PMC Tactical forums

Here's a little scenario I came up with today for the Panama Theater. I don't have the theater installed at the moment, so I don't know how much work it will take to make it compatible, or if it's even worth it.

Exercise Tropic Thunder

Premise: CVBG Pre-deployment Workups

Scenario: Soviets/Warsaw Pact have covertly (in cooperation with Communist/sympathetic S. American countries) have infiltrated the Panamanian government. A coup ensues, installing a pro-WP puppet government. Air defense and aviation units, secretly stockpiled in S. American dockyards and depots are rapidly deployed throughout Panama.

Two US CVBGs are deployed to the region to keep watch on the situation as it develops. Enroute, a US flagged merchant is sunk while transiting the now Soviet-controlled Panama Canal (by an insurgency or by the KGB?). In response, the US CVBGs are ordered to conduct offensive operations against Soviet/WP forces in Panama as part of a pre-invasion preparation. A US Marine amphibious group is deployed to the region (ETA 3 days) to conduct an invasion of Panama, with the goal of capturing Panama City and restoring the pro-US government.

BLUEFOR: US Navy and Marine Corps air assets

OPFOR: TOPGUN/Navy Fighter Weapons School/NSAWC Adversary units; Soviet-emulated SAMs and AAA, and ground units.

Exercise Length: 7 days (amphibious landing on D+3)

Scenario Map



Thoughts?

Variant A would be FF5 only.

Variants B and C should be able to be created with the SP/FF4 DB and be compatible with all versions of Falcon. With some small additional work, the theater can be expanded using different Adversaries for OF (like Nevada). In other words, OF has a different F-16 set of adversaries than FF4/5, more F-5E skins, etc. But initially the campaign should work with either with minor adjustments in tacedit and skins.

Variant A should be strongly pro-BLUEFOR, with B and C more balanced. Variant C would likely be the most challenging due to the very near equity between the various platforms.

-the amphbious landing could be set at Colon, or a nearby Army base, or the AFB at northern end of Canal.
In the first three days, only air operations over the area.. and on day 3 Marines arrive, ideally the landing area should be cleared, and marine units can move from north end to south end of canal- finally capture Panama city.

- for 1989 scenerios, OPFOR may have Mi24, mig23/27, and mirageIII. ( Cuba join the game)

- for 2009 scenerios, OPFOR may have more.. like mirage2000, su22/25/30, mig29, AMX, SE..etc. ( more latin america AF join the game).

The idea was to make it a Red Flag type exercise, using only US assets training against US assets.

That is not to say that additional campaigns couldn't use the planeset you mentioned.

I really need to get into the theater to see what I have to work with first. And, for that matter, if it works, why I'm proposing modding it in the first place...

good ideas on that mates, BUT again and again, WHY don't we keep focused on one theater to get that really running and the terrain fixed? i really don't understand it..

IMHO it's just wasting time... too sad..

derStef wrote:good ideas on that mates, BUT again and again, WHY don't we keep focused on one theater to get that really running and the terrain fixed? i really don't understand it..

IMHO it's just wasting time... too sad..

no harm pal.
you can not FORCE ppl to focus on something.. we are not employee

Besides, panama theater is quite complete, Malc has been developing it for years, so bugs are fewer than expected. it deserves modders to take a closer look.

ccc wrote: no harm pal.
you can not FORCE ppl to focus on something.. we are not employee

sure not. i just want to mention that all these small patches are nice but.. the theaters need more work than just campaigns and skins... it seem that everybody tries to make just small fixes on the same point (campaign/skins/UI) and don't want to bring the whole thing forward (terrain/obj) which would be the most important thing...

true alone, it is not possible.. thats why i said, let's form groups... anyways, it seems i'm the only one who thinks so, .....or not?

ccc wrote:Besides, panama theater is quite complete, Malc has been developing it for years, so bugs are fewer than expected. it deserves modders to take a closer look.

really? you mean all objects are right placed, linked, and tiles/elevation is good? no water mountains? has it a own tile set? groundwar is working properly? really? hmmm..

@derstef,

to avoid de-rail the thread, i'll keep it short..
the terrain work is pretty good in my eye. Malc has been working on it alone since SP days. some minor bugs can be fixed, otheres are due to falcon version/file compatibility issue.

Basically, what ccc said. He indicated the theater is in good shape with links and obj, with minor tweaking needed to take it to fully-working status.

You're absolutely right- adding planes and ground units via tacedit is time-consuming, but not very "hard". I still think that finding the right mix of units to make for a challenging, balanced scenario isn't easy, and is more art than anything else. Wrapping all that up in a believable scenario, with the jets people want to fly, it's not a small undertaking.

I'm not proposing the next Taiwan here Stef. Just a small tweak on an already existing and "working" theater. But I haven't played it yet, so I don't know how "working" it is.

May I digress for a second?

Back when I was flying P-3s in Hawaii, we had a full-motion simulator that we would use sometimes instead of flying the actual plane. The sim was "night time" only; graphics were about Flight Simulator 1992 quality, if that (and at night at that).
Anyway, I remember booting the sim up and setting up on the Kaneohe Marine Base. We took off and flew over the island to shoot an ILS into Honolulu International. I set the weather down to like a 500 foot ceiling. So we set up, get on the ILS, shoot down to mins, break out of the clouds....and there's no runway. So, we shoot it again, still no runway. So I take off the weather and would you believe it? Honolulu Intl. just wasn't there! They completely left it out of the sim.

This is a military level simulator, and it just happened to be missing a fairly large airport on the island of Oahu.

So, when I come across a floating building or something in my home computer game simulator, I have to be honest man. It just doesn't upset me all that much. I mean, I can still enjoy my sim with a few floating buildings, mis-tiled terrain, etc. I'd like to strive for perfection, but I'm ok with just "good enough" sometimes too.

May I digress for a second?
Back when I was flying P-3s in Hawaii, we had a full-motion simulator that we would use sometimes instead of flying the actual plane. The sim was "night time" only; graphics were about Flight Simulator 1992 quality....

yeah.. good enough is good enough just enjoy it

hey since you mentioned Haiwaii.. Crossup's work just comes to me.. old modding days..
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/F4Hawaiia ... message/11

toonces wrote: So, when I come across a floating building or something in my home computer game simulator, I have to be honest man. It just doesn't upset me all that much. I mean, I can still enjoy my sim with a few floating buildings, mis-tiled terrain, etc. I'd like to strive for perfection, but I'm ok with just "good enough" sometimes too.

ok, here is the difference between us.. for me its all or nothing...