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I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 9:09:56 AM

Grazyn

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Can anyone tell me what I'm doing wrong?

In the attached scenario, there are 6 flights of bombers orbiting in support missions "able-dog" and "fox-baker". There is also an empty mission called "radar strike" with some targets. My problem is, when I unassign the bombers from their orbits and assign them to the strike mission, they all plot a course towards a single radar target. I want them to select different targets from the list and not the same one.

I tried checking "allow off-axis attack", deleting their groups and making the mission single-aircraft size, but they always seem to go for that one radar. I don't mind 2 or 3 planes going for the same target, but not all of them. Do I have to make separate strike missions for each target?

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 9:23:25 AM

Phoenix100

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Is this helpful?

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=4369217

Seems to suggest a combination of WRA set to one round, plus off-axis ticked. But read the whole thing, maybe.

< Message edited by Phoenix100 -- 11/9/2017 9:25:23 AM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 10:09:01 AM

Grazyn

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I tried, as you can see in the save, WRA is already set to 1 rnd for the planes and off axis is ticked. After the planes are assigned to the strike, WRA is still 1 rnd

< Message edited by Grazyn -- 11/9/2017 10:10:00 AM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 11:42:56 AM

Raptorx7_slith

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Yeah its not perfect but once the first target is destroyed the planes will go for the other ones. Either that or make separate strike missions.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 12:58:14 PM

Grazyn

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quote:

ORIGINAL: raptorx7

Yeah its not perfect but once the first target is destroyed the planes will go for the other ones. Either that or make separate strike missions.

Yeah I can't really work with that, I need them to head towards different targets from the start. Separate strikes it is I guess

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 1:27:29 PM

thewood1

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I noticed you didn't have the only pre-planned targets from the list checked. When I checked that, the three flights seem to choose different targets. I didn't play all the way through so it might still end up as you say. Just noticed it. Also, I didn't have time to check, but you can try ungrouping flights and assigning them. That might also give you what you are looking for. Never tried it before to compare.

Frankly, I have never even noticed that. If I need any kind of timing with dissimilar aircraft, I always create separate flights and targets. It just makes managing things like this easier.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 1:44:12 PM

mikmykWS

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Looks like Opportunity fire is on as well. This one would be a nightmare to debug as so many switches are pulled.

I'd clear and start again with the recommended settings above. If you really are this particular about the targets that are struck you may want to just create missions with 1 target per group rather than assigning many groups to many targets and adjusting in hopes of the AI picking he targets you would like. I definitely get your way was more efficient in terms of clicks but also adds more point of failure if you're not sure what you're doing.

Mike

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/9/2017 5:28:28 PM

Grazyn

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quote:

ORIGINAL: thewood1

I noticed you didn't have the only pre-planned targets from the list checked. When I checked that, the three flights seem to choose different targets. I didn't play all the way through so it might still end up as you say. Just noticed it. Also, I didn't have time to check, but you can try ungrouping flights and assigning them. That might also give you what you are looking for. Never tried it before to compare.

Frankly, I have never even noticed that. If I need any kind of timing with dissimilar aircraft, I always create separate flights and targets. It just makes managing things like this easier.

Ungrouping doesn't work, I said that in the OP (and yes I also set the mission to single aircraft in that case). Checking missions specific target also doesn't work - it looks like it's working at a glance because of the off-axis courses, but they're all actually going for the same radar. Unchecking opportunity targets in the doctrine window doesn't work either.

I made a brand new test scenario to delve in deeper and had the same results, bombers will head towards one target, destroy it and move to the next one, all together. Separate flights are definitely needed. And that's where I stumbled into another problem.

Apparently their mission presets are suicidal. It turns out that dropping a 3.5 Mt bomb from ~700 metres isn't really ideal if you intend to survive. I know that SAC developed some really cool low altitude bombing maneuvers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqIJL8lx00o) but they don't seem to be very effective here. So I manually set them to stay on max altitude (11 km) during the bombing run. But even at that height surviving is hard (mushroom clouds are pretty high) and it requires micromanaging. Nuclear bombing ain't easy!

Scenario attached if you want to have some fun trying to bomb all targets without getting your B-47s caught in the blast. And if you want to make it more challenging, try a higher yield, like the Mark 36 (10 Mt) or the Mark 41 (25 Mt).

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< Message edited by Grazyn -- 11/9/2017 5:41:54 PM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/10/2017 12:22:52 PM

mikmykWS

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quote:

Scenario attached if you want to have some fun trying to bomb all targets without getting your B-47s caught in the blast. And if you want to make it more challenging, try a higher yield, like the Mark 36 (10 Mt) or the Mark 41 (25 Mt).

If you can man put separate issues in new strings. The reason is so when the devs go to look for things to fix it sticks out. In this example why would they know to find an issue on nukes on a string about attacking multiple targets? I'll add this to the master list so it doesn't get lost!

Thanks!

Mike

< Message edited by mikmykWS -- 11/10/2017 12:23:05 PM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/10/2017 2:03:41 PM

Grazyn

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Wait I didn't think it was a game issue, otherwise I would've posted in tech support. I asked here about the strike mission because I assumed I was doing something the wrong way, and indeed it turned out that I needed separate strikes. I also don't think the nuke thing is a "bug", yes maybe the mission profiles could use some tweaks but it's realistic that surviving a nuke is hard even from altitude unless you leave the area really fast.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/10/2017 4:56:11 PM

mikmykWS

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Grazyn

Wait I didn't think it was a game issue, otherwise I would've posted in tech support. I asked here about the strike mission because I assumed I was doing something the wrong way, and indeed it turned out that I needed separate strikes. I also don't think the nuke thing is a "bug", yes maybe the mission profiles could use some tweaks but it's realistic that surviving a nuke is hard even from altitude unless you leave the area really fast.

Ok no problem. Issue captured and recorded for the devs to take a look regardless.

Thanks!

Mike

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/11/2017 10:20:23 AM

ComDev

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I took a look at the original scenario, you need to add the aircraft to separate missions to get the behaviour you're after

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/11/2017 10:25:40 AM

ComDev

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On the second scenario, it is a problem with the detonation delay for the Mk15 bomb. It is currently 25 seconds but should be 90, ref: B-43.

Have assigned a ticket to Paul for this and similar bombs in the CWDB.

Thanks

< Message edited by emsoy -- 11/11/2017 10:28:06 AM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/12/2017 11:37:41 PM

DWReese

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Hi Ragnar,

I know that you suggested that the poster use specific missions to ensure that his target was struck by the strike.

But, I played around some with the mission target lists today. It seems to me that the lists are always in alphabetical order, despite what the game player may deem to be of more importance. If it's on the list, then it's in alphabetical order.

When the strike a/c come, they start at the top of the list and work their way down. If they run out of ordinance before they get to the "good targets" then that is just the way that it goes.

I know that you suggested that the poster create separate missions, and that will most assuredly work, but, I was wondering if some kind of "priority list designation" could be built into the original target list for missions that include multiple targets. That way the gamer could prioritize which targets that he would like to hit first, and save some of the other targets if he still has some ordinance left.

It's just a thought.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 4:13:59 AM

ComDev

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Hi Doug,

What you suggest is a great idea and its actually already on my to-do list. So it will most likely make it into the game eventually. Just need to find the time to actuallt implement it hehe.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 8:50:06 AM

slimatwar

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I had same problem in similar strike missions and I tried the following procedure:
Create a strike mission through mission editor, launch aircraft(s) and once they approach the target(s)(or even just after take-off) choose manually(SHIFT+F1) the targets that you want to hit and allocate also manually the proper ordnance.
It works but I wonder why nobody has referred that.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 9:17:13 AM

Grazyn

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quote:

ORIGINAL: slimatwar

I had same problem in similar strike missions and I tried the following procedure:
Create a strike mission through mission editor, launch aircraft(s) and once they approach the target(s)(or even just after take-off) choose manually(SHIFT+F1) the targets that you want to hit and allocate also manually the proper ordnance.
It works but I wonder why nobody has referred that.

Yeah well, at that point I'm better off just selecting the planes and ordering them to auto-attack the target I want, without even setting a mission. In my case it's the better option because I have to manually manage their speed and altitude anyway, and I can still allocate the weapons manually and automatically through the plane WRA doctrines. It's also faster than creating strike missions for every single target I need.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 8:05:45 PM

DWReese

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Ragnar,

Following up on the alphabetical thing, as a workaround until you are able to write it into the program, I created a list of random targets, prioritized them in my mind, and then simply renamed them with an "A-" before the name of the first one, and a "B-" in front of the next, etc. Guess what? It worked perfectly. I had 10 targets and the first two, my priorities, were destroyed first (as usual) before the rest of the strike package started attacking the other targets.

So, my recommendation, at least for now, is to simply rename the target and place a simple letter, making sure that it is in alphabetical order, BEFORE the name of each of your prioritized targets, and your strike will work out fine.

Anyway, that's my workaround for this situation.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 8:17:35 PM

DWReese

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In your post, you posed the question "why nobody has referred" to just using the SHIFT+F1 key to manually allocate the targets and ordinance.

Answering for myself ONLY, the reason that that doesn't work for ME, is because I am creating scenarios that involve the game being played by BOTH SIDES, and I can't do that if that effort belongs to the AI side. So, it's important to ME that both sides have the ability to pull off all of their attacks on their own, with no outside interference or involvement by me. That's why I am unable to use the method that you described.

You are correct, however, that your should work, but so will manually sending your planes out.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 9:44:22 PM

Grazyn

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Renaming the targets is a simple and elegant solution, thank you. I am afraid it could break complex scenarios due to LUA triggers and stuff not firing because a unit has a different name but it will work for me.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 10:05:46 PM

Grazyn

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Well, I tried it, and it didn't work. Here you will see Flight Hook90 assigned to mission "strk1", it only has 2 targets, and I renamed the Radar so that it would be prioritized over the Building (control tower), but the flight still plotted its course towards the building first.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/13/2017 11:55:00 PM

Rory Noonan

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Grazyn

Renaming the targets is a simple and elegant solution, thank you. I am afraid it could break complex scenarios due to LUA triggers and stuff not firing because a unit has a different name but it will work for me.

Part of good Lua practice is to use GUIDs for things the player can rename in order to avoid this. As for renaming contacts, that won't actually affect the unit that the contact represents, which is pretty neat.

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/14/2017 12:17:37 AM

DWReese

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I am not a trouble-shooting guy, so I can't tell you what is OFFICIALLY wrong.

What I am seeing is that your two targets are located at two different locations. Maybe I am wrong, but it looks like that to me. I have never tested having a strike go to two different locations before. What I was talking about was a strike hitting a grouped area of targets in the same general vicinity and then being able to choose one of those targets on the list over the other.

As a very exaggerated example, you could fly a strike mission from Montreal and have Los Angeles and New York on your target list and I would assume that there are factors in the game that would cause the program to select New York first, regardless of whether Los Angeles appears first alphabetically or not. I was really only talking about targets grouped together when I talked about the alphabetical order issue.

I didn't look, I do assume that you only have the one of the P-14s renamed? I used a hyphen after the A (A-), and I then put the name.

Other than that, I'm not exactly sure what is happening. If you have two missions (two different locations), then you could use a lua script to begin a new mission upon the conclusion of the first. You may have to use TIME as being the trigger. I am just getting used to lua myself, so I am not the person to ask on that topic.

Good luck, but I've probably taken you as far as I can.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/14/2017 9:24:25 AM

Grazyn

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Yes, it's the P-14 radar, but the 2 targets are only 7 nm apart, I don't think the NY-LA comparison is fitting. Not to mention that if you try to assign them to the "radar strike" mission in my first post, the bombers don't seem to go for the closest one either.

Basically what I wanted was to recreate a standard cold war nuclear strike mission, where bombers were assigned a primary target and eventually one or more secondary ones (since even reaching the primary one was a challenge). In that case I wanted the radars taken out first, and if a radar was reasonably close enough to an airbase or another valuable target, to have that set as a secondary target for that flight group. So 1 or 2 targets at most for every flight/mission.

I tried the hyphen first, then I tried without it since it didn't work. If the targets are selected alphabetically, it shouldn't matter if it's A-radar or Aradar or even Aragorn as long as it comes before B. Yet the flight still goes for the Building first.

< Message edited by Grazyn -- 11/14/2017 9:25:56 AM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/14/2017 11:42:25 AM

DWReese

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I don't have any idea. I didn't measure the distance, but it didn't look that close to me. It looked like it was a bit of a distance, but I guess that it was a close shot.

In theory, it should have worked, but it obviously didn't. Perhaps you should try it (test it) with two other targets and another group of attackers. There are simply too many variables that could be coming into play that it causing your situation not to work. Mine worked, but I don't know what the obstacle is for you.

Until Ragnar is able to address it, the only thing that you can do is set the group to two, successive, missions, one after the other, or two separate missions.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/15/2017 12:48:52 AM

DWReese

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The LA/NY thing was an extreme exaggeration just so I could make the point about the distance. I hope that you didn't take it literally.

In any case, I set up a similar situation to yours. But, instead of 7 miles, I separated the two identical targets (A & B) by 35 miles. I sent a U-2 in the area to find the targets. I purposely placed B closer to MY base than I did A. I then assigned one bomber with two bombs total to the strike mission. I used WRA to tell the bomber to use one weapon per target only, and I included bot targets (separated by 35 miles) on the same target list.

The U-2, as expected, found B before it found A. The bombing mission was set to start AFTER the U-2 would have found both targets. In other words, both targets had already been located when the bombing mission was activated.

When the bomber took off it immediately plotted a course set to fly to B. The already drawn-out course then had the bomber return to base. There was no mention of A. The bomber flew to B, released its bomb, and destroyed B. The bomber, despite having the aforementioned path which directed it to go back to the base, instead flew directly to A. Once there, the bomber destroyed A, as had been hoped and as expected. At this point, the bomber, which was now out of ordinance, established a new path and flew directly back to base. The bottom line is, everything worked perfectly, although the bomber did go for B before A.

I replayed the situation a dozen times and everything happened exactly the same way, with the exception of one. On that occasion, the bomber's first bomb missed Target B. When that happened, the bomber circled around and dropped his second bomb on target B, this time destroying it. With no more ordinance, the bomber then headed back to base using the same plot that had originally been exhibited. Target A, obviously, wasn't attacked in this situation because the bomber did not have any more bombs. Again, everything worked exactly as had been planned, and the bomber did again go for the closer target (B), as opposed to (A). (So, I guess that a bomber would go from Montreal to NY first rather than LA. <g>

I did notice that the bomber does adjust its speed and altitude as it moves toward the target. At some point, because the bombing run was so low to the ground, the fuel was listed as only 33 minutes left of flight time at that speed. When the bombing run was finished, it climbed to a higher altitude on the way home, thus saving fuel. I don't know what the distance is from your bomber to your base, back from the target, but it could be that the AI governing your plane may have determined that it did not have enough fuel to go after your second target and, therefore, directed it to go home.

That's as much as I have. It seems to work for me in all of my tests, so there are likely some other factors involved.

But, as Ragnar pointed out, if it's that important you can always assign two missions, or use lua to assign a second mission to your plane, assuming that he still has the ordinance to make an attack.

Good luck.

Doug

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/15/2017 6:31:42 AM

Grazyn

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Thank you for your testing, I'm just trying to figure out if alphabetical order actually matters in target priority, like you said. In your test it was expected it would ignore alphabetical order because the "A" target wasn't known yet when the plane took off.

In the attached scenario I have 2 targets, auto-detectable, close enough to make distance irrelevant, and I put A- before one of them. But the bomber still goes for the more distant target first, destroys it, and only then proceeds to the "A-" one. I included another pair of targets and another unassigned bomber at the base, you'll see that if you create another strike mission targeting the second pair (you'll have to set WRA as well to prevent it from deploying all the bombs on one target) it will have the same behaviour.

This is consistent with what I found in the previous scenario, alphabetical order doesn't seem to apply even when distance isn't taken into account.

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< Message edited by Grazyn -- 11/15/2017 6:33:04 AM >

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RE: I can't get an airstrike to target multiple targets - 11/15/2017 11:30:24 AM

DWReese

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"In other words, both targets had already been located when the bombing mission was activated."

"In your test it was expected it would ignore alphabetical order because the "A" target wasn't known yet when the plane took off."

For the record, what I said us listed in the first paragraph, and what you interpreted is in the second. Your interpretation is not what I wrote. In my scenario, both targets were known at the time of the mission take-off.

In any case, I see your point. Again, the fuel/flight profile may be an issue, OR perhaps the program has something that designates a certain target at a higher value, or may be there is something else that you can't see. I don't know why yours doesn't work. I know that the alphabetical thing works with like-targets, but maybe it doesn't with dissimilar ones.

As I said, I'm not a trouble-shooter, so I've gone as far as I can go to try to help you. It's going to take someone with a higher "pay grade" to figure it out for you. Ragnar did say that he would address the issue down the road. Until that happens, I guess you will have to either use two a/c or use lua to make two missions.

Good luck.

Doug

(in reply to Grazyn)

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