know you are trying to balance the battle to make it interesting but the Russian flights spawn very quickly after each other. At least from my couple play through.

 

Anyway overall I enjoyed the mission but was unsure how to complete it.

 

Thanks!

Bearfoot,

Thanks again for you help. I will give your advice a shot! I also really appreciate the effort in generating the mission, briefing and integrating the scripts etc.

any chance of a Syria version?