As some of you may be aware, I wrote a QBasic program to supplement Lowengrin's Dynamic Campaign Generator. I thought I had the thing working properly, so I posted the code about a week ago.
Was I ever wrong!
The thing hadn't been thoroughly tested and debugged. As soon as I started testing it in the PTO, the whole thing came unglued. I did a test mission in my DCG Solomons campaign. My flight was assigned an anti-shipping strike. The first thing I noticed was that VMF-214 B flight, which should have been re-assigned to escort my flight, was sent off to escort some bombers from another airfield, which should never happen. I looked at the Mission file, and was dismayed to discover that a flight of Japanese Oscars had been assigned to "escort" my flight.
Obviously, this wasn't going to be a happy liason.
I went bug-hunting, found and swatted that bug, but several other bugs popped up in the process, and DCG also threw me a couple of unexpected curves. After several hours of bug-hunting/swatting, I flew a couple of test missions, one in my ground based Solomons campaign and one in a Marshalls carrier op. Everything went well. The correct number of CAP's and AI escorts were produced, and this time they all escorted their own bombers from their own airfields and carriers. This time VMF-214 B flight escorted my flight. Even the carrier op went well. 2 flights of Hellcats stayed back to cover the carrier group. My flight and another flight of Hellcats escorted 4 flights of bombers against a hapless IJN destroyer squadron. Another flight of Hellcats escorted some bombers to a land base where they engaged the IJN defenders. Both missions went without a hitch. There weren't even any collisions.
So I now believe I have the program correctly doing what it is supposed to do in both land and sea campaigns:
1. Changes the fighter formations to finger four. This is more realistic, and seems to reduce collisions.
2. Spreads the bomber formations vertically, which seems to reduce collisions.
3. Changes mechanized ground formations to a line astern formation so they will run on roads and railroads.
4. Since DCG does not assign AI fighter squadrons to escort duty, the program re-assigns spare CAP's as escorts. CAP's will only be assigned to escort strikes originating from the same airfields or carriers. The player flight may be reassigned to escort duty if the player gets a CAP or sweep mission. The program will always leave a minimum number of CAP's at an airfield. This minimum number is determined interactively by the user. If DCG does not assign any CAP's to an airfield, the program will not add any. This feature also facilitates long range escorted strategic bombing. Escorts are assigned without regard to range limitations of the fighters, so for realism, only long range fighters should be stationed at bases with long range bombers.
5. Screen prints a cryptic mission briefing on all the flights originating from the player airfield or carrier. Displays squadron names, mission directives, and target coordinates. If you get reassigned to escort duty, you can figure out which strike(s) you're escorting by comparing target coordinates. Then you can look at the original DCG briefing to find the target name.
6. Provides long range loadouts to CAP's reassigned as escorts. For this purpose, the program assumes that payload (1) is Guns Only Long Range, which is the case with all stock fighters and most addons.
7. Offers the player the opportunity to change the payloads on all the player flight aircraft after displaying the mission briefing. DCG only loads out fighters with rockets for strike missions. This option allows the player to switch to bombs or whatever.
8. Searches for and fixes 3 known DCG bugs. There are 2 other intermittent bugs I know of that I haven't gotten around to addressing, but they're not in the Mission file. This program currently only edits the Mission file. There is a bug which sometimes occurs in the Squadrons file when a squadron is transferred to another airfield by DCG. It is also the case that DCG will continue to assign strikes against task forces after all the ships in the task force have been sunk. I doubt if I'll even try to fix those bugs any time soon. (cripes, what a headache this has been) Those of you who have experience building DCG campaigns will be able to manually fix those problems when they occur.
I visually checked the Missions file and test flew the missions to verify that all this was being done correctly.
What a relief! :d I really wanted to get this thing working correctly. It makes a big difference in DCG campaigns.
Was I ever wrong!
The thing hadn't been thoroughly tested and debugged. As soon as I started testing it in the PTO, the whole thing came unglued. I did a test mission in my DCG Solomons campaign. My flight was assigned an anti-shipping strike. The first thing I noticed was that VMF-214 B flight, which should have been re-assigned to escort my flight, was sent off to escort some bombers from another airfield, which should never happen. I looked at the Mission file, and was dismayed to discover that a flight of Japanese Oscars had been assigned to "escort" my flight.
Obviously, this wasn't going to be a happy liason.
I went bug-hunting, found and swatted that bug, but several other bugs popped up in the process, and DCG also threw me a couple of unexpected curves. After several hours of bug-hunting/swatting, I flew a couple of test missions, one in my ground based Solomons campaign and one in a Marshalls carrier op. Everything went well. The correct number of CAP's and AI escorts were produced, and this time they all escorted their own bombers from their own airfields and carriers. This time VMF-214 B flight escorted my flight. Even the carrier op went well. 2 flights of Hellcats stayed back to cover the carrier group. My flight and another flight of Hellcats escorted 4 flights of bombers against a hapless IJN destroyer squadron. Another flight of Hellcats escorted some bombers to a land base where they engaged the IJN defenders. Both missions went without a hitch. There weren't even any collisions.
So I now believe I have the program correctly doing what it is supposed to do in both land and sea campaigns:
1. Changes the fighter formations to finger four. This is more realistic, and seems to reduce collisions.
2. Spreads the bomber formations vertically, which seems to reduce collisions.
3. Changes mechanized ground formations to a line astern formation so they will run on roads and railroads.
4. Since DCG does not assign AI fighter squadrons to escort duty, the program re-assigns spare CAP's as escorts. CAP's will only be assigned to escort strikes originating from the same airfields or carriers. The player flight may be reassigned to escort duty if the player gets a CAP or sweep mission. The program will always leave a minimum number of CAP's at an airfield. This minimum number is determined interactively by the user. If DCG does not assign any CAP's to an airfield, the program will not add any. This feature also facilitates long range escorted strategic bombing. Escorts are assigned without regard to range limitations of the fighters, so for realism, only long range fighters should be stationed at bases with long range bombers.
5. Screen prints a cryptic mission briefing on all the flights originating from the player airfield or carrier. Displays squadron names, mission directives, and target coordinates. If you get reassigned to escort duty, you can figure out which strike(s) you're escorting by comparing target coordinates. Then you can look at the original DCG briefing to find the target name.
6. Provides long range loadouts to CAP's reassigned as escorts. For this purpose, the program assumes that payload (1) is Guns Only Long Range, which is the case with all stock fighters and most addons.
7. Offers the player the opportunity to change the payloads on all the player flight aircraft after displaying the mission briefing. DCG only loads out fighters with rockets for strike missions. This option allows the player to switch to bombs or whatever.
8. Searches for and fixes 3 known DCG bugs. There are 2 other intermittent bugs I know of that I haven't gotten around to addressing, but they're not in the Mission file. This program currently only edits the Mission file. There is a bug which sometimes occurs in the Squadrons file when a squadron is transferred to another airfield by DCG. It is also the case that DCG will continue to assign strikes against task forces after all the ships in the task force have been sunk. I doubt if I'll even try to fix those bugs any time soon. (cripes, what a headache this has been) Those of you who have experience building DCG campaigns will be able to manually fix those problems when they occur.
I visually checked the Missions file and test flew the missions to verify that all this was being done correctly.
What a relief! :d I really wanted to get this thing working correctly. It makes a big difference in DCG campaigns.