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Any experts with Lowengrin's Dynamic Campaign Generator?

J

JapLance

Charter Member 2012
I'm trying to set up a mini-campaign for Lowengrin's DCG, but I can't get it to work as I'd like.

My idea is to create a Malta 1942 situation, where the Germans and Italians are sending raids to Malta from the Sicily airfields and the British are flying on the defensive.

This is the look of the situation in the Mission editor:

CFS2DCGMalta42.jpg


Now, this is written in the guides in the DCG site:

Editing the Campaign File

The campaign file is fully editable with NotePad or any other text editor. It consists of the campaign date, the end date, and the position of the frontline. The first line of the campaign file consist of the date (DD/MM/YYYY). The second line consists of the end date. The third line of the file sets which way the front runs as well as which side of the lines the player starts on. The value of side must always be one of the following (capitalization included): North, South, East, West.

In the example below,the side is "East". The player's nation begins East of the frontlines which forces the lines to automatically run North to South.
Click to expand...

According to this, I should clearly set the side of the front as South (it is a British campaign for the moment), but if I do so, strange things happen after a few missions, like Axis planes based in my airfields in Malta or my flight group having to fly CAP for Italian airfields.

Otherwise, if I set it up as North, the campaign runs more or less fine, but I'm never ordered to fly CAP on my own airfields and enemy bombers seem to never target them. Most action occurs over the Locations I set up in the campaign files.

Is there anybody around here familiar with this utility to create missions? This is my first serious attempt with DCG (it seemed like a perfect situation for it) and something is flawed somewhere, but I don't know what.
 
Ettico is the expert on the DCG. I've done a couple of campaigns with it but that was along time ago. I also did a Malta about 7 years ago and had a great time flying it. I don't even know where it is now but it might be on one of my discs from back then.

I did a CATF,Solomons and Attack on Japan with the DCG. All were fun. But they were all done 5 to 8 years ago.


Talon
 
Hi Talon,

Hopefully Ettico will see this post and will come to the rescue. I love his latest AIRBOSS utility for DCG.
 
Hi Japlance,

I've been on a sabbatical from cfs2, but I still check the forum regularly.

You're correct to flip the 'side' designation. In that part of the world, east-west works normally, but north-south is reversed in the 'mind' of DCG.

I don't know why you're not getting CAP missions, but it may have something to do with your Airboss settings. DCG normally assigns lots of CAP's, but Airboss will re-assign some of the CAP's to fly escort duty if bombers are based at the same airfield. If you're using Airboss, you'll have noticed that Airboss gives you the option to enter the minimum number of CAP's you want defending the airfields, or you can allow Airboss to decide using it's formula for CAP coverage by entering 999 in answer to the query. Airboss will only re-assign 'extra' CAP's to escort duty.

I programmed Airboss to re-assign CAP's to escort duty because DCG never assigns AI squadrons to escort duty, which leaves the bombers undefended. So the bottom line is, you won't get any CAP missions if the Airboss minimum CAP number is set to 0 AND there are bombers at your airfield needing escorts, OR if DCG assigns enough CAPs to allow Airboss to re-assign your squadron to escort duty while leaving a sufficient number of CAPs.

Other than those considerations, I don't know why you wouldn't get CAP's.:isadizzy:

Glad you're enjoying Airboss. One thing I particularly like about Airboss is the ability to get escorts assigned to the player squadron when flying a strike mission. An escort flight helps a lot when you're attacking a defended target. You just need to have enough fighter flights at your airfield to cover both CAP requirements and escort duty.
 
Thanks for your thorough explanation, Ettico :applause:

Strange bug that of the North/South setting, but not really smashing. It just bugged me a lot at the beginning because I didn't understand why it wasn't working. Now that I know that it simply works this way it's no problem at all.

With regard to the CAP problem, AIRBOSS is not the cause, as I'm talking about the mission DCG assigns you when you click in the "Generate Mission" button, well before any use of AIRBOSS. But I just generated a long streak of missions a while ago and got one CAP mission over one of my airfields, so there must be something else affecting the allocation of my unit, probably that there are more British squadrons than airfields (only three on Malta) and the AI planes are already assigned that duty most of the time.

I'll keep experimenting with that. Maybe adding RAF Kalafrana and St Paul's as runways instead of locations as it is now might help a bit.
 
JapLance said:
Thanks for your thorough explanation, Ettico :applause:

Strange bug that of the North/South setting, but not really smashing. It just bugged me a lot at the beginning because I didn't understand why it wasn't working. Now that I know that it simply works this way it's no problem at all.

With regard to the CAP problem, AIRBOSS is not the cause, as I'm talking about the mission DCG assigns you when you click in the "Generate Mission" button, well before any use of AIRBOSS. But I just generated a long streak of missions a while ago and got one CAP mission over one of my airfields, so there must be something else affecting the allocation of my unit, probably that there are more British squadrons than airfields (only three on Malta) and the AI planes are already assigned that duty most of the time.

I'll keep experimenting with that. Maybe adding RAF Kalafrana and St Paul's as runways instead of locations as it is now might help a bit.
Click to expand...

Right. It just works that way. In the Western Hemisphere, East-West is also reversed. It doesn't seem to affect anything if you flip the 'side' designation.

'Location' markers will also pull off CAPs. DCG wants to attack and defend the 'locations', so if you have several of them, then DCG will tend to assign more flights to strike or defend the 'locations' and fewer for CAP.
 
Hi Ettico

I'm having a problem with the latest version of Airboss.

I'm setting up an ETO 43-45 install of CFS2, and as a test I made a tiny Campaign with DCG based on Operation Bodenplatte. The campaign runs fine and create the missions, but after running them through Airboss, the missions become unplayable: "Error loading mission file.Either mission file is corrupt or formatted improperly".

At first I thought it was a problem with the campaign, and I was incapable of finding the error, but then I played the original mission as created by DCG and everything worked perfectly :kilroy:. This happened mission after mission that I was generating with DCG.

After comparing two missions side by side I located the possible bug. Check these snippets of the same .mis file before and after running Airboss:

DCG .mis:

[formation.5]
id=6005
type=air
waypoint_path_id=5005
directive=32
hidden=1
formation_type=2
unit_id_position.0=9118,0,0,0,0
unit_id_position.1=9119,0,-500,-1000,-10
unit_id_position.2=9120,0,-1000,-2000,-20
unit_id_position.3=9121,0,-1500,-3000,-30
unit_id_position.4=9122,0,-2000,-4000,-40
unit_id_position.5=9123,0,-2500,-5000,-50
unit_id_position.6=9124,0,-3000,-6000,-60
unit_id_position.7=9125,0,-3500,-7000,-70

[waypoint_path.5]
id=5005
waypoint.0=1,1,N50* 33.80',E3* 51.48',+13060,,,,231,,0,0,1
waypoint.1=1,1,N50* 33.76',E3* 51.43',+13060,,,,231,,0,0,1
waypoint.2=8,1,N50* 33.73',E3* 51.39',+13060,,,,231,02:00,0,0,1
waypoint.3=8388608,1,N50* 33.68',E3* 51.31',+8706,,,,231,02:00,0,0,1
waypoint.4=16,1,N50* 34.33',E3* 51.99',+8706,,,,231,02:00,0,0,1
waypoint.5=1,1,N50* 34.99',E3* 52.68',+13060,,,,231,02:00,0,0,1
waypoint.6=4096,1,N50* 33.68',E3* 51.31',+13060,,,,231,,8028,0,1
Click to expand...
Airboss .mis:

[formation.5]
id=6005
type=air
waypoint_path_id=5005
directive=32
hidden=1
formation_type=2
unit_id_position.0=9118,0,0,0,0
unit_id_position.1=9119,0,-400,-650,0
unit_id_position.2=9120,0,400,-650,150
unit_id_position.3=9121,0,800,-1300,150
unit_id_position.4=9122,0,1600,-1300,300
unit_id_position.5=9123,0,1200,-1950,300
unit_id_position.6=9124,0,2000,-1950,450
unit_id_position.7=9125,0,2400,-2600,450

[waypoint_path.5]
id=5005
2000,1,N52* 7.52',E5* 53.72',750,,,,316,,0,1,1
waypoint.1=32,1,N51* 38.14',E4* 45.98',+6000,,,,316,0,6008,1,1
waypoint.2=1,1,N51* 37.11',E4* 30.63',+6000,,,,316,0,1,1,1
waypoint.3=1,1,N51* 26.91',E4* 21.61',+6000,,,,316,0,1,1,1
waypoint.4=1,1,N51* 37.42',E4* 31.8',+6000,,,,316,0,1,1,1
waypoint.5=1,1,N51* 59.37',E5* 45.90',+6000,,,,316,0,0,1,1
waypoint.6=4096,1,N52* 7.52,E5* 53.72,+2000,,,,316,,0,1,1
Click to expand...
The part in red is deleted by Airboss. It happens in all the missions I've tested, and always in the same place (formation.5), but only in this install (or this campaign, I'm not sure). I hadn't had such problem in any of my other theater installs that have DCG campaigns. Once manually corrected adding the missing part, the mission loads OK.

Any ideas on what could be causing this?

EDIT: I've just noticed that this happens only in strike missions. With CAPs, sweeps and interceptions Airboss seems to work OK. Maybe this invalidates the part about it only happening in this install, as I don't usually have campaigns that create strike missions.
 
Hi Japlance,

It's good that you figured out that the bug doesn't happen when you start on the ground. I was able to figure out from the mission files you sent that AIRBOSS tried (but failed) to assign the affected squadron to be your squadron's escort - which really shouldn't have happened because it's an enemy squadron!.

Those facts narrow things down and give me an idea where to look for the bug. But it will still take me a while to re-familiarize myself with the brain-twisting code in that part of the program.

In the meantime, you (and any other AIRBOSS users) can avoid the bug by starting your missions on the ground. That's probably why I didn't find the bug. I always start on the ground.
 
I also usually do start on the ground, but I was having problems with a heavily loaded FW 190 to take off, so I decided to skip that part for a while. Luckily that served to uncover that strange behaviour.

Hope you can find a cure :ernae:
 
Lighen The Load...

JapLance said:
...I was having problems with a heavily loaded FW 190 to take off, so I decided to skip that part for a while. Luckily that served to uncover that strange behaviour....Hope you can find a cure...
Click to expand...

One solution, though NOT for Purists, is to cut the weight of individual bombs in their DP files to something less than realistic...

In some cases I have 10 pound 50Kg bombs SPECIFICALLY for those "carpet bombing" missions that would make taking off difficult.....

Just a suggestion.... :mixedsmi:
SC
:kilroy:
 
I found the bug. It only happens when you air start. Normally, there is a "+" symbol in front of the waypoint altitudes of the strike flights. AIRBOSS looks for the "+" symbols, because they tell it where the altitudes are located in the string. It uses the altitudes to place the escort flights 2000 feet above the strike flights at each waypoint.

The problem is, there is no "+" symbol in front of the altitude at waypoint.0 when you air start. So, when AIRBOSS doesn't find the "+" symbol the whole house of cards collapses in a way I haven't bothered to figure out the details of yet.

There is no other (simple) way for AIRBOSS to find the altitude imbedded in the string. The only other constant is the number of "," symbols preceding the altitudes. So the code will have to be changed to count the "," symbols until it finds the one preceding the altitude. There are 4 "," symbols preceding the altitudes. Sounds simple, right? Wrong. Nothing is ever simple in programming. Not for me, anyhow. Some people take to it like ducks to water, but I'm more like a cat.:icon_lol:

I'm not exactly convinced it's worth it just to recover the option to air start. It's usually OK to warp to your first waypoint, so you don't really save all that much time by air starting. I'm not sure exactly what the advantage of air starting is. Also, fixing the bug would require recompiling and uploading the fix as AIRBOSS.7

Edit: Sorry Japlance, I didn't see your post before I posted mine. having trouble getting that big bomb off the ground, eh? OK...technically, air starting to get a bomb off the ground is cheating, but I'll see what I can do. Or you can go with sc7500's workaround.
 
No problem, Ettico.

In the end in has turned out to be a minor glitch and not a big bug. I understand that there is no need for a new version just to solve this. If you can find a solution great, but I think we can live with it now that we know what is causing it.

About those bombs, don't worry. I'm trying to get me a more satisfactory flight model for that FW 190A-8 trying to stick to real plane specs :icon_lol:.
 
JapLance said:
No problem, Ettico.

In the end in has turned out to be a minor glitch and not a big bug. I understand that there is no need for a new version just to solve this. If you can find a solution great, but I think we can live with it now that we know what is causing it.

About those bombs, don't worry. I'm trying to get me a more satisfactory flight model for that FW 190A-8 trying to stick to real plane specs :icon_lol:.
Click to expand...

I'm glad you found the glitch, Japlance. Now that I know about it I'll get around to fixing it. To make the upload more worthwhile, I'll include some campaigns with the upload. The "Enterprise vs Japan" campaign I included with the last package didn't work as intended, so I can replace that with a better version and add a couple more.
 
There were actually two bugs caused by air starting. I found and fixed both of them after a good deal of toil and trouble.

I've been running tests of both ground and air starts. I don't see a problem. But there would have been a problem if I hadn't found and fixed the 2nd bug. Thanks to Japlance for helping find the bugs.:salute:

I'll put an upload together including the fix and a couple of new campaigns.
 
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