[MP Coop] Altar Pieces

[nominesine]

Altar Pieces was released for BETA testing as a SP Mission. Since it's also playable in MP, a test report would be more than welcome. It has only been tested briefly in a LAN-environment so far, without any show stoppers being unveiled.

The MP mission is intended for 1-4 human team leaders, though any number of players may participate as regular grunts. The mission contains 40+ playable slots altogether.

Link to Mission/SP Thread.

[johnnyboy]

Howdy N.

I played this MP but only myself playing.  I like it!  Nice intro.

I chose the large infantry squad, and opted to pursue all side missions:

1. Patrol
2. Convoy ambush
3. Escort
4. Search for caches

We had various contacts, and my AI and I handled it pretty well.  Finally got chewed up a bit on the 4th one.  Then the mission ended successfully without me ever getting near Altar mountain.

A few comments:

1. Under the Execution section of notes, change "anyway you chose" to "anyway you choose".

2. I find the spec ops generator not that interesting when I do the canned version, but built into your mission I found it much more interesting  (maybe got lucky with more contacts).

3. You might add a little chatter among the squad to liven it up.  Especially if it could be task specific.  I don't know if you your scripts have visibility to spec ops info that's generated that could be used to key off of.


4. You might consider some synchronized triggers for the AI groups heading to Altar Mtn, so that they hold off the attack until at least one player led group is near the objective.  That way player doesn't miss out on assault if he accepts side missions.

5. Respawn to Group is my favorite option. Thanks for that.

6. My squad would only do column formation.  I ordered them many times, but they never obeyed formation change orders.  Weird.

I look forward to trying this again with  a friend or two.  Nice work.  I'm curious how u built it, sohopeto unpbo it someday if time allows.

Takecare,

JBoy

[nominesine]

Thanks for your input. Many of your suggestions are good, and I'll implement some of them in the next release. Enemy resitance will be slightly increased around Altar Mtn, to prevent AI from completing the main task all by itself. It's the tanks that crushes all opposition in the current version (it will be corrected). The "column" problem is a scripting mistake by me. It will be changed in the upcomming version. I have no control over the secOps tasks in this mission. They are completely random and I like it to remain that way. The release version is nearly finished.

[hoz]

We played this tonight as well. Great intro, and the overall ambience is wonderful. It sounds like theres so much going on around you, really job well done.  It took a couple of tries but we managed to complete this one a couple of times.  We really didn't find much wrong with it.

[johnnyboy]

Tried it again a few times.  I really like this mission, so much going on.

Tried as Recon team, and was bothered that I could see menus for support and sec ops, but choosing them did nothing.  They are only for Swordsman.  I wonder if you can hide those options to players they do not apply to.

Love how contacts will call artillery strikes on you.  Really keeps the suspense and danger feeling.  Had to laugh when I chose a "attack position" spec ops.  When about 200 meters away I called in an artillery strike on them.  Within about 30 seconds artillery was raining down on me.  WTF?  I thought it was friendly fire until a minute later my artillery strike hit the enemy position dead on.  The enemy called a strike on me first!  LOL.

Suggestion:  I came upon downed choppers a few times with live pilots nearby.  A nice reward for going to downed choppers would be for the pilots to join your squad (when you approach within x meters of the dudes).  A little chatter about saving their asses could help immersion too.

Chopper insertion of recon team is sketchy.  Sometimes it lands and everybody gets out.  Sometimes it gets engaged and doesn't land.  Then I eject right into a firefight and get chopped up.  Since player has no control of chopper its a bit frustrating.  If your intent is for it to land and unload right away, you might set the pilot as setcaptive true, so he won't get fired on, and behavior = careless too....

Anyway, great mission.  Oh yeah, love how you get  a different intro for different squads too.

[nominesine]

Final version released. Thanks everyone.