AI Planes Not Flying At Set Altitude

[Beebop]

My AI planes do not want to fly high enough.
Example: A Ju-52 with default cargo loadout.
It spawns at what looks like close to the set altitude (1000m) and flies to, and lands, at an airfield.

 

** In the planes "Properties" box I make the Plane a Linked Entity.

** I set the plane to 1000m in the 'Y' Position field.

**  I place a Waypoint Trigger and in it's Properties box set the altitude to 1000m.
** In the Waypoint Trigger Advanced Properties I have;
Priority: High
Area: 200m
Speed: 195kph

** I Object Link the Waypoint to the plane.
** Target Link the Waypoint to the Command Land MCU.
I originally had only one waypoint linked to the plane before the Command Land MCU. Thinking that having only one waypoint might be the problem I made 3 more waypoints all at 1000m with the same Advanced Properties, the first of these close to the plane.  I Object Linked the first waypoint to the plane, the intermediate waypoints to each other in the direction of flight and the last waypoint Target Linked to the Command Land.  It didn't help.
 ** As soon as the plane spawns it slowly sinks to about 300m and flies the rest of the way to the airfield at that altitude.

I've read everything I could find in the ME Manuals about planes/waypoints and MCU's that seemed relevant to me.

I have looked at other exapmles and can't find anything done differently where planes fly at set altitude.

 

Other than this anomaly the plane does what I want it to.  All Objects and MCU's seem properly linked and aligned.

Am I missing something?  (probably)

What am I doing wrong?

 

Thanks In Advance

[Jaegermeister]

Edit... ignore my post if you even had time to read it.

Edited December 22, 2019 by Jaegermeister

[unreasonable]

3 hours ago, Beebop said:

 

What am I doing wrong?

 

Thanks In Advance

 

No idea, assuming you have a start mission and trigger timer linked to the first waypoint, not the command land.  But what might help get an answer is to post the mission file here.  People do sometimes look. 

[JimTM]

Please post your mission. Although you gave a detailed description of the setup, more complex descriptions like that are rarely reliable enough to troubleshoot an issue properly.

 

Carefully review the waypoint setup in "Example: Make a Bf109 Fly a Circuit of the Field", on pg. 62 of the editor manual. Your description differs from this setup. For example, you must object link all of the waypoints to the plane, not just the first one.

Edited December 22, 2019 by JimTM

[jollyjack]

When is the OnPlaneTookoff needed?:

 

[Beebop]

I went back in and, after reading thru page 62 of the manual and looking carefully at the diagram, linked each waypoint back to the plane.
Sadly they still sink to ~300m.

 

It wouldn't let me put a "7z" extension in and renaming to "7zip" made it useless.

Here's a link to the mission:

 

https://www.mediafire.com/file/ouf7hetuz0kh02l/The_Breach.7z/file

 

 Open the file and place the 'data' folder in your game.  It has the correct file structure to place it in "Multiplayer > Dogfight". 

This is an incomplete WIP Dogfight mission.  To quickly see what's going on, as soon as the mission loads go to "Spectate" and hit Ctrl+F2.

 

Thanks in advance for any enlightenment.

 

Edited December 22, 2019 by Beebop

[Zooropa_Fly]

I don't think you need to connect mission begin to the waypoint nor the command land.

The lead plane is the only one O Linked by the waypoint.

I'd increase the waypoint size, try 300 or 500M.

I never use plane formations in my simple maps, it's easier working with them individually.

But if they're anything like vehicles they can be a pest to control.

Doesn't explain the altitude issue, but a couple of things you can tidy up, Jim'll be along with the right answer soon.

 

S!

 

[JimTM]

Remove the target links from Translator Mission Begin to the waypoint (as Zooropa_Fly recommends) and to the land command. The first waypoint should be triggered by "3s START Time" only. The land command should be triggered by the waypoint only.

 

Also,

• Set "3s START Timer" to 3 seconds (it is currently 0 seconds). This timer provides a short delay to allow the mission to finish loading before your mission logic kicks in. The delay may not always be necessary, but I put it in to be safe.
• If the planes don't fly to the waypoint properly and trigger the land command, try increasing the waypoint area from the current 100m to 200m.

 

Edited December 22, 2019 by JimTM

[Beebop]

THANKS Zooropa_Fly and JimTM!  That worked but now there is a different problem.
First here's what I learned;
After removing the Mission Begin link to the first waypoint and setting 3s to the START Timer (I swear I did this but I'm learning that you need to always check every OK Box during any process), they still sank down to 300m.
Realizing that I had failed to remove the link to the Command Land I did so and now they spawn at 1000m and stay there.  It was the link to Command Land that apparently caused to low flight profile.
So thanks to both of you for that.

 

Now here's the "new problem".  The Command Formation is set to "None" as I want them in a 'Line Abreast' formation behind the leader.  They do that now but each plane is now staggered some ~30m below the plane in front.  As it is now they only take that formation at the "Command Land" linked waypoint.  
* I reset the Formation Type to "Loose".  Same behavior.  
* I extended the distance between each plane.  They would close distance but stagger down as they did so.
* I reset the formation to "V".  They still stagger down but it's not as severe.  I can live with that but still prefer the 'Line Abreast' style.

 

Is there a way to make the formation Line Astern?  I thought about making each plane at a slightly different altitude but then realized I can't transfer that information to each Waypoint to each waypoint and as soon as they reached Waypoint 1 the would revert to the "staggered down"  formation.  Am I right about that?  

Is making each plane a separate entity with separate waypoints the only solution? 
And if I made each plane a separate flight would each one need it's own Command Land MCU or could they share one?

 

Thanks for all the help so far.

 

[Zooropa_Fly]

The trouble with sharing things, is that when some kind of command is triggered, all object-linked objects get the command at the same time, which you probably wouldn't want.

i.e. in the case of 'command land' as soon as the first plane gets the instruction, so do all the others at the same time.

It's not that bad to do them seperately - do one sequence then simply copy as many as you want, then position them.

But it sounds like you want a formation, which I probably can't help you with, hopefully someone else will be able to.

 

S!

[JimTM]

11 hours ago, jollyjack said:

When is the OnPlaneTookoff needed?:

...

 

When you want to trigger something once the plane has taken off. For example, once a plane has taken off, you can trigger the first waypoint of the plane's route so that the plane flies toward it. See "Make a Plane Take Off, Fly a Route, and Land", on pg. 61 of the editor manual.

[Jaegermeister]

41 minutes ago, JimTM said:

 

When you want to trigger something once the plane has taken off. For example, once a plane has taken off, you can trigger the first waypoint of the plane's route so that the plane flies toward it. See "Make a Plane Take Off, Fly a Route, and Land", on pg. 61 of the editor manual.

 

11 hours ago, jollyjack said:

When is the OnPlaneTookoff needed?:

 

 

In addition to triggering the 1st waypoint, I also use it to trigger the 2nd flight to take off if they are on the same runway. No timing issues that way.

[Beebop]

1 hour ago, Zooropa_Fly said:

...It's not that bad to do them seperately - do one sequence then simply copy as many as you want, then position them.

 

I think that's the best solution to what I want.  Thanks.

 

A couple of questions.

* Would it be wise to set the individual Command Land MCU's on top of each other or should they be separated to prevent planes running into already landed planes?  I ask because that happened one time when testing using the formation.  Would each landed plane disappear before the next plane lands?

* If I use individual planes I no longer would need the Command Formation MCU and it's associated Timer Trigger?  Just Mission Begin MCU Target Linked to a 2s timer that is Target Linked to the first waypoint?

 

TIA

Edited December 22, 2019 by Beebop

[Gambit21]

10 hours ago, Jaegermeister said:

 

 

In addition to triggering the 1st waypoint, I also use it to trigger the 2nd flight to take off if they are on the same runway. No timing issues that way.

 

I use a check zone object connected to the last plane of the previous flight - placed directly in front of it. This way I get 12-16 aircraft taking off one after the other.

[jollyjack]

17 hours ago, Jaegermeister said:

In addition to triggering the 1st waypoint, I also use it to trigger the 2nd flight to take off if they are on the same runway. No timing issues that way.

 

I guess you mean with 2nd flight another plane or leader classified ai plane of a group with wing men etc

[Jaegermeister]

2 hours ago, jollyjack said:

 

I guess you mean with 2nd flight another plane or leader classified ai plane of a group with wing men etc

 

yes, another separate flight waiting on the runway or taxiway to take off behind other flight or flights.

 

9 hours ago, Gambit21 said:

 

I use a check zone object connected to the last plane of the previous flight - placed directly in front of it. This way I get 12-16 aircraft taking off one after the other.

 

Further, 40 meters kind of thing? Sounds quicker, they don't have to get the wheels up.

 

 

Edited December 23, 2019 by Jaegermeister

[Gambit21]

2 hours ago, Jaegermeister said:

Further, 40 meters kind of thing? Sounds quicker, they don't have to get the wheels up.

 

 

Let's say you have flights of 4.

Put the check zone, object linked to number 4 of the flight,  just in front of the spinner hub of Lead in the next flight, targeted to command take off, no timer delay

 

 

[Jaegermeister]

Makes sense, I’ll give that a roll. (no pun intended) I can see a group of 3 or 4 flights taking off together making things convenient.