Hopped on after rolling out of bed to check the situation. It looks good, Blue ground forces have made some gains, though it is currently in consolidation. In the offline IF I am playing concurrently, I am experiencing more of the false starts, where an offensive is announced to begin in a few hours, but then shortly before that time arrives it reverts back to consolidation. That's the same thing we were seeing at the end of BoP. Luckily Seoul is not far away and we can win this one with some hands-on ground war management I believe.

I was also happy to see the target I wanted to hit in my mission last night was still there. I'll hop on in a couple hours after I drop the mini-me at school.

The time now is about 2000 hours. If it mirrors my offline run, the Reds will get a reinforcement in about 6 hours. Suddenly there will be a Wall O MiGs so be ready if you're on.

The second attempt at a first hop went much better. I fragged essentially the same mission, an interdiction just west of the Nuclear Plant just to the north of Kunsan. Target area about 35 miles from base. There were a number of rocket artillery battalions deployed there. Set a precision steerpoint and got my strike heading. Loaded the jet with four CBU-87, four AIM-120C and two AIM-9X, plus the obligatory sniper pod and jammer. Nothing was up on AWACS view, but I knew that with the target so close I'd have time to loiter after coming off target.

Got aligned coming in and locked a vehicle at the precision steerpoint #99 and from 15,000 feet executed a 25 degree loft release, and then pulled off target to the left. Leveled out above 20,000 and watched the bombs. They looked good, and closer inspection with zoom showed a number of fires.






Did I mention I love lofting CBU? Turned back toward the front line and flew east along it, waiting to see if any gomers would make an appearance. Sure enough, I started hearing enemy aircraft launch activity calls and before long we had our first contact. This proved to be a pair of MiG-23s. They didn't seem to notice me for a while as they werre quartering in to me. But inside 15 miles they picked me up and it was on. I flipped on the jammer and pulled into the leader. Fired the first missile, and beamed for 15 seconds, then pulled in to the wingman and Fox-Three'd him. One of them got a shot at me, but I didn't see it. Only knew about it in the debrief. Based on the timestamp it must have been the lead MiG-23? It was an AA-7 Apex. It's SARH, so when the MiG blew up the missile had nothing to guide it. Or perhaps the beam maneuver defeated it?

The first MiG locked up



I turned around and flew back toward base again and got another contact, this time a pair of MiG-21s. They seemed to pick me up early, and they were spiking form 18 miles. Shot the leader with a slammer from 12 miles. He was really hauling, and that missile took him out quick. The wingman dove and I lost him on the radar. I guessed right about which way he turned though and as I swept the antenna lower I found him at 6,000 feet and cooled my 9X's. With a big altitude advantage my Sidewinders had good range and I shot one when I got a good tone from over 12 miles. I turned to drag him and didn't see the results of this missile shot. No 21 spikes anymore anyway.

Turned for the front again, and picked up some Il-28s that had just crossed the FLOT and were heading in to our territory. From 41 miles I chased to 13 miles and I got a missile off which blew up one of the bombers. The other was knocked down by a SAM Hanging around the FLOT for a bit longer a pair of MiG-29s and a four-ship of MiG-23s appeared. A nearby Hornet section engaged the MiG-23s, while I looked to engage the 29s. A good angle didn't present itself, and I wasn't wading in to this one, so turned cold once again. North of Kunsan the Hornets were still messing with the 23s, and I think had shot down two, leaving two still up. With a single Sidewinder remaining I had to be cool about it. I waited on the edge of their engagement and finally the 23s turned tail and ran. I started to chase in burner, but with just +30 knots of overtake I couldn't afford the fuel nor the flight over Seoul

The Il-28 chase



The MiG-23 fourship is jamming and the 29's are tucked in behind them.



So I turned back with one 9X hanging and squeezed in to a very busy traffic pattern at Kunsan. The 14th was set to HQ control so there was a lot of activity between the Vipers and the Hogs arriving and departing. Good mission and good start.

Bombs were good, missiles performed flawlessly.




Event Crossfire joined as Shark11 at 22:19:32
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK KrAz T 255B destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:47
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:48
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:48
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:48
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:48
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:49
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:49
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:49
Event DPRK BM21 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:49
Event DPRK ZU-23 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:50
Event DPRK ZU-23 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:50
Event DPRK ZU-23 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:50
Event DPRK ZU-23 destroyed by Crossfire at 22:28:50
Event AA-7 launched at Crossfire 22:35:15
Event DPRK MiG-23ML downed by Crossfire at 22:35:31
Event DPRK MiG-23ML downed by Crossfire at 22:35:42
Event DPRK MiG-21MF downed by Crossfire at 22:39:50
Event DPRK MiG-21MF downed by Crossfire at 22:42:37
Event DPRK IL-28 downed by Crossfire at 22:49:11
Event Crossfire landed at 23:08:40
Event Crossfire exited from Shark11 at 23:09:20

Great mission DBond.

I'm hoping to get on tonight with some SDBs to take out multiple SAM radars (that's the plan anyway).

Thanks Wildcat. yes, about your post the other day regarding the SBDs... that sounds awesome. I'd love to read your AAR if you detail what you do. No obligation of course, but I would be interested in the nuts-and-bolts aspect of how you go about it.

Will try to get some screenshots and write a debrief.

But essentially, I'll change the flight plan to overfly a few SAM sites, load 8 SDBs. Use the recon map to recon the SAM sites and assign each tracking/acquisition radar to a steerpoint (81-88 to keep separate from the flight STPT).

Then it's just a case of flying at altitude until STPT 81 is in range, pickle. Switch to STPT82, when in range, pickle. Then onto STPT83 and so on. It's a really simple way to do significant damage to the air defenses.

I imagine the biggest problem will be red air.

Alternatively, I could target a single SAM site and take out 8 targets at that site - completely wiping it out - but I think just hitting the radars for now will do as it renders the site useless anyway. Could go back in with CBU to clean up later on.

Just messed with the SDB's in the last week, they are great at taking out targets standoff style.

DBond, you're a one-man airforce.

At what range will you typically release them? And from what altitude is that? Sounds like it's the next thing to add to the bag of tricks. I love dropping eight-fours CCIP, but that's not using our tech advantage much is it

Lately I've been trying to expand my arsenal, and flying more survivable profiles, especially on the server. So I need to learn these. Have a good mission Wildcat to inspire me more quickly lol.


Had time to hop on for one more. A quick note about the weather which I forgot to in the last AAR. I was surprised to see Kunsan with sunny weather when I joined last night. That wasn't how it was supposed to be! But of course the weather is always changing in our setup, so ya never know. However, I saw it change on my previous sortie, growing more overcast between Kunsan and Osan. In this second hop of the campaign, Kunsan was fair and the target was poor. I was happy to see that my efforts to set a higher stratus floor seemed to work, and you can now use the pod up to 18,000.

For this mission I flew exactly the same sort of thing as the first. The only differences being the target and the distance to it. I had mistakenly given the wrong target type in my previous AAR. That's been corrected to rocket artillery. This time I did indeed target the self-propelled artillery located about another 20 miles to the NNW from the rockets. Same loadout, same lofting delivery, better results. The cloud cover made it difficult to judge from the air, but the debrief was good. Some of these kills totals are a bit absurd, and there is no special talent needed. I mean, I am lofting four CBU from high altitude for cryin' out loud. The trick is finding the most profitable targets and doing sufficient recon to get the strike heading correct. Then just fly over and fly your cues.

In both of these missions I am exploiting the campaign engine really. I like a lot of kills of course, but I believe I do it because it's a good way to help win the campaign. I'm just as happy with a well-executed surgical strike knocking out two buildings with JDAMS. But that doesn't help win the campaign so much. In each of these missions I found Red battalions that were 'stacked'. The program places them directly on top of each other, so that bombs being rippled down their deployment axis are quite effective indeed, with each hit taking out units of three to five battalions at the same time. Not realistic is it? But it's effective, if perhaps a bit on the shady side



It was still morning where I live, and it was bright, and the Track IR was going bananas. I couldn't spot the rogue reflection so I had to fly this mission without it. Talk about a fish out of water suddenly. A few years ago, no problem. I could nudge the hat just so to get the view I wanted. Now? Drunk.

Took off from Kunsan and hit the target. My loft took me up through the cloud deck so I got no visual on the bombs hitting. As before, I flew off in search of air targets. Not much up, but I think there are a lot of An-2 prop spotter/recon planes flying around, down low where AWACS cannot spot them. I chased one to heater range when if blew up in my face. Found a second later that I did knock down. Tough to spot on radar, and they aren't any danger to Blue I don't think, aside from some intel perhaps. I had mixed it up before with some MiG-29s, knocking one down with a slammer.

The target battalions all bunched up



Got out from over the cloud and had a look through the pod and good fires





Running very low on fuel I headed for home, but some MiG-29s took off almost below me and burner'd out to the north. I couldn't keep on in case they suddenly turned around. So I engaged. And at the same time they did too. Everything went from calmly flying home, to full-on missile fight at 20 paces. I shot both of my remaining slammers at each MiG, without waiting for them to go autonomous. I didn't wait for the first one before I shot the second, and I was in full burner drag before the second one went pitbull. Missile launch was lit up (debrief showed AA-10A Alamo). But I couldn't afford the fuel for long. A 29 was still spiking behind me and I altered course toward an 18 spike. Soon, those Hornets shot the 29 off my tail and I started for home, 117 miles with 900 pounds. So I had to manage it a bit, but that's enough. Good mission especially since it was flown without the Track IR. The air fights with the MiGs I sort of felt naked without it.

On the way home the DED is rather pessimistic

Had a less good flight just now.

Fragged my 2-ship AI but for whatever reason the flight was airborne since 2 minutes when I got it in my hands.
No chance to set the loadout I had to try do something worthwhile with 2 huge JDAM's.

No success with those I turned my eyes to the sky and with a pretty recent picture clear from AWACS there was a 2-ship Floggers inbound.

Wingman lost in a blue-pause I managed to wrestle them down but with another two blue pause I opted to just exit.


Event theOden joined as Python11 at 02:33:54
Event Python12 crashed at 02:45:27
Event DPRK MiG-23ML downed by theOden at 02:50:40
Event DPRK MiG-23ML downed by theOden at 02:51:45
Event theOden exited from Python11 at 02:55:04

Will restart server in a minute or two.

Too bad Oden< I wonder what happened with the takeoff time? Why was it airborne?

FWIW, I had two blue pauses in the second mission that I escaped from. Hopefully it's just due a reset, but this KTO IF seems to be giving us some trouble.

I tend to aim for 25000+, and release shortly after 'JIZ' appears on the hud for that stpt. I also go full burner and nose up to get a little extra range out of them but not sure what the number is.

I think max range is 60 miles, so a little under that.

I don't think IVC is used enough for us to have SOPs... but then again, I did ask for us to at least have SOPs in place for when people fly together. I'm guessing (based on the number of screenshots) that not very many MP flights are happening for this to be an issue though...
In any case, if we do have SOPs, I vote as Wildcat has mentioned....

Thanks. Damn, that's a long way. You could just about hit Seoul without flying over the FLOT. I gotta try these.

Interesting weapon. Just read up on it a bit. They want to fit these things to MLRS evidently

Just tried it out in the campaign and at 25,000ft, at 320kts range is little over 40 miles.

I loaded up with SDBs and took out 4 AAA radars (fire cans) and a couple of guns. 5 hits, 3 misses - not the best.

Also took out an Il-76, a MiG 21 and a MiG 23, unfortunately I made a mistake and took out my wingman... Oops. (Though to be fair, the way my wingmen have been crashing online in the last few missions he didn't stand much chance anyway).

Wingman had 8 A-G kills.

Still a bit rusty, only got back into flying BMS after 5 months off last week.

----------------------------------------------------------

An A10 taxis by during startup




And another comes in to land on 36 at Kunsan.




Nosing up for altitude, AG mode selected, SDB powered on and steerpoint 81 selected. Note the carat in the top right of the hud - just waiting for this to come down into the bracket and the display to read out JIZ, once you see that it's time to pickle.



SDB in range, time to pickle then move to the next stpt and repeat the process.




On Egress we meet up with some MiG 21 and MiG 23. Fox 3 on a 21.



I then cranked left and had my wingman go shooter while I reset and came back in.

I saw he was on the tail of the 21, and had a couple of MiG 23 popup 30 miles away, so I quickly locked them up and got a shot of in TWS mode on the trail 23,




TMS'd right to move to the next target, expecting lock to shift to the lead, but it didn't it went to my wingman who was on the tail of the 21 and I didn't realise, until he told me I could kiss my career goodbye.

In the heat of the moment I misreadmy FCR, I thought I was locked onto the lead 21 due to the cursor being over him, but obviously not




Now out of missiles and with a 23 on my tail on the RWR I decided to dive and burn home, which made the lonely, missing a wingman trip a little more enjoyable.

Running away...



Followed a couple of A10s in on finals and landed without any drama in a bit of a crosswind.

That's cool Wildcat. The range of those bombs is awesome. To glide that far and hit the target is great. So many uses for a weapon like that. I knew of them of course, but had yet to try them, and didn't understand their capability. If one jet could take out 8 SAM radars what an impact that makes. eh? And without even coming within their range. Thanks for wising me up to these things.

I was thinking of fragging a mission and trying to take out 8 control towers. Ha. It wouldn't affect Red in the least, but it's plinking control towers lol.


As for the campaign... in my offline campaign it's all consolidation. Over and over it announces an offensive but reverts to consolidation before the set time to start. If the same happens on the server that wouldn't be good. Not so much on the ground, because I think we can overcome that with some manual control. I've already started a few armor battalions north. But the ATO falls asleep during a consolidation, that thing I call the siesta. Having little to no aircraft flying is not good and leaves everything open for any Red strikers that come our way. A consolidation here and there can be managed, but if it's that way all the time it's a problem.

Got two late missions in, strikes against nuclear plants. Blue has launched another offensive so hopefully it will last a long time. Oden, I pushed a few units forward, and they are out of HQ, so if you spot any maybe give them new orders if they need it. Red got that big reinforcement that I had mentioned, but for whatever reason I have yet to see the air activity I expected from it. If all of a sudden the Red ATO goes bonkers, there could be a big wave of Red aircraft at some stage. It's been pretty quiet for most of day two in the air. Just a little over 3 days left in this one. I worked some A-10 interdictions along the road to Seoul, but there is more there, including some full strength battalions on the south side of Seoul. More could be as yet undetected. I put up another set of CCCI mission for 16 hours, but they've already used half of that.

Sweet AAR Wildcat.
Sad about your wingman, I'm pretty sure I am the one who have heard "kiss your career" most of us all

I did try SDB's in Tiger Spirit (or was it RollFire?) but I got very few kills and the few hits I got resulted in damage only most of the time.
Avoided them since.

DBond, wilco on those noHQ units.
(and I can see we in team84 are losing you to high-tech hahaha)

They only work on non moving targets.

Do you remember how you assigned the targets? Recon screen and assign to STPT?

You can also use the TGP or a Markpoint in the air.

And remember to CZ and not have anything locked up in FCR or TGP if using STPT.

Sometimes it's just down to bad/old intel, if the SAM site moves after it was last seen to be placed on the 2D map you'll end up firing at nothing

I actually wanted to go after SAM sites last night but around Seoul it looked as if they'd all been hit, which is why I went after radar guided AAA instead.

Can't get rid of me that easily. It's true I am attracted to the shiny techno bits and bobs. I'm trying to survive another 20 missions lol. But both of the nuclear plant strikes were done with Mark Eight Fours. The first was a loft of two bombs which hit for limited damage. The second was the standard Vipers in the Storm CCIP attack with four. So I am still part of Team84

Here are the bomb shots from each of those attacks.


The lofted pair




The 30 degree CCIP drop with four




The difference is clear. In the first, I am at 22,000 when they hit. The second is 13,000, which actually is pretty good for me, I'm usually another 4 or 5 thousand feet lower. Altitude is life in this sim, and that's a big difference.

Always wise to stay above 12,000 ft unless you have to go lower to stay out of range of nasties on the ground. Easier said than done!

Yes, that is wise indeed! However, wisdom is not my strength

I have some sort of issue with CCRP deliveries and I don't know what it is. I can come cruising over at 18,000 feet and all looks good but the release cue reaches the FPM then begins to climb and the bombs fail to release. It happens alot. I don't know what I am missing, what I am doing wrong. So suddenly I am in the middle of the attack and I either come off dry, or more likely I change to something else. I can roll over to steepen the dive and switch to CCIP, or sometimes this dive puts me back under the release cue and now the CCRP drop works. But now I'm and 12,000 or whatever, and in a screaming dive. By the time I pull out I'm at 8,000 or there abouts. That puts me in the heart of the IR envelope. This has led to most of the shoot-downs I've suffered over the past couple of months.

I watch videos of guys doing level CCRP drops and I don't see anything I am doing differently, except they release bombs and I don't. I've done hundreds of CCRP drops over the years, but something about what I am doing in BMS inhibits release.

For whatever reason level CCRP drops seem to work for me with JDAMs, but if I have slicks loaded I have trouble. Is it possible to consent to release too early?