FAC Snoopy is grounded (But it's back!)

[+Menrva 4,202]

One can uncover funny things while modding the game. Probably it was discovered already, but I've never seen threads about it. Basically, in my upcoming GUI mod I have re-introduced the Briefing screen which was present in SF1 games. It's more of an eye-candy screen, not useful to something. When playing CAS missions where the FAC would usually spawn in SF1/WOX games, at the Briefing screen we get that the FAC has the G002 callsign instead of Snoopy. Obviously, Snoopy was cut in SF2, we all know that. What's funny is that G002 actually is the Friendly ground force we have to support during that mission.

Another interesting fact: TACC is always Red Crown, even when in SF2NA we are playing for the Navy, where TACC is Hawkeye. But we know how poorly Hawkeye has been implemented.

Edited January 9, 2019 by Menrva

[Viggen 644]

If only there was a way to bring Snoopy back. Yeah he never fired the smoke rockets and all too often was shot down, but I can't be the only one who missed seeing that little O-1 orbiting a tank battle.

[+Menrva 4,202]

10 hours ago, Viggen said:

If only there was a way to bring Snoopy back.

Yeah, I miss it too! That's why I made this post.

Me thinks that TK cut Snoopy abruptly somewhere. The Briefing screen clearly shows that G002 is being assigned as the FAC; that means that the FAC logic, in theory, is assigned to a ground object which can't make use of it, by not being an aircraft. If the logic of Snoopy is in the .exe, I highly doubt there's something we can do. If it's in the DLLs, maybe something can be done. But I'm not the one with such knowledge, I'm afraid.

[Stratos 3,192]

11 hours ago, Viggen said:

If only there was a way to bring Snoopy back. Yeah he never fired the smoke rockets and all too often was shot down, but I can't be the only one who missed seeing that little O-1 orbiting a tank battle.

It was very fun and immersive, I really miss Snoopy and as you guys, will love to see him back...

BTW, specially useful and fun for COIN missions like in Vietnam!

[Wrench 9,851]

Have you tried importing the O-1 from SF/Wo*, and see what happens??

[+Menrva 4,202]

51 minutes ago, Wrench said:

Have you tried importing the O-1 from SF/Wo*, and see what happens??

Nothing. It's not the plane that matters. I can add an aircraft with the FAC role, but it simply won't work. If I feel like, I'll try to export the O-1 from my WoE copy. But I am 100% it's not the plane itself. In a single mission offered in WoE, I remember that an AV-8A was assigned as FAC, and it worked. TK cut the FAC in SF2, but improperly; the Briefing screen suggests that the Friendly ground force is assigned as the FAC. I am experimenting a bit with missions and small tweaks. If anything worth mentioning happens, I'll keep this thread up to date with such info.

How I wish Stary and other modders were still available. With their knowledge, something more could be uncovered. Stary knew a lot about unused DLL calls. I found some of them myself, but those are functions never implemented by TK. It's a different story...

Edited January 10, 2019 by Menrva

[+paulopanz 2,876]

The Snoopy was removed, as I remember, mostly because it wasn't possible to set it with terrains or nations ...

So you could find a stranger plane in an odd place and you could not avoid that.

Never fixed, never put again in game.

 

 

[+Menrva 4,202]

2 hours ago, paulopanz said:

The Snoopy was removed, as I remember, mostly because it wasn't possible to set it with terrains or nations ...

So you could find a stranger plane in an odd place and you could not avoid that.

Ah, I never knew this. Thanks, Paulo! I wonder why, though. The FAC is a plane with the FAC role. And the nation, AFAIK was bound to the ground forces' nation. If you find more info about this, I'd appreciate.

EDIT: Now I get it; not all in-game nations have a dedicated FAC plane, hence why...

Edited January 11, 2019 by Menrva

[+Menrva 4,202]

Snoopy is back! 

Well, sort of... I am using two scripted missions which were available in WoE. Snoopy is defined inside the mission files, so it spawns because it's manually defined. It responds to the ground forces, but it currently spawns unarmed (I have to mod the loadout file) and so it gets destroyed by the enemy AA in matter of seconds.

The Briefing screen still shows some weirdness; now that Snoopy is present, it sort of takes the place of Red Crown, and the FAC is still the ground force defined in the mission files. Here below you can see it for yourselves.

I also attach the two WoE missions. They work but you need SF2E, obviously, and you must install an O-1E or edit the mission to replace it with another aircraft with the FAC role.

1970-0918 Harrier In Fulda.msn 

1979-0918 Warthog In Fulda.msn

The automatically generated missions of SF2 do not bring the FAC. But manually edited missions show that Snoopy can still work. The FAC must have the SNOOPY callsign, that's all.

Edited January 11, 2019 by Menrva

[+paulopanz 2,876]

3 hours ago, Menrva said:

Ah, I never knew this. Thanks, Paulo! I wonder why, though. The FAC is a plane with the FAC role. And the nation, AFAIK was bound to the ground forces' nation. If you find more info about this, I'd appreciate.

EDIT: Now I get it; not all in-game nations have a dedicated FAC plane, hence why...

... and you had a perfect stranger flyng around

Very nice to test your missions

[+Menrva 4,202]

7 minutes ago, paulopanz said:

... and you had a perfect stranger flyng around

True. Still, TK could have found another way to let Snoopy in-game. For those nations not having a proper FAC plane, FACs could have been ground based! At least we would have had better and more complete radio chatter between the engaged ground forces and the FAC unit. What we get in SF2 is an allied ground force calling out Snoopy out of nowhere.

[+Menrva 4,202]

More testing of the missions I have attached in the previous post has revealed that the FAC behaviour is rather broken; even if armed, Snoopy completely ignores the battle and flies straight. Reminds me of the dreaded bug with Escort missions, where the Strike flight flies straight instead of attacking its objective and returning to base. Could it be that the removal of the FAC is somewhat related to this other bug? Still, in the test missions I have provided, Snoopy gives an answer to the ground force. So its presence as an FAC is "felt". 

[Stratos 3,192]

Menrva, Is possible to get the radio chatter back? Cause what I do for the FAC is to have a FAC plane orbiting nearby the battle and have a smoke column ground object on the ground marking the battle. Having the radio cahtter back can be epic!

[+Menrva 4,202]

2 hours ago, Stratos said:

Menrva, Is possible to get the radio chatter back? Cause what I do for the FAC is to have a FAC plane orbiting nearby the battle and have a smoke column ground object on the ground marking the battle. Having the radio cahtter back can be epic!

I have already answered, check the screenshot above. Snoopy answers back to the ground force, by saying "Delta 47, Snoopy, copy that". But that is the only thing you will hear with the manually added FAC. The FAC is FUBAR, it just flies over the battle and goes straight to its predefined waypoints. In SF1, it launches HVAR rockets and so it advises the ground force with more radio chatter. Without source code, I can't do more than this. Maybe there are some geeks around who can experiment with the .exe and .dll files. But no one seems interested on this matter.

[+Sundowner 4,837]

Have you added the FAC callouts to the Missionsummary ini?....

[+Menrva 4,202]

50 minutes ago, Sundowner said:

Have you added the FAC callouts to the Missionsummary ini?....

Oh yes, I did. I didn't mention it because it was not worth it. AFAIK the missionsummary.ini file only deals with the strings we get at the hangar screen, the ones describing our selected mission type. Such strings slightly vary from time to time, that's all that there is to it. We can't fly FAC missions like Snoopy, hence why it is void in SF2; no strings describing the FAC type of mission. I had extracted the SF1 missionsummary.ini and tried the FAC test mission with it, but to no avail.

Still, much thanks for the effort. I'd really like to see more people thinking out of the box!

Edited January 12, 2019 by Menrva

[+Sundowner 4,837]

No problem, Snoopy always added to the immersion of the SEA missions, just like being able to start on the ramp, 2 things that made the game more enjoyably & got cut for no sensible reason.

[+Menrva 4,202]

The more I try WoE, the more I am angered; even in WoE the FAC doesn't seem to spawn (I'm using the latest Oct2008b patch), but at least the ground forces' chatter is complete, they talk to Snoopy and request assistance. In SF2, the ground forces are silent mostly, saying only "we're moving out" or "enemy units southeast of our position". This shows that the cut FAC ruined something more in SF2, something that in WoE worked perfectly. No Snoopy? Alright, but at least the ground unit could talk. And it's not the speechsystem.ini file. This broken behaviour is hardcoded, I am afraid.

Edited January 12, 2019 by Menrva