Combat Simulator

This has been mentioned before as a useful aid for ironing out timing and force balance issues, but running a mission 'hands off' can be an interesting exercise in its own right. Not all missions lend themselves to being self run, but a surprising amount can be learned from simply watching the game. It may sound strange for a Helo 'simulator' but you can run through entire missions without leaving the ground.

When the mission starts, press F9 to put yourself in chase mode. Don't touch the joystick and your view of the Helo will swing to the rear as you follow it towards its first Waypoint. Prior to a missile launch, your view switches to the front corner, to witness the launch and the screen then tracks the missile as it flies to its target. Moments before impact, the view switches to the target and you witness the impact (or a miss). Your view then returns to the front of the Helo, before swinging back to the rear to continue in chase mode. If at any time you move the joystick, you can pan all around the Helo, move up and down and zoom the view, but you are no longer in chase mode and you will longer follow the missile launch. To return to chase mode, press F9 again.

Chase mode works with all friendly platoons and the missile tracking function works with all launched missiles; even ground launched ATGMs. This is huge fun when riding with aircraft at high altitude, or with T80s during a tank assault. Switching between platoons is easily done with the F11 and F12 keys. Begin by pressing F9 to put yourself into chase mode, then Press F11 to move to the next vehicle in the platoon (which would be your wingman: assuming a 2 aircraft team). Press again and you should move to the 1st vehicle of the next platoon down in your mission file. You then step through that platoon to the 1st vehicle of the next platoon. You cycle through each platoon in the order in which they are written in the mission file. Using F12 reverses the direction and moves you back up the list.

Make use of this fixed order when using a UAV during mission building. Make sure the UAV is the first platoon after your flyable one and you will only have to F11 down through one platoon to find it. Platoons that don't need too much attention (Trucks, Bunkers etc) can be safely moved to the bottom of list to avoid having to scroll through them to reach the 'more watchable' combat units. If you get lost somewhere in the middle of the ground platoons and loose track, you can quickly return to your Helo by pressing F1, F2, F3 or F4.

While riding around with the troops, you can still retain an overall picture by pressing N to go to the map screen. The map screen is always accessible from any platoon and shows all friendlies and all 'located' enemy units. The enemy units will appear and disappear as the mission progresses. You can assess the situation at a glance, press F9 back to the platoon you were riding with and F11/12 to move to the scene of the action. If the vehicle you're riding in gets hit, move to the next one. Note that not all dead vehicles show smoke and flames, but a live vehicle always has an 'engine noise'. If it's quiet, it's dead.

The map screen does have some limitations. The only units that can actively display Waypoints are the Helos, so even if you move to the map screen from a tank platoon, you can only see it from its icon. Similarly, the zoom function will only zoom on the position of the flyable Helo unit.

It's not perfect, but it's still very usable.