OFPEC Forum
Missions Depot => Mission Discussion => OFP - Reviewed Missions => Topic started by: Hawkins on 10 Mar 2005, 19:56:30
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Dak To
Version 1.1 BETA 4
By Hawkins
What you need to play:
SEB NP2 & CoC Mines - http://ofp.gamezone.cz/index.php?special=articles/mods.html#5
Ebud's Jungle Everon - http://ofp.gamezone.cz/islands/Jungle_Everon_1_20.zip
Editor Update 1.02 - http://tuote.org/~black-beret/vietnam/KegetysEditorAddon111.zip
Footmunch's F4 Phantom - http://tuote.org/~black-beret/vietnam/f4e.zip
or alternatively, all of the above should be found at ofpec.com
OFP Res v.1.96
http://www.flashpoint1985.com
Overview:
The NVA has been pushing the US troops further and further back. Now it's time to stop it! Take part on an assault to Dak To and take the city!
Includes:
- Intro
- Outro Win/Loose
- Briefing
- Overview
- Voices
- Music
Mission updated 05/05/05, 2015 hours
Finnish time, GMT +2
To be included in later versions:
- Hmm... What do you think?
Other comments:
A mission which was started and finished at least three years ago. Remade using NP2 and the latest goodies. Original concept has stayed the same, only some minor changes, like the defending part, has been made. Scripting is used now, the last mission was a trigger orgy. :) What can I do eh? It was back in the day. :D
Anyway, this isn't a high-tech mission and will probably be a waste of time, but if you enjoy a large attack, try this out, if you want. :)
Here's the download link:
http://tuote.org/~black-beret/shieet/Dak_To_v1_1_Beta4.zip
or
http://ofptf.net/users/Hawkins/Dak_To_v1_1_Beta4.zip
~3.2mb
Mission updated 05/05/05, 2015 hours
Finnish time, GMT +2
All suggestions/comments will be appriciated!
Hawkins
Edit: This mission has been reviewed and is available from the Missions Depot (http://www.ofpec.com/missions_depot/index.php?action=details&id=70).
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I'll have to give this a go :)
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I like Nam mission but there rarer than rocking horse s**t. i'll play an update as i progress
OVERVIEW - nice picture and text, maybe a few too many exclamation marks. For westmorland ;D
INTRO - Good stuff liked it alot. The truck taking the men or R'n'R drove into a house and then a tent that should be on a safe or careless WP to stick to the road. "Damm custer f*ck" - i didnt know what that was about. sounds like adigio for strings, but the choral version. very Nam.
BRIEFING - Very good :thumbsup:. all there intel, mission plan. Looks proper miliatry not just kill the baddies type objectives.
MISSION - we wait for the bird to pick us up, i reload the mag to burn time. We hop in and head fat to the start points, all the voices sound clear and good. the chopper doesn't land and we bail out (did you use the flyinheight command and eject to get this effect?) this is a great touch and true to life. were running south now towards Dak To (montignac :P) My leader runs so fast i cant catch up with him and the rest of my squad kills the NVA without my help, i see a few siloettes in the distanmce so like a true grunt put my gun on auto and let loose getting as many rounds downrange, but there friendlys. the player should be more involved in this first firefight beacuse its over by the time he/she gets there. You should have the sqaud leader suggest which front to cover, its all a bit vague as to where the nva counter attack will come from. after one to many freindly fire incidents im executed by my leader! This time i pick up an RPD ;D and await the counter attack. All the M79'ers have their pistols out, i would think about taking tese away as they become useless without ther grenade laucnher at the ready. I spot them first and open up and hit not alot, but the rest of the guys open up and then the M60 kicks in, oh boy this is some hardcore firefight. I stop aiming after a while and just fire. once the first wave has been defeated a T55 appears! :o Now not to sound to fussy but the NVA first used T55's from about 1970's onward, before that they used the PT76 amphibious tank so this is kinda historically inaccurate, but i'll let it slide. now contact on the other side of the ville so i rush over and actualy hit someone and see him go down. Hazzar. im waiting around and not alot seems to be happening, so i grab an RPG and fire it into the sky like a mortar. still nothing happens so i go on a runaround and run through a booby trapped tent and die. starting in the ville again i wait in a great ambush place a when charlie crests that hill i waste them all with under 100 roounds. thats some good shooting if i dont say so myself. I wait for a good 10 minutes but nothing happens so i grab and rpg and head down the road to see where that tank got to. I hit it down the road with 4 rpgs but it doesnt blow (this rpg has the armour penetration of a cat) and i kill the crew. still nothing happens so im guessing there is a bit of an error somewhere.
OUTRO - didnt see
OVERALL - apart from not finishing this mission rocks. It is what all missions should be like, there are some great moments like the crescendo of machine guns as the counter attack is repulsed, my RPD adding to the noise :). there are a few little changes i would make wheich are mentioned above. (if i have been to impatient because there is another counter attck tell me and i'll finish the mission). great stuff. a 6/10 but will be higher when the ending works. I noticed when aborting it said something like script vc14 not found, if that will help at all. Keep up the good work :thumbsup:
GI-YO
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I played it though it was difficult and I had to use savegame cheat.... :-[ (Skill 0.5) My suggestion is that you suggest a certain skill value (ex.: 0.7 for good players) in the readme or the dialog.
I liked the intro too. It was good quality and the custom voices were a nice surprise as not many people make them.
Briefing was quite good. It had the intel, but it didn't get boring. The mission was difficult for me... Placing the NVA in those firing positions under these things was realistic, but the enemies stayed under them and in the end many enemies just lay there doing nothing.... And I didn't find the last NVA soldier so I had to cheat again :( (endmission)
The outro was nice. The two soldiers carrying the third one was impressive. Also the music made me laugh :)
This thing is quite high quality, but clearing the village is abit hard when you have to find the last quy lying under the bush.... though I quess nothing can be done to this...
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Just starting it. I liked the intro...bully bully...and what's a cluster fuck?
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Viet-Nam... haven't played one of these in a while ;D
I had forgotten how nasty these missions can get... you did well to remind me.
Overview- The Picture was good, stood out from the page etc.
- The text was very well written. It sold the mission well, got the pace up and made me feel excited :)
Intro- Does well to set the scene
- The sound (music from the radio as well as voices) seemed far too quiet. I suggest upping the volume a little
Briefing- The notes were very well written. They emphasised that the operation was not one to look forward to. The only criticism I have is that they were a little hard to read, due to being in one big block. I suggest breaking them up into paragraphs, with a break between each one.
- The link back to the plan page doesn't work (flaw in OFP's version of html). I suggest using 'click on the plan tab' or something similar.
- Instead of saying 'here, here, here etc.' I suggest use 'Northeast, Southeast west' etc. This just helps situational awareness a little.
- Possibly make it a bit clearer about which squad the player is in? It is hard to tell from the briefing (maybe make the marker a different colour or something?).
Mission- Again, all the radio calls were very quiet.
- NICE hot insertion... very atmospheric and well done :)
- The mission has that great feeling of being part of a large military operation. This ratchets up the atmosphere significantly.
- I took Dak To reasonably easily, and holed up for the expected counter attack.
- FAC spotted guys... it would have been nice if the FAC would mention the Armour though ;D
- CRAZY!! The only thing that came next was slaughter. I didn't manage to finish the mission... there were just too many bad guys. I suggest having them in waves, with a slight time delay between each. Simply to give the player a chance!
I was always getting killed from a new direction... it may just have been because my platoon got massacared, but I had an incredibly hard time of it...[/list]
Other than the difficulty level, this mission has all the hall marks of greatness :)
Possibly split up that counter attack (no need to reduce numbers) to make it a bit more manageable, and you'll have yourself a winner ;)
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Here we go, I played and while playing wrote my review so if its a little incoherent then soz. :P
Dak To:
overview: good pic, decent text
intro: good, bully bully again...
Don't get the cluster f#ck.
And the NVA wasted about 10 rounds each shooting the ameicans. Why not give each
"executioner" a dotarget to the appropriate prisoner, and use the fire command or fire
[AK47-, single] so its one shot maybe to the head, but not putting their Ak's on burst and
letting loose.
Briefing: I like how it is in the form of a memo with seperated parts. Looks good and
military. Though I found that the link back to the main page from execution made the page go
weird and not show the objective, but clicking the plan heading fixes it.
Mission:
Whoops! I didn't know the skill thing was for the enemy! Ahh! That does add to the
replayability though. Set it at 0.8, I'm screwed...
Okay, I wait and then get some radio messages I can't hear due to the huey's and the music.
We get in the air after our Huey does some funny touch and go with the ground.We fly to our
LZ and jump out. I hear something about bravo needing a medic, maybe someone hurt themselves
jumping out of the choppers?
Anyways we attack the enemy and get slaughtered. I throw grenades in the bunkers and then
take residence in the "big" gun bunker and get a M60. From there I kill a few more NVA and
obj complete.
Some choppers come in and let our troops off but some of the choppers get stuck to the
ground and crash or just go down somewhere. I find tons of NVa in town again and from my
hiding spot put down at least 10 of them. I run to outside the city amid ak leadthat's
flying around me to find, tada, a t54 in good condition. I use that to take care of the
remaining NVA and now I'm stuck with a bunch of americans who are angry at me for some
reason. Maybe I blew someone up by accident. I dunno...
But when I finished the last NVA off I found our reinforcement troops laying in the
crossroads and a bunch of NVA interspersed with them and no one was firing on each other. I
am very suspicious. I have'nt finished the mission yet because of this.
And I noticed all choppers are down and only one huey is still alive, but its :landed" and
won't go back into the air again.
Hope this helps, but if you could explain my situation, maybe I could finish the mission.
Cheers
GRK
@Sui, taking Dak To was easy? What are you on? :noo:
But I find those DVSHK machine gun bunkers are verrry good for putting down that counterattack.
@Hawkin's again: I noticed those little "objects" in the tents. Surprised me quite a bit after I ran up and put some M60 rounds in the NVA officer's head. I had the idea that tents would hide me a little, but noo. ;D
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Thank you very much guys! :) Some great stuff here, will help me alot. ;)
@GI-YO
the chopper doesn't land and we bail out (did you use the flyinheight command and eject to get this effect?)
Yep, it's a modified version of some old parajump script from flashpoint.net, which was the site back in the day. It's not foolproof, and it needs some touching up. :)
You should have the sqaud leader suggest which front to cover, its all a bit vague as to where the nva counter attack will come from...after one to many freindly fire incidents im executed by my leader! This time i pick up an RPD
It's ment to be a bit vague, but you're right. Due to the large open fields of Jungle Everon, the FAC's would have no problem spotting those troops. I'll do something to it. ;)
FF incidents are a pain, yes. :D Imagine this in thick jungle with triple canopy. ;D You gotta be sure what to shoot at, that's for sure. :)
Now not to sound to fussy but the NVA first used T55's from about 1970's onward, before that they used the PT76 amphibious tank so this is kinda historically inaccurate, but i'll let it slide.
True, was thinking of completly taking the tank away. I added it there by someones suggestion, can't remember. :o Wasn't too worried about accuracy, since the whole mission is a bit dodgy on the accuracy. ;)
I wait for a good 10 minutes but nothing happens so i grab and rpg and head down the road to see where that tank got to. I hit it down the road with 4 rpgs but it doesnt blow (this rpg has the armour penetration of a cat) and i kill the crew. still nothing happens so im guessing there is a bit of an error somewhere.
Hmm I though I fixed that one. :o It actually worked on the last few times I tested it. There's some NVA in good positions on the south side of the ville IIRC. It might be them. I'll take a look at it, and maybe add a enemy flee script or something similiar. :)
I noticed when aborting it said something like script vc14 not found, if that will help at all. Keep up the good work
Thank you for playing GI-YO! I'm glad you found time for this one. :) I think the vc14 error was a sounds error, since I have some vietnamese sounds in there, which the enemy shouts randomly, something that adds a bit to the athmosphere. ;)
@Epeli
I played it though it was difficult and I had to use savegame cheat....
No worries mate. ;) I use that all the time when beta testing. :)
Placing the NVA in those firing positions under these things was realistic, but the enemies stayed under them and in the end many enemies just lay there doing nothing.... And I didn't find the last NVA soldier so I had to cheat again
Yea they're well dug in. I'll fix the enemy not moving from the positions in the next version. ;)
The outro was nice. The two soldiers carrying the third one was impressive. Also the music made me laugh
Heh, tried to add something from FMJ to it, though the humour might not suite everyone. :) Glad you liked it. And yes, that song that plays there is one of the best from that timeline. ;)
Thanks for playing Epeli! :)
@GuiltyRoachKillar
The guy lost a poker game. ;) It's not that obvious I know, a nice table with some cards would be nice. *hint hint* :D
@Sui
The notes were very well written. They emphasised that the operation was not one to look forward to. The only criticism I have is that they were a little hard to read, due to being in one big block....The link back to the plan page doesn't work (flaw in OFP's version of html). I suggest using 'click on the plan tab' or something similar.
Yes you're right. I know the excuse of the briefing being just a 5 minute quick-fix from the old mission doesn't convince you. :P I'll touch it up. ;)
That error truely is an annoying one! :-\\ Will add the note to click the plan tab. :)
Instead of saying 'here, here, here etc.' I suggest use 'Northeast, Southeast west' etc. This just helps situational awareness a little.....Possibly make it a bit clearer about which squad the player is in? It is hard to tell from the briefing (maybe make the marker a different colour or something?)
Right again, will touch those up. :)
CRAZY!! The only thing that came next was slaughter. I didn't manage to finish the mission... there were just too many bad guys. I suggest having them in waves, with a slight time delay between each. Simply to give the player a chance!
Sh!t piles up so fast in 'Nam you need wings to stay above it. ;D Crazy was something I went after, to make the player feel alone. Though, making the attack in waves could be nice. I'll add a delay between the attacks. ;)
Thank you for playing Sui! :)
@GuiltyRoachKillar
And the NVA wasted about 10 rounds each shooting the ameicans. Why not give each "executioner" a dotarget to the appropriate prisoner, and use the fire command or fire [AK47-, single] so its one shot maybe to the head, but not putting their Ak's on burst and letting loose.
DoFire is used, I'll test with the two later ones too. ;)
Though I found that the link back to the main page from execution made the page go weird and not show the objective, but clicking the plan heading fixes it.
Will be fixed. :) I just love that small annoying error. :P
Whoops! I didn't know the skill thing was for the enemy! Ahh! That does add to the replayability though. Set it at 0.8, I'm screwed..
Next version will hopefully have a skill selection for both sides. :)
But when I finished the last NVA off I found our reinforcement troops laying in the crossroads and a bunch of NVA interspersed with them and no one was firing on each other. I am very suspicious. I have'nt finished the mission yet because of this
They're fraternizing with the enemy! Smoke 'em! ;D I ran into this bug too when the friendly reinforcements arrived. I've looked through the creation scripts and such, I have absolutely no idea what causes them to be on the east side. I'll look more into it, that's for sure. :)
Though, I'm glad to hear someone else had this error too. I started to think my computer has developed a mind of its own. :D
And I noticed all choppers are down and only one huey is still alive, but its :landed" and won't go back into the air again.
Another strange error, will be looked into. :)
I noticed those little "objects" in the tents. Surprised me quite a bit after I ran up and put some M60 rounds in the NVA officer's head. I had the idea that tents would hide me a little, but noo.
Boom! ;D
@All
Thank you very much for playing, this info will make the mission alot better. :) Next version will come soon, hopefully later tonight. Though I'll have to put my studying for final exams as first priority. :o Will try to get a new version out today, won't be studying all night. ;D
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Still havn't gotten round to testing :( I'll wait for you new version later on and then give it ago before bed :)
sim
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Hmm, those americans are on the east side?
No wonder they were shooting at me! ;D
I think I've still got my t54, they won't last long. ;)
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New version up!
Added stuff:
You will now get a piece of the action during the attack. Though I noticed that the friendly units might be a bit late sometimes. Should I make them come early enough to join the attack?
Friendly skill level selection added. You can now define the skill of units on both sides! Adds a bit more to replayability.
Made sounds a bit louder.
Briefing touched up...
Other stuff I can't possible remember... :)
Things from which I would like to hear your oppinion on:
1) Should I make the guys on 2nd platoon take part on the assault more, or do you as the player want to see some more action during the assault?
2) CAS, should I add some? Was thinking of adding it to the defence part. Possibly scripted, since I don't want to use any more addons. Though, I have a nice Skyrider or a Phantom here... ;) Some napalm...hmm? :D
3) Difficulty? Is it ok? Should there be more enemies? Less friendlies?
I think that's it. :) I hope you have fun playing! ;)
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Downloaded now, off to play in a bit :)
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Are you the "worldwide famous Hawkins of Hawknam"? ... If so, why don't you update your site at all?I drop in on almost each day and still there's no change at all!How about some new missions, mate?Have you become an REMF at last or what?And now, sticking to the point - on to the mission: yes, please, I'd love to see some action and to have some airstrikes at my disposition just like it was Nam for real. And don't hesitate to use any addons that only fit into the Vietnam war era: Nam fans just like us won't hesitate for too long, even if it requires to put a little effort into finding them. Others would always complain, so who cares?
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Love Nam. Will download after those bastard aliens keep shooting down my interceptors. I mean, how fair can it be? They got plasma and shit and I got bullets... >:(
I hate UFO: Enemy Unknown
:beat: *Gets Shot* :beat:
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Are you the "worldwide famous Hawkins of Hawknam"? ... If so, why don't you update your site at all?I drop in on almost each day and still there's no change at all!How about some new missions, mate?Have you become an REMF at last or what?And now, sticking to the point - on to the mission: yes, please, I'd love to see some action and to have some airstrikes at my disposition just like it was Nam for real. And don't hesitate to use any addons that only fit into the Vietnam war era: Nam fans just like us won't hesitate for too long, even if it requires to put a little effort into finding them. Others would always complain, so who cares?
Worldwide famous!? Damn. ;D
Sorry for not updating the site, I've been working almost full time with my final exams at college and some nasty 'Nam stuff, of which you can see pics at my site. ;) You can count that I'll start updating the site more. :) Just been a bit busy with RL.
You're right about the addons, what ever addon makes the 'Nam experience greater, one should use it. I'll add the CAS to the next version. :)
@dmakatra
Jump into the nearest time machine and transfer yourself back to the golden 60's, into the hot and dangerous jungle, where every bush is your enemy and where the monkeys bite. ;D
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Page Cannae Be Found when trying to download the mission. :-\
:beat: *Gets Shot* :beat:
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Hmm seems that my host is having some problems. I'll talk to him today to see what's going on. ;)
In the mean time, here's an alternative download link:
http://ofptf.net/users/Hawkins/Dak_To_v1_1_Beta2.zip
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Hey,Hawkins!I've just visited your site just like I am used to do almost each day and to my astonishment this time it's updted. Good!That's not much of an update, but even the furthest journey begins with a single step. I watched the pictures from the Ah Shit valley and I got pretty excited with the project. When you mean it, my question is wheter you are going to release something about the Rangers' struggle in there? If so, me and a friend of mine, both OFP/Nam maniacs, would be more than over the moon to see that finally released. We've been reading some books on the subject recently like "L company LRRPs in Vietnam" or "Blood on the risers" by Leppelman. It's time somebody took care of the Rangers' contribution in the Vietnam war, I mean - somebody who knows the subject backrounds. Dark Angel was doing something like that in his project, a campaign supposed to be called "Shadow valley", but I doubt if it's still on. So, all our hope is thus put in you along with lots of trust. good luck.
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Oh, I forgot to mention: Rangers lead the way!
Bill Lee, sgt 1st class, H Company (Ranger), 75th Infantry
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Hoping to release a new version today. Just have to test some new stuff out myself. I've inlcuded the CAS and, hopefully, solved the problem with those US soldiers being on the NVA side.
Burroughs,
We've been reading some books on the subject recently like "L company LRRPs in Vietnam"
That book is on my "to-read" list. ;) Currently waiting for another book to arrive, but after that one I'm going to order that. So, you can at least expect missions based on the events described in that book once the island is released. ;)
EDIT:
And, I kept my promise, almost. Missed by 56 minutes, finnish time that is. Anyways, had to redo some radiovoices since they went crazy after I turned their volume up. :o New version available from the first post. Don't forget to download Footmunch's great F4, which can be also found on the first post. ;)
EDIT2:
Oh forgot to add, there's a small bonus (or actually 6 of them) for those who finish the mission. The bonus is randomly selected, so that alone should encourage you to play the mission again. ;) I wont tell what they are, you just have to look yourself.
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This mission is just about ready I think Hawkin. One or two little fixes and it'll be ready to go.
I thought your little bunkers were shit hot. I might have to borrow them myself. ::) Even after I thought everyone was dead there was still the possiblity of getting zapped by someone hiding in a bunker. I liked it. Also, I'm glad that you were'nt afraid of using the CoC mines. Lots of people think its too hard with them but I think it rocks. I was nailed by one in a tent. Doh!
First I'll go through the two errors I found then I'll go on about what I think would enhance the mission further.
Errors
I noticed two things while playing the mission.
First was a big error message which filled the top of the screen. I didn't catch what it was in full but it had something about "moveincargo heko 2" in it.
Second was a bit of text that shouldn't have been present in the radio message from Kilo Red 1 "...run complete give us a call..." was part of the message.
Misc Ideas
The mission as it stands is top quality. Its nice to see that someone out there is still making missions properly. However, and isn't there always, I think one or two things could make it better still.
I love to watch air support going in. I think it would be beneficial to have the cloud cover, and fog, clear a bit so we watch the Phantom doing its stuff. It would look really cool seeing the bad guys getting toasted.
The only other thing really is that I think its too short. It would make a great mission in a campaign series.
I hope you get this finished and released soon. It'll definatly be one I keep.
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Thank you The-Architect! :)
There indeed was an error in one of my scripts, which creates some reinforcements that are sent to Dak To if too many west loons die. That's been fixed. :)
Also the issue with the Phantom not showing up, I made it make another run, and if you don't see that, the player has to be blind. :D "Get into your holes down there boys..."
About the campaign, this actually is/was the first mission of a 4-5 mission mini-campaign. I have all the missions ready, but I'm not totally sure I'll release those. There's so much other "nasty 'Nam stuff" I have here that is more top priority. ;D Though, I will release one more beta of this one, and if there's no big troubles with it, I'll wrap it up as final. ;)
Thanks again for the kind words. :)
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No probs.
The issue with the Phantom.
I did see it fly past. However, I was saying that I wanted to watch it. The cloud cover meant I just caught a flash as it went by. No matter though, its not really relevant.
Maybe you couyld take a look at my latest mission. Its an early beta. The link is in my signature.
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Any updates on this Hawkins mate?
:)
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Yep, I have a new version for this one. Waiting for a few sounds, but if you want, I can post the new version which has some placeholder sounds until I get the ones I'm waiting for. ;)
The new version features more bar'b'que and probable FF incidents if you get too close. ;)
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Yes Hawkins if you dont mind plz post the new version would like to try it out sounds really good from what ive just read ,,,,As always keep up the good work ;)
Quang tri
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OFP 1.96 vet mode, bench 5895, no super ai
played in mods\ folder
Readme:
no reference to the F4 phantom
potentially incorrect version number (b3 eg)
Overview:
a careful study of the pic shows the favorite sneaky bunker.
The red text unfortunately is almost illegable at that size.
Although the revision is in the pic, there is no author advertising.
Intro:
Is very well put together and tells a story. The choice of bold lowercase arial is very good.
The use of the music means that even if a storyline weren't present, there would be good situation awareness of the mission to follow, where we are, where they are and etc.
Great sound of parrot. Just right.
The Jeep moving 3 meters makes no sense at all. I would have cut the bit with them getting in and just show a shot of the jeep coming into camera view and stopping.
Briefing:
Plan:
Well written but a little too terse on the front page. A link direct to where we will kick off out of the chopper would be helpful.
The map is too noisy. There is at least one typo, sqaud
The notes are very good
There is no gear selection. Fine
The group is puzzling. There is a single recruit amongs all experts. This is strange and not explained. I can imagine he's a fly in replacement, but I need an explanation why the rest of us ar so sh*t hot.
Mission:
The skill indicator is damn useful, makes a replay game inevetible, That's good, not apparent though who's skill is who. I selected max-on for both.
I like that bold arial font very much.
The wait for the chopper is well done. gives player a chance to get adjusted. Particularly to unfamiliar jungle scenery. Visually, it's a winner with the 3? hueys coming in. great atmosphere.
Yep, in flight, I immediately disliked that first briefing page again, I really didn't want to scroll around for myself to find out where' i'd land. A single target marker is needed, even just dak to would do.
The mission itself plays well. There's confusion, probably deliberate, with loons at 2'oclock. At a certain point Bravo squad mix in with them and get caught in the crossfire.
All comments re hidden bunkers from others, from me too, they're damn good.
BUG
Hunt the last loon
the remnants of the other two squads remain, centre town, admiring the sky. I clean out a bunker extreme south road, and another, extreme west road. Loons are generally hiding in or around them. Not clear to me, but i think they are the remnants of the original defenders. Either way mission wont end till I find the very last one, and that shouldn't be necessary. It's only me, doing any work.
-endmission
Outro:
confused by why a single escaping loon was shot
confused why the reference to John Wayne.
The nudes appeared to be authentic 1960's material.
SHOWSTOPPER
missing MIF_CIGGY\Mif_Ciggy.Clouds.sqs
OFP hangs in the black screen of death,
Overall:
Very good use of authentic music to set the scene and a credible attack on a viet-minh held town. A credible counter attack also. The napalm or whatever was happening from the sky was a waste, I was in no position to see it, let alone, would I dare watch it (I was defending east side)
Rating:
7, if the black screen of death and hunt last loon bug are removed.
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Thank you for playing mikero! :)
no reference to the F4 phantom
potentially incorrect version number (b3 eg)
Cheers for that, I forgot to update the readme it seems. :) Will do it for the next version.
Although the revision is in the pic, there is no author advertising.
Yep, I don't usually add my name in there, that's what the readme is for IMO. ;)
The Jeep moving 3 meters makes no sense at all.
Tried to simulate a soldier checking papers there, might add some speech to it, with the guard saying "Ok your clear to go sir" or sth like that.
Great sound of parrot. Just right.
It's actually a monkey. ;D No worries though, first heard it in my mates mission and thought it was a parrot.
The briefing, yes many have said that it should have a brief info on what the players squad does. I'll add some notes to it made by the squad leader. It should be sufficent. :)
The skill indicator seems to change the select x skill on either cases when you slide one of the sliders, I'll look more into it.
BUG
Hunt the last loon
Solved in the future version, I made a script for the enemy which is in the current version too but it didn't work. It's now fixed and the enemy moves into the center of the town. IIRC, I also made the remaining friendly forces move into their own flanks, waiting for the enemy.
About the outro, the NVA soldier was trying to escape when a guard saw him (Something out of the movie FMJ which I though might fit into the mission).
John Wayne reference was used when some loon did something like killed an enemy soldier and seemed proud of it, and his friends or fellow squadmates would ask, "Who do you think you are? John Wayne?". :)
The nudes appeared to be authentic 1960's material.
They sure are. I've added girls from january, february, march, april, may and june to the mission. They're randomly selected at the end and all are from 1968. ;)
SHOWSTOPPER
missing MIF_CIGGY\Mif_Ciggy.Clouds.sqs
Now that's weird. Did you get it in the mission or somewhere else? In the main menu maybe? That shouldn't happen in the mission itself. It's almost impossible. :o
The napalm or whatever was happening from the sky was a waste, I was in no position to see it, let alone, would I dare watch it (I was defending east side)
Fixed in the future update. You'll wish that you had a foxhole to dig into when you see it. ;)
Again, thanks for playing mikero! :)
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>check papers.
THAT makes perfect sense.
>parrot.
there are no monkeys in vietnam, only Polar Bears, and ,,, parrots.
Regradless, where it happened and when it happened was perfect. I admire authors who know when to back off the gas pedal and understate things. Now realise that that was why I though it so good.
>author advertising
for my future savage attacks on other people's creations. 8) Are you saying this is a bad idea (tm) or I'm right to at least suggest it? As in not necessarily in the readme? Do you think it too noisy, too crass? Please convince me not to include such comment if you feel I'm strongly wrong.
>showstopper
it only appeared after the advertorial to play mission again.
I play the entire vietnam thing, ALL addons, ALL anims, everything, out of mods\ folders. It could be me?
I dont alow anything in standard ofp folders for hopefully obvious reasons.
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for my future savage attacks on other people's creations. 8) Are you saying this is a bad idea (tm) or I'm right to at least suggest it? As in not necessarily in the readme? Do you think it too noisy, too crass? Please convince me not to include such comment if you feel I'm strongly wrong.
Hehe, it's ok to suggest it mate. :) I just find the readme a better place to add the authors name and contact details. Some find that the overview is a good place too since (unfortunately) some people don't read the readme at all, and if they do read it, they read it once, when they first download the mission. :) Hell, usually when I make MP missions I add the contact details to the notes section in the briefing. ;D It's good to make suggestions, I always consider every suggestion I get from beta testers. The overview is a great place to add your name and e-mail if the mission maker wants to do so. :)
Sometimes when you don't have the island's anim folder in the main addons folder (OperationFlashpoint\AddOns), and when you go back to the main menu, the last thing you did (played a mission or edited one) will play on the backround. Since OFP looks for anims in the main AddOns folder, it can't find some scripts that are used in for example your own mission. So that's why I asked about the main menu thing. :) I also play with my 'Nam mod folder and don't have any unofficial addons in my addons or res\addons folders. Though, I put island anim folders to the main addons folder so I can view the island anims and avoid the above mentioned problem. :) Mod folders rock, but it's a shame that island anims only work from the main addon folder.
I hope that made some sense, english isn't my first language. :P
Stay tuned for the new version, which will (hopeffully) be released today. :)
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Ok fellas, latest version uploaded! Still waiting for some sounds and in the mean time, I've added some placeholders for them. New version includes:
- More of that nasty napalm. Does it hit the northeast side when you play?
- Enemy units now move to center of town for a last stand once they've lost enough buddies
- Friendly units now have their own parts of town they need to clear. They will stay and defend that part when the enemy comes.
Can't think of anything else I added... :) Grab it from the first post!
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I gave the older version a go yesterday and it was a good fun and a bit challenging gameplay, but surely I'm going for this one, too.
Bill Lee, s/p 4, 101st Airmobile
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Ok, I started to do a full write up and have decided to scrap it. As too should this version, it is dreadfull
choppers crash into each other sometimes.
Objective Complete
the hell it is. I have a centre town Mnest to deal with, I ran and checked that 3 THREE low bunkers south of mash still had nasties in them, and so on.
The 1st phase aircraft attack is misleading, What is it doing? Is the very bad drone in the signal deliberate? If so, fine.
The second phase, the napalm is not visually there. I ran back northeast because the voicovers gave me a clue to where it might be, but gamewise, I would naturally be south of Mash tents since this is where I would finish cleaning out last of loons.
There are way over the top too many nasties for any napalm to have any effect as a single burst and, at that time, there are so many call outs of enemy at 100 and 50 meters this visual would be the last thing on my mind.
Call for more if you need it?
well, yes please but frankly, why not just keep delivering the stuff thanks?
NO NO NO. Your mission is fine, but this release is a disaster
PS have checked all the better bits, intros and all, it's the mission i am screaming about.
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Thank you for the continued interest Mikero. :)
I played around with the mission for around 2 hours yesterday, looking for anything suspicious. The napalm did hit off the target, and it seems that there's some errors with the plane dropping it's load. It's not my fault, though, must be an error with the addon.
There's two ways around this, I either remove the napalm sequence all together, or I use that single napalm addon. I also have a script for the napalm so I can simulate a flyby and add a radio action for it. Hmm... Maybe I should make the player be the RTO so he can call in bombers? What do you think?
Choppers didn't hit each other when I played, though a few times one got shot down. Was thinking of adding some sidechat to that, the pilot screaming bloody murder when he's shot down. "RPG! Holy shit! We're going down!" ;)
NO NO NO. Your mission is fine, but this release is a disaster
That was bound to happen sometime with this complex mission and OFP's built in randomness. ;D I'm grateful that you played it even though there were some faults, thank you. :)
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@Hawkins
please drill down to the fundamental issue here that objective complete occurs before all nasties are removed from the town. There were at least 4 that I checked and I suspect many more in other bunkers.
The player cannot move about, look at, or admire what-happens-next, until that town is truly cleared.
I can't give you constructive, or destructive, comment on anything else (napalm eg) until I have a free zone. I'm too busy staying alive.
If this proves impossible, then alter the construct so that napalm eg, and the ferocious counter attack eg, become seamless, that there is no objective complete (from player's perspective) at this stage, simply a continous whole of a lot of things going bang.
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I'm too busy staying alive.
That's exactly the thing I've been aiming for. ;D The player has to fight for his life to accomplish the mission. :)
please drill down to the fundamental issue here that objective complete occurs before all nasties are removed from the town. There were at least 4 that I checked and I suspect many more in other bunkers.
I took care of that in the current dev version I have. The NVA soldiers that refuse to leave their bunkers will get a nasty surprise. ;) Also the issue with NVA still alive when the objective ticks, has also been fixed. Now the town has to be clear in order for it to be ticked.
I'll try to work out the napalm thing. If the player already is struggling to stay alive, I think making him the RTO and being responsible for his buddies lifes might be too much. Or would it? 8) I'll see what I can do. ;)
I can put in a radio command (just for beta testing) that sets the player to captive so testers can check the stuff out and see how they go?
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>>I'm too busy staying alive.
>That's exactly the thing I've been aiming for.
Then it's not been achieved. And the reason for that is there is too much else going on that is not consistent with what the player 'thinks' she has to achieve.
This is the mistake all high value mission makers such as yourself encounter. You give the player a sense of failing when she succeeds!!!
objective complete.
well, umm no, >>I<< didn't
go look at the fireworks
umm, I can't
1 down 2 down 3 down mission complete
but i didn't save my squad? I didn't know where to go.
loons everywhere, mission complete, splat splat zing
but, umm. >>>>I<<<< haven't finished yet.
In otherwords, she survived, she succeeded, she stayed alive. And failed.
I can see the half-construct, I love missions where it's smoke and bangs and nastiness around every corner. I love chaos and deep deep doodoo.
The mistake you are making is trying to tone it down!!! Ie setting game pauses by clearing the village alerting player to a fresh counter attack, changing mood sequence by looking out for napalm as if these were 'objectives' to achieve. They aren't.
Suggestion: scrap all feedback, all of it, scrap ALL msg text, the lot. No radio traffic of any kind, no titletext, nada.
play the mission through, let the triggers happen that happen.
THEN put back some message traffic in QUIET moments.
when the player sees an F4 coming in, let her wonder, let her be amazed, you keep quiet.
>RTO
if you make a player leader with a half dead squad, you have to watch out for player sense of failure. Unless she can keep the remnants alive, there will be a feeling of despondency, a let down, for the player at the end.
I've got no issue with you Hawkins introducing experimental stuff in beta missions, seeing if the napalm looks good, is inherently 'good'. The issue is poor choreography, too much instruction, too much mission text, let the game play itself.
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Good mission Hawkins.
Finally got round to playing it, James Myers freaky! I had him pencilled in for the unsung demo campaign guy :o
lol
Anyways...
Mission was extrememly well put together, voice acting was kool, even though it did seem a bit cheesey :P
Loved running up the hill and watching the trasers go over my head, that was brill. Glad to be more involved in the first firefight now :)
I moved forward taking people out untill a lucky bastard got a shot off on my head and I mysteriously died ::)
Didn't have time to play after that so I'll have another whirl later, like the onplayerkilled aswell, that was nice ;)
sim
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Sim, thanks for playing! :)
Glad you liked the mission! You guys also have one James Myers in your campaign? :o
Yes the voice acting might have went a bit over the line, at least one some points, but I though I'd let it run, just this once. ;D
I'm glad you liked the onplayerdeath. :) I kinda got fed up with the old one, and the one I use felt better and more fitting to the mission. ;)
Oh, and the best of luck to you and the rest of the Unsung team! I'm eagerly waiting to play with your 'Nam units, and especially the campaign you're making. :)
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Glad you liked the mission! You guys also have one James Myers in your campaign? :o
Yes I was rather freaked out about this! :-\
Ah well two great minds think alike :P
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Hi, here is my take on the mission!
Intro
One word: Wow! Cool 60ies music, voice overs, perfect camera, and the text is even on the bottom of the screen and does not distract the player.
Overview
Nice shot of the bunkers we will be facing.
Briefing
I liked the military style as well, pretty clean and good information.
Mission
Bailed out of the helicopter (no crashes during my playing run), stepped on a mine in the village.
Retry. Looks like I must be blind, because I did not see the F-4 on the second run, neither the napalm strike itself.
I encountered only one wave during counter attack, this means to me the mission was not THAT hard, just the right difficulty. And there has never been any tank.
I'm a bit confused about the bunkers. After I cleared the village center and defeated the counterattack I found a single bunker on the south road, cleared it and then -endmission.
Should there be several more?
Outro
Cool music, good scenery and nice idea with the medics. Good Idea with the pin-ups after the outro. I was thinking of replaying the mission when: "missing addon: CIGGY_cloudlets" ---> screen went black. What a pity that this bug is still present. Otherwise it is an excellent mission.
Greetings
Mathias
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Thanks for playing Mathias! The version on this site is obsolete, I've posted the final version on my site here. (http://tuote.org/~black-beret/) I forgot to mention that here. :-X
The bug with the cloudlets, that's very weird. I've never ever got that error. If it shows up when you go back to the main menu, then the script is still playing after the mission and the island intro that's on jungle everon is trying to find it, but without luck. I've had a few other guys test the mission and neither reported that bug. :-\
About the bunkers, yes there are more. There's at least 5, maybe 6, can't remember for sure.
The napalm in the other version should be more visible, I at least hope so. There was some errors with the addon itself so I remove it all together, though it's kinda cool IMO when it does work, dunno.
The enemy counter attack waves all come a bit off from the next wave, so the player has a chance to survive. There's a total of 3 waves I think. You shouldn't have to wait for the other waves that long though, but there's just enough time to get some more ammo if needed.
The tank, it has been removed. ;)
Again, thanks for playing Mathias! :)
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Hi!
Thanks for you update on your mission, I will play it next week, because I liked it. Do you still appreciate feedback on the updated version or is it already finished?
Greetings
Mathias
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I always appreciate feedback. :) The word "final" doesn't mean a thing, it's just a word. Good feedback on missions is always welcome, even if it has the word "final". So yes, I would love to hear your feedback on it. :)
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Hi Hawkins!
Played the final version again and I liked it as well.
But sadly thi CIGGY_cloudlet bug remains. Also, I decided to stay in the relative security of the village so I did not attempt to find the other 4-5 bunkers.
I like your style very much and I am looking forward to more missions from you.
Greetings
Mathias
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Thank you Mathias! :)
I will curse that ciggy error to hell. ;D I'll look into it, thoroughly. :)
And about missions, you can count on that there will be more 'Nam missions from me. ;) This is just the calm before the storm...
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Hey,Hawkins - where's the HawkNam?I mean - how much longer is it going to be offline?And when is the beginning of the storm?Any Ranger/MACV SOG missions ready to deploy me back into the steamy South Asian hell? ...
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Benchmark 6410, ECP, Vet mode, no super AI
Nice intro. Works well and is atmospheric.
All stuff in briefing was simple, well laid and to the point, no typo's that I noticed.
Mission starts and I get 2 sliders up. Hmmm. Sorry, no heroics from me, Friendly 1, Enemy 0. :D
The choppers turn up in a very nicely choreographed move with lots of chopper dust. Love it! Move on and get ejected from chopper in an interesting way. Must have a look at that. ;)
Can't report accurately how this started, suffice to say you had the desired effect of what appeared to be a fairly major battle going on. With no lag either. Chopper gets shot down and I lose most of my squad getting up the hill. Get to road and leader dies, so I'm in charge.
One niggle. Combat ambience. I'm not a big fan. In theory it should work but because it's a sound effect heard for 4 years or so it's a little tiring. Maybe a different sound effect could be used or just rely on the actual battle for the ambience.
Carry on towards the town and apart from a few scattered AK rounds going off it seems quiet. Get lazy and get whacked by a bunker. Hmmm, not noticed them. See custom death cam, nice.
Retry. This time doesn't go quite so well. Get injured pretty early on and most of my squad are down. Crawl on my belly towards the town, take out the first bunkers and hear some DHSK fire. More bunkers, if you have constructed these, good job. They are evil. :-X
My heart lifts when I see a med-tent and I start to crawl towards it and I'm introduced to Death-Cam again. Bah.
And again.
And again. X4
The downside to Death-Cam is that I can't get to retry quick enough. ;)
Finally clear the town and Hint box and radio message appear. I use this opportunity to finally try and get to the medtent. Get whacked by a loon by the med-tent. Harumph.
Also at this point notice a dude in the medtent and after healing I head towards the napalm to have a look and notice a MG sticking out of a wall. Whack it.
Don't know what to say about the next bit apart from it was very very messy and me getting very acquainted with Mr Death-Cam. Also wondering if you've played an evil trick with those difficulty sliders and made them the opposite of what I'm expecting.
Despite it being very addictive I have to call it a night. This needs a restart and hopefully more west will survive because I'm on my own and definitely feel outnumbered and outclassed. This is tough!
No bugs so far though. ;)
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Thanks for playing MrN! :)
The sliders should be the right way around, I've checked this many times. In fact I just checked it, it was the right way around. ;D
Didn't pay that much attention to the combat ambience, I use my own set of sounds in OFP. :P
It's good to hear that you played with ECP, since I myself made the mission with that. It ran smooth on my comp too and I didn't even get any ECP errors, so it's nice to hear that you made it out without any too. :)
Yes the downside of the deathcam is indeed that the retry takes a bit longer to pop up. Though, that should encourage the player to try and stay alive. :P ;D
I'm glad you enjoyed the mission! This is just a small "throw your brain out of the window and kill them all" type of mission, a remake of my first one which was made back in the day when OFP 'Nam was just a newborn child. :) Thanks for the excellent feedback!
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Grrrr. Determined to finish this but you appear to have implemented a hunt MrN script that I have yet to find.
"that should encourage the player to try and stay alive"
Trust me I'm trying. ;)
The hint box that indicates the area is clear lies, might be an idea to just bring in the reinforcements rather than having messages.
First napalm strikes to the far west. Second napalm strikes to the North east but doesn't seem effective. I don't even see or hear the plane I just hear a faint "Karump" as the bombs go off. How about, dare I say it, giving target control for the napalm to the player. I've been playing around with LCD's Airstrike + Napalm (map click) script which is pretty cool. The only downside is that you need the napalm.pbo addon. But lets face it, people playing ‘Nam missions should have it anyway.
This is a nasty nasty mission. I like it!
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The hint box that indicates the area is clear lies, might be an idea to just bring in the reinforcements rather than having messages.
I felt the same thing. I was busy rooting out a few of many bunkers with all these messages going on that clearly weren't ahem, quite right, and then saving my backside from loon attacks north and south. I felt the mission would flow better if it all just happened.
It's a great mission Hawkins, one of the best Nam ones out there, probably the best. It's spoilt by messy ending bits. So many Nam's are poorly done with expectations on the author and players part that the eye candy alone is good enough when it isn't. This mission is fierce and I know it's been a long time since you first developed it, that you're into far more interesting things, but I hope you finish it off. It's way above average.
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Thanks for the continuing interest guys! :) This mission is getting better by every beta test you make.
I've removed the hints, they surely were too much, considering that there's radio traffic.
I've taken the F4 out, completly. The napalm it has just seems to be way too buggy to use. The fire effect seems not to be tied to the bomb itself, which usually leads in the fire burning somewhere else and the bomb dropping miles from it. I'm considering of implementing the other napalm, by shogun. I probably wont let the player deside the drop positions, though. ;)
Now a few questions for you testers:
Do you want to have more control over your weapon? If yes, I can change the mags to non-HD for the player only. Though, if he picks up mags from dead loons, then he would have HD mags.
Should the mission be longer? Maybe a small submission where you need to go on a seek and destroy mission to destroy fleeing NVA? If there's enough men left after the attack, that is. ;)
Again, thanks for testing! :)
EDIT: Hmm I lied a bit, I didn't completly take the F4 off, I still use it. It just doesn't drop its own nape now. :)
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@Hawkins
I have a few dissapointments with nam missions in general. They are:
loons are almost always past stupid. They invariably sit there waiting to be shot or can't see you and run right past, or worse, your team ignores them.
the topogrophy, the landscape: nam causes targeting to go out to lunch. You can visually see the buggers at 70 metres but nothing can 'identify' them. This is particularly noticeable on any terrain with wispy ferns eg. It's as if the engine treats everything below 2 meters depth as building.
The weapons are attrocious. Using high dispersion (HD) was I believe introduced by BAS and while good in that it prolongs a firefight on *good* weapons, with this crud, it just makes it unmerciful.
The engine appears to be working so hard on the visuals for the island (and the island class underneath the island, in fact three in total) that it sacrifices game play. Basically, there's no crunch left, to give loons of either side any smarts at all. This is almost bearable with tweaks, for loons, but I've yet to meet a vehicle that can go in a straight line, let alone shoot.
You 'got round' many of these issues by effectively removing armor (the plane *would* be an issue here and a big one), by using town terrain (and therefore eliminating grass 'buildings', and, somehow, i don't know how, giving *some* loons *some* fierceness. There are however many loons that are not fierce, are just plain stupid, and cause the hunt the last loon bug. This is noticable on bunkers extreme west and extreme south. All other places are inexplicably unpleasant (that's great), particularly, the center mgun. SO whatever you've done, you're three quarters on the money.
I'm also playing, like you, the riverboat mission here. It's in the same class as yours, thematically immersive, genuine feeling of US grunts and the VC, but it too suffers from attrocious ai, much worse than yours, and I'm sufficiently p*ssed at it that I doubt 'nam has very much to offer game wise, only candy wise.
I haven't played enough nam to 'know' if ai is always this crappy, I mean real crappy. I hope you can restore my faith a bit and prove me wrong because I'm not inclined to bother with this Island ever again. For sp players, there's too much frustration and it might be consigned to MP roles, much like 'grasslands' is.
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Not looking forward to the kicking I'm going to get then. :P
Do you want to have more control over your weapon?
Not sure if this is going to be useful because as you say any ammo picked up is going to be HD. Anyway that's part of the fun, the tension of not being able to hit anything.
Should the mission be longer?
Only if it's not any harder!
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@Mikero
That's some good feedback! I think you should post that to the VTE forums too. :)
Jungle Everon is indeed outdated. It was a groundbreaker when it came out, but now it's just another "old" island. The new ones have more dense foliage, with some working and some not. It's a matter of how the objects were made. Depending on the development of the model, the AI can see or it cannot see through the foliage. This has been a pain for us for sometime now, since there just doesn't seem to be a good way around this with the current engine. If you place a square, the AI wont see through cracks or leafs that make openings like fore example a texture with leafs, even though the player does. But, once the AI detects the player, the knowsabout goes high and the AI will see the player even though he is hiding behind the "square". After time the knowsabout will go down, but it wont drop to zero even if you teleport the guy to the other side of the island. So, once the AI sees the player or any other enemy, they will shoot, and will keep on shooting if they have a clear sight and there's no solid objects on the way... I hope that made some sense. :D
So basically we can't create a "good" terrain for jungle maps. There will be problems, but with some tweaking (as you mentioned Mikero), we can at least try to make the 'Nam experience as good as we can. It is possible for a player to hide in a grass patch without the AI seeing you even though he walks right past you (for example SOG and other recon teams in 'Nam had these situations). That has happened to me many times, and I can tell you, my heart was pounding like crazy when there was a 9-man NVA squad stopping to take a break right in the middle of our 4-man recon team. :) (In OFP, of course. ;D )
I'm pretty sure your faith will be (at least to some extent) restored. :)
Edit: This mission has been reviewed and is available from the Missions Depot (http://www.ofpec.com/missions_depot/index.php?action=details&id=70).