The "Uber" Command: Modern Air/Naval Ops Thread

[JudgeDredd]

another question! while playing the air tutorial I unassigned my tomcats from their patrol mission since there was no longer a threat of enemy air. I then deleted the patrol mission. what behavior should I expect from those tomcats after they are unassigned? the ones I had in the air remained in the air and their status was unassigned. should they RTB automatically since they have no mission and are just flying around aimlessly or will I need to manually order them to do so? thanks.

I believe removing them from a mission just means you are removing them from their current mission. They will stay there until you RTB them. I guess the thinking is they could be assigned a new mission - in which case you don't want them heading home

[CptHowdy]

using the air tutorial as an example here. I make a mission for the 12 tomcats to patrol. can I make them a group while they are waiting to take off or do I need to wait until they are airborne and then drag a box around them and press G??

[Nefaro]

The problem  you had with ordering them down so low is that the manual Altitude ordered is Barometric altitude.  So while you may be trying to force them down below 650m to release some cluster bombs, on the alt slider, they will actually be going down to their minimum allowed altitude (100m).  I'd like to see the manual altitude slider give them AGL orders, if possible.

hehe well I have no clue what the difference is between barometric altitude and altitude and what are AGL orders? I know in the new update that those bombs are being removed from the loadout and just going with the shrikes. is that plane capable of using that loadout with the low altitude bombs, ever?

AGL = Above Ground Level.  Regarding the altitude setting.  Barometric altitude is Above Sea Level.  The latter is lower than the ground, when you're over land, so setting 300m in the first tutorial (for example) is actually ordering it to fly much lower.  Fortunately it keeps it from flying into the ground, but the aircraft is still flying at around it's minimum 100m AGL instead of the 300m ordered.

As for the CBU cluster bombs in the SEAD loadout, yes you can force it to attack with them if you manually order the aircraft down under the 650m maximum launch altitude for that weapon.  The reason the AI will not drop them after it fires the Shrikes is that it refuses to drop below this launch requirement since it's loadout has it's own min-max flight profile that overrides the weapon's requirement. 

I'll be sad if such typical loadouts are gutted of some weapons because the mission AI can't attain their launch envelope.  Hopefully another solution is found and implemented that allows the AI to attain launch parameters for any weapons it carries, instead of just removing them to avoid the issue.  :-\

[mikeck]

New open beta patch available on matrix forums. Lots of fixes and stability\performance behavior improvements.

[JudgeDredd]

Right - how about this...

A Group of 2 Sea Harriers - they were on CAP and exited the CAP area (because investigate outside was ticked). They found and attacked 2 A-4 Skyhawks. I saw they were low on fuel and with only 1 Sidewinder left, I decided to RTB them.

a) How do you do that - RTB a group?
b) The way I did it was go into unit mode, clicked on the leader and then selected RTB...to my pleasure the other one also followed for RTB
c) However, they were showing as 2 units...I pressed 9 to go back to group mode - and they didn't - they stayed as individual units. So I selected both of them again and pressed G to group them - only to have the message "Group_706 has no units left; dissolving..." - so how do you get them to form a group again

The most important one though is why is RTB missing from an air groups list of possible actions. The right click menu system should be available for groups as well as units. What's the point in having a streamlined grouping system if you have to keep jumping in and out of unit mode to see various things or assign various orders...and I get that some are specific to platforms - so the Group menu system should be modified to only include the available actions that can be carried out by all the units in the group.

I also think the fuel left for the aircraft with the lowest fuel assigned to a group should be displayed...along with my other requests for weapons. In UNIT view, you should be able to see the weapons available in the right hand side under the fuel. In Group mode, you should see the fuel left for the platform with the lowest fuel level in the group and also the available weapons - in total...so a group of 2xHarriers would show 4xSidewinders and the fuel for the Harrier with the lowest amount of fuel. The fuel thing is especially important if you were having a mix of air assets in a group.

Just my opinion.

One last thing - it's late - please PLEASE for the love of god remove the need to switch off the numlock. Nefaro requested this and it's driving me bloody nuts. Currently I'm playing through a scenario and I'm going out to the web to find a platform image, saving it, using my pic program to edit it and trying to save it - only realising when I've been typing the damn platform number that I had num lock off. So I switch it on and save the file, go back in game and at some point try to go back to unit/group mode and realise the damn num lock is on! Please get rid

[JudgeDredd]

Retracted - unfair.

It's got some faults - but I don't actually feel like I've been BETA testing.

[CptHowdy]

using the latest build 438. trying out the air tutorial again. made patrol mission and put 12 tomcats in it. first 4 launched so I decided to group them for the heck of it. when I grouped them it removed them from the patrol mission  >:(
why?? I set a mission for 12 tomcats to patrol just because I grouped 4 of them doesn't change the fact that they had a mission. I only realized they had had been dropped because they flew within range of the sam sites. my patrol zone was set up outside the range of those sites. once I assigned the group back to the patrol mission they immediately got their butts back into the patrol area and out of harms way :)  I also minimized the game on accident and when I went to switch back it froze up and had to shut down. luckily I had saved right before that!

[jomni]

using the air tutorial as an example here. I make a mission for the 12 tomcats to patrol. can I make them a group while they are waiting to take off or do I need to wait until they are airborne and then drag a box around them and press G??

You can let them take off (without mission assigned) in the aircraft / hangar menu.
Just highlight several planes then there is button below to 'Launch as Group'.
They will take off as a group.  But take note the time to form up.
Then you assign a mission to them as a group.

[CptHowdy]

using the air tutorial as an example here. I make a mission for the 12 tomcats to patrol. can I make them a group while they are waiting to take off or do I need to wait until they are airborne and then drag a box around them and press G??

You can let them take off (without mission assigned) in the aircraft / hangar menu.
Just highlight several planes then there is button below to 'Launch as Group'.
They will take off as a group.  But take note the time to form up.
Then you assign a mission to them as a group.

ok thanks. launch without mission and select launch as group option. where do they form up? will they just circle the base?

[jomni]

using the air tutorial as an example here. I make a mission for the 12 tomcats to patrol. can I make them a group while they are waiting to take off or do I need to wait until they are airborne and then drag a box around them and press G??

You can let them take off (without mission assigned) in the aircraft / hangar menu.
Just highlight several planes then there is button below to 'Launch as Group'.
They will take off as a group.  But take note the time to form up.
Then you assign a mission to them as a group.

ok thanks. launch without mission and select launch as group option. where do they form up? will they just circle the base?

Yup.

[bostonmyk]

Right - how about this...

A Group of 2 Sea Harriers - they were on CAP and exited the CAP area (because investigate outside was ticked). They found and attacked 2 A-4 Skyhawks. I saw they were low on fuel and with only 1 Sidewinder left, I decided to RTB them.

a) How do you do that - RTB a group?
b) The way I did it was go into unit mode, clicked on the leader and then selected RTB...to my pleasure the other one also followed for RTB
c) However, they were showing as 2 units...I pressed 9 to go back to group mode - and they didn't - they stayed as individual units. So I selected both of them again and pressed G to group them - only to have the message "Group_706 has no units left; dissolving..." - so how do you get them to form a group again

The most important one though is why is RTB missing from an air groups list of possible actions. The right click menu system should be available for groups as well as units. What's the point in having a streamlined grouping system if you have to keep jumping in and out of unit mode to see various things or assign various orders...and I get that some are specific to platforms - so the Group menu system should be modified to only include the available actions that can be carried out by all the units in the group.

I also think the fuel left for the aircraft with the lowest fuel assigned to a group should be displayed...along with my other requests for weapons. In UNIT view, you should be able to see the weapons available in the right hand side under the fuel. In Group mode, you should see the fuel left for the platform with the lowest fuel level in the group and also the available weapons - in total...so a group of 2xHarriers would show 4xSidewinders and the fuel for the Harrier with the lowest amount of fuel. The fuel thing is especially important if you were having a mix of air assets in a group.

Just my opinion.

One last thing - it's late - please PLEASE for the love of god remove the need to switch off the numlock. Nefaro requested this and it's driving me bloody nuts. Currently I'm playing through a scenario and I'm going out to the web to find a platform image, saving it, using my pic program to edit it and trying to save it - only realising when I've been typing the damn platform number that I had num lock off. So I switch it on and save the file, go back in game and at some point try to go back to unit/group mode and realise the damn num lock is on! Please get rid

Hi Judge

Right click the unit and select RTB from the dropdown.  Groups break up when you order that.  Please let me know if you see an airgroup that you can't right click and see the RTB option.

As far as switching from unit/group you can use the pageup key as well.

Your other requests have been added to our list of things to look at when you first wrote them.

[Herman Hum]

A new review for CMO has been posted to SimHQ.
http://www.simhq.com/air-combat/command-modern-air-naval-operations-review.html

The review has been re-posted and, except for normal editorial amendments, remains unchanged.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

You might ask the editor to go over it again as there are still quite a few typos and grammatical errors present in the article.  It's not as bad as one of my postings, mind you but it still detracts from the review.

[Herman Hum]

The concern is appreciated.  I went over it, too.  I could not find many grammatical problems.  Would you please identify a few?

[GDS_Starfury]

its needs the use of the word gooder more.