@kenguan:
Any tips regarding playing in a campagin? I’ve read a few threads on campaings, and found most of it mentions about adjusting this setting or that setting, but I’d like to get an overall picture of what should be adjusted & what not.
I think the first question to start with is what do you want from a campaign, because from reading other threads I see some people want to fight a campaign like a real war and play the strategy aspect of it taking total control and doing their own tasking, whereas others will write they have never completed a campaign and only play for interesting missions. However, you don’t need to play the strategy aspects to “win”, whatever “winning” really means. My understanding from browsing this forum, is the campaign is to some extent smoke and mirrors - that you win by flying missions with excellent performance, as long as you fly missions at a minimum frequency. A limiting factor is supposedly the AI tends to generate missions to blow up bridges your own troops will need to cross later, which is why the Infrastructure slider is moved all the way down. Supposedly the campaign engine also generates too many naval missions, which should also be turned down.
Personally, I play for interesting missions with ambience (the feel of being in the middle of a theatre with lots of stuff going on) while trying to keep it reasonably real. If that is what you like, then I’d say (a) pick interesting missions and if there are no interesting missions then task one of your own (and bring enough support), (b) avoid suicide missions, bring a reasonable loadout which should pretty much always include two bags of fuel, and never jettison except in actual emergencies. Also perhaps (d) pick or generate missions which give reasonable separation in space and/or time from other missions. Some times the skies over Korea seem to be rather crowded. So you are going on a sweep mission and are looking forward to kill some bandits. However, every friendly pilot and his grandmother is out flying in more or less the same volume, and by the time you reach the bandit they have been shot down by some other flight - again. And (e) focus on your mission; you don’t need to blow every bandit out of the sky; if you are on an A/G mission, then hopefully you brought an escort and can leave it to them. Role-play the mission, trying to be on time, keeping your package alive and doing stuff more or less “by the book” whatever that means; us mere armchair pilots can only make educated guesses about that.
Edit: oh … one more thing, (f) check for enemy air defenses and adjust the flight plan for your mission accordingly (or at least mark threats). E.g. flying an AI generated TARCAP which puts your patrol over an enemy SA-2 is perhaps not the best idea. Tweak the flight plan so it keeps you out of air defense engagement envelopes.
I don’t really care about winning campaigns, because “winning” really only means you consistently played missions with good rating. Which also may not always really mean anything, as mission score may be completely off. You got an excellent score though you know you actually really messed up, or you got a failed mission because though you planned for “one pass and haul a%#” and you perfectly dropped your bombs, they were only sufficient to damage the target and wingmen like to drop single GBUs - so you are flying home with a damaged target and 3 wingmen with a GBU left. Or you got a court martial because your wingman decided on his own to go dogfighting with the Mig-29 that you were turning to re-engage, and was acquired by one of the two AIM-120s you fired.
Whatever your play style, happy campaigning