Dogs Of War Vu

Network of Friends => Tornado => Topic started by: Frankie on August 13, 2016, 05:38:18 AM

Title: Planning a 6-Tornado coordinated attack with Tornado's amazing Mission Planner
Post by: Frankie on August 13, 2016, 05:38:18 AM

My first attempt. JP-233 attacks from two flights, ingressing from opposing directions.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81jEJvbauw8

To go full-screen click here (https://youtu.be/81jEJvbauw8).

Forgive me for my droning, rambling, mumbling, at-times incoherent speech and babbling. My next video will be better.
The critical moment begins at 4:34 and it lasts a whole ... 4 seconds. Enjoy. Haha!

What the planning screens look like - Tornado's Mission Planner

(http://www.moodurian.com/tornado/images/mp_6strike-1.png)

-and-

(http://www.moodurian.com/tornado/images/mp_6strike-2.png)

-and-

(http://www.moodurian.com/tornado/images/mp_6strike-3.png)

Title: Re: Planning a 6-Tornado coordinated attack with Tornado's amazing Mission Planner
Post by: Tom N on August 13, 2016, 01:44:54 PM

Nice one! Never saw a double JP-233 Strike on the same airfield, really interesting!

BUT you should give every Wingman multiple tasks! so to have 2-3 high priority targets per airplane (preferrably the HAS for denying enemy CAS and IDS in following campaign/ command missions).But then again this part of the strategic planning is a bit unrealistic (or weirdly programmed) in what to strike and what to expect of the effects.

Title: Re: Planning a 6-Tornado coordinated attack with Tornado's amazing Mission Planner
Post by: Frankie on August 13, 2016, 04:07:48 PM

Hi Tom.

Thank you very much for your kind comments and good advice. Haha, you thought that you had seen everything you there was to see in Tornado after all the years of playing the game. I guess there is always something new to learn in this simulator. I am humbled that you, a Tornado power-user, have had some enjoyment and 'amazement' at this new 'trick' that I have pulled out of the Tornado game.

Yes, you are right that I should have  assigned a Target waypoint-Y for each plane. That is the only way to win a campaign because the enemy is also striking multiple allied targets.

My focus for the video was to get the TOT synchronized with multiple flights. Tornado is famous for its mission planner which allows the armchair pilot to coordinate a multiplayer strike at the exact same time from different directions. That is what I had read in the manual and what others had commented in the Google Groups pc games flight sim newsgroup. It was always what I read, but never what I did. So I had to give it a try. I had never experienced a coordinated strike for myself until today.

The hardest part was setting up and adjusting a flight's waypoints. They have to be set so that when Waypoint-X (the target) is the exact same time as another flight, there are no red error Windows that pop up. I found that I needed to setup many waypoints for each flight. 4 or 5 waypoints was not enough to achieve a dual-JP233 simultaneous strike. I would experience the red error message pop up. The most common error message was "Takeoff time is too early". I overcame the error message by setting up at least 10 waypoints per flight and by adjusting the lengths of the legs (e.g., the length of waypoint B to waypoint C). In this way I could get the attack timings of Waypoint X to be exactly the same.

I had never done a synchronized strike before with the fabulous Mission Planner and it took me many hours to get it right. I also believe that with a little imagination, creativity and experimentation, there can be many other 'tricks' anyone can do with the Mission Planner.

Then Mission Planner is like a game within the game, isn't it? I consider it the heart and soul of Tornaso. One can play a preset missions as it is, or modify the mission. Or one can start from a fresh, clean mission map and build the entire mission from up to 8 Tornados. The latter is what Tornado excels at. How the programmers crafted the game is amazing. If Tornado had a mission recorder that could playback AARs like what Red Baron/Flanker 1.0/1.5/2.0/2.5 did, it would be even more fantastic. Alas, the only 'AAR' I can have is what I can record using Open Broadcaster Software (OBS).

Finally, it is my pleasure and joy to create and to share the video with you and others.

Cheers
Frankie Kam