[request] SP practice missions?

[thekev506]

Does anyone have any single player scenarios they've made that would make for good practice missions? Helo missions that involve picking people up would be amazing because I'm much too ham-fisted with the editor to make something like that work

[wolfenswan]

There are some missions around but have you tried the Armory? If you fly around in a heli the auto-assigned tasks involve picking up people etc.

To unlock everything the armory has to offer go in the armory and press (left shift and numpad -) then type GETALLGEAR.

Otherwise there a plenty of different training missions online, if you google a bit or search on armaholic you might find some. However there are no way mandatory for the sessions, trial by fire is the best way to learn

[Ferrard Carson]

Heck, you don't even have to mess around with the random missions (ever tried to ferry civilians with an Mi-8? Half of them are ancient grandmothers who shamble slower than earthworms. You run out of time waiting for the first batch to board). Just start it up, unlock all the stuff (really freakin' useful, and I can't believe I didn't know that trick beforehand), and then practice approaches, landings, and extracts. Takistan's a good map for it, Zargabad if you need to practice roof-top insertions, Chernarus if you just want to tree-slalom. Just hold the chopper on the ground for 15 seconds to simulate a landing, 30 to simulate a pickup. If it's workshop folk boarding your chopper, cut those times by 2/3

To me, the Little Bird is the most fun to fly, but we tend to use Black Hawks, Chinooks, or AI-piloted Flying Buses (Mi-8's) most often, so if you want a repute as a quality pilot, grab those. Training is by no means mandatory, though. Just don't get us all killed. The Party gets irate when it kills its own people without proper authorization.

~ Ferrard

[Black Mamba]

About flight training/Helo insertions:
I created on each map a really simple mission: myself in a flying chopper, 4 fireteams of blufor dudes on the edge on the map, and five sections of opfor dudes with machineguns and RPG.
The blufor dudes start inside the chopper, and I have a radio trigger to get them to disembark and give me an All Out signal.
After that, I'd just choose an LZ in the editor, roughly place the opfor dudes all around it, set my chopper 3km out, and practice my landings under fire.
I'd just need to change the chopper in the editor if I wanted to switch from a Littlebird to a Chinook.
Not a real dynamic mission then, but it was doing the job alright.

If you want to practice the Littlebird, check out Dslyexci's excellent training mission, although they don't include being fired at.

And then, just take a chopper, and fly as fast and as low as possible. You shouldn't do that afterwards in MP, but if you can do it in SP, you'll feel more comfy flying as a regular dude in the MP sessions.

[thekev506]

Thanks everyone! That armory code sounds incredibly handy so I'll set that up now and have a go at flying party-approved helos I've played around with the chinook at mi-8 in the editor but I like the random side of armory.

I'll try setting up a drop-off mission like the one you use, Black Mamba, because that's pretty much the kind of thing I need to try out the most. Let's see if I can make the triggers do what I want

Thanks again!

[fer]

Some of the mission maker-hosts are starting to use GitHub to collaborate on mission development - you comrades might consider using that to team up and develop such SP missions together.

[Macaco]

If you just wanna practice basic landings (which is arguably a good idea before moving to fancy stuff like pinnacles) just spawn a chopper in editor, and go from one end of the run way to the other and back. build up at least 150kph and that will help you get the muscle memory for quickly slowing and setting it down sans explosions.

learning how to land when you have no power is also pretty important as that is how most landings end in hot landing zones (there are tutorials on youtube that can explain better than I). Though in the couple of times I've flown I was usually dropping and picking up guys far enough away from the bad guys that it wasn't of much concern.

[Ferrard Carson]

Though in the couple of times I've flown I was usually dropping and picking up guys far enough away from the bad guys that it wasn't of much concern.

That's only 'cuz you haven't piloted when I'm in command

~ Ferrard

[Black Mamba]

^ That.