What is the Best Replacement for Police Maverick and Ambulance Maverick Helicopters For Grand Theft Auto 5 LSPDFR?
Bored of the default ones and want to EASILY replace them no destructively (no coding necessary)? Then read on!
I think this is a bold statement but let me explain.
I feel the best authentic police helicopter for GTA V or LSPDFR is this one.
AS-350 Ecureuil (LAPD & CHP) [Add-On / Replace | Livery]
And use this livery pack for it and choose the SAHP to keep the copter lore friendly. However with these two packs you are good to go. If you Google in Google image search ‘California Highway Patrol Helicopter‘ this is it! CHP is more generis across the map than say a Sheriff or LSPD as it van operate state wide if you see what I mean so makes more sense arriving on scene anywhere apart from say The U.S. Coastguard or SAFD.
California Highway Patrol Helicopter (Lore Friendly Included) 1.0.0
But what about the Ambulance? and how do you install it easily?
NOW!
In the Vanilla GTA5 Game you have the Police Maverick it is an important helicopter (we all know it from storymode cops chasing us! or Swat abseiling off of it! LOL) as it can do a number of things not least allow the passengers to rappel on ropes out of it and abseil. It comes in two liveries the LSPD Black and white both of which you can directly replace with the alternative liveries on the new heli I suggest. The air ambulance in red and white skinned with the yellow version below.
I have created an ambulance texture for this model and you can download this below.
This means in effect you can replace copter for copter simply nondestructively overwrite the Police Maverick vehicle with this pack above and these textures.
METHOD (Make a back up of the folder first this is at your own risk!)
OK Now whilst I do not mind DLC files they are sometimes a pain and unnecessary. Here is the best way to do a simple recoverable overwrite to change your default copters to something new. Remember if you want the old ones back with this method just remove them from your patchday folder below and the old ones will return with no meta file editing! The spotlight works perfectly and the handling is fine.
1. Use 7zip (or windows zip most use 7zip cos its free and can extract LSPDFR .rar files :P) to extract the 64e6da-AS350_Ecureuil.zip
look inside the folder and find dlc.rpf
2. Open OpenIV as you will need to extract some files from the DLC. Put OpenIV in Edit Mode at the top.
3. Drag the DLC to your mods folder (this is just somewhere temporary to extract the contents once done you can delete it). If there is another DLC there (you may have one I don’t) then temporarily rename it to dlcOLD.rpf then change it back after.
4. Double click the DLC File mods\dlc.rpf\x64\levels\gta5\vehicles\vehicles.rpf\
5. Select as350.yft as350_hi.yft as350.ytd and drag them out to your desktop.
Go back to the mods folder where the DLC is located.
6. Delete the DLC be careful here you do not accidently delete Update or x64 etc…
7. Go to your desktop and change the file names to polmav.yft polmav_hi.yft polmav.ytd now go back to your Mods folder in OpenIV and find this folder.
mods\update\x64\dlcpacks\patchday24ng\dlc.rpf\x64\levels\gta5\vehicles.rpf\ in this you can simply now drag your 3 new polmav files to it.
OPTIONAL (meta but not needed)
Now many people add a meta file text and many can mess their game up doing this. vehicles.meta is the most common reason apart from ragehook updates for games to crash so you have been warned! I personally do not bother with meta unless there is no other choice (like water always take the path of least resistance) as we are overwriting the existing Police Mavericks in the game so they automatically are used by GTA in place of their existing ones. If you want to spawn them separately with a different name or the vehicle name that came with it (before you changed it to polmav) and use the polmav as the handling file for it go ahead . Remember you can manually add the Heli name to say Ultimate Backup and Wilderness callouts .ini files. Then just leave it as it is. But if you do want this meta file it is here in the DLC mods\dlc.rpf\common\data\levels\gta5
DONE! You now have replaced your boring old vanilla choppers with these new ones and they look amazing and air ambulance paramedics and SWAT can rappel out of them just the same rather than fall out of them.
HOWEVER!
You can now change the textures.
Double click the polmav.ytd in OpenIV and you will be greeted with the texture window. Change as350_sign_1 to one of the textures provided in the links above. I like the SAHP one in the texture link above at the beginning of this tutorial for keeping it authentic. The other texture REPLACE as350_sign_2 to My new Ambulance texture below.
Save it.
Now when you want to call an Air ambulance in game make sure the Ultimate Backup ini here has the correct livery
Grand Theft Auto V\plugins\LSPDFR\UltimateBackup\SpecialUnits.xml Note where it says livery=”2″ that is the ambulance texture you want turning up when you call Air Ambulance in Ultimate Backup. Its that simple. Remember you can add any Helicopter you like here but remember not all are capable of using ropes to abseil! So some the paramedics will just leap out screaming which is kinda funny but …. well you know?! :/
———SpecialUnits.xml———–
<SpecialUnit name=”Air Ambulance” role=”medic” code2=”False” code3=”True” pursuit=”False” traffic_stop=”False” felony_stop=”False”>
<LosSantosCity>
<VehicleSet spawn_distance=”200″>
<Vehicles>
<Vehicle livery=”2″>POLMAV</Vehicle>
</Vehicles>
<Peds>
<Ped>S_M_M_PARAMEDIC_01</Ped>
</Peds>
</VehicleSet>
</LosSantosCity>
<LosSantosCounty>
<VehicleSet spawn_distance=”250″>
<Vehicles>
<Vehicle livery=”2″>POLMAV</Vehicle>
</Vehicles>
<Peds>
<Ped>S_M_M_PARAMEDIC_01</Ped>
</Peds>
</VehicleSet>
</LosSantosCounty>
<BlaineCounty>
<VehicleSet spawn_distance=”250″>
<Vehicles>
<Vehicle livery=”2″>POLMAV</Vehicle>
</Vehicles>
<Peds>
<Ped>S_M_M_PARAMEDIC_01</Ped>
</Peds>
</VehicleSet>
</BlaineCounty>
<NorthYankton>
<VehicleSet spawn_distance=”250″>
<Vehicles>
<Vehicle livery=”2″>POLMAV</Vehicle>
</Vehicles>
<Peds>
<Ped>S_M_M_PARAMEDIC_01</Ped>
</Peds>
</VehicleSet>
</NorthYankton>
</SpecialUnit>
————————————
And go into the game. Open ultimate backup and call an Air ambulance to an ‘injured ped’ and try both the landing and the rappel extraction methods take a photo put it on your Social media and give me a credit link 😉
Have Fun!
And happy days
Surfwidow :)x <3