UberQuick Mission Manager (UQMM): The definitive tutorial, and a whole new way to enjoy BAT!
Greetings mates!
Now that I released Update 002 (
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,65131.0.html) for the UQMG for BAT, I can say that UberQuick Mission Manager (UQMM) fully supports BAT WAW. Please see below and read along.
(Note that some minor changes in the Interface are not updated as far as the screenshots because they do not affect the content of this post.)
For our discussion:
* SP = single player mission
* DF = multiplayer dogfight arena mission
* Coop = cooperative multiplayer mission
There are some exciting news, especially dealing with Dogfight Arenas. Just read on...
What is the UberQuick Mission Manager, or UQMM for short?
- It is an embedded application within UberQuick Mission Generator (UQMG) for BAT.
- It’s function: To allow players to play any existing IL-2 BAT mission (SP, campaign, or coop) in just about any way you want. (Currently only WAW is supported, but updates are coming in IL-2 standard time... 2 weeks!
) For example:
- Play in any flight in a mission (SP, campaign or coop, as long as they are not flights that spawn after the mission starts), friendly or enemy.
- If you fly for the opposing team, the objectives of the mission are automatically adjusted for the perspective of the enemy. If original mission was ground attack, enemy perspective is ground defense, and etc.
- Without overwriting the original mission you generate 3 versions of the mission, just like in UQMG, that is, an SP version, a DF version, and a Coop version, and you play in the same menus as in the UQMG missions. So there is really not too much of a learning curve.
- For Coop version of the mission, you pick whatever plane is available as usual… but you can play the mission offline if you wish… have you ever wondered what it feels like being a gunner through an entire mission? If you pick a gunner position to play the mission, in planes with multiple gun positions, you will be able to shift between/amongst positions.
- You can play a Coop mission as an SP mission, choosing which plane to fly in the SP version and able to use the offline features, like autopilot and fast forwarding through time and/or waypoints.
- Sure, you could do all this manually, but UQMG and UQMM takes care of file management for you so you can get to the business of enjoying the play! All within BAT.
I wanted to have a separate discussion about DF arenas. What I found out today blew my mind, and it may not be news to you, but it completely changes the way you play DF arenas… even if you generate them for OFFLINE play.
Here is what UQMM does when it generates a DF Arena:
- It does NOT modify the mission.
- It takes all active bases in mission and make them spawn bases for either RED/Allied or BLUE/Axis team. Active bases are the ones that have takeoff and/or landing waypoints.
- It uses ALL aircraft types in the mission and assigns them to the spawn bases by team, so if RED team has P-40s, Yak-1s, and Pe-8s, those will be the available types in RED spawn points, regardless of whether they were present at beginning of mission or spawned later in the original mission. Same thing for Blue team; if they had Bf-109Fs, Ju-87Bs, and He-111s, that is what would be available for the mission.
DF and OFFLINE PLAY
Here is the game changer for OFFLINE PLAY and DF arenas: The original aircraft in the mission will be present in the DF arena. They will spawn as AI planes in their designated times (beginning of mission or later).
This means that you can play as an addition to the mission that is ongoing in “online” DF fashion. Pick your spawn and go. If you get shot down, pick another (new) plane… even switch teams if you want. Bailed out? Want a change? Out of ammo/fuel? Just press “Esc” and select Refly, as the mission will keep on going in real time.
This means you can affect the mission in surprising ways. And basically play forever until you are tired. Of course this is also fun online as you are able to do the same with your buddies. Pick a mission, set the server based on an SP, or Campaign, or Coop mission and make a DF arena out of it and have the mission going while you and your friends and enemies come in as you desire.
Now I did not know that was possible (having AI planes in DF), so forgive me if this is old news, but at the very least, UQMM makes this so EASY to do!
Messing with UQMM updates was not anywhere in my focus when I updated UQMG. I guess it has been so long I forgot that it takes the same files from UQMG to identify countries/regiments and aircraft. So when I found out today that I could use that feature, I started messing with it and had a pleasant surprise. (So yes, it uses all BAT WAW planes, all BAT WAW countries, and all BAT WAW regiments/units). Shall we look at an example?
- Start UQMG for BAT/WAW
- Click the UQMM button (Refer to the pictures in the beginning of the post; optionally you can click the yellow “?” button by it for a quick description.)
- Uncheck “Do NOT allow AI planes in DF Arena”
- Check Remove Coop Mission AI Only Tags
- We will have to do a bit of navigating files, but eventually I’ll have a faster solution in an update in uh, 2 weeks. The emphasis here is the functionality.
- Select the third large button, which is labeled “Play Any SP Mission (Choose Any Flyable Flight/Position)”
- In BAT, we will pick the following mission (just showing because this is a stock mission so everyone should have it.) It is the first of three single Fw-190A-4 SP missions from the stock missions.
- The “Open File” Dialog should be open so navigate to the location of the mission, which is: “[BAT Installation Folder]\Missions\Single\DE\FW-190\FW190_1.mis” and select it.
- Note that originally I intended for UQMM to take care of the folder it opened through the interface, but in BAT that is ignored since we have the “Single (Module_Name)” structure available. (Module_Name = Dawn Of Flight, World At War, etc).
- So this means you can use it with any BAT WAW mission today! Why wait? We have operators standing by, but supply is limited! If you act now you can get this functionality within seconds, and for the great price of Zero Euro, or Zero Pounds, or Zero US Dollars! We are adding new currencies every day!
OK, let’s continue. Below you will see the following sequence of pictures:
- The original player flight for the mission
- A list of available flights for the mission (only the ones that spawn at the beginning of the mission).
- Displaying a pick from the enemy perspective.
- Clicking OK, and getting the mission creation/ready to play message, and the additional information.
- Super important to notice that THREE versions of the mission were created in that step:
- One SP mission from whatever perspective (in this case, the enemy team, with adjusted mission objectives).
- One Coop mission. (Unfortunately, in Coop, the objectives are always from the perspective of the original mission, so if the mission was Blue, the objectives are Blue… sorry. To avoid that if your intent is to play Coop, then just pick the original flight and go through the steps outlined previously.)
- One DF Arena… and this is where it gets interesting. Let’s wait a moment.
Just to go through the motions, before discussing DF mode, I will show a few pictures of going through the SP mission, showing the mission and that objectives are now from the enemy perspective (the other team, even though the briefing is the original one), and a couple of pictures in the mission. Then we will see the Coop version, up to the plane selection screen.
So now to the Dogfight (DF) version. UQMM does not operate like UQMG in this fashion. It simply adds the DF spawn bases to the original mission based on takeoff/landing points. Depending on team, the aircraft available in the mission are the ones available in the mission. It does not alter any other content.
The interesting thing here is that somehow, unbeknownst to me, between 4.12, and all the Mods, the ability to keep all dynamic ground and aircraft (AI) objects was added within BAT. This makes for DF arenas that have objectives and functionality similar to SPs and Coop missions… but you (and your best friends and worst enemies) can spawn in and out at will.
This adds a whole dimension to game play, because you can do that not only with other players, but by yourself. You can generate an arena in which things are happening and you introduce yourself at will to shape the world around you… kinda like some of the arena games you have around.
The fact you can do that with IL-2 BAT is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!!!The sample below is a simple mission with only 3 types of planes, but look at the potential for developing very complex scenarios, from scratch, or using one of the existing THOUSANDS of missions in your BAT installation (considering the content from SAS 1946).
It boggles the mind. Take a look at the same mission. I start flying for the Blue team. I catch up and help. Then I bail out when things are done (so I can Refly), then I pick an enemy plane, then I come back to strafe the Blue team, but get killed by Flak. I could have continued to fly but there was no other planes left, but this is a simple mission.
Try a complex mission and see the results. As you saw in a different post, I created a long lasting arena with continuous waves of spawning AI bots (
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,65160.0.html). But doing that requires a few more steps because of how UQMG is built. Let’s talk about that later. Take a look at the mission I described above:
To give you additional options, I highly recommend:
* Whistler’s BAT Single Mission Community Packs
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,62119.0.html* SAS~Poltava’s WAW Campaigns
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,63302.0.html* SAS~Monty27’s Campaigns
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,54494.0.htmlAmongst other missions...
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Topic: UberQuick Mission Manager (UQMM): The definitive tutorial, and a whole new way to enjoy BAT! (Updated 14 Nov 2020) (Read 1826 times)
