Mod Idea - Vertibird Missions

[zackperk]

So I'm a little disappointed by the BoS radiant missions. The Scribe one is pretty much the only fun one, and thats only when youre taking the scribe to actually dangerous places.

So I was thinking, what would be fun to do over and over?

Vertibird Missions. You see the birds flying around dropping people off anyways, so how easy/cool would it be to take part in those?

It could be all kinds of things; extraction of a surrounded squad, going to a place to pick up some tech, clearing a location, assisting a scribe...

But you start on a vertibird from the Prydwen and head to the point. And being part of a 2-3 man squad would be awesome. I am not a modder, so I'm not sure if this is possible without the GECK yet. In fact I'm sure it won't be a quality mod without it.

So, any modder's out there, keep this guy in mind, I think it would be a ton of fun.

Any other idea's or ways to go about this?

[Vaernus]

Looking to do some similar functionality in the Brotherhood Overhaul (http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/3603740-brotherhood-overhaul-conceptual-stage/). It's mostly in the planning stages (though I've gotten through what is possible pre-GECK but will hold off launching anything until the bigger features are in), so any input would be welcomed. With regards to vertibirds, you'd be able to call them to a location either as a gunship, or to drop off a patrol using similar mechanics to the fast travel version (throw an appropriate smoke grenade, and you'd get the result you want between the 3). In the thread, we've discussed having salvage runs where you take a vertibird to locations you recommend and work to clear them out with a salvage squad, as well as joining squads on patrols and supporting attacks on any of the BoS holdings. I'm sure there's plenty more opportunities outside of escorting scribes and squires.

[zackperk]

I was looking through that thread a bit. Really cool ideas.

Okay, I'll take this over there. Thanks for the input

[jcdenton2012]

Luckily, The Gunner's Faction has numerous bases on overpasses or other open spaces which would make such combat missions rather fun. In order to script such a beast might I recommend looking into how "Show No Mercy" is scripted with its triggers forcing the vertbird to circle the battlefield... when the GECK is released that is.

[Vaernus]

Luckily, The Gunner's Faction has numerous bases on overpasses or other open spaces which would make such combat missions rather fun. In order to script such a beast might I recommend looking into how "Show No Mercy" is scripted with its triggers forcing the vertbird to circle the battlefield... when the GECK is released that is.

 

Yah that's the thoughts I had. I've already broken down generally how they're doing it, but scripting is nearly impossible currently. However, it looks like they basically drop down an "RECenter" marker that is used for any vertibird orbit operation. These are used both with Fort Strong, the top of Mass Fusion, and any time a random encounter with a vertibird is found. They orbit around this point and then either continue until the quest completes (special case), leave if no encounter (in the case of a flyover), get shot at and react by attacking the area until all enemies are removed before leaving, or drop off a patrol/troops (for either a patrol or troops random encounter). Apparently they also pick up said patrol when it finishes but I've never actually followed one, which follows the same RECenter orbit, pick up, and return to home base. It should be as straightforward as placing more of these RECenter markers, and then attaching them to actual missions versus a random encounter. With Brotherhood Overhaul, I'll most likely be spawning a new RECenter marker dynamically to handle the new smoke grenades that will effectively call in the same functionality as the flyover/patrol/troop vertibirds on top of the fast travel version.