(Review Completed) [SP] Red Tide

[Fragorl]

Mission 2

Restart, using ofp lite (aka non ecp). I did pretty much everything the same, but was fortunate enough to repel all reinforcements, including the two armoured units, and sustain no casualties (aside from 2 who was wounded in the leg).

Attacking the base, I was a bit tricksy. I ordered all to prone, then stealthily crawled over to the egde of the hill, with my men in a line formation. I ordered all to hold fire, but spotted and assigned targets for all of them. Once I'd got the 'ready to fire' message from just about everyone, I stealthily crawled back the way I came, having ordered all to halt. I searched around for an AK47 + Grenades,  found one, loaded up with 4 grenades and 2 magazines, circled round to my favourite spot on the hill, and cheatsaved. (I guess it's cheat saving? I aborted, then resumed. If I subsequently failed and wanted to restart, I killed myself and pressed escape once the end dialogue appeard. This allowed me to then resume from my original position.)

Once I was in position, I ordered 3 to attack the M2, and simultanoeusly shot off 3 grenades, and then proned and ordered all to "go go go". My first grenade fell wide, my second knocked off a straggler, but my third did some significant damage, taking out 5 or 6 men. Having thrown the base into confusion, and caused most of the prone enemy units to (try and) target me, they were hit with the full force of the main attack. The officer and machine gunners succumbed, and most of the rest of them were killed before they could react. A few survived long enough to return a few bursts before they were finished off.

Casualties: 4 total, all died in the main attack. M2 got one, a machine gunner got one or two of the others. No idea how the 4th died. Plus, a couple of injuries.

I am now standing in the conquered base, waiting to see what happens next. I seem to remember a final counterattack from the North...

EDIT: and about two seconds later, my mgunner opens fire and kills a final soldier. Mission ends. Hurrah!

Outro - win

Perfectly good outro. Some BMP's reaching the beach and offloading troops, an mi17 landing with good accuracy on the helipad, and offloading even more troops, the russians occupying the former American positions. Americans tucked away in body bags. T55 and M113 are off to the side of the base (not where I put them - but perhaps they're being salvaged). My only gripe is the position of the body bags - the ideal spot would seem to be behind the base, in that flat patch of land. But then again, the bodies are probably only in temporary storage anyway

Conclusion

Nice mission, exemplifies the entire 'capture the base' genre. Is reasonably hard, but not too hard. It's always a thrill when your tactics work out the way you mean them too. This mission is excellent officer training material. Done properly, it should be entirely possible to avoid more than one or two casualties (I didn't do it particluarly well, I just wanted to finish it). A vigilant (or at least experienced) commander will spot the infantry groups arriving from the base, and the tanks and reinforcements arriving from entre deux/chotain. As for taking the base, well, my tactic worked, but it was a frontal assault and I had to try it several different ways before I found one that worked. Even then, casualties were really unacceptible.

One or two ideas. Spare at least one group of reinforcements for later. I was pretty much attacked within two minutes of that first alarm going off- and it's pretty unavoidable. The player's focus should be clearing the base, maybe coping with one group of resistance from the western hill, and then be hit from the back by a surprise bunch of auxiliaries, as I was in v1.0 (surprise if you didn't read the briefing ). Perhaps you could even fool the player by having a titletext like "ah, the base looks cleared", and in the briefing say "There's a possibility that troops stationed in Entre deux will be alarmed". But that's just an idea.

Well, I'm going to replay the mission with a couple of different strategies now: 1.) circling right the way around the base, destroying the back wall and launching an attack from 180 degrees the opposite way the enemy were expecting. I might have to 'borrow' some satchels off one of those spetznaz at the beginning.

[THobson]

I have 29 global boolean variables, is that a lot?

Not in my experience.  It must be something else.  Do have a lot scripts running?  All the local variable will also count if the script is running when the player does a save.

[Pilot]

@Fragorl

not where I put them - but perhaps they're being salvaged

This is sort of the impression I was trying to create.  I wanted to give the impression they were dragged off the battle field, to be scrapped at a later date.

But then again, the bodies are probably only in temporary storage anyway

Yeah, it is only a temporary spot, which also explains why they are so unorganzied.

As for your suggestion, I will consider increasing the time between your attack and the resistance counter-attack.  I shouldn't be too hard to do, and it would be more realistic.  Maybe I'll even make the tanks empty, and force the crew to get in them.

Thanks, Fragorl!

@THobson

Not in my experience.  It must be something else.  Do have a lot scripts running?  All the local variable will also count if the script is running when the player does a save.

Typically, there might be 4 scripts running at the same time, with an increase when certain triggers are fired.

[Mikero]

I will consider increasing the time between your attack and the resistance counter-attack

For me, the 2nd wave, the guys coming from extreme north?, ie not the ones associated with the armour, generally and almost certainly, end up on corner of fort, far edge and give the impression they're just part of that fort (maybe behind it, eg)

I only encountered them as I believe you intended, once, when I attacked the fort directly and moved into it. That game play is unlikely, given the ferocious attack from the armour people. The player probably wont twitch from the hill for awhile.

For me, the timing of the armour and it's squad was just right, I keep forgetting that I *know* about them, if you read fragorl? comments he didn't and they'e one hell of a surprise, so the timing there must be pretty close to perfect. I do remember my 1st run thru where they got me !!!

If anything, leave them alone, and change the trigger for the 2nd group so that they only make themselves felt as you close in. I think that is where the 'mistake' is pilot. You're firing off both groups simultaneously. Realsitically perhaps the 2nd lot wouldn't necessarily be alerted.

And, on the other hand, it also makes sense that these guys just make getting into the fort tougher, doing what they already do, they are great reinforcements for the fort, rather than of the fort. Your mission works on many levels, and one of them is illusion.

No slap at Fragorl, but the moment i saw the radiation signs, i knew what the burnt wrecks were, and why they were there. There's a richness to all of your cutscenes, all of them, we dont take all the detail in at one sitting. It took me 99 goes so to speak to notice the pow exchange.

[Pilot]

If anything, leave them alone, and change the trigger for the 2nd group so that they only make themselves felt as you close in. I think that is where the 'mistake' is pilot. You're firing off both groups simultaneously. Realsitically perhaps the 2nd lot wouldn't necessarily be alerted.

You're probably right.  I will probably add a trigger that the player must be inside for the second group of reinforcements to arrive.  The first group of reinforcements will consist of the armor group and the squad from Chotain, since Chotain is closer and they both arrive at the fort at the same time.  They will come first.  The second group of reinforcements will consist of the two squads from Entre Deux.  They will come after the player is in the trigger.  How does this sound, mikero, Fragorl, and anyone else?

[Mikero]

>How does that sound?

ABSOLUTELY AWFUL

that's the magic in your mission you touched there pilot. The magic that we DONT all get in fort and wait and know bloody well what's going to happen next, because it's happened in every other bloody mission out there.

Ho hum, yet-another counter attack thingo. Wash your mouth out.

eerk eaak, spew, throw up, kick fido, aaaargh. ouch!

[THobson]

I will probably add a trigger that the player must be inside for the second group of reinforcements to arrive

I agree with mikero - avoid this sort of thing at all costs.  Play it once it might be fine (except most players now know to expect this sort of thing).  Play it twice it is predictable.  A lot of mission builder seem to do this sort of thing and it really gets boring, or worse, the player feels like they are being manipulated, and it is puzzling - "Why did they wait until I did this before I they did that?",  "Would they really have done that?".  

My suggestion:
Put some random delays in the timing of the reinforcements so that sometimes they might arrive in a difference sequence.  Then even you will not know where the next lot is coming from.  You have reinforcements at specific towns - good.  Once the alarm is raised they will reinforce the base as soon they can, but there might be a random delay while they get mobilised.  Think like that rather than - what will the player see.  Try to keep the underlying logic realistic.

Just a suggestion and my own personal view.  Some missions play like an interactive movie and I am sure the authors (an maybe many players) love them.


On the savegame bug: four scripts is not a lot, but it depends on how many local variables you have in each.  The problem seems to be caused by the number of names in the game.  Each variable is a name but also every unit and every object that you have given a name will also be contributing to the problem.  Unless you have given every unit a name I am really surprised this mission is hitting the bug.  It just shows how much resource ECP gobbles up.  To give you a feel for the scale of the problem - when my mission hit the bug without ECP the number of names in the mission was well into three figures.  When I realised what to do about the problem I cut that drastically, but I guess it is still well over a hundred, and Planck recently reported that the big was there sometimes and not others so I am taking it that the mission was about on the borderline.  Since then the numbers have increased again - but that is another story.

[Pilot]

Well, considering the emphatic response about this part of the mission, I won't be adding the trigger the player must be in to make the second group of reinforcements arrive.

@mikero

I was surprised to see your response the way it was.  Maybe I misread an earlier post :

If anything, leave them alone, and change the trigger for the 2nd group so that they only make themselves felt as you close in. I think that is where the 'mistake' is pilot. You're firing off both groups simultaneously. Realsitically perhaps the 2nd lot wouldn't necessarily be alerted.

I thought what I suggested was what you wanted from reading this post.  Could you please clarify for me?

@THobson

Put some random delays in the timing of the reinforcements so that sometimes they might arrive in a difference sequence.

I can do this to three groups.  The armor group, the group from Chotain, and the two groups from Entre Deux.  I don't want to seperate the two groups from Entre Deux, though.  Currently I have it scripted so those two groups arrive at the base together.  I think this is what can make the mission difficult at the end, but I also think this is realistic.  If you have two groups from the same town, why make them attack seperately?  Anyway, I will consider adding random response times.

[THobson]

I hope you don't mind me posting this here, but the thread where you posed the question:

Commands are seperated by a semi-colon?!  I thought any text after a semicolon was considered to be a note and not used during the processing of the script.

Has been solved so no more replies are possible there.

Anything after a  semi-colon is treated as a comment if the semi-colon is the first non-blank character on a line, but where you have a block of instructions defined by {...} for example:

if (condition) then {list of instructions} else {another list of instructions}

or

while (condition) do {yet another list}

then if you have more than one instruction in the list you should use semi-colons to separate them (just as you would in the init field of a unit.

[Mikero]

@pilot

my post said that i was ambivalent about whether the 2nd group were ok as is or should be changed. Both work.

What worked for me 'better' was the one and only time I went to fort directly and was left, sea, corner, outside of it. I could SEE these buggers streaming down the hill. The effect, and response, was similar to that of the first group.

By an area trigger, i mean a tripwire closer to the fort, "as you close in", the position of that tripwire is where and when the player could see partially or wholly that hill they come from.

It would make sense to me, that these buggers appear  and affect game play at around the same time as you are in, or move to, the fort. Rather than the very stale, very traditional, let's wait for the counter attack business.

If you tripwire a bit closer, then the player wont be able to wait them out, as I do, on the hill, and clean them up when the get into the fort.

There might not be any satisfactory tripwire that garantees a visual of them streaming down hill, so, (opinion), I would just try to ensure that it's mayhem for the player just when he's in or very close to fort, and that no amount of cunning devilishness on players part will prevent this from happening.

Put another way, I want to see mayem IN the fort rather than waiting for something to happen. Contrast that statement with the fact that what IS happening now, is also quite ok, the buggers give the impression of re-inforecments from behind the fort.

[Fragorl]

You're probably right.  I will probably add a trigger that the player must be inside for the second group of reinforcements to arrive.  The first group of reinforcements will consist of the armor group and the squad from Chotain, since Chotain is closer and they both arrive at the fort at the same time.  They will come first.  The second group of reinforcements will consist of the two squads from Entre Deux.  They will come after the player is in the trigger.  How does this sound, mikero, Fragorl, and anyone else?

I agree with what mikero/THobson have said, in regards to the timing and spacing of the counterattacks. Here are a few extra suggestions:

- The random delay to represent the time it takes for the units to get equipped, plus, the fact that the two reinforcement groups are different distances from the army base, will combine to keep the player on his toes. To make it even more random, consider giving the reinforcements a few different sets of waypoints to attack by. This is done easily with a 'switch' trigger attached to the first waypoint in the second set, and the first waypoint of the third set and so on. Use an activation of random(1) < 0.3 or whatever you want the probability as. You may already know this

- There is an alarm which goes off (I think) once you have alerted the patrol on the road. How does this work? Is it simply an area trigger, or a knowsabout check, or a CombatMode check?  If the former, consider one of the two latter. If you use one of the latter, then I am just clumsy and allow my men to be spotted too easily

- Once the relevant check has been done, I suggest having a unit run back to base before the alarm goes off, or at least a check to see if the sentries at base can see the patrol. At the moment, the patrol seem to be communicating telepathically with their HQ. And likewise with the reinforcements. The player should get a chance to avoid (or at least delay) the reinforcements somehow. Perhaps include a suitable 'communication building' (could just be an m113 in a camo structure ) that the player has a chance to destroy in the main attack, provided they do it quickly - this could buy some time to prepare for the counter attack, but with a legitimate excuse.

- Alternately, there could be a motorcycle rider (why motorcycle? No reason. could equally well be a jeep) in the patrol who zooms off to alert Entre deux and/or Chotain. Although this isn't exactly modern age, it once again gives the player a chance to procrastinate the counter-attack by shooting the rider.

- Finally, and this is most definitely optional since it would mean a lot of extra work, have some way of relating back to the other units also involved in the assault. Recall there was a north, a central, and a south group. You could have a third (final!) retaliatory strike by the surviving members of the US/resistance forces, provided they defeat your comrades, otherwise none if they themselves are defeated.

[THobson]

fragorl - far be it from to say you are clumsy.... but: the 2 man patrol west of the main base can be taken down without setting off the alarm.  Nevertheless the comment about telepathy is a valid one.  At the very least there should be a delay between being detected and the alarm being raised, and the alarm should only be raised if the detecting group still has a living memeber - to simulate some sort of radio message back to base.  An alternative would be to have a guy (or two) at a sentry waypoint that have their next waypoint in the base and a trigger that detect when they are close to the base and activates the alarm.

Your last point reminds me of a concern I had the first time I played but then I forgot.  This is meant to be part of a major landing.  Where is all the noise from the other battles?  Why is there no interaction between this battle and the others?  Then I thought - it's a neat mission that is fun to play, leave it at that.

Pilot:  You have options here.
- It is a fun mission, so just leave it
- Tidy up the alarm/base alert process
- Include aspects of the other battles
- Change the story so this is the first  landing and the other battles are not happening yet.

The problem with all of these options except the first is the law of diminishing returns, and also you give everyone more time to get really picky.

The points that are now being picked up on are the things that flit through the back of your mind as you are playing but don't really detract from the fun.  A bit like watching a Hollywood movie when things don't quite fit together properly - which, in my view is a lot of the time, but I am one of the worlds pedants.

[Fragorl]

Your last point reminds me of a concern I had the first time I played but then I forgot.  This is meant to be part of a major landing.  Where is all the noise from the other battles?  Why is there no interaction between this battle and the others?  Then I thought - it's a neat mission that is fun to play, leave it at that.

Pilot:  You have options here.
- It is a fun mission, so just leave it
- Tidy up the alarm/base alert process
- Include aspects of the other battles
- Change the story so this is the first  landing and the other battles are not happening yet.

The problem with all of these options except the first is the law of diminishing returns, and also you give everyone more time to get really picky.

THobson has hit the nail squarely.

Yes, I'd have to say that as the mission gets improved, feedback becomes less and less about fixing up mistakes and more about what else you could add to the mission. My feedback is generally like that from the beginning, which isn't always helpful . From this point on, you're not writing the mission any more, we, the beta testers are are ;D

On reflection, my advice would be (from THobson's list) to go with: a lot of a.), a little of b.), and don't worry about c.) or d.) unless you really want.

[Mikero]

@all

>other battles

I accepted from the outset that all this mission was, was an intro into the campaign that Pilot had CLEARLY introduced for me with the very large and detailed intro.

I too wanted to 'hear' the other battles, and probably some, as you all say, 'interaction', but for me, i was expecting this interaction to occur in mission 2 with this stuff as a quick, get it over with, intro mission.

That's very different to saying you're all wrong, I'm all right, it's a perception of how this mission hangs together in something larger. If it is going to be 'something larger', then i think (opinion) it should be new missions with ALL of our suggestions in the brew. On the other hand, pilot might choose to go away and develop this one single mission into an abandoned armies style. In which case, he clearly has to include the interaction here. Both styles are valid.

[Pilot]

Sorry for may lack of response, I have been busy the last few days, and will remain so for the next few days.  So if I don't reply right away, it's not that I have gone away, I am just busy.

The 2nd Reinforcement group:
I'm not going to change this too much.  Right now, their actions are all scripted, and the script is quite large.  Adding more conditions to the script would increase the size of the script considerably, and test my scripting skills.

@Fragorl

There is an alarm which goes off (I think) once you have alerted the patrol on the road. How does this work? Is it simply an area trigger, or a knowsabout check, or a CombatMode check?  If the former, consider one of the two latter.

I use a knowsabout check

About the alarm:
I will probably do what THobson suggested:

At the very least there should be a delay between being detected and the alarm being raised, and the alarm should only be raised if the detecting group still has a living memeber - to simulate some sort of radio message back to base.

Why?  Because it's easiest.  I don't want to do any more major changes to this mission if I don't have to, and adding a runner is, in my opinion, a pretty big change.

I don't think the beta-testers have noticed, but I do the alarm differently.  I am not simulating a radio message from the base to the towns.  In my tests, I played a resistance soldier in the towns.  When the alarm went off in the base, I could hear it from both towns.  Also, when the alarm goes off in the base or one of the towns, the alarm will go off in the other two places after a random wait period.  This means the resistance don't need radio messages, they know to respond from the alarm.

Your last point reminds me of a concern I had the first time I played but then I forgot.  This is meant to be part of a major landing.  Where is all the noise from the other battles?  Why is there no interaction between this battle and the others?  Then I thought - it's a neat mission that is fun to play, leave it at that.

This is something I have thought about.  I wanted radio messages from the other groups to Roman, telling of thier status.  I haven't done this for one reason:  I don't have the ability to do custom sounds.  I am an American, and do not have a Russian accent, nor do I know anybody with one.  Further more, the recruitment depot is down, so I can't go that route.  Because I don't have access to custom sounds, I wanted to keep radio transmissions to a bare minumum.

- It is a fun mission, so just leave it
- Tidy up the alarm/base alert process
- Include aspects of the other battles
- Change the story so this is the first  landing and the other battles are not happening yet.

I'll do a lot of A, and some of B.  I want to include C, but have not for the reason stated above.  And I deffinately don't want to do D.

I accepted from the outset that all this mission was, was an intro into the campaign that Pilot had CLEARLY introduced for me with the very large and detailed intro.

Mikero, you really want me to make a campaign, don't you? ;D

Thanks for the replies!  If I get behind on posting responses, It' not that I am ignoring you, real life is just getting in the way.

-Student Pilot

EDIT:
@THobson

I hope you don't mind me posting this here, but the thread where you posed the question:

Quote:Commands are seperated by a semi-colon?!  I thought any text after a semicolon was considered to be a note and not used during the processing of the script.  
Has been solved so no more replies are possible there.

Anything after a  semi-colon is treated as a comment if the semi-colon is the first non-blank character on a line, but where you have a block of instructions defined by {...} for example:

if (condition) then {list of instructions} else {another list of instructions}

or

while (condition) do {yet another list}

then if you have more than one instruction in the list you should use semi-colons to separate them (just as you would in the init field of a unit.

Thanks!  I learn something new every day.