Mission Editor - Hot Tips

Hello,

I need a little help with ships in single player missions.

....

Why change the topic of a thread? ... why didn't you open a new thread for your problem?

For a moment I tought that a real Hot Tip had been added :cry:

moved, so post could be deleted here. sorry, but the answer could be something for a hot tip I thought.

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?p=4310901#post4310901

This is pretty hot

I've discovered a few tricks over the time while building missions.

No need to keep the secrets I've learned if it can help you others. :)

 

 

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Q: "I want to check for some condition OR another condition.

But it seems like all the Mission Editor can do is AND in the conditions!?"

 

A: "OR"-condition hack for triggers;

By default all conditions are using the AND statement.

However - You can "hack" you mission-file and change it into OR if you like.

 

Here's a sample;

1. Create a mission with a normal AND condition.

[ATTACH]33931[/ATTACH]

Normally the above statement will be evaluated as "Group1 dead AND Group2 dead" etc.

 

2. Save the mission and open the mission in Notepad++

Change the AND statements into OR

[ATTACH]33932[/ATTACH] [ATTACH]33933[/ATTACH]

3. Test the mission - now you can see that only 1 group needs to be dead;

[ATTACH]33934[/ATTACH]

NOTE - if you save the mission again in the Editor it WILL revert to "AND" again. So be sure that this is one of the last things you do.

 

Another sample of advanced "AND->OR" hacking;

If you have a MP map with 8 players and need to check if *any* 2 are in a Zone at the same time.

How to check for 2 players in a Zone; http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=809924&postcount=23

How about editing some of these older posts that are now outdated...

OR for example is now possible in the editor,

Its a big thread and still relevant, but some of these "TIPS" are really out of date now, considering when thread was originally started back in 2009...

(A lot of DCS information is just so out of date now and misleading like this post)

Especially for new guys starting out now trying to find good info. so trying to work out was is now false info is not helping the learn process.

(and this is a main pinned thread on a very useful topic)

Just saying... (and thanks heaps for the tips you did do back then, many are still very useful...)

Labels

My issue.... It's hard to spot aircraft in DCS with my setup, but using labels makes it too easy.

 

My solution? Use the dot labels, but make it so that friendly and hostile units appear to be the SAME colour. Helps with the spotting, but you still have to get close to visually ID them.

 

Thanks for everyone on the forums here that showed me how to do this, I thought I'd put it into one thread for reference.

 

This also may not be the most efficient way to do it, but it does work for me for now.

...

 

Full post here

This is what I do for labels:

This gives better visibility without the default overkill labels.

(Of course labels have to be enabled in game client for this to apply)

This is based on what is done on the Red Iberia MP server. This is their blog post with the labels.lua script and description here

The general gist is as follows:

 

No Red/Blue all labels are the same color, Black.

Aircraft labels remain as a dot and begin fading in at 8km, reach max view-ability at 3km before fading back out by 500m

Missiles remain as as dot start fading in at 4km reaching peak view-ability at 500m.

Ground Units start fading in at 3km and have faded out by 1km.

Naval units fade in at 9km and fade out at 6km

labels.lua

You can put this in the mission file(as per the above post) and/or if you want to use this on your own client for your labels offline (overriding the default labels) by placing in this folder (the labels.lua script).

Saved Games\DCS\Config\View

This will take precedence over the built in labels.lua script in dcs located in this game folder DCSWorld\Config\View (Do not overwrite this default file in the games folder, use the saved games location above)

You can also write your own custom labels.lua file and tweak to suite. It's commented and not hard to work out what it does.

Precedence (highest to lowest) for labels.lua is

The mission file => The saved games folder location =>The game folder location.

Hello editors. I want to make a mission for fire fighting with helicopters.Any idea how can i do it?

On "actions" i can see only "STATIC ACTIVE" but not deactive. Any idea how to deactive a "smoke and fire effect" from an area?

Hello editors. I want to make a mission for fire fighting with helicopters.Any idea how can i do it?

 

On "actions" i can see only "STATIC ACTIVE" but not deactive. Any idea how to deactive a "smoke and fire effect" from an area?

No, that is not a very hot tip, but thank you for your contribution.

Turn static ship into working FARP

Discovered an easy way to do this yesterday - thought I'd share this tip.

I found Mithandra's "Alligator 1171 Class Saratov Helipad Version" static ship yesterday but was disappointed it wasn't FARP enabled. (Later discovered it IS FARP enabled. See explanation below)

https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/2542583/

I later found Suntsag's "AM2 Mat Mod" here https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=273049 (Post # 8 )

Had a brainwave on combining the two mods and tried it out - it worked! Yay!

Place the Alligator Helipad ship in shallow enough water like a river, lake or coastal waters, then place an AM2 Mat right under the ship helipad - hey presto, instant Alligator Helipad FARP ship!

It will work as long as the water depth plus helipad height above it doesn't exceed the service radius of the AM2 Mat. I used the single "**X1_AM2_Mat NGUR" mat as shown in the screenshot and it worked great. Must be the "NGUR" Version as that signifies "No Ground Units Required".

This trick should also work with any other floating static or stationary ship/boat/barge etc that has a suitable landing surface that's big enough for a chopper to land on.

EDIT: Just realised Mithandra's Alligator Helipad Ship IS FARP enabled. I initially didn't see it in the ships list so thought it was simply a static model but it is a complete ship unit. My apologies for being a dumbass.

However - you can't put ships in rivers or lakes, even with the old copy and paste trick so my trick above is still useful. Allows you to put a static Alligator Helipad Ship (or other vessel) in inland waterways and FARP enable it. Can't spawn aircraft on it though unfortunately.

If you like creating missions that simulate night fighting here are a few tips.

Pick a time and day that has a full moon. This way the moon can add some color to the scene and some much needed light in dusk and dawn conditions.

Schedule flights around dusk and dawn. Typical missions last about 1-1.5 hours (before your butt gets square), so you can easily find days where the entire mission can be flown without the sun and without the need for NVGs.

If you increase Gamma to at least 2, dusk and dawn missions will be much nicer. If you add the full moon, the increased Gamma makes the moonlight seem more real. Do NOT use Nvidia Gamma in the Nvidia Control Panel under Adjust Desktop Color Settings. This causes banding where light and dark come together, and the stars will disappear. Leave it set to Other Applications control color settings, and use DCS Gamma.

Schedule flights in the winter (Caucasus). The white snow adds much needed visibility during dusk and dawn missions.

ME won't load any Missions

After the mini update my ME won't load any of my missions, all my mission loaded before the update but now not one will load. I had done repairs, updates and removed all mods but it still will not load. Missions will load normally but not in ME which means I can't change, make or modify any thing. I have attach my log file, also can not load mission in the Release version either.

dcs.log

After the mini update my ME won't load any of my missions, all my mission loaded before the update but now not one will load. I had done repairs, updates and removed all mods but it still will not load. Missions will load normally but not in ME which means I can't change, make or modify any thing. I have attach my log file, also can not load mission in the Release version either.

According to that log you have a bunch of mods that appear to have their own errors with loading.

The error in the editor is stated below. I have to assume you have a mod installed that modifies the me_briefing.lua file or its an older version of the file because by default there is nothing on line 122. And a mod like my coalition modification does have something on that line, but it doesnt contain dialogsDir.

Try deleting that file and running a repair.

LUACOMMON: Error: GUI Error: [string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_briefing.lua"]:122: attempt to concatenate field 'dialogsDir' (a nil value)
GUI debug.traceback: stack traceback:
[C]: ?
[string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_briefing.lua"]:122: in function 'create_'
[string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_briefing.lua"]:184: in function '?'
[string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_toolbar.lua"]:1132: in function 'untoggle_all_except'
[string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_toolbar.lua"]:1211: in function <[string "./MissionEditor/modules/me_toolbar.lua"]:1207>

Hello everybody.

I am not sure this is the right spot to post my questions, but I am quite new both to DCS and the forum.

Leveraging on 30 years of Air Force experience, I have been contacted to develop BFM/AFM and BVR training scenarios. Mission Editor helps, but I am still struggling with some controls.

Cutting to the chase… Is there a way to:

-        Make red air (AI) notch (turn approx 90 degrees off the initial heading) at a pre-determined distance? I get the trigger/moving trigger zone, the problem is the specific action

-        Make red air (AI) commit on condition (eg. X many seconds after the notch or at a specific distance)

-        Make red air (AI) resume CAP if blue air “strays”

I have been dabbing with Combined Arms (it CAN control Air Assets as well as Ground) but it becomes a challenge with multiple units (it’d be easier to play the Flight of the Bumblebee on a piano!)

Thanks for your help. By the way: I have zero scripting skills.

P.S.: I might repost this in other pages, as I attempt to discover more suitable Topics headers, digging in the forum.

On 7/26/2021 at 7:55 AM, Arrow48 said:

Hello everybody.

I am not sure this is the right spot to post my questions, but I am quite new both to DCS and the forum.

Leveraging on 30 years of Air Force experience, I have been contacted to develop BFM/AFM and BVR training scenarios. Mission Editor helps, but I am still struggling with some controls.

Cutting to the chase… Is there a way to:

-        Make red air (AI) notch (turn approx 90 degrees off the initial heading) at a pre-determined distance? I get the trigger/moving trigger zone, the problem is the specific action

-        Make red air (AI) commit on condition (eg. X many seconds after the notch or at a specific distance)

-        Make red air (AI) resume CAP if blue air “strays”

I have been dabbing with Combined Arms (it CAN control Air Assets as well as Ground) but it becomes a challenge with multiple units (it’d be easier to play the Flight of the Bumblebee on a piano!)

 

Thanks for your help. By the way: I have zero scripting skills.

 

P.S.: I might repost this in other pages, as I attempt to discover more suitable Topics headers, digging in the forum.

 

All of these things are possible, but NOT only in the ME with rudimentary controls.

Each of the things you're describing are going to require logic expressed in code to implement.

But these things can be done. This isn't offered as usable code but just some ideas on the "how" here using scripting/MOOSE:

-  Make red air (AI) notch (turn approx 90 degrees off the initial heading) at a pre-determined distance? I get the trigger/moving trigger zone, the problem is the specific action

red_air = GROUP:FindByName("redaircraft")



red_air_heading = red_air:GetHeading()



newheading = {90,-90}



red_air_newheading = red_air_heading + newheading[math.random(1,#newheading)] 



desired_notch_distance = 20000 --meters



has_been_routed == false



scheduler_stuff_here { 



distance = (get2DDistance_from_some_other_obj)



if distance <= desired_notch_distance and has_been_routed == false then



  red_air:TaskRouteToVec3(some_random_point_in_new_heading_direction)



  has_been_routed = true



end
} --end scheduler

You have some difficult problems to solve, but they are not impossible by any means.  

Can we use the above with spawned AI like A2A dispatching does?

It's a bit more work involved, such as creating a set and using OnAfterAdd() but yes you could.

I've been moving missions between maps by unpacking them and changing the theatre in the mission and theatre files.

The same technique works with static templates. 

Just edit it, and change the theatre to suit.  

Syria

PersianGulf

Caucasus

You can then load the template on the other map.  Really simple way to move large numbers of assets around.

On 12/9/2021 at 12:41 PM, fargo007 said:

I've been moving missions between maps by unpacking them and changing the theatre in the mission and theatre files.

The same technique works with static templates. 

Just edit it, and change the theatre to suit.  

 

Syria

PersianGulf

Caucasus

 

You can then load the template on the other map.  Really simple way to move large numbers of assets around.

Could you be more specific? What files do you edit and how? This would be a great time saver for me if I can get it to work.

9 minutes ago, King39 said:

Could you be more specific? What files do you edit and how? This would be a great time saver for me if I can get it to work.

So for static templates (.stm files):

        }, -- end of ["DEFAULT"]
    }, -- end of ["localization"]
    ["theatre"] = "Syria",
    ["desc"] = "",
} -- end of staticTemplate
 

Here where it says "Syria" you change this to either "PersianGulf" or "Caucasus" for instance.

For an unpacked mission, change the same thing in the "mission" file, and also change it in the "theater" file that only has that one word in it anyhow.

Is it possible to get the Huey Nav radio working with a transmitting unit or trigger zone. I did Set up a unit and a zone on 119 AM and 120 AM. I get the Sound File from the radio but no action on the Instruments.

When i spawn a unit [via script] the engine is off and cold - is there a command in DCS World Scripting Engine to start and stop the engine?

Need this for the FLIR! 

to use the new acls function do you have to enable it in mission editor for every mission ?

On 5/6/2022 at 3:47 PM, bonniebonbon said:

to use the new acls function do you have to enable it in mission editor for every mission ?

Yes.

On 5/4/2022 at 11:07 AM, mwd2 said:

When i spawn a unit [via script] the engine is off and cold - is there a command in DCS World Scripting Engine to start and stop the engine?

Need this for the FLIR! 

I would like to know it too. Same problem with FLIR. Admittedly, it's more realistic but, at night, it's a lotta more difficult to find spawned vehicles with engine off and cold.

There might be an answer on getting the vehicle at mission start but set as "invisible" and then during mission use the combo of getting visible & triggered action "Start"...

Any way how to do instant repair without any waiting time?

25 minutes ago, bingbean said:

Any way how to do instant repair without any waiting time?

Respawn or time acceleration in SP. Otherwise, not that i know of any quick method.