Russian/exUSSR military plans

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 27 Oct 2006, 21:47

Looks like practically all the Russian airport afcads will need to be redone in order to accomplish anything like what I'm trying. My estimate is somewhere around 50... Ptooie. this is getting to be intimidating! Lol.

Post by **BadPvtDan** » 27 Oct 2006, 21:56

That will be one hellaciously big package!

Post by **VulcanDriver** » 28 Oct 2006, 06:25

I've done Engels, Ukrainka and have started on Domna airbases. I'll post these when I'm satisfied that they work OK.

John

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 28 Oct 2006, 07:39

I'm figuring that "the package" will have to logically be broken down into a number of packages... at least that's the way that I plan on developing them for my own use... This will ensure maximum flexibility in installation, utilization and modification for both myself and others.

For instance, there are multiple major military districts in Russia which make for reasonable groupings similar to the ANG packages. OTOH, the Russian Air Force(TU16s/TU22Ms) and LRA/Strategic Bomber Forces(TU16s/TU95s/TU160s) have reorganized into a merged force relatively recently but have not incorporated the Soviet Naval Air Forces which maintain their own chain of command and logisitcal structures.

Not only will there be intra-district flights, inter-district flights are not uncommon, but must be coordinated within the "whole" of the scheme or else it would be like installing the UGA AI pack without removing the default GA AI traffic - duplicates and meaningless flights in some areas with possibly a shortage in other places. I'm looking for some sort of reasonable balance across key airfields and districts.

Consequently, I see something like 10-15 separate bomber/SNAF packages... This doesn't count the fighter forces at all - I haven't even come close to figuring out how I want the fighters to interact with "my world" - as I suggested before, if someone else wants to tackle that, be my guest! The bombers and SNAF will keep me busy through at least Christmas simply due to the depth and breadth of missions I am trying to develop... and the lack of afcads only complicates the problem.

I decided to begin working in the Far Eastern Military district. So I worked on two afcads tonight and my experimenting got me nowhere. I was playing with Vladivostok-Kneivichi and Yelizovo-Petropavlovsk ... but while trying to get a simple TU22M AI flightplan to work in order to test them out, I ran into a problem where I can't get the planes to even show up. Obviously, I am overlooking something - hopefully something simple that I will find tomorrow.

I've posted a request for possible afcad assistance over on the RAIT forums looking for some information in the hopes that they might have something that would provide at least a temporary leg up... Most of the afcads I do have/have found haven't got squat for military parking. (I found three separate "colletions" on avsim and simviation.... none of them complete by any means). I even found one "military AI package" some Korean guys put together that is supposed to have some Russian military stuff in it. Since their installation was via .exe files, I virus scanned them and then intsalled them....but never saw any indication that the Russian stuff they barely mentioned in the readme.htm file was acually flying. So, a very unsatisfactory evening for me thus far.

On a positive note, I did locate sourcing for the Russian bombing ranges - something I was slightly concerned about. Between these and the "obvious" ASW, general military-aviation exercise and operational areas, I'm not limited to routing only airfield-to-airfield flights but can accomplish what I had hoped - semi-realistic mission planning/routing (not considering the real world economics of it all).

Post by **VulcanDriver** » 28 Oct 2006, 11:17

drmweaver2 wrote:I'm figuring that "the package" will have to logically be broken down into a number of packages....

Yes that is how I see the MAIW release too. I see a complete bomber package, a transport package and training / misc package. The scenery / afcad package would be separate and released at the same time of the bomber package.

hermit · Post by **hermit** » 28 Oct 2006, 14:28

I'm not trying to dissuade anyone from pursuing this and my memory may not be as good as it once was but didn't Christian Muenier say that he would be rather quiet for a while as his next package was going to be Russian Military? It might be worth trying to contact him as it would be a shame to duplicate efforts. It's been nearly 18 months since his last package but you never know.

john.

hermit · Post by **hermit** » 28 Oct 2006, 15:14

Memory better than I thought it was:

http://www.fsgateway.com/index.php?opti ... opic=37586

john.

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 28 Oct 2006, 16:58

Hmm.. Last post in that thread 05/05? I'm guessing either real life interfered with plans, the scale of the endeavor became overwhelming or something else occured. I'd love to see his package if anyone finds it, but I won't be holding my breath due to the time that has passed since that thread.

Regardless, I've got the Tolmachevo package mentioned in that thread.... and that's actually the one I mentioned where I said I couldn't/didn't notice any AI traffic... Either I clicked the .exe file wrong or something else happened. Who knows.

Also, as with the non-Russian military packages I've seen, tweaking is something I find I want to do with each of them -- each has something that stretches my "willful suspension of disbelief" and not tweaking them makes things jarring or aggravating to me. So, hard as it is for this old fart's brain to learn new things, I'm trying exactly that...

My "personal project", as I think of it, set a distant goal that is not easily obtainable and has a definite learnnig curve that must be surmounted before I get there. But when I do (not if), my real life experience won't be running smack into the limitations that threaten to make FS9 a less then truly enjoyable experience for me. Like I've said, I get to do a bit of reliving the past by doing this... So, I'd be doing it anyway.

Post by **VulcanDriver** » 29 Oct 2006, 08:58

hermit wrote:Memory better than I thought it was:

http://www.fsgateway.com/index.php?opti ... opic=37586

john.

I'll be surprised if he will be using pure multi-LOD AI aircraft. I have all of his packages and fine as they are the some of the AI a/c are based on existing high-poly, low (or one) LOD models.

What we are proposing is are all pure AI packages so that the FPS does not take a massive hit.

BTW I've found a photo on the Net of a unnamed Russian airfield where they have over 300 fighters! Looks impressive but FS would die if we tried that

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 29 Oct 2006, 19:44

VulcanDriver wrote:...BTW I've found a photo on the Net of a unnamed Russian airfield where they have over 300 fighters! Looks impressive but FS would die if we tried that

Not if we'll use a future multi-LOD model with, let's say, 10 polygon LOD005 (I mean 9-th LOD from the most detailed one)

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 30 Oct 2006, 01:52

Well, small successes make my day! Hooray!
As I hoped a simple transposition of letters in the flightplan screwed things up royally - as in nothing was showing up! Copy and paste works so much more accurately than squinting and hunting/pecking...

Anyway, I've made my first TU-22 and TU-95 deployments somewhat successfully. I'll work up a few TU-142 ASW routes just to see how that goes and this should beginning to liven up the Russian Far East.

The aircraft models I am using are all in the Tomachevo pack - for some reason (probably poor vision) I overlooked (while scanning through my aircraft directory) that that package has the following aircraft in it:
AN124, AN12, AN22, AN24,AN26, AN320, AN72, BE12, IL18, IL62,IL76, IL86, MI8MT, SU35, TU134, TU154B, TU154M, TU160, TU204 and TU95s.
It could be that I overlooked all of these due to the naming construct ---
ex., AI AN IL18_TOLM
(edited to add/modify - to the blank line)
Almost definitely not multi-LOD AI models, but I had 20+ of these on the ground and/or taking off while I was doing a 175knot flyover of the UHWW runway at 500 feet and got 17fps...(middle of the road specs AMD3.2GHZ, 1GB Ram, BFG nvidia 6600). YMMV.
With the directory alphabetized, the aircraft seemed to be listed in a way that made me think I am just going blind after I found them(possibly likely the case).

I'm missing TU-16s for "real" bomber/transport routing experiments. But overall for a noob, I guess I made some progress. I'm actually feeling good enough to dream a bit bigger even!

Here...

How's this for expanding this project/idea into the realm of the ridiculously large... Vladivostok and Petropavlosk are the rough equivalents of San Diego, San Francisco and Bangor, Washington in terms of naval submarine and surface units. Hehe. Recreating these scenery and AI Ship wise... now THAT would be a real capper to any AI Russian Far East Military Aviation project because of the association of the SNAF with surface and ASW operations.

And of course with the Kutznetzov assigned to the Norhern Fleet, were the CVAI project to ever be competed, THAT should be transferable in concept at least to recreating a Northern Fleet exercise like was going on when the SSBN Kursk was lost. Hehe!!!

Ah the ability to dream after even a small success...

RipPipPip · Post by **RipPipPip** » 30 Oct 2006, 06:27

So, we have a defined mission for next 3 - 5 years ...

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 30 Oct 2006, 07:06

RipPipPip wrote:So, we have a defined mission for next 3 - 5 years ...

Um... probably longer than that... lol

GZR_Sactargets · Post by **GZR_Sactargets** » 30 Oct 2006, 17:12

I often rename the "manufacturer" entry in aircraft cfg. That is what shows up in my aircraft selection menu. You can actually tailor that entry to suit your needs. For example, in the case of a specific sim designer, I sometimes add them to the line. "Posky 747_Air Force1." Thus you can sort models according to your needs. Even within a .cfg you can have different manufacturer names and it will appear that way in the menu.
You might want to create categories to use. Like "VVS_MIG 25_FarEast"
I have several categories related to the ANG and AFRES AI sets. IIRC the folders for them also have a specific name like "AI A-10 SWUS". The downside is that you should make a list of them and include your labels in your package. The user can and should use the names from his aircraft folder to make sure the correct airplane flies in the flight plan. As you pointed out-a less than exact name will be a 'no-fly.' Not saying this is a perfect system, it is just the one I use for my aircraft.

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 30 Oct 2006, 22:55

For some obscure reason, I think the additon of the TOLM on the end of the names was what caused me to overlook these aircraft when scanning for them. They showed up clearly in my head after I printed out the directory listing and actually READ the listing one line at a time.

I used to speed read - which has both its plusses and minuses. Even at 95% accuracy at 2500+ words a minute, a small typing error has just as much chance of getting through/past because renerally that's not what's being read (or you just read past that). Unfortunately, I have resisted slowing down my eye speed despite the effects of aging and I think this is probably the "bat inthe forehead" that is going to make me get my eyes checked and get new glasses - again. That and having to make a deliberate effort to slow down...

Word of advice guys... don't get old if you can. Aging may represent or reward you with experience but the physical junk that goes with it ain't worth the price in my book!

GZR_Sactargets · Post by **GZR_Sactargets** » 30 Oct 2006, 23:44

sometimes it is as simple as a. Missing one of those or putting one in can bollux up the whole thing.

I have two pairs of glasses these days, A computer pair which is essentially a bifocal with a limited long range to hit the computer screen distance and a normal reading lower bifocal. Those just help to prevent a crick in the neck.

My 'regular' glasses are trifocals. Distant; super market shelf distance; and reading. Now if they could just do all that shifting automatically like they do with the gradual light adjustments we would be in great shape. Note that I also have a hand magnifier to read some fine print when cockpit details won't enlarge or are just printed too damn small for regular folks.

f14driver · Post by **f14driver** » 01 Nov 2006, 01:21

drmweaver2 wrote:Hmm.. Last post in that thread 05/05? I'm guessing either real life interfered with plans, the scale of the endeavor became overwhelming or something else occured. I'd love to see his package if anyone finds it, but I won't be holding my breath due to the time that has passed since that thread.

Regardless, I've got the Tolmachevo package mentioned in that thread.... and that's actually the one I mentioned where I said I couldn't/didn't notice any AI traffic... Either I clicked the .exe file wrong or something else happened. Who knows.

Also, as with the non-Russian military packages I've seen, tweaking is something I find I want to do with each of them -- each has something that stretches my "willful suspension of disbelief" and not tweaking them makes things jarring or aggravating to me. So, hard as it is for this old fart's brain to learn new things, I'm trying exactly that...

My "personal project", as I think of it, set a distant goal that is not easily obtainable and has a definite learnnig curve that must be surmounted before I get there. But when I do (not if), my real life experience won't be running smack into the limitations that threaten to make FS9 a less then truly enjoyable experience for me. Like I've said, I get to do a bit of reliving the past by doing this... So, I'd be doing it anyway.

I've tried to contact Christian multiple times now and in the past and all his email adresses came back as undeliverables.
He lived on Reunion in the indian ocean.

I've been never able to contact him since 20-05-05.

So I'd push your project ahead since I don't expect snything from him in the future

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 01 Nov 2006, 01:39

I figured as much and, as I said, I intend to continue.... offering as much or as little to MAIW for use/modification/ discarding as any here should choose.

For instance, today's little effort was fairly productive. I've made serious progress creating a new afcad from scratch - for 1 of the 3 airfields which were/are part of Sovetskaya Gavan, Mongohkto which is north east of Vanino. This used to be a major base for long range bombers... According to Google Earth, the base is in need of serious maintenance, but there are aircraft there.

It would be great to be able to make scenery.. even RWY12/EZScenery stuff for this.. I just don't have the knowledge yet.

So, at this point, I've got the runways laid out from scratch, created teh exclude file, and now need to figure out how to make a flatten for this airfield.

With about half the parking in place, I tested it out by flight planning my first simulated strike on one of my former duty stations - Vanino against Adak! Enroute, the bombers took out Shemya, a major over the horizon radar station. Adak was a Naval intelligence collection/Coast Guard (LORAN) base. Fun stuff... For grins, I had the bombers escorted by a couple Mig-29s... I went to Adak and watched them arrive after the bombing!! Heh.... Invasion by bombers! Totally fake but fun to do.

So.. it continues.

drmweaver2 · Post by **drmweaver2** » 01 Nov 2006, 02:20

Heh, figured out the flatten!
Here's a quickie look at the ramp.. 2-Be-12s, 2 TU-95s, and 8 TU-22Ms in the pic.

Post by **VulcanDriver** » 01 Nov 2006, 12:17

I've been busy too. Here is Engels. I'm currently making scenery for Domna AB (MiG-29 base), this should be finished by end of the week.

John