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Hello all fellow aviators! Im new to BMS and are falling off now and then due to the steep learning curve. So for my own sake i started to generate a document that would help me get started with self-teaching.

Perhaps this is something other beginners would like to use as well?

What do you think? Can it be refined? Should i make more , for the other training missions?

PDF: Google Drive link

Is this my DDay??

BMS Companion 1.3.8 — WDP for Falcon BMS 4.38.1, EZBoards and WDP modes, live MFDs, weather generator, radio log

Download: https://github.com/Scorpion-41/Falcon-BMS-Companion/releases/tag/1.3.8

BMS Companion 1.3.8 adds a port of Weapon Delivery Planner for Falcon BMS 4.38.1, running on the PC, Android and in the browser. Also in this release:

• EZBoards mode and WDP mode for the Mission section;
• one mission picture on every map, limited to the threats the mission knows;
• live MFDs in an F-16 bezel;
• Dashboard pages and a Weather card;
• a weather generator based on WeatherGen;
• a Radio page and automatic taxi from BMS's debug log;
• carrier decks drawn from BMS's ship models;
• an Info box (coordinates, elevation, frequencies) on every airfield page;
• parking numbers as BMS Ground assigns them, and fixes.

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The Planner is a port of Falcas's Weapon Delivery Planner (WDP) to Falcon BMS 4.38.1; its pages, attack geometry, ballistics and performance planning are his work. The weather model is Craig Andera's WeatherGen.

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1. EZBoards mode and WDP mode

A switch at the top of the Mission section (and in Setup) selects the data source for every device.

• EZBoards mode (default): PRINT in BMS fills the Mission section, EZBoards makes the cockpit kneeboards, and the Planner is locked.
• WDP mode: open the flight from a save in the Planner, plan it, Save to DTC and press Populate from Planner. The Dashboard, Map, Taxi, Briefing, Comms and VR boards then show that flight; a printed briefing of the same flight is used as is, so both modes read the same. Cockpit kneeboards come from the Planner's Upd Kneeboard; EZBoards and Run HTML Briefing are paused.

Populate runs only when pressed and prompts if there are unsaved edits.

Each new mission starts clean. BMS keeps lines, PPTs, targets and nav offsets in the cartridge until they are overwritten. When a new mission begins (a PRINT of another flight, or another flight opened in the Planner), the PC removes the entries the Planner saved for an earlier flight, provided they are unchanged. A mode switch does the same and restores BMS's own kneeboard pages over the other mode's earlier ones.

2. WDP for Falcon BMS 4.38.1 — Mission → Planner

Every control is in WDP's original place; the data is BMS 4.38.1's own (airports, radios, HARM codes, PPT types, aircraft, stores, pylons and racks).

Order of work (also shown by Steps on the toolbar, with the current step marked):

1. In BMS: open the campaign or TE, pick your flight and seat, set the loadout.
2. In BMS: open the DTC, set what you want, SAVE; then save the campaign or TE.
3. In BMS: PRINT the briefing.
4. Open mission… → pick the save, your flight and seat (WDP's "Precision STPT?" question is asked; No is the default).
5. Plan: DataCard, DTC, Attack, Map.
6. Save to DTC.
7. In BMS: open the DTC again → LOAD → SAVE.
8. Populate from Planner.
9. Upd Kneeboard.
10. FLY, and LOAD on the DTE page in the cockpit.

For custom weather, generate it on the Weather tab and save it in BMS before step 3; later steps read what BMS has saved.

Pages:

• Briefing / DataCard / Coordination Card: filled from the printed briefing of the flight, or from the save (situation, intel, ROE and emergency texts worded as BMS words them). Weather is read from the save's own weather file. The card stays on the planned flight.
• Map (new): the cartridge as the HSD will show it (route, lines, PPT rings, bullseye, attack points), beside what the mission provides and the cartridge does not yet hold (tanker/AWACS tracks, threats, airfields), added with a tap. Includes an HSD preview and WDP's MAP tab tools: grid, bullseye rings, airfields and VORTACs, JSTARS, search radars, ships, position/elevation/variation readout, Measure, Auto PPT, Change Area and Save Map.
• DTC: all sixteen tabs, with From mission… on nine of them (tracks as HSD lines, spotted SAM sites as PPTs, steerpoints from airfields or targets, comms, TACAN/ILS, laser codes, HARM tables).
• Attack: Pop-up, HADB and TOSS in one tab with a rail to switch. TGT STPT selects the target and, in VIP mode, IP STPT the IP (VRP needs none). IP STPT at the VRP places a steerpoint at the VRP and plans the attack as VIP from it. Save to DTC on an attack page also fills the DataCard's Delivery section, so the card and the cartridge agree. The attack last changed is drawn the same way on every map (Planner Map, kneeboard, Mission map after Populate). Target elevation comes from BMS's height map; every ELEV can be typed.
• Performance: WDP's engine tables, any F-16 type, and a new Loadout window (grouped store list, search, Mirror, totals).
• ATO Targets: WDP's ATO Target List with latitude and longitude.

Save to DTC writes the cartridge directly, as WDP does, changing only the edited lines. Upd Kneeboard writes the cockpit kneeboard pages in BMS's own format: in WDP mode the DataCard on page 1 and the Coordination Card on page 2, plus optional briefing, weather, target list, route map, attack profile, ground charts or a picture file. Each page shows which tool wrote it.

Options → Settings, Get DTC File and Save DTC are where WDP has them, and every control has a tooltip. Planner files are kept in User\BMS Companion Planner inside the BMS folder, in WDP's formats.

How the Planner differs from Falcas's WDP 3.7.24

The same as WDP:

• Pages and controls laid out as in WDP.
• Attack geometry, ballistics and performance tables give WDP's results; every calculation is checked against WDP itself.
• Latitude and longitude as WDP prints them, which match BMS's own ACMI recordings and AIPs to within 2 m.

Corrected:

• BMS 4.38 weather files could not be read, so the card showed no weather.
• Some TE and training missions did not load.
• Precision steerpoints could be lost or shifted on save, and a campaign save cleared BMS's route in the mission file.
• ILS frequencies below 109.00 were altered; HARM codes were missing or wrong; IFF codes lost leading zeros.
• Offset aim points on steerpoints 24-25 were never read back, and a cartridge could carry VIP and VRP lines for one attack.
• The card's TGT in HUD did not follow the page's check; TOSS VIP bearings had north and east swapped; HADB and TOSS heights assumed a sea-level target.
• Pressure altitude had the wrong sign; F-16 variants named differently by BMS were not found on the Performance page.
• The ATO Target List printed no coordinates, and Korea TvT had none at all.

New in the Planner:

• Runs on the PC, on Android and in any current browser, through the PC that holds the saves and the cartridge.
• BMS 4.38.1 data throughout: airports, ILS, TACAN, frequencies, theaters, aircraft, weapons, pylons and racks.
• Open mission… and Pick a flight from any device, for every installed theater.
• Map page: HSD preview, items added to the cartridge as PPTs or lines with a tap, and intel without unspotted sites.
• From mission… on nine DTC tabs.
• Attack rail, IP STPT and IP STPT at the VRP; Save to DTC on an attack page also fills the DataCard.
• Loadout window on the Performance page.
• Upd Kneeboard keeps each page file's format, and accepts picture files.
• Populate from Planner sends the plan to the Mission section (WDP mode).
• Steps and the Guide; with a TE open, Save to DTC also writes the TE's mission file.

Phones and tablets: pages fit the screen and never scroll; text boxes are edited in a bar above the keyboard with Next and Done; double tap zooms.

3. One mission picture on every map

The Mission map, the VR map board and the Planner's Map page draw the same mission: route, tanker/AWACS tracks, PPT rings, the flight's airfields, bullseye and the mission's threats (the sites the briefing names, placed from the save). Sites the side has not spotted are never shown, including from the live feed. Hostile SAM rings use one red on every map. In EZBoards mode, route and tracks appear after PRINT rather than only in 3D.

Hostile contacts from the live feed are off by default on the map, the Dashboard, the AWACS page and the VR boards; Setup → Show hostile contacts (live) turns them on.

4. Live MFDs

• The actual MFD pictures from BMS in an F-16 bezel; the buttons and the BRT/GAIN rockers press BMS's own keys. Side by side or stacked, with a full-page view.
• Requires Export RTT Textures → Enable on the BMS Launcher's main page; the display states what is missing.
• If BMS runs as administrator and BMS Companion does not, Windows blocks the button presses; the card reports it. Run both with the same rights.
• There is no MFD VR board; in VR the cockpit's own displays are in view.

5. Radio page and automatic taxi

Requires BMS debug mode and Display Radio Subtitles (SETUP → SIMULATION).

• Radio page: every radio call of the session, grouped (ATC, AWACS, Tanker, My flight, Flights, Other), with sim time and search.
• Automatic taxi: the Taxi page and the Live taxi VR board follow Ground and Tower — the runway cleared to before departure, and the parking spot assigned after landing.
• Optional clean-up of old debug logs (Setup, off by default) to the Recycle Bin.

6. Weather generator (Mission → Weather)

A port of WeatherGen's model (MIT licence), matching WeatherGen cell for cell except for three corrected WeatherGen errors.

• Moving highs and lows, fronts, and wind that veers with height; override regions for storms; settings per theater.
• Save map adds an entry to BMS's Map Model list; Save series adds update maps from the mission's start time.
• To use a map in BMS: Weather → Map Model → BMSC <name> → MAPS AUTO UPDATE (on for a series) → SAVE WTH, then save the TE or campaign, before PRINT.
• All BMS theaters are supported. BMS's own maps are never changed.

7. Airfields and carriers

• Info box under the ground chart on every airfield page, in every theater: latitude and longitude as BMS shows them, elevation, and the field's frequencies. Tap a value to copy it.
• Carrier decks drawn from BMS's own 3D models (19 ships); with ACMI recording on, the jet is shown on the deck.
• Parking numbers match BMS Ground ("park 04"); spots show size and the alert cell as on the theaters' parking charts.

8. Other changes

• Dashboard: five pages and a Weather card; the previous layout becomes page 1.
• Reference: Airfields | Map | Threats | Arsenal with the theater picker.
• Checklists: Previous/Next, one Starting Engine checklist, and a complete warning and caution light index for the F-16 and F-15C.
• Smooth zoom on every map and chart; faster maps on Android.
• Graphics setting for older PCs (OpenGL or software rendering).

Fixed:

• Korea's tanker/AWACS tracks and friend/foe were read from the wrong file;
• tanker tracks appeared only in 3D;
• recon targets were drawn as part of the route, and the Taxi page could open on the wrong field;
• AWACS and tanker PPTs were drawn as small threat rings;
• the Traffic and Hostiles switches depended on each other;
• every US carrier in Korea was identified as the Carl Vinson;
• the Briefing could treat the package lead's flight as the player's;
• EZBoards on PRINT occasionally did not run;
• the Taxi page's cards were out of reach on a tablet held sideways;
• in the browser, one wheel step zoomed the map fully in, and some symbols showed as empty boxes.

Update: About → Download → Install. Existing settings are kept.

So I've been slowly learning falcon bms. I jumped into a campaign and have mostly been doing air to geound. The first few missions went fine, and then this kept happening. So here are my questions:

1. Is it possible to add additional escort flights to an auto-generated package? I can't find any helpful instructions neither in the manual nor online. I tried opening the ATO and adding flights to the package that way but it didn't work. I tried making a whole package just to fly a fighter sweep in the target area around the same time but that didn't help obviously. I'm hoping extra escorts might stop the entire USAF from getting killed.

2. If I assign a ground target to each member in my flight (for example a runway segment on an oca mission), and we are using laser guided bombs, will the ai drop both of their bombs on that assigned target? Is that how it's supposed to be done? I assume real fighter pilots wouldn't make multiple passes on a target.