New Open Campaign Map Test - All Welcome!

Greetings from No.401 Squadron!

This Saturday, May 30th, No.401 Squadron will be hosting a test run of a new Campaign map that we hope to have operational for a Full Public Campaign in the very near future - and we'd like you to participate!

What sort of Campaign?

The campaign will be running on a new scripted mission we have just recently developed that we are calling "Finest Hour". This mission is designed to operate persistently with results from each server restart carrying over to the next. Each time the server restarts, a new 'day' of the Battle of Britain begins. The campaign will start with the date of July 10th, 1940 and depending on the actions of players will continue all the way through to September 17th, 1940.

What results will carry over?

The RAF team will need to manage resources that include:
No. of aircraft (both serviceable combat ready aircraft and unserviceable aircraft in need of repair)
Airfields (airfields can be damaged and turned non-operational)
Fuel supply (both reserves in fuel depots and refineries that produce fuel)
Aircraft factories (some factories produce parts that will repair unserviceable Hurricanes and produce new Hurricanes while others repair and produce Spitfires)
Convoys (merchant ships will occasionally appear in the channel and delivery resources to the team if they survive the day)
Ports (damaged ports and docks will received supplies from convoys at a lower rate or nil if heavily damaged)
Morale (civilian targets are available to be targeted and will impact the morale of the population)

The Luftwaffe team has plenty of resources to pursue the battle for the duration of the 70 days that it could take place, therefore their aircraft/fuel/factories etc. are not tracked or limited (at this time).

How does a team win the campaign?

The goal of the RAF team overall is to survive as a fighting force for the duration of the campaign run (70 days). If, at the end of the final mission, the RAF is still capable of presenting a credible defense, the RAF team wins.

The goal of the Luftwaffe team overall is to conduct the campaign in such a way that they are able to destroy the RAF's ability to respond to an invasion force or to destroy the morale of the population to such a degree that a change of government is forced and capitulation takes place.

What is the test run for?

Currently, the mission is functioning well with around 10 to 12 players participating. However, we would like to open up the mission to a wider public audience and need to ensure that there are no scaling effects when larger numbers of players join and play. To that end we would like to have as many people as possible up to our player limit of 36 players come and try out the mission on Saturday May 30th. If the test goes well, we will conduct a further test with a higher number of player spots open until we find the perfect number. After that, we will officially begin the campaign.

How can I participate?

The No.401 Squadron Server will be open with no password at 9:00pm EST (GMT -5) on Saturday, May 30th and players are encouraged to join and play. Players are welcome to join No.401's members on our teamspeak server (T331 . DARKSTARLLC . COM, port 10336), or to use their own teamspeak servers to help coordinate. We will be looking for RAF team players as well as Luftwaffe team players. It is not necessary for us to have equal numbers of RAF or Luftwaffe for the test, so please come on in.

What do I do when I get there?

The first thing to do would be to say hello! The second thing to do would be to find out what's currently happening. The mission is designed to allow the Luftwaffe team to decide on a target and start a bomber raid via the menu system. The same menu system will allow all Luftwaffe team players to find out what the current target is, what the route of the AI bombers is, and a system of locating friendly contacts in the air in real time. There is no restriction on airfields you can use for either team.

In short:
If you join the RAF team, find out where the enemy is coming across the channel and scramble to intercept...or wait at readiness until the raid does come.
If you join the Luftwaffe, team find out where the bombers are headed and link up with them to provide escort...or start a raid yourself!

When will the real campaign start?

We are hoping to have the official campaign begin in coordination with the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Britain and present the campaign in real time matching day for day starting with July 10th, 2015 equaling July 10th, 1940. Each day will be presented starting at 9:00pm EST (GMT -5).

Thank you for reading, and we hope to see you on Saturday! Space may be limited depending on response.

Thank you everyone who came to play tonight. It was great fun and helped immensely in working out a few of the bugs and concepts that we're developing. The Luftwaffe players did a great job attacking Dover Docks and a very explosive final attack on the Sittingbourne fuel depot. The server ran pretty smoothly and I think some of the little lags and stutters were related to players with custom skins (custom skins were on).

We'll press forward with the targets we need to complete to fill out the map and get ready for July 10th!

Thank all №401 Squadron Staff for the development of this campaign, in the opening test, which we had a chance to take part.
We hope that this will be another step in the long life of CLoD.
In the first flight, we on 2 Ju87 took off from the Oye_Plage airfield , and our target was Fuel Depots in the AT25. But on the way we found a Convoy in AW28 and decided to attack. Two transport ships were fully damaged and I hope sunk.
Next raid we start on 3 He111. And we have some problem with spawn at Rosieres_en_Santerre airfield. We were born parked nose to nose. (If you need help to fix it (only the blue airfield) like as is done on Storm of War server), let me know ( I use well the full editor). On the way we have been intercepted and were not able to attack the target.
3-d raid we took Ju87 and tried to repeat the same attack. At it was successful. But we met serious resistance, as far as possible from the opposing side. The spectacle of exploding fuel storage was awesome.
After we took a break 1.5 hours. In the remaining time, we made 3 by 3x110th raids on Convoy approached the harbor Folkestone.
A long time there was no practice, and our attacks were not successful...
Finally all ships were sunk except the Corvette, which is has lagged behind main convoy of ships, and could not protect them (I saw it from the 1st flight, may because of the speed?), but it could hurt some of our aircraft that flew too close to him. After all bombs were released, we attacked Corvett with course weapons. In result wheelhouse was destroyed and it caught fire. 30 min notification of the end of the mission appeared on the server.
Best regards.

Thanks guys was fun yesterday had a great time raiding dover and also being the distraction up high
I think you are onto a real winner all you have to do is convince the public on how it works
maybe you can try and make a intro video and get it out there that the battle of Britain is about to begin

as for stutters and freezes I didn't encounter any

one possible bug I found was I had to ditch in the channel about 2km off the coast of france and got a server message that I was captured by the British

also I think the AI raids timer might be a tad to long I think it was 2.5hrs before we could call in another raid

BLUE AIRFIELDS

For the people who wish to help fix the Blue spawn points, there are a few options:

1. Create a .mis file that blocks the bad spawn points at the various airfields and send to us in a .zip file.

2. Create custom airfield spawn points that will avoid bad areas altogether.

3. In the FMB take a screenshot of the various airfields with problems and paint an X or something on the bad spawns. Send the screenshot to us and we'll block the spawns ourselves.

Either option works, however if there are so many spawn points that are bad that 100s of objects have to be placed in France to block them, it may make more sense to make custom spawn points. When I get home tonight I will upload the blue_spawns.mis file that I have that has all the Blue airfields on it so that people who want to help can use that as a template to work from.

I think this is probably a larger problem for the bomber pilots whose aircraft occasionally spawn in places too small for them. It will probably take me a lot longer to find the problem areas than pilots who regularly fly Blue. Hopefully we can get this fixed as quickly as possible to make the test days run more smoothly.

Thanks!