Hej again :)

Yesterday I ordered a heli insertion for an ammo box. I was able to unload it but then, the Heli stayed until it was blown away like 20 minutes later.
Same goes for the helis that drop reinforcements - they stay forever or until blown apart (or deleted via zeus).

@HeroesandvillainsOS  Yes I'm seeing this too. On multiple maps. Resupply choppers that the Virtual AI order and the ones I manually request all do this.

Exactly.

@Murdock Yesterday I ordered a heli insertion for an ammo box. I was able to unload it but then, the Heli stayed until it was blown away like 20 minutes later.

This too.

Is there any solution to that? Maybe some lines of code I could add to put a "kill/despawn after x minutes" function in it?

For the time being, I find the helicopter logistic units under the operation sub-tab and give them a move order. After they've flown away a good distance I just delete the unit via Zeus. This is actually only one of very few instances that I've found needing Zeus intervention.

Yeah, for me it was the same. But I don't think you Need to move them first via Operation sub-tab. I think you can just order them to move via Zeus.

ALiVE team has been hard at work streamlining THE mod and the latest changes have brought splendid performance increase to the whole player combat logistic chain. No more waiting for troop insertions or AI groups disappearing during insertion. What a good time to be ALiVE!

After these fixes contributed by the ALiVE team my mission that is heavily relying on a working player combat logistics is nearing to finally go live. I played the mission for over an hour to confirm that everything was now working as expected.

Everything except what has been discussed here.

Right at the end of that short test play there was three logistics helicopters (requested by me) hovering over a friendly objective. Even the one I requested right at the beginning of the mission.
Now I'm intending to make the mission for 10 players (only!). Imagine the mayhem with all the idle helicopters when all those (ten!) players request their AI groups be delivered by helicopters!

I would like to take this moment to appeal for any changes made that would remove herein described behaviour of logistics helicopters.

@SpyderBlack723 The helicopters, once the logistics have been delivered and the helicopter returned to the starting location, should be removed once they are virtualized again. Is this not occurring for you?

No. Not since I've been on this mission of mine since February of this year.

Now that you've probably finally asked the "right" question I guess there's a pointer => and the helicopter returned to the starting location.
The thing is that the logistics helicopters never return to the starting location, which I assume is the place where they appear the first time on the map as virtualized.
Instead the helicopters always fly to hover over an objective and never budge to any direction from there.

And I bet everyone else witnessing this behaviour have it the same way, hence the reports (this is not the first discussion, but might be the first actual topic).

Here's the basic formula on Stratis:

This pic is from an earlier test mission I did for testing another problem. The logistics helicopter behaviour in that test mission does not differ any way from that of my some-day-to-be-published mission I've been on since Feb.

That "test mission" is actually the same I shared with you on the 24th of April via a PM for testing a problem with the ALiVE_Tablet.

What comes to the picture and why logistics helicopters probably are behaving the way they are:

• we can see that the helicopter carrying the requested AI squad appears virtualized close to the edge of the map.
• It then proceeds to deliver the troops to the requested location by flying over an objective (/TAOR) in Jay Cove. I have no idea why it is taking this "detour".
• Once the helicopter has done the insertion it flies to Jay Cove and NOT to the original starting location.
• There it will hover until it gets shot down or if given enough time runs out of fuel.

There is nothing in that particular location. (highlighted are the 5 'basic' modules close to the coast of Stratis)

So you are saying that the correct way for logistics helicopters would be to spawn over an objective, sort of out-of-nowhere? And that that would then also denote the correct starting location?

I was thinking the opposite and that how my mission(s) is/are currently spawning logistics helicopters would be 'the correct way', at least from a player's viewpoint (= no helicopters spawning out of nowhere and instead they do an approach from some direction).

This has a lot to do with players being in the vicinity of the logistics helicopter(s) and thus forcing them to spawn in the first place. If a logistics helicopter gets spawned it does never complete its "logistics support request cycle" _while being spawned_ and in turn ends up hovering over a friendly TAOR.
The "logistics support request cycle" as I will call it in this context consists in its entirety of the communication between the player and the AI that handles the logistics for the player. The communication forms out of several short messages that in part denote what phase is on-going in the logistics cycle. The short messages that bears significance in this particular problem are as follows:

• "Alpha 1-1 Rotary wing units have arrived at the destination. Commencing unloading"
• "Alpha 1-1 Rotary wing insertion request completed"
• "CSAT reinforcements have arrived. Available reinforcement level: 99"
• "Alpha 1-1 Rotary wing insertion request completed"

Here the last two short messages are the final confirmation that a logistics support request has been completely fulfilled and that the code (if I may assume it is so?) ends the request cycle and "relieves the helicopter from its duties" allowing it to fly away/be virtualized.

A logistics helicopter getting spawned because of getting inside the set Spawn Radius will only ever reach the first phase of completion ("Alpha 1-1 Rotary wing insertion request completed") and will never reach the latter two:

• "CSAT reinforcements have arrived. Available reinforcement level: 99"
• "Alpha 1-1 Rotary wing insertion request completed"

When this happens the logistics support request cycle can be completed by the player/players moving out of the set Spawn Radius thus allowing profiles to be virtualized. When doing so you are under few seconds greeted with the short messages declaring that the cycle has been finally completed in its entirety. Either teleporting or moving back to the area where the helicopter was hovering we can observe that it is no longer there.

tl;dr
(logistics) helicopters spawned from virtualized state do never fully complete a "logistics support request cycle". When allowing those to be virtualized again that cycle gets fully completed and the helicopter gets despawned as expected.

Since I don't know what's going on under the hood I'll just ask this bluntly: is the code missing a check preventing spawned helicopters having a successful completion of the request cycle?