Hi, Has anyone made missions with the mission tool and if so posted them? I am looking for anti-ship missions in particular. thx.

I must be too stupid to use it, I dl'd a mission builder and f'd up one of the missions that came with the game. I tried and tried to fix it back, but some how I even have some spits on the German side. LoL, help!

dsawan, there is already a anti-shipping mission under the Ground-Attack category in stock bob2 missions.

New missions made with this tool was done for the game, Air Battles : Sky Defender, i am not aware of any modded missions for bob2.

Craterman, if you need to restore your original missions, place the file linked bellow in your Bob2\BFIELDS directory.

http://www.franva.org/quick.dat

To be honest I think the campaign interface is the best LW mission builder out there at the moment.

You want to build an anti shipping mission? Start the convoy phase, there are two convoys already on the map to pick from. Build your strike package(s) in the 2D map then save the game as 'convoy mission 1'. You can't dictate how the RAF will respond, but that gives the mission great replayability because the RAF response will be similar each time, but it isn't guaranteed to be the same.

The same goes for strike missions against airfields or other targets. Choose August 12 (Adlertag phase), click your target, set up the raid (eg 130 He111 with 300 109s as escort), waypoints etc and save the game (I usually describe the target and composition in the savegame name eg BHillH100E300) and then play it. When you frag into the 3D mission you have complete freedom over which aircraft you want to fly, and whether you want to fly it from takeoff or later in the mission.

The great thing about it is, once you have loaded the game on the 2D map, if you want to change some of the mission parameters (waypoints, altitudes, aircraft composition, extra raids etc) you can very quickly do so, save it under a new name, and then you are away again!

I have to admit this isn't as straightforward for those who want to build missions from the RAF side. I do have a couple of good RAF mission savegames that were very easy to set up though.

If you choose the Adlertag phase, you are guaranteed the LW will send heavy raids against RDF facilities, Manston, Hawkinge, and Tangmere. Just make sure you choose to fly for a squadron based at the airfield you want to fly out of, and set it to 2 minute readyness, set it up and save the game. I have the following gamesaves set up:

Manston Scramble against Ju87s
Dover RDF defence against Ju87s
Dornier reconnaissance intercept
Tangmere patrol
Hawkinge patrol

If you choose the Blitz (final) phase of the campaign, you are guaranteed the LW will send heavy raids against your remaining 11 group airfields so the following missions were easy to set up:

Biggin Hill scramble
Big wing patrol over London (80+ Spits and Hurris)
Big wing patrol over Dover
Patrol over Eastchurch
Patrol over Thornley

The problem for using the campaign engine to build RAF missions is of course that you have no control over the LW AI and what raids it assigns. The trick for making sure you get the type of RAF mission you want is to save regularly, wait and see what LW raids develop after the save, and then go back to the save and set up your desired RAF mission. Clear as mud? What I mean is eg at 0710 on 12 August save the game (call it 'test'), then wait to see what raids develop eg you may see a big raid appear over calais and head for Tangmere at 0730. Go back to your save game and pause the action, and you can set up a fantastic Tangmere scramble mission.

By experimenting with the different phases of the campaign and using the savegame method, you can set up just about any LW or RAF mission your heart could desire, with that exciting element that no two missions will play exactly the same each time!

(Caveat: I have noticed a tendency in the past for the extensive use of savegames to result in the savegame file being corrupted and resulting in a game crash. I avoid this by not re-saving a save game under the same name, once I have created the mission I want.)

Hi biggles109,

A very interesting post. With careful management you can have almost an infinite number of missions. You would need to name your savegames carefully so you can remember them.

Fredick is working on a mission builder for BOBII for both our use (new games) and the customers use.

You would need to name your savegames carefully so you can remember them.

Yep but naming the savegames is pretty easy. The game already splits them logically into LW or RAF savegames, so I just do:

BHillH100E300 : this equals a raid on Biggin Hill, with 100 heavies and 300 Emils, or

TangS601: equals Tangmere Scramble 601 squadron, or

TangP213 which is Tangmere Patrol with 213 squadron from Exeter

You can put as much or as little detail into the filename as you wanted.

Technically, I guess you could also make your savegames available for download. Though I guess they would be effected quite markedly by the player's own game settings. It's just so easy to set up your own missions though (especially LW), it would hardly be worth the effort of putting them up for people to download I think.

I am in the middle of finalising a short scripted campaign based around Pete Townsend and 85 squadron. These are the missions so far, covering the action he saw between 11 and 31 August.

Six plane patrol over Sussex. Intercept on Do17 recon flight. (Townsend damaged one Do17 but was shot down by the bombers in this mission, which was actually over Southwold but BOB2 LW raids rarely reach that far north.)

Intercept raid He111s and 109s Sussex (claimed two 109s)

Patrol Sussex vectored to intercept an incoming raid (claimed two more 109s)

Intercept Bf110s Ashford (damaged 1)

Patrol Croydon against incoming raid (he scored no kills in this sortie)

Scramble Croydon against large raid of He111s and 109s (his last sortie for the battle, he got one 109, damaged another but was shot down by a 110 and had part of his foot amputated)

I just need to fine tune a couple of things and then I will have a short semi scripted Pete Townsend campaign! It is nearly ready to go, and has only taken me about two hours of work.

The only element of suspension of disbelief is the fact that all the action takes place on Aug 24 in the BOB2 engine. If you wanted, you could run the campaign in 2D then setup the mission on the right date, but that would be very anal. (And its nothing compared to the suspension of disbelief you need if you are playing BOB missions in IL2 with russian language maps of eastern europe simulating the SE England coastline!)

One of the things that helps immersion with these BOB2 campaign generated missions is that you see the action going on all around you as well, because the AI is busy generating other raids and intercepts. So you get a feeling for what was going on around you, and if you are lucky enough to survive your assigned mission with a few rounds left in the brownings, you can ask for more business, just like back in the day.

I think it would be great if users shared their campaign savegames. You'd soon have a large repository of dynamic missions. Just save after you have set up all missions for the session or before your selected squadron takes off. This would be especially handy for those who don't have the time or interest to get into the strategic part of the campaign.

Tremendous stuff, Biggles. I do like the sound of that 85 Squadron experience.

I am wondering about sharing savegames, too, actually.
Whilst I agree that settings make a difference (and there would be no ability to change them at will if you used someone else's campaign) it would surely give a taster to the feel of the BoB campaign and its genuine unpredictability. I do remember long ago putting together early Multiskin work and sharing campaign saves for another tester. I asked him how it had all gone, and he said 'Sorry, didn't have much time for testing, just been having too much fun with your savegames ;).

If the save games were posted, I'd use them. For me, a new prop flyer, they could be a good primer until I get the skills to actually fly the campaign. The save games would be like dating, no real commitment but still involved and trying to put on a good first impression. The campaign is like marrage, committed and must know what your doing or you are in hot water. (in some cases for a Loooong time). With that being said, anyone wanna post some missions for this Dating Dogfighter?

Sharing Save Games for BOBII would work with the correct organizationand leadership, IMHO. You would have to clearly specify your setting so a customer would only download Save Game with setting he enjoys. We know from experience that customers enjoy different setting and will not fly the savegame if the setting are not to his taste.

I am not sure how many key setting we would have to deal with (Labels, skill, realistic, some views maybe, etc). We may come up with a reasonable number.

I would download 2.06 savegame missions if I had the setting that fit my needs (I am a busy BOBII coder so look at the time that would save me). If you had a wonderful mission that customers were interested in you could do several savegames with different settings (if it was a low number).

This would clearly be super PR for BOBII and explot our very key and unque campaign feature. After using the save Games customers might be more willing to try the campaign as it might be hard to resist.

Some very good and interesting thinking on this thread. The savegames would last for as long as a new BOBII version was delivered then they may not work (I may need to try and fix this). Some save games would become popular and promote discussions of how best to win, loose, or draw. It could open up a exciting new challenges for BOBII customers.

You can change the game settings in the Frag screen, just before you enter the mission. Sure it's not very convenient if you have to do it every time, but it is possible

Very good point, I had forgot that.

Check out the Shockwave forum. Heinkill has made a number of missions (Galland vs Deere and Pete Townsend mission set).

Yes, he has. Here are the links:

http://shockwaveproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7958

http://shockwaveproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7953

He needs support to work out the kinks, I think.

Yes all help and advice welcome! I have put together about six downloadable missions now, created using the campaign interface and then saved as savegames for sharing purposes. Give them a try and then give your input into whether we can make this idea work! Pls note these are test missions only to see if the concept has legs...the missions themselves would need fine tuning but give you a good idea of the potential of this concept.

Pete Townsend Mission Set
http://www.box.net/shared/u0ig916s6x



These 5 missions recreate the sorties during which RAF Ace Townsend got his 7 Battle of Britain kills. How will you fare?

The Zip file here contains the missions and a readme file with mission descriptions and instructions on how to use them (simply unzip into your BOB2 SAVEGAME directory and from the main menu go Load game>RAF and you should see Tsend 1 thru Tsend 5.)

Adolph Galland vs Alan Deere Mission
http://www.box.net/shared/9ugohbr98i



In mid August these two opposing aces clashed in the skies over SE England. Deere was shot down by Galland but baled out and lived to fight another day. This mission recreates that clash.

Again the zip file contains the missions and a readme file, just unzip to the savegame folder in BOB2 and from the main menu go to Load Game>Luftwaffe and you should see the file Galland1



I would divide the kinks into a few categories

The good

These savegame missions are actually easy enough to design. I have probably chosen the hardest type of mission to model in these examples, as they are specific squadrons performing specific types of mission, even specific aircraft in specific squadrons such as Townsend, Deere and Galland.

These take a little more time because there is that element of chance and luck when you set up a mission, you never know how the campaign AI will respond (eg setting up an attack on Rochford so that Galland and Deere would end up clashing, took a bit of luck and a lot of perserverance!) But if all you wanted to do was set up a Stuka raid on Manston, or a series of Stuka IA missions, or a mini campaign in the Bf110 without worrying too much about historical niceties, it would be very simple and very quick to do.

Want to set up a huge furball of 20 Spits and 20 Hurris against the same number of 110s and 109s? I guarantee that would take about five minutes! How about a scramble from Manston, with bombs falling as you struggle to get one up? A little longer because you have to get the timing right, but say 30 mins.

LW missions are the easiest to create because you have total control over which aircraft, which squadrons and which targets you want to attack and the battlefield can be as crowded or as empty as you want to make it. The RAF missions are no harder to create, but take slightly longer, because you are basically forced to take what the AI throws at you and then work around it to get the missions you want. This is why I chose to do an RAF mission set to start with, to see how practical it would be, but in reality it takes very little time, given how intense the Adlertag period is, for the right raid to come along in the right place at the right time. Honestly I don't regard 3 hours to create five basic but interesting RAF missions to be a big investment. The Galland mission took about 90 minutes because I had to find Deere's Kiwi squadron (I was looking at Hornchurch but found them at Rochford) and having found them, I had to lure them up! All of this makes mission building fun and rewarding...

The bad

The ideal mission builder of course is one where you can have your mission briefing on screen and then dive into the mission, pref straight into the cockpit. In these BOB2 savegame missions the briefing has to be in a separate readme, and the game starts on the 2d campaign map, which can be confusing for those not used to this interface.

A small FAQ may be needed for those IA fans new to the campaign interface (how do I frag into the cockpit, how do i get back to the 2d map, how do I speed the game up, how do i get a vector to the enemy or my next waypoint etc how do i know if i accomplished my mission?)

Missions have to be very well designed (my test missions are very rough) so that the player is left in no doubt which flight they should frag into, and what they should do once they are in the cockpit. The best idea is often to fly as wingman, not sq or flt leader, and just follow along, but some missions require player intervention via radio command (go here, attack that, regroup etc) for greatest success.

And many wont be happy that there is no straightforward measure of their success...no victory screen saying well done, mission accomplished! These missions reflect the real life challenge of the pilots - the objective of an RAF mission may be to stop an incoming raid, but in reality, after the merge, all bets were off.

The ugly

The game settings that were in force when the mission was created and saved, will override the players own game settings. This may be a minor annoyance for some, or a major annoyance for others. They can be reset on the frag screen via the sim config menu before playing the mission, but the ideal would of course be if we can find a workaround that avoids/prevents this happening.

Of course this is no problem at all if you are just making missions for your own benefit (eg the 40 v 40 furball described above) but half the fun of making them is sharing them...


The change is not permanent - all the player has to do to go back to their own settings is load up one of their own campaign saves.