New mission is up. Needs testing.

[AbortedMan]

The first iteration of "The Pocket" is up on the server. Needs testing and polish...have at it.

Please test:

Medevac aircraft loading up passengers, specifically while another medevac is loading up on another loading ramp (simultaneously). You'll get a text prompt to finish flight and a "loaded" He111 will become available at Pitomnik...fly this back to Verbovka for mission objective.

Burn Stalingrad to the fucking ground. I need to see if the amount of smoke kills people's FPS.

Drain the fighter aircraft from airfields and see if the mission ends correctly.

Check FPS near south of Kalach over the tank fight (when it starts...give it about an hour after mission start).

There's other odds and ends that need tweaking that I'll get to later...I'm going to bed.

[Nraged]

Last week or so has been really dead. 

[Roo5ter]

Damn, out of town and work for a bit.  Hope to catch some time on it next weekend!

[AbortedMan]

Welp...the things I had planned simply cannot be done on this server. As soon as the tank battle started brought the machine to its knees, set it on fire, and shot it in the back of the head. I'll have to tone down a lot of things to make this work, so the mission has been pulled until then.

[dillon.biz]

I thoguht ground assets don't take up much CPU resources?  How many objects are we working with?

[AbortedMan]

Yeah I dunno.

It's back up with some trimming.

[Corley_C]

Was something done to the load out menus? I feel like I can't outfit any of the planes the way I want to. It seems that a game with barely any manipulation of your plane/settings just got decreased even further.

[AbortedMan]

Locking loadouts was finally implemented by devs so I can and will start using a supply system. Only guns, fuel and bombs are locked at the moment.

This is also to balance the mission...no more constantly decimating things with Satans.

[Corley_C]

Well that is unfortunate considering myself and others who can no longer do any high altitude bombing / stuka sorties the way we enjoy them. Let me know if y'all decide to change it back to the way it was, I was in the teamspeak yesterday when people I didn't recognize jumped in, upon learning they couldn't change their loadout, they immediately left. I enjoy flying with TWB, but I also enjoy having fun and enjoying the game itself.

[dillon.biz]

Well that is unfortunate considering myself and others who can no longer do any high altitude bombing / stuka sorties the way we enjoy them. Let me know if y'all decide to change it back to the way it was, I was in the teamspeak yesterday when people I didn't recognize jumped in, upon learning they couldn't change their loadout, they immediately left. I enjoy flying with TWB, but I also enjoy having fun and enjoying the game itself.

Remember, the mission in development is a constantly changing landscape.  Compound that with the fact that the devs like to drop these updates that add features (that should have been there from the beginning) with little to no warning, make it tough to predict the outcome of some of changes that are made.   We're looking into it.

[AbortedMan]

You're really not going to play because you can't use a loadout that wasn't realistically plausible for the scenario that is being modelled?

[AbortedMan]

I've consulted multiple people that have given their input regarding the choices made in this mission...the reason we don't allow 1800kg, 2500kg, or 1000kg is it completely decimates the objectives. We dont want one guy John McClaining the entire thing. The loadouts were chosen based off of the types/difficulty of the objectives. Ordinance  1000kg+ was deemed as too devastating and leading to the map rolling entirely too quickly with the effort of very few. A single 1000kg bomb was found to be capable of single handedly destroying any objecting on the map by itself.  We are trying to create a mission that requires a certain level of teamwork, but that is in no way impossible for someone working hard to accomplish. I understand people want choice and we have tried to create plausible loadouts for the mission that also wont ruin the fun of others because things are completely too easily.

[Corley_C]

   No, I am not saying I won't play with TWB anymore. Not at all, I will definitely hop in for a quick fighter cover or intercept mission! But I probably won't be in the server near as much as I was, and its not because of you guys. I love TWB, but I bought the game to have fun and I have just gotten into high level bombing with larger yield munitions, I bought the LA and the FW for an extra $40 just so I could have the unlocks to experience and play the game the way I would like to, without the burden of grinding away. Now I can't do what I find interesting and enjoyable at the moment. I'm sure you guys understand where I am coming from..

[TheElf]

Corley, I understand your concerns.  I think ultimately the goal will be to have several maps in a rotation, with different objectives depending on the scenario.  The Scenarios will be as historic as they can be so a map (or several) with high altitude bombing objectives could very easily be in that rotation.  Right now though, with the limited maps, ie. snow and a frozen Volga, "historic" missions means after mid-December when the Volga froze in 1942.  That puts missions in a Pocket timeframe where the LW was heavily focused with all Ju-52s and All Kampfgeschwaders lending their sorties to the aerial resupply effort, while StG 2 operated out of Karpovka in an Anti-armor role.

When the summer maps come up we can build scenarios that lend themselves to LW offensives (which would be historic), where High-mid level bombing was more common.  In the meantime, what if the map/scenario we've been flying stayed in rotation with the new pocket mission that ABM has been slaving away on?  Compromise?

[AbortedMan]

Sure, gotcha Corley.

Just be aware that there are different aspects of the game that will be explored for the enjoyment of others as well which may specifically include or exclude certain features for gameplay and balance reasons. This goes for ordnance, amount/type of aircraft available, fuel levels based on objectives, etc...

The things you're used to doing are still achievable in this mission with the ordnance that is available...it just takes a little more finesse now, which is intended. Also, as a sidenote...Everything I've read about the He-111H6 bombing tells me that it was solely a relatively low altitude bomber and that the bombsight on the specific model in BoS is extremely ineffective at altitudes over 1500 meters (while I don't think that inefficacy is modeled at higher altitudes in the game). Do you do only high alt bombing because it's more of a challenge or more fun to you, or are you following a procedure that these He-111s used that I haven't read about? (I haven't read a lot)