With the current waypoints, mission builders have little direct control over AI behavior. In order to make AI planes use certain tactics, like lingering over a certain spot for a certain time, the player must fly as fight lead and give the AI orders to do so. Needless to say, this cannot be done for every flight in a given mission. Allowing mission builders to set specific combat/navigational maneuvers on waypoints for AI flights would give the builder more direct control over the mission. I've listed a few potential options below:
For Gattack waypoints, the method the AI uses to attack the target could be specified in a dropdown menu.
Dive: Plane dives vertically on the target, regardless of type or altitude
Level: Plane drops bombs with bombsite
JaBo: Planes make multiple passes with one bomb at a time
Hit and run: Planes come in shallow dives, drop all bombs, and fly away
Target type: Dropdown menu allowing one or more specific target types to be set (flak, tanks, etc.) for a Gattack waypoint. Say you wanted to have a flight of bomb loaded P-47's attacking ships in a crowded harbor. The harbor will probably be swarming with ships, trucks, flak, and other ground targets, so the AI planes will attack everything in sight. Currently, the only way to make them attack ships only is to (a.) fly as the flight lead and order them to attack ships, or (b.) set an individual ship as the target for the whole flight, in which case they will only attack that one ship, and when it's destroyed, simply fly home. The problem could be solved if there were another dropdown menu in the waypoint section of the FMB, which would allow you to set ships in general as the flight's target. That way, they would ignore all other ground units and attack multiple ships.
Something similar could be done for air to air targets. For example, if a fight of Bf-109s attacks a formation of B-17's with fighter escort, the 109s could have "bombers" set as their target type for that waypoint, and will ignore any fighter escort.
Formation: Dropdown menu allowing the builder to set the formation the flight flies in for that waypoint.
Author
Topic: New waypoint types/options (Read 1180 times)
