Untitled

"Flight Groups" Page

Ships

Options

Arrival

"Orders" Page

Order

This is a list of all know Orders that can be assigned to a FG. A brief description of the Order will be displayed below the selection box. There are some Orders (such as "Attack Targets") which are not suitable for large ships due to the way they will manoeuvre, however there are "Starship" versions of the same Order.

All craft in the same FG have the same Orders. Many orders will require valid Targets and/or Order Parameters to be set in order for them to function correctly.

Next to the Order selection box is the + button for adding the currently displayed Order to the Order Clipboard. This works in the exactly the same way as the Condition Clipboard.

Targets

This is where a lot of people get into trouble, so I'll try to explain it in detail.

There are 2 sets of Targets: Primary and Secondary: Targets

Each set has 2 target Classes (A and B), which each specify:

Target Type (e.g. IFF) and an Instance of that type (e.g. Imperial).

Each set also has an Either A or B flag which determines how the 2 Classes are treated. If it is unchecked, this FG may target FGs which fit either Class A or Class B, if it is checked, it may only target FGs which fit both Class A and Class B.

In the example above, the FG's Primary Targets are Flight Group T/B Alpha as well as Flight Group T/B Beta.

Its Secondary Targets are only FGs which are both in Ship Category Starfighters and are IFF Imperial.

Be careful to assign valid Targets, as A.I. controlled FGs will leave the mission if there are no FGs which match their specified Targets.
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Order Parameters

These are the 2 parameters below the Targets whose meaning varies depending on the current Order. The labels next to the spin boxes will describe their effect where known.
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Description

This is the Order Description which will appear next to the FG when you enter a mission. You can select the box and type in a Description, or choose one from the drop down list, which is customizable.
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Throttle

This the percentage of full throttle the FG will begin the mission at.
For Capital Ships that you want to "Sit and Fire" set this to 0% and give it an order such as "Patrol and Attack".
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Speed

This setting is the top speed the FG can travel at, in MGLT.

This only has effect when the Throttle is set to 100%.

It also works for Player Craft, but it is a cheat as it remains your top speed regardless of your power distribution.

Order List

A description of the FG's 4 Orders is shown at the bottom of the page. To edit any one of them click on its text, or double-click to bring up the Order Clipboard.

Orders will be carried out in sequence from 1 to 3.

Order 4 is the "Jump to" order i.e. the FG will jump straight to this order as soon as its Jump Condition (on the "Other" page) becomes true.

"WPs" (Waypoints) Page

Waypoint Grids

There are 2 Grids on this page with which you can edit all of the 3 dimensional points used to place the FG and define its movements, although this can also be done in the Map a lot easier.

The grid on the left shows the WP data in kilometres, the grid on the right shows the same data in "raw" form, without being converted to kms.
Beside the left grid is the Enabled list. You enable a WP by clicking on this list to highlight its name. If a WP is not enabled, it effectively does not exist.

The different types of WPs are:

Start 1-4

A ship will begin the mission at its Start Point 1, unless the in-game "Randomize" option is chosen, in which case its start point will be randomly chosen from one of the 4 Start Points.

WP 1-3

These 3 WPs are used to define the flight path that a FG will follow if it has "Fly Once" or "Circle" type order, or while it is has no Targets to attack.

They will travel through all enabled WPs in sequence, then repeat the path as many times as their Orders require, or until their Targets arrive.

Craft will begin the mission facing WP 1 (if it is enabled, if not it will lie parallel to the Y axis.) A ship with Start 1 and WP 1 having the same co-ordinates (and WP 1 enabled) will lie at 45 degrees to each axis.

Hyperspace

This is the point a FG must fly to before it can enter Hyperspace.

Set to Start 1

Pressing the "Set to Start 1" button will set the Briefing co-ordinates for the current FG to match it's Start 1 co-ordinates for all briefings. This is an easy way to get a basic layout for your Briefing Icons.

There is similar option in the Briefing editor to set the Briefing points of all FGs to their Start 1 co-ordinates for the current Briefing.

Raw Data

For WPs to be displayed in kms, the actual number stored in the mission files must be divided by 160. The result is then displayed to 2 decimal places. This means that editing is accurate to .01 kms, when actually it's possible to edit them to .005 km (but NOT .001 km).
The "Raw" grid shows the numbers as stored in the mission files. Editing these numbers by 1 unit will give the smallest possible increment.
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3 Decimal places

This option will round off the conversion to kms in the WP grid to 3 decimal places rather than the default 2.

"Other" Page

Orientation	This option only works for objects, it does not work for shielded Craft. Each successive value increases the angle of rotation. Points where the object is Flat, On Edge and Upside Down are marked in the list. ..
Jump to Order 4	Double Condition which will trigger the FG to Jump immediately to Order 4. ..
Unknowns	There are several labels showing values from different parts of the mission files. These are parameters that have been used in the official missions (i.e. have had non-zero values) but their purpose is unknown. The Edit Unknowns button brings up a window where you can edit these values if you want to experiment with them.