OFPEC Forum

Missions Depot => Mission Discussion => Topic started by: Eviscerator on 27 Apr 2003, 23:05:30

Title: Black Hawk Down
Post by: Eviscerator on 27 Apr 2003, 23:05:30
Ok, before seeing the film myself i have seen hundreds of threads talking about a Black Hawk Down mission, or mod, and to be honest, i was wondering what all the fuss was about, after seeing the film (a couple of days ago), and watching it again, and again, and again (I'm up to about 5 times now) I'm yet again wondering why people want a Black Hawk Down mission, it REALLY[/i] does not suit OFP, close combat in ofp is clumsy, OFP doesnt do cities well, at all, it doesnt handle lots of AI well and the AI flys the helicopters too poorly to be able to do the manouvers seen in the film, also, the player would die too easily and with no respawn in single player it would be a very boring mission, what ofp does do well is what was seen reasonably near the start of the movie, where the Deltas capture the arms dealer by taking out the car, or where they pick up an operative who has just got information, this is where mission makers should make assaults on small villages, or terrorist camps which ofp does do well, all in all BHD is a bad mission idea for OFP, if you really must insist on a BHD mission, try the official game, it has an engine and a city catered for this type of warfare, and it saves us addon makers from having to recreate it and it turning out worse than the official game...

So please, lets not have hundreds more threads about people trying to get someone to make a BHD mission for them...
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: asmodeus on 27 Apr 2003, 23:21:59
I must say I wholeheartedly agree with you Eviserator!  I don't have the time or want to put forth the effort to overcome those obstacles...

Some people might see what you've described as a challenge, but I hope those people will be people that can actually make something happen instead of being all talk.   ;)  

Asmo
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Messiah on 28 Apr 2003, 01:05:44
i made a mission a while back like the choppers taking out the car.... ermm, didnt turn out to much tho - but sure is fun to play
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: futurehornetdriver on 28 Apr 2003, 01:26:05
everybody and their mama wants to make a BHD mission..all I have to say is GET OFF THE BANDWAGON....there a much more things ofp can be used for than to beat a horse that is already been beaten to death..if someone wants to play bhd buy the game from novalogic..I too agree with Eviscerator the engine doesn't suit urban combat type missions and there's other "topics" that could be better represented in ofp...my two cents...
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Iwesshome on 28 Apr 2003, 03:42:48
But you guys are forgetting something.... Yes, the subject is old and no one has turned out a successful, worth playing mission yet but who cares? If I want to spend a month or two designing a city or urban block and spend hours putting together scripts or setting up flight path for helo's why does it effect you?

I don't criticize the hundreds of other designers out there who do or don't turn out useful or already played to death missions... I am not even claiming to be a good mission designer. I just expect from my OFP community to be jugged on the type of mission and enjoyment of game play I might design.

As you stated OFP cannot handle hundreds of people but there are tons of scripts to fix that issue... Cannot handle cities? I have not yet scene a full fledge city yet... heard but not scene. Crappie AI Choppers? Agreed but with a little patience and some altering of storyline and design you can accomplish some of your effect.  

Why so much hatred? If you want to go down that road... good for you, if you don't... good for you too. We should limit the amount of topics that continue to pop up and limit it to one post but let them have whatever fun they want  ;D

IW
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Phantom on 28 Apr 2003, 06:47:09
the "black hawk down" situation wasn't all in buildings, it was around them mainly, using them for cover.

although the movie isn't quite on target as the book, have a look, and only a few bits at the end are in buildings, and even then, they're just sentry's.

IW's right, it can be done, just need  patience
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: KTottE on 28 Apr 2003, 09:01:24
The 'Black Hawk Down' mission everyone is proposing is what happens after the Rangers and Deltas are given the go-code Irene in the movie, I presume.
Let's break that down into details:

Here's how many vehicles and troops you'll need


Let's summarize.
That is 36 + 32 + 26 + 50 + 12 + 20 = 176 AI controlled troops. (Well, 175 AI controlled, one player controlled)
Not only is that a stress on OFP, because it needs to draw the soldiers, and keep track of them using the CPU and the memory.
Then to that we add vehicles. 4 + 8 + 8 + 6 = 26 vehicles.
Vehicles which are harder for the OFP engine to keep track of, because they consist of more polygons, more selections, more proxies.
So that will drain more CPU, more memory and more GPU power.

To this we add the huge city terrain which we'll need, which will be damned hard to construct and get to run well.
I'm running a good system (AMD XP 2000+ 1.66GHz, 256mb DDR, GF4MX440) and I notice a hit on the performance when I enter say Petrovice. That is just outside the houses, but it still adds to what the OFP engine and my computer has to deal with.
So making a city which simulates Mogadishu would not be a good idea, because only those with enough money to stay at the leading edge would even be able to play it.

Then we'll need to do a lot of CQB, and, like Evis said, this is not one of OFP's strongpoints.

Then you'd need to come up with a way of making the AI drivers drive exactly where you wanted them. That goes for the 5ts, HMMWV's, Blackhawks, Littlebirds and Technicals.
Because you know how stupid the AI is when it gets into a town whilst on the ground, and the choppers would either crash into eachother or into a house if you didn't keep an eye on them.


This mission is not suitable for OFP. You could make heavy alterations to the mission, but then it wouldn't be Black Hawk Down anymore, so what would be the point?

I'm not trying to rain on anybody's parade, but you shouldn't pursuit near impossible goals either.
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Messiah on 28 Apr 2003, 12:38:24
but kotty, thats assuming you do the whole black hawk down scenario in one mission...

if you were to make several missions to form the whole combat, then those numbers are seriously cut down....

1 mission for insertion at chalks (no convoy needed or as many militia)

1 mission for convoy coming in to pick up hostages after insertion (no need for all the blackhawks now)

etc etc


it can be done, just would require alot of work.
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Phantom on 28 Apr 2003, 13:31:29
it was 19 choppers over all.

and messiah is right, it'd be pointless to do it all in one mission, for one people would get fed up for getting heaps far through it then dying.

mission by mission would be fine, there's a script somewhere which will rollover what u had from the last mission. but base it on the book, because in the movie they don't get re-armed.
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Iwesshome on 28 Apr 2003, 14:28:27
KTotte,

I have tested somewhat your troop theory and so far it works for me in my constructed demo mission with no lag.... My setup

(5) Front Humvees (5 men x 5 = 25m)
(3) 5-Ton (3 men x 3 = 9 m)
(4) Back Humvees (5 men x 4 = 20m)

(4) MH-6 (2 men x 4 = 8m)
(4) Black hawks (2 men x 4 = 8m)

Total = 70 (Works Fine)

Still Building

4x 4 Man Delta Teams
4x 12 Man Ranger Teams
1x CSAR Bird (Pilot, Gunner & 2 Medics)
1x C2 Bird (Pilot, Gunner & 2 Officers)
2x AH-6 (Pilot and Gunner)

Final Count = 150 (Haven't tested)

Planned Idea

Now I was told the more of the same type of troops or object you have in OFP the faster the engine will run because it doesn't waste a lot of time trying to load different objects.

Ideas - Mission1

1. Troops lift off it opening sequence (Intro)
2. Delta and Rangers insert (Mission)
- This is where you could already have the convoy gone (less people)
- Pending what city you use... you could delete certain Chalks that are not needed once they land at corner (working on that now)
- When convoy ready to come in you could create them from thin air (I know there is a script for that)
3. Black Hawk Down (Outro)

What I am trying to do is prove that things are possible and yes this does take a lot of time to setup. I spent over 2 hours just placing objects and units on Nogova for my test mission. But I have ideas and so do other people out there that think with some patience and a lot of luck something could be pulled off.

Note - Almost forgot… I have not tried to play in a major city yet so I am unaware of that effect on lag.

Computer Specs

Pentium 4 - 2.4
GeForce 4 - 1200
512 Ram

IW  ;D
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: KTottE on 28 Apr 2003, 14:35:13
Let me know when you get it moving in a mission, not just units standing on a map, okay ;)
There's a huge difference between loading all the stuff and loading it and get it to move around.

Also, it is true that OFP will load 150 West Soldiers faster than 150 different kinds of soldiers, but every bit you add to the total amount of units will slow OFP down a bit.
And you do run what would be considered a very good system.

And yes, agreed, there's no need to make it all one big mission, but unless you change it a lot you will not cut the number of units per mission down by that much (notice that I said mission and not on-screen).

And, my point all along was:
If you make a BHD mission to be even close to reality or the film, it won't be doable in OFP.
And, what use is a BHD mission unless it's true to either the film or reality?
Title: Re:Black Hawk Down
Post by: Iwesshome on 28 Apr 2003, 14:43:22
KTottE,

I guess I could put one of those disclaimers on the bottom of my read me that states do to the OFP engine the events you are about to see and play are based on actual facts and truly do not represent the actual event... hehe  ;D

Seriously - I have been able to get it moving but am dragging in the city... Not enough time in my day's to concentrate on this project. It is amazing how some of these editors out there can create these massive projects like Invasion 1944 and so on. Well I will take it one day at a time and see how it goes…. Massive beta testing and from that determine if I need to tone it down for other players like two version kind of like what BAS did for their Delta/Ranger add-on missions

IW