landable landing craft

Started by _AH_BigChief, September 10, 2008, 04:02:38 PM

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_AH_BigChief

Hi all,
Been trying to get landing craft, within the mission builder, to be able to land at the beachhead without success. I can only get them so close to the beach but then thats it. I was wondering if there was a way to be able to get them to the beachhead or is that possible at all? :help-sos-sos-29402:

_AH_BigChief

_AH_Moggy

S! Chief:

Yes, it's not hard to do.  It's a bit tedious, but here is the method I use (Note: I strongly recommend that you first try this out with a single ship and single aircraft):

1.  In FMB, put a landing craft ship (or whatever ship you want to use) on the map with two waypoints, anywhere at sea.
2.  Put an aircraft (I always use the J8 so I can easily spot it in the mission file; actual type & side doesn't matter) on the map, starting it where you want the landing craft to start the mission.  Give this plane a # of waypoints where you want the ship to travel, including the final waypoint on the beach.  Altitude & speed don't matter.
3.  Open the mission file with NotePad or WordPad.
4.  Go to the [chiefs] window & ID your landing craft.  If it's the only one it'll be numbered "0."
5.  Scroll down to that [_Chief_Road] window.  These are your landing craft's waypoints.  There will be only two.
6.  For both lines, cut the first two entries (latitude & longitude), leaving the rest, usually starting with "120."
7.  Now go back to your airplane that will be acting like a landing craft.  Go to its waypoints.  They'll all start with "NORMFLY."
8.  Here's where it gets a bit tedious.  You're going to cut all except all the latitude/longitude values.  Line-by-line, cut the "NORMFLY" & all values after the latitude (2nd value).
9.  Once that's done, highlight all the remaining latitude & longitude values for your "plane" and hit either "cut" or "copy" (I use "copy").
10.  Scroll down again to your landing craft's [_Chief_Road] section and paste these values above the two lines remaining (one will read simply "120;" the one above it will have the LC's speed (in meters/second).
11.  Now you're going to cut & paste the first remaining original landing craft line (starting "120" & ending with the LC's speed) to the right of all the latitude & longitude values you just pasted, except the one at the bottom.  The bottom line must end up with simply a "120" to the right of it.
12.  Now you have to delete two entries for the aircraft you used.  First, it will have an ID line in the [Wing] window near the top of the mission file.  Delete that line.  Second, delete in entirety all its description (planes, skill level, class, fuel, etc.) and its [_____Way] waypoint entries below it.
13.  Save the mission file & open FMB.  You'll see now that what used to be an airplane now is your landing craft.  You can access each waypoint to change its speeds, but won't be able to move any of them that are close to land.

There are other methods you can use, such as using some object to pinpoint the beach point where you want the LC to end up at, and simply using the latitude/longitude for that object.  This will work well, and is easier, if you have only 2 or 3 waypoints for the LC, with only one of them near land.  Just make sure you delete the object you use as a reference point later.  The reason I use the method above is that often I like to use it to place multiple "close-to-shore" waypoints for all kinds of ships, and I'm used to it.

Moggy

_AH_Col._Hogan

"Yes, it's not hard to do"????????

I'm dizzy.............

_AH_Olds

"My choice early in life was either to be a piano-player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference". - Harry S. Truman

_AH_BBQhead

S~. WOW.. thanks, Moggy..  that's some piece o' help there.. impressive.. much more so than my , now pitiful sounding, work around... which is to put some moving ones in as close as they'll go, then add some static ones on the beach..   :sad-056:

At that awkward age where your brain has gone from " Probably shouldn't say that" to
"What the hell, let's see what happens"?  Me too.

_AH_BigChief

Moggy,
Fan-dam-tastic sir!! I owe you a beer! :drinking-29:

Figured out  what you were talking about and have been playin around with it all night.  :cool:

Now I am going to get busy doing some mission's that I have wanted to do for a long time now. Just one more question. Where in the world did you come up with doing that? :lol-034:

I got another question about using the mission builder but was so happy to get the landing craft and other ships to do what I want, I dang near  :censored-015: my pants and forgot the dang question now.  :happy-112:


Salute!

BigChief

_AH_BigChief

ok, Moggy. Now I know what the question was that I forgot.

Question is: Is there a way to get vehicles to go over bridges? ....ie, tanks, cars, trucks etc? Do you do it the same way as you would do it for the landing craft or is there another way, or not possible at all?


Salute!

BigChief



_AH_Moggy

Quote from: _AH_BigChief on September 11, 2008, 05:54:09 AM
ok, Moggy. Now I know what the question was that I forgot.

Question is: Is there a way to get vehicles to go over bridges? ....ie, tanks, cars, trucks etc? Do you do it the same way as you would do it for the landing craft or is there another way, or not possible at all?


First, make sure it's a road bridge, not a rail bridge. Usually, just plotting the vehicle's waypoints to proceed along a road will automatically take it over any road bridges between those waypoints.  Occasionally, more often with single vehicles (as opposed to convoys or tank platoons, for example), you have to plot waypoints right in front, and then right after, the bridge.  Then you can continue.

BTW, there's also a way to get ships/watercraft to go under bridges along rivers.  But, we'll save that for later...

Moggy

_AH_BigChief

Moggy,
Thanks for the info but not what I was looking for. My fault. What I was getting at was.... in FullMissionBuilder, if I was to place a bridge (from the objects list)somewhere across a river outside of using any roadway, is there a way of getting the vehicles to cross that particular bridge. I tried to do the same thing using your example with the landing craft but they wouldn't go up and over the bridge, they would go through and under the bridge.
I guess what I am trying to say is, I want to be able to place a bridge anywhere on the map and have them go up and over instead of through it.

As for getting ships to go under bridges, already figured that one out. It took me a bit but got it.
I still owe you the beer for helping me the first time!

Salute!

Chief

_AH_BigChief

I need an example, if someone could, explain how to split briefs? Cant figure it out!

Salute!

Chief

_AH_Moggy

Quote from: _AH_BigChief on September 12, 2008, 04:36:12 PM
I need an example, if someone could, explain how to split briefs? Cant figure it out!

Salute!

Chief

Here's a sample brief for both sides, the way you'd input it in FMB:

<ARMY NONE>Welcome to Aces High!  Today we'll be bombing BBQ's house.  After aircraft assignment, check back here in the ready room for briefing!</ARMY><ARMY RED>Here you'd input all the information pertinent to red side.</ARMY><ARMY BLUE>Here you'd input all the information pertinent to blue side.

The first part (after "ARMY NONE") is seen by all pilots;  the 2nd by red only; the 3rd by blue only.

Moggy

_AH_Moggy

Quote from: _AH_BigChief on September 11, 2008, 10:19:57 PM
Moggy,
...What I was getting at was.... in FullMissionBuilder, if I was to place a bridge (from the objects list)somewhere across a river outside of using any roadway, is there a way of getting the vehicles to cross that particular bridge. I tried to do the same thing using your example with the landing craft but they wouldn't go up and over the bridge, they would go through and under the bridge.
I guess what I am trying to say is, I want to be able to place a bridge anywhere on the map and have them go up and over instead of through it...


Ah, OK.  To my knowledge, it isn't possible except for perhaps one trick.  The reason is the elevation of the vehicle is keyed & locked to the elevation of the ground it traverses.  Since the bridge object is higher than that, you'll see the vehicle either crash into it or proceed under it.  I haven't actually tried this out, but there may be a workaround.

It has to do with the elevation data for "Chiefs" (moving objects).  One of the entries following the latitude & longitutde might be for elevation, or possibly some code for following ground level.  I've never experimented with this, and frankly don't know what the entries following the lat/long. mean, except for the last entry (speed).  It might be possible, if you can find out if there is an elevation entry or code, to play with that and, with a little tweaking, make a vehicle change its elevation via multiple closely-spaced waypoints.  I suspect that it's not possible, but don't know for sure.

Moggy