October Newsletter
Screenshot by Flying-Finn
Welcome to the October News
It has been another fantastic month for S.O.G. Prairie Fire. A team of devs and testers made it over to Fort Bragg and Las Vegas to meet our heroes, while at home the community fired up some awesome new content and events. These activities, bringing together the guys who were there with Arma’s community creators, fire up our collective imagination to make better missions and content, to set up exciting historical events, and to give the campaign another play-through to build team skills.
So let’s dive into this bumper issue of S.O.G.Prairie Fire news…
Mike Force Update - Version 1.00.02
Your favorite SOG game mode received some fixes and additions this month. Thank you all for reporting issues. Mike Force just got better!
Changelog:
[New] Adds masterarm functionality to vehicle spawn building
[Change] Makes HQ defense complete faster
[Change] Updates dynamic view distance to have more configuration options
[Change] AI will no longer despawn when last player is downed in the AO
[Fix] Sites will no longer fall through the map and be uncompletable
[Fix] Players will no longer get 'Mission Failed' if the server loads take a long time
[Fix] Player numbers will update correctly after players disconnect
[Fix] Zeus-created vehicles will now have the correct skin, instead of US default
Hall of Heroes movie
As mentioned in the September news, Team Savage created a movie which is part of the new MACV SOG Hall of Heroes display at 5th Special Forces Group HQ, Fort Campbell, KY. Thanks to Ghostrider Don, you can now watch the movie on his YouTube channel (don’t forget to subscribe and support your favorite crew chief!). If you are visiting the base to see the 101st airborne museum be sure to pay it a visit.
Lynne Black SOG cast
Tilt Meyer has been busy in recent weeks publishing so many new SOG casts we can’t keep up with them. He’s doing a valuable job of preserving so much essential black ops history. In these two new podcasts he interviews former team-mate and lifelong friend Lynne “Blackjack” Black about his insane missions for SOG. Lynne’s October 5th ‘68 mission was the inspiration for our campaign finale “Oscar Eight” which gives a good idea of the wild ride you’re in for here.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Team trip to the US Part 2: Team trip to Virginia
While in Virginia in early October we had the chance to visit the Virginia War Museum and meet several Arma SOG Prairie Fire players who were staffing a display about the Chechen war! Of course we invited them to come join our team games. Having a personal tour by Maj. Gen. Ken “El Cid” Bowra was a special memory. Here you can see him with a display he donated to the museum, which comprises items of enemy equipment and clothing he collected after ambushes. These items and a lot more in El Cid’s collection formed the base of our character art references for the DLC.
-New Special Forces podcasts
During this part of the trip, we also had a chance to shoot Civil War and Indian Wars weaponry with a group of arms collectors, led by El Cid and Colonel Roger Healey (pictured below). Roger led the A-team that built Plei Mei Special Forces camp way back in 1963. His insights have been very valuable to the team, and we’re considering how to memorialise his experiences.
We recorded in-person podcasts with Roger and also with Ramon “Tony” Nadal who was A-company commander at LZ X-ray at the battle of the Ia Drang Valley in 1965, led by his boss Col. Hal Moore. In the movie “We Were Soldiers” the actor playing Tony can be seen wearing his SF shoulder patch. These will be released on our Youtube channel in the coming months.
Over the next couple of months in Team trip to the US Parts 3 and 4: we’ll cover what happened when the team visited Fort Bragg with 6 MACV SOG veterans, and the team trip to the Special Operations Association Reunion in Las Vegas. Meantime, keep your eyes peeled for new podcasts coming soon.
ARSENAL - Arm Yourself Against the Negative Effects of Stress
Urgent Memo from Lt. Col. Dick Thompson:
The ARSENAL Assessment can help you manage stress, develop Stress Resilience and make better decisions. It is based on the ARSENAL model of seven best practices that are key to resisting the negative effects of stress. ARSENAL measures your overall level of stress as well as how well you are doing now in each of these seven areas.
Fully-funded support, takes 10 minutes to complete, builds your capabilities, useful to try and recommend to your buddies.
Free for veterans! You can get it here now - please try it and recommend it to your veteran friends - it may save their life:
https://mvgcharity.org/peer-to-peer-support-arsenal/
SOG Prairie Fire gaming events
- FNF Vietnam PvP Event
Friday Night Fights is back in Vietnam and is hosting their 120 Team versus Team events on November 11, 2022 8:00 PM and November 18, 2022 8:00 PM (UK Time).
Friday Night Fight (FNF) is a weekly Team vs. Team Arma 3 events that are usually played with modern era mod assets.
FNF consists of organized TvT gameplay, split up into 3 separate rounds throughout the event. Almost all scenarios are one-life only, and last around 45 to 60 minutes. The whole event typically lasts around 3 hours.
FNF holds two events every Friday. One at an earlier time, and one at a later time.
one at EU time (Public, anyone can join) and one at US time (Invite only). The events will consist of 3 rounds each, with one round being roughly 1 hour.
To join the FNF Event you must join their Discord and read the rules first:
https://discord.gg/ZXnqbPWa
- SOG Halloween Event
On the 29th of October, 50 players underwent a spooky Halloween Vietnam experience event in which they had to fight not only the NVA/VC but aliens and monsters as well in the cover of darkness.
The MACV-SOG Recon Team (RT), RT Columbia, was deployed behind enemy lines on a routine reconnaissance mission when they heard the sound of a massive explosion followed by the smell of a strange gas. Two CBRN Teams were then called to support the SOG Team as they moved into the area to further investigate the situation.
As they reached the area, the players found out that it was a crash site and some alien-like eggs were in the crash site along with some useful intel which directed the teams into a tunnel. Upon reaching this tunnel the teams found out that it wasn’t a normal VC Tunnel but a laboratory of some sort. As they moved further down the tunnel they found a device and when they touched it, disaster struck.As they touched the device a glow of light took all of the power of the tunnel, along with the teams radios. Aliens and Monsters started appearing as the teams rushed out of the tunnel in panic trying to reach out to any air support and extraction. The teams got separated in the jungle as Air support had arrived and started blasting the Aliens and Monsters from the rear of the teams. One of the teams reached a river from which a helicopter was able to spot them and recover them, the other teams regrouped in a previously occupied NVA Village from which the teams had to hold until the extraction arrived.
All teams successfully extracted from the area, all thinking “What the hell just happened”.
Several of the players were streaming/recording so you can catch up on the craziness of the mission.
Clips from the streams:
LongLiveQuebec gets scared:
Digby: Freak out in your own time:
Ewett got so scared his fire alarm went off:
What the f*ck is THAT? RUUUUN:
Digby trying to distract from the scary noises:
Don't push the button. You are CBRN specialist, not blowing massive box specialist:
Nothing like overkill when against smoke-monsters I
found out you can throw/bash vehicles as a Bully:
Dinkle being left behind on first evac, but I see it and picks him up:
6 guys in a hallways panics from EMP:
Dinkle wanting to get out after EMP:
Quebec learning how not to get attention of friendly helicopters using VC weapons and tracers:
Quebec. That is awful, I don't want to go down there again:
Quebec, Getting very surprised by whats behind the doors in the tunnel. He did not see that one coming:
Bully comes charging!
- The Battle of Ia Drang
Digby is back with a special mission for us! Saturday, November 12th starting at 9:30PM UK Time.
This time we will be playing as the 1st Air Cavalry Division in the first major battle in Vietnam. The Battle of Ia Drang, occurred when the 1st Air Cavalry, led by LTC Harold G. Moore, was deployed on a search and destroy mission deep into the jungles of a plateau in the Central Highlands in the Ia Drang River Valley in South Vietnam. The American forces met strong resistance from the 32nd, 33rd, and 66th Regiments of the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) and the battle lasted for 5 days.
Community mod news
- LZ X-Ray - by SkyDong
A Cooperative 1 to 56 player mission.LZ X-Ray is a persistent mini-campaign that depicts the Battle of Ia Drang at LZ X-Ray. It includes fully voice-acted cutscenes, build menu, enemy and friendly commander system. This is a must play mission for the Vietnam aficionados.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2877015340
- The Ambush - by Davis1987
Ambush by Davis also features a fully voice acted 2 player Coop mission. In this mission you ambush an NVA convoy near the cambodian border.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2881175699
- Ravage - River Styx - by Recaldy
A single player or Cooperative mission with up to 3 players. This is a Vietnam Horror type of mission that makes use of Zombies, so if you are still in the halloween mood, this is the mission for you.
“Headquarters is isolated by VC/NVA and the undead. We are running low on supplies and the nearby Camp Striker has not responded to support requests. Your squad is to find and destroy three AA guns allowing HQ the ability to evacuate by air down river.”
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2882290201
Closing remarks
Well as our roadtrip in the USA has drawn to a close we are looking back fondly on an outstanding journey lasting 6 weeks, meeting some extraordinary men, hearing and recording so much Special Ops history, and preparing for our next actions in the SOG gaming world.
We recorded something like 25 podcasts and took hundreds of photos, and it will take much of the next year to process it and publish it to our channels. We hope you enjoy the fruits of this historic trip, and continue to support the SOG Prairie Fire community in its efforts to welcome new SOG veterans to the gaming world, while supporting their new books coming out.
Let’s raise another glass to the men of SOG and their brave opponents, and the indigenous soldiers who fought alongside SOG. Thank you for supporting us on this journey.
Break Contact! Continue Mission!