So many Addons, So few Missions, Why ?

[Kuro]

Hanging around in the OFP scence for quite some time, i noticed a strange trend.  On OFP.Info i find every day several new Addons and even Mods. But there are no missions. Why ?
For me,  Addon Making and Mission Making is nearly the same effort.  (You can do a simple one in a day, complex ones take several months). Why are so many Addon Makers and so less Mission Makers. What should be done to get more missions ?
There are plenty tutorials, lots of scripts, example mission, addons for every setting i can imaginge,  a whole forum full of ideas.
Please give me your ideas how to improve the mission flow.  Do you think some competion whould work.  Like "Best SebNam" SP Mission of the month. What would you expect as price for a Mission of the month ? Maybe we can find some sponsors ?


If this is the wrong forum please tell me and move it.
With regards
Kuro

[Artak]

Yes, it was the wrong board, but really there's no right board for this. Sense the topic is indeed rather interesting, it's allowed to run here, in 'MD comments' -board. However, leave money out of the conversation as referring to money, sallary, ect., is not allowed in OFPEC forums in any form.  

[qqqqqq]

Mission making is thriving but there is a conspiracy to keep it secret.   ofp.info never publish news of missions.    Flashnews rarely.

14 missions have been submitted to the missions depot so far this month.    The reviewers can't keep up which is presumably why there is a recruitment drive.   Others are published but not at ofpec.   Overall there is probably a new mission every day.    Is there a new addon every day?

Mission making is much harder than addon making.  Addons just sit there but missions are dynamic and must take account of a human player.

[Mikero]

Hmmm, I wouldn't say on the beta board that we have a flood of missions, but what we do have is a steady trickle of around 5 new ones per week in the ratio of 2 non-addons vs 2 off the cuff addons vs 1 x island. For me, that's pretty good volumes.

The mixes swap about a bit, but frankly, the quality in there is a wholesome lot better than some dreadful stuff 'out there'.

In terms of addons vs mission ratios. I believe it's current proportions make sense. Even if you were charitable and said 50% of people do addons and 50% make missions (and swap roles but never at the same time), then it's logical that the 50 people making missions have ONE addon each to play with. Hence the percieved dilution.

Bis themselves did make an attempt to address this imbalance with their AddonsAtEase utility, where it was required to at least supply A mission, for a given addon. I think that largely contributed to the failure of that scheme. It was an added burden, senseless and impractical for what has turned out to be classes within classes within classes of enhanced addons using other people's models. Who really wants to test yet-another M16? Let alone make a mission for the damn awful thing.

On balance, even when you look at what appears to be endless models spewing out of the Czech site, my best guess would be that reality says there's a ratio of 10:1 missions 'out there'. we see addons glorified because yet another enthusiast wants a machine gun with pink snowflakes and has found out how to do it. When similar happens to 'yer basic' mission, it's a big yawn and is promptly forgotten and isn't glorified with a sexy picture. Basic hype.

Don't forget also that many addons are simply country-centric. Play mission X but use Pongolian BMP's with new decals.

As far as competitions go, well MacGuba speaks all for itself. A single (and granted an exhausting) marketing campaign of "Beta Mission Party" brought god knows how many more submissions in. A LOT!

As far as prizes are concerned, I could think of some things that may attract:

specific addons or scripts made available only to submitters. (and later released to Joe Public)

perhaps a variation on that theme that the addon has to be used in the submission. (maybe a catch 22 there)

specific missions made available to submitters (prior to general release, god, we have enough good ones)

A hall of fame. A mec entry type competition, or some other device, where only the best will get on that list (for download). un-impossible eg, abandoned-armies eg and now, your-best-mission eg. I'd only choose 1 in 500 though to ever get in there .

[oyman]

i think there are so many addons than missions because its easier to make a m4 than a good mission

for example take me, I think its easier to make a whole new tank model than make a really good mission

[Frumbasjt]

I think most people dont make new missions cause it's hard to make something special, original, realistic, etc.. But an addon is doesn't have to be very special. People will like it anyway

But i'm making only missions cause i dont know how to make addons (and it lookst too boring to me)

[Bluelikeu]

I don't think it's that we don't have enough missions to play all the add-ons, but rather, some of the add-ons out just don't have a place in the mission. So Mikero is completely right, the ratio is about balanced. Add-ons may constantly be plopped on our heads, but some of them just don't fit at all. Missions are generally time specific. You wouldn't have a new spiffy LAW launcher in a WWII environment. Not to say that there are a lot of WWII missions, because there really aren't, but I think you get the point.

Thanks,
Bluelikeu

PS: This might frighten some people, but I've never downloaded a single mission made by someone else. :-X

[XCess]

Bluelikeu, get your ass on to the beta testing forums and download Abandoned Armies THIS INSTANT!!!!  

I generally use addons in all of my missions but I hardly ever release them becomes all they ever become is one very cool firefight with about 5 addons used. So NOBODY would beta and move the idea on.
Addons improve a mission immesnly and I would only suggest the standard units be used in large laggy missions such as THobson's masterpiece.

I'd suggest a stick topic listing the OFPEC Recommended Addons. Addons that everyone should have, or that a lot of people own and use.

HYK Soldiers, the RHS and BAS Stuff, CBT Stuff, ORCS... etc.

[Mikero]

@Bluelikeu

I've never downloaded a single mission

did you have your fingers crossed when you said that?

Let's see, ofp = 5 years, and you've NEVER played a mission other than your own. ummmmm......

Put it this way, we could do with quality coments in the Beta Forum.

@Xcess

Shhhh, keep it a secret  

>Recommended addons.

Blue chip addons yes. As in an ofpec rating similar to their mission reviews A hall of fame for both (they currently dont have either of these, just a rambling list of ratings)

But 'recommended' is dangerous turf provoking passionate flame wars. The only politically neutral addon I know of is editor102

----
as far as addons go themselves, i've discovered two classes of them (ok, so I'm a slow learner). There's the eye candy addon that essentially involves the addition of at least one paa texture, then, there's the very demanding type which truly does contribute to enhanced game play which involves altering / uncovering / masking attributes of an exhisting model. These normally take only a few lines of script text, but swap a western soldier to civilan, eg, provide a law soldier with sniper rifle eg, or just generally provide a shortcut model to something that would otherwise cause a camcreate (for each unit) Editor102 is ne of these, and large elements of HYK fall into this category where it (hyk) simply modifies an existing class (read no extra textures)

[XCess]

HYK, CBT, BAS and the like own places on many peoples hard drives yet we hardly see them used in missions. They improve the visual and audio quality of the mission immensely and, in my opinion, allow the player to delve into deeper depths of immersion.

I myself am on a land line connection, yet I have all of the most popular addons excluding the mods on my hard drive.

Maybe "recommended" is the wrong word. Perhaps "popular" would be better. A reference for the mission designer to know which addons he/she can use and still gain a wide audiance.

Although I still believe lite and heavy versiojns should become stadard. One mission with addons, one without. It's not a hard job for the mission designer, and widens the audience to it's highest degrees. Both addon lovers and haters will be willing to try the mission.

[Ding]

i thought editor 102 was just a big config file? i havent looked at its pbo but that is what i presume

[Mikero]

>just a big config file?

all of them, one way or other, are just big config files. Many of them simply alter existing 'objects' by over-riding the variables, or adding to, or removing, the variables already existent in some underlying 'addon'. It's done by what's called 'inheritence'. The object, the addon you are creating, MUST inherit some other object for it's base. You simply over-ride (in many cases) what's already there (make it visible to  all in the case of Barron's editor)

When it comes to what Joe Public often percieves as an addon, eg a real live M16 with pink snowflakes, it's the same big config file with all the usuals, plus, over-rides of paa (picture) elements. But, they, the texture type addons, are rarely the ones that make significant difference to the engine play (except to slow it down), visually, yes, but gameplay is enhanced by the variables and weapon load outs that all addons have, a sometimes-large, config file. By a few simple lines of text, you can change a BMP to be on the Nato side. Now, THAT, is an addon!

[Stinky Nut Rappa]

like mos of the other people here have said it is easier to make a good addon than a good mission. mission making is an artform to get the right atmosphere and scripting is rather quite difficult. but making new textures for a unit as most addons are, is relatively simple just get a picture of a soldier and then play about in photoshop.

[NhapLance]

Hmmmmppph

Er, im new to this forum, and i had a look around and didnt understand where to post a topic i want to ask about. Well, i write it in this thread maybe you can answer it anyway. Its a question about the addons, i wonder if you need the latest Operation Flashopint patch. I have the GoTY, and i updated it to the version that is on the 3 cd, like 1.8???

So the question is, Do you need the latest patch to download addons???
And if not, where to download it then. And also, if you could suggest som fun singlemissions would be great  ;D

[macguba]

NhapLance,

Welcome to the forum!

i had a look around and didnt understand where to post a topic i want to ask about

That's because there is nowhere to post it - it is technically off topic here at OFPEC because this is an editing-related site, not a general OFP site.   (In other words, creating missions and addons.) If you can't find the right board that's often a good indication that you're going to be off topic.

General questions like this are best asked on the official BIS forums.    However, we're nice here and as you're new we'll point you in the right direction.    

You can d/l addons from the Addons Depot (link at the top of the page) or ofp.info, although theirs are not tested and may have problems.    You should update your OFP to v1.96 from the official site www.flashpoint1985.com although many addons will work fine with the v1.85 that you have.

For missions, go to the Missions Depot - link also at the top of this page.    The best missions are those scoring 7 or more in the last couple of years:  some early high scorers (2002 and before) got their marks for introducing innovations that later became standard.

Have fun!