Who wants to be Chickenhawk!

[spook27 5]

CHICKENHAWK!

 

Although I mostly fly single missions in ‘Wings over Vietnam’, the sheer tyranny of a short campaign, its arbitrary nature, can be quite appealing from a masochistic grunts perspective. We who love WoV, need not explain the sheer joy of Intruders, Scooters, Smokers and Gunfighters. Some of us have even loitered with intent in Sandy, and now we have Hueys to complete the picture. Rather than relegate their role to background scenery, I decided to get up close and check out the plausibility of a Huey campaign.

 

The new Hueys with Kesselbrut’s superb cockpit are beautifully flyable! I like to reverse the polarity of my throttle stick so that it works like a collective. Start with thrust vectored fully down and bear in mind the tweaked flight model allows the chopper to be flown slowly with flaps down or quicker with flaps up. That peculiarity aside, release the ‘brakes’, I think of them as chocks or tie-downs, yank the collective back, nudge her nose forward and we are away! For approach, flaps down, dump the collective and set up a smooth descent to stop right on the apron.

 

This chopper flies well, so how would I prepare it for a campaign? It would be necessary to tweak a few things, I set about modifying my Huey to make it campaign-durable and improve its survivability.

 

Firstly, the Pilot mod, there are a couple of great looking guys in USAFMTL’s Bronco, so they were fitted along with armoured seats, chaff dispensers, flare dispensers, a modest ECM Jammer (AN/ALQ-55 ), bigger fuel tanks, rocket pods for HE and WP (with corresponding loadout file), and finally a couple of 20mm Machine Guns. There is no modelling on this Huey for the Guns, but with a little practice I positioned the muzzle flashes between the skids and the body. When carrying Rocket Pods the gun effect looks fine and when blasting away and the excellent cockpit sight makes it easy to direct tracer or rockets. I also darkened the cockpit panel for a more authentic look, combat Hueys often had a dark dash.

 

To summarise its capabilities, this Huey can fly in low and slow, mark a target with Willy Pete, blast it with HE and mow down insurgents with the MGs. Hunting troops in the long grass is a lot fun in this armed Huey, the gunsight is fantastic! When Winchester, jettison the pods and she becomes a slick.

 

Setting up the campaign I used the 1st Special Operations Squadron, added some fancy intro text for the campaign select screen and based the Huey unit in Pleiku, down south. Set for CAS and Recon, the campaign continually presents me with flights into the interior or north along the coast. You could imagine that the objective would to cover a troop insertion, search for a downed pilot or deliver a crate of grog to the grunts – The Chickenhawk lives again! Sometimes the missions are hot, sometimes uneventful, but the stress of flying a helicopter in a combat zone where Migs and SAMs proliferate is always with you. This is the greatest strength of WoV, immersion and the consequent satisfaction upon getting yourself and the rest of the flight safely back.

 

Down in the weeds it is possible to avoid the attention of Migs or evade the most persistent. SAMs will nail you easily at altitude, but are fooled by a low slow chaffing jinking Huey, A6 drivers will know the drill! Once an ambitious Mig driver tried to match velocities as we played scissors down in the valleys, his inevitable overshoot gave me a split-second deflection shot and my first recorded air-kill with a chopper! - And yes I have the pictures!

 

Simon Read (Spook27)

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Edited September 22, 2006 by spook27

[Heck 496]

Sign me up, Simon. I had a friend a number of years ago who was a Chickenhawk. Looking forward to the upload when you get it done. Now that we have infantry in black pajamas, it should be fun. Everyone remember to change your VC ini's to air_and_ground for the maximum pucker factor. "They listened for motors, then counted the rotors, and waited for us to arrive..."

[spook27 5]

Sign me up, Simon. I had a friend a number of years ago who was a Chickenhawk. Looking forward to the upload when you get it done. Now that we have infantry in black pajamas, it should be fun. Everyone remember to change your VC ini's to air_and_ground for the maximum pucker factor. "They listened for motors, then counted the rotors, and waited for us to arrive..."

 

Thanks for the tip mate, that is brilliant mod, now we have hotter LZs, ie CAS Missions! A little more testing and I shall put the package together.

[spook27 5]

Following further testing, I have added the 1st Cavalry Division (Air Mobile) to the Squadron List. I kept them as a USAF 'Service' for simplicity, but it is a great thrill to see the briefing screen type up '...elements of the 1st Cavalry Division.....'

 

I'm now tweaking the campaign further to try and achieve multiple flights, large formations and lots of Helo traffic down south. I've written an entirely new campaign file set in August 1965 when the Air Cav' deployed.

[Heck 496]

Sounds great, Simon! Waiting patiently to see the work. One thing: can you include your control set up in the readme? Some of us haven't done a lot of copter flying in this sim, and I think it would help newbies to it, like me. I hate to ask you for extra time put in, since the mods take so much time with testing, etc., but I think it would help.

[spook27 5]

Sounds great, Simon! Waiting patiently to see the work. One thing: can you include your control set up in the readme? Some of us haven't done a lot of copter flying in this sim, and I think it would help newbies to it, like me. I hate to ask you for extra time put in, since the mods take so much time with testing, etc., but I think it would help.

Yep I will put down my notes on flying, anything that helps. What started out here as an interesting idea has become quite a large project thanks to your encouragement and as I realised how good it could get!

 

I have changed the ambience, the flavour of WoV, with this campaign. The skies down south are now filled with choppers, you are able to fly with large attack formations, simulating ground operations rather than focussing purely on the air war – A Huey pilot was really just another kind of grunt! The flights thrown up by the campaign engine continue to surprise and delight (mostly).

 

We have Hueys, Cobras, Littlebirds, 47s, Jollys, Choctaws, often all airborne at once performing individual roles. Some Huns and F-4s live up north, operating as Interceptors and hopefully keeping your skies clear! The Navy are at Yankee Station and continue to send in strike packages, although I have cut back their activity along with the Air Force and Marines in order to avoid helos being assigned as escorts to fastjets!

 

The beauty of it is that the campaign files are standalone and don't modify anything else, so you can get back to the jets and boats when you get tired of the egg-beaters!

[Sky Captain 0]

Hawt. I've always been a helo fan, and loved to fly around guys in BF2/'42. (Yes, it's not a 'real' sim, but it's still fun)

[spook27 5]

Hawt. I've always been a helo fan, and loved to fly around guys in BF2/'42. (Yes, it's not a 'real' sim, but it's still fun)

That Huey cockpit by Kesselbrut is superb and really the reason I'd like to make more use of the aircraft.

[bucklehead101 29]

Sign me up! I have just finnished reading this book!

[spook27 5]

Sign me up! I have just finnished reading this book!

Hi bucklehead101! Having read ‘Chickenhawk’ you now understand how a helo works, how to fly it, and the kind of ‘feel’ I’m trying to achieve in WoV.

 

Here’s what we have so far –

1 USMC and US Army Aviation Squadrons, 1st Cav, Aerial Rocket Artillery....etc.

2 Operations down South in August 1968 (so we can have Hueys, Cobras and Littlebirds).

3 Huey Formations, Strike packets of four to sixteen choppers at once.

4 Single ship Dust-off Hueys and Jollys on SAR/Medivac flights.

 

Leading a ‘strike’ you will go in low to rocket and hose the area ahead of the strike force, directing the other ships to attack ground troops. To see that many Hueys in the air together is awesome!

 

I have written and tested the campaign, learning much. I don’t build objects, so I will provide a list of things you will need to go and get.

 

The Helos – UH-1B - OH-6A - H-34 Choctaw - UH-34 Gunship - SH-3J - AH-1G - AH-1J. They are all found here at ‘CombatACE’. Thanks to Capun, Charles, Eightlein, Gramps, Pappychksix, Pasko, Kesselbrut, USAFMTL, The Wrench & Wehner.

 

You will also need Yankee Air Pirate (YAP) – This fabulous addon adds many new objects, aircraft mods, historic missions and more importantly, vastly improved scenery for WoV. Yankee Air Pirate provides a deeper understanding of the war through their superb research, the missions are great! WoV is much poorer without it, anyone serious about WoV should buy and install it now with no reservations.

 

Really crucial to all this, YAP adds targets down south, simulating insurgencies through Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, properly capturing the fluidity of the Vietnam War and making Chopper Ops across Central and South Vietnam realistically possible.

 

In my humble opinion it’s worth every penny spent and I might add, the customer support is superb, the guys are accessible and they are really there, an excellent job! No surprise really, they are regulars at CombatACE!

 

Let me make that crystal clear – You have to go buy YAP. All you will get from me are the new campaign files and my ‘tweak notes’. I am also putting together some stuff on flying Helos in WoV and how to get the best out the campaign once I am satisfied with it.

 

IMHO – If you don’t have YAP, you are missing out a lot on the potential of WoV and my Huey campaign won’t work for you.

 

Get tooled up people! – I will talk to YAP owners and Huey Nuggets later on this channel!

Edited September 25, 2006 by spook27

[jtin 0]

Wow, that sounds good! I have also been trying to improve the huey a bit (haven't gone far) just a tip if you don't know about it, set the stall speed really low like 0 or 5 and you can sort of fly in low and slow, and even hover! I'm trying to implement thrust vectoring into the UH-1H, but I don't think I'll do that well. I'll have to go buy WoV and YAP now....

[spook27 5]

Here’s something to get you started - Yankee Air Pirate has some amazing missions, including some CAS down south. Fire one up and try it out with the Tadpole or Smoker suggested, but also try the mission using the Huey Cobra by Capun instead (by changing the aircraft at the loadout screen).

 

No mods required, no fancy stuff, these great geniuses have provided for us! – get YAP, get the Cobra, simple.

 

Meanwhile, I continue to collect Vietnam era helos and experiment with campaign files.

 

Gotta keep your edge though, last night I had three passes before I could get that damn Crusader back on the deck….

Edited September 27, 2006 by spook27

[Guest zerocinco]

If you get it to hover, contact me IMMEDIATELY!!!

[spook27 5]

While it is happiest low and slow in translational lift, she will fly very slowly in a stable profile, more like a slow creep than a full hover, same goes for the Hueys.

 

What has been achieved already with the various Helo flight-models is quite remarkable, but whether we ever get an easily flyable user friendly hovering Helo remains to be seen…..

[eightlein 10]

 

 

Spook, I think we need some night vision gear here...

[spook27 5]

That's Beautiful man! Great stuff, Chickenhawk comes to life!

[Tede 0]

Please sir, I want to be Chickenhawk too sir! How's it coming along?

 

Tede

[HrntFixr 4]

Hey Spook, standby for some "interesting" stuff coming from YAP with regards to helo's.

[spook27 5]

Hey Spook, standby for some "interesting" stuff coming from YAP with regards to helo's.

Excellent news! I have been flying Yankee Air Pirate missions for months now, it's incredible the amount of new sruff YAP adds to the basic WoV sim.

[spook27 5]

Please sir, I want to be Chickenhawk too sir! How's it coming along?

 

Tede

I appreciate everybody’s interest in my initial idea. However, if in the future I post a full campaign there are a few issues to deal with.

 

Firstly, such a campaign would only work for YAP customers, because the YAP team alter the target structure of the terrain and present a war that spans Hanoi to the Mekong Delta, as it really did.

 

Secondly, there are issues with getting AI helos to behave themselves and there are more and better helos on the way. As you can see from earlier posts, the YAP guys are working on helos and will present some missions, indeed they already have put out some missions with a new Super-Jolly.

 

Thirdly, I started flying all these single missions from YAP and discovered something else. Detail, incredible detail. Missions so beautifully written that a campaign sequence looks a bit ‘lite’ in comparison. A series of YAP Huey missions is certainly going to be better than any campaign. I don’t know exactly what they are doing; I’m only a customer. But I have spent a lot of time flying all the YAP missions I can, and I am not even halfway through all they have produced, including several new Helo missions!

 

Fourthly, they set the bar so high! If in the future the flight-model and AI issues are solved (I believe they will be) and a ‘Chickenhawk Campaign’ is presented. Such a campaign will certainly use many YAP elements and will have to be done with their co-operation, or at least their approval.

 

So we shall have to wait and see what comes along. I’m sorry it has to put on the ‘back-burner’ for now, but I believe it will happen – and it will be worth waiting for!

[oxo 0]

Great job. I am flying my Huey around like a tourist. can't wait till you get this finished. You got yourself another fan. Keep up the good work,

[SandyC 2]

Looking forward to this! Like you, I think YAP has revolutionised the game and their stuff is terrific. I look forward to more heliborne possibilites - for me that is the essence of the Vietnam War. Thanks - and good luck with the rest of the project.

[jtin 0]

Thirdly, I started flying all these single missions from YAP and discovered something else. Detail, incredible detail. Missions so beautifully written that a campaign sequence looks a bit ‘lite’ in comparison. A series of YAP Huey missions is certainly going to be better than any campaign. I don’t know exactly what they are doing; I’m only a customer. But I have spent a lot of time flying all the YAP missions I can, and I am not even halfway through all they have produced, including several new Helo missions!

 

Does this mean that you're going to create single missions? I got WoV and the first ten missions from YAP, and it BLEW MY MIND AWAY!

LOTS of detail, and I'm trying to make some UH-1 missions myself (working on a mission VERY loosely* based on Hamburger Hill right now), unfortunatley, I don't have the YAP team's talents or resources to create missions as good as theirs, but if I get to a point where I think that it is good enough, with the YAP team's permission (as I had taken some waypoints from Khe Sahn A-6) I might upload it...

 

*by loosely I mean not even in the same area (as there is no Hill 937, but I might get around to building it), let alone as a historical mission.

[spook27 5]

Does this mean that you're going to create single missions? I got WoV and the first ten missions from YAP, and it BLEW MY MIND AWAY!

LOTS of detail, and I'm trying to make some UH-1 missions myself (working on a mission VERY loosely* based on Hamburger Hill right now), unfortunatley, I don't have the YAP team's talents or resources to create missions as good as theirs, but if I get to a point where I think that it is good enough, with the YAP team's permission (as I had taken some waypoints from Khe Sahn A-6) I might upload it...

 

*by loosely I mean not even in the same area (as there is no Hill 937, but I might get around to building it), let alone as a historical mission.

I suggest we wait for the next instalment of YAP, check this out!

Yankee Air Pirate tames the Huey

[jtin 0]

Wow! I can't wait! All that detail... <drool>

 

Still I'll continue with Hamburger Hill and the next installment comes out, I can update it to use the new <drool> UH-1s!!!