First of all a big thanks to all of you who have been part of developing this wonderful sim and all of you who have created various tutorials.

I’ve finished one of the campaigns and managed to return to base alive and with partially successful missions most of the time (icons etc off) so I’m acquainted with most of the systems. There’s however parts that I don’t understand..



PROBLEM: Adding flights using the datalink so that they show up on the radar (flying campaigns)

I’ve watched Krauses/Tanits excellent datalink tutorial ( [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWyvJ99L2k4][/url] ) and have no problem adding my wingmen, assigning them targets etc. But I can’t add escorts or other flights. Let me illustrate using an example:

My flight is called “Falcon11” and “Falcon12” and the task is SEAD. Another flight called “Lobo11” and “Lobo12” are also performing a SEAD mission in the same area during the same time. The flights are escorted by “Serpent11” and “Serpent12” which according to the briefing should escort the package.

I want to see where “Lobo” and “Serpent” are but can’t add them via the datalink because they all have the same number combinations (11 and 12).

If the second SEAD flight was called “Falcon21” and “Falcon22” and the escort called “Falcon31” and Flacon32” then I would be able to add them but that has never been the case.

Is this simply how the campaigns are generated or is there something fundamental I have missed about the concept of “Flights” and “Packages”?

Thanks!!

From what I have been told (and have seen in the sim) only a/c "flights" in your "package" can be seen in your Data Link.

Yes that Is how I also understand it but what made me confused is
1) In the mission briefings you are for example instructed to "..rendezvous with package.." at a specific point but the strike flight and escort flights are parts of different packages (Falcon1 being the SEAD flight and Serpent1 being the escort flight). When I ask AWACS about the vector to the package then I get the heading to where my wingman (Falcon12) is and not the escort (Serpent).

2) Not once during the campaign have flights being generated so that they are part of the same package.

So you've never seen this?



When flights are shown like this in the briefing they belong to the same package. Only these flights can be seen with the datalink, and the way to add them is this: the first digit of their DL address is the order of the flight in the package. That means the first flight that appears in the briefing has the 1X addresses in the DL, the second has 2X etc. So in this case, Banshee1 flight would have addresses 11 - 14, Blade1 is 21 - 24, and Falcon 1 is 31 - 32.

Easiest way is to open the ATO. That will list the flights in your package.

So if there were listed as :

Falcon1

Cowboy1

Lobo1

Assuming just 2 aircraft per flight:


Falcon1 would be 1,1 and 1,2
Cowboy1 would be 2,1 and 2,2
Lobo1 would be 3,1 and 3,2

Hope that helps.

ah ok now I get it.. I thought the flights had to be named
something like this..

Falcon 11 & 12
Falcon 21 & 22
falcon 31 & 32 etc

..to be part of the same package.

I'm going to try it out again. Thanks a lot!