(Review Completed) [SP] The Red Grinder

[Krieg]

The Red Grinder

Author: Krieg

Description: Americans have been pushed off the Everon for a month now. They have put up more then a proper fight, but numbers eventually prevailed. NATO command has ordered them to retreat to southern peninsula and establish defense and hold off Russians until reinforcements arrive.
Soviet command has planed out a quick tank attack on southern peninsula. 5 T72's and 3 T80's are ordered to remove NATO presence from the island once and for all. You will lead the attack. Good luck.

Player's side: East

Mission version: Final

Version of OFP required: Resistance 1.96

Island: Everon

Addons Needed: DKMM M46 Artillery piece (In case link is broken, look it up on ofpr.info, version 1.2)
ftp://ftp.ofpr.info/ofpd/unofaddons2/dkmm_m46_v1_2.exe
KBB Gate (included)
BBS Dangerschild (included)

Bugs: None known yet.

Size of .ZIP file: 564 KB

Edit: This mission has been reviewed and is available from the Missions Depot.

Change-log:
Beta 0.1 - First version released to public for beta testing
Beta 0.2 - Added some support for player, remade the briefing, fixed some problems, added Soviet base at Levie.
Beta 0.3 - Re-remade the briefing (spelling problems hopefully fixed, and achieved a bit more realism in intel report), added some casualties of war, remade support (partially, bug encountered).
Beta 0.4 - Re-remade support (a lot of thanks on that to Walter_E_Kurtz), added more variation in the mission, personalized the mission a bit, fixed a briefing spelling error I found (1 M60 Patton MBT's instead of 1 M60 Patton MBT).
Beta 0.5 - Added intro and outro, added some more radio chatter and added new overview pic.
Beta 0.6 - Fixed some bugs, fixed some briefing grammar errors, added checkpoint between outpost and Durras, increased size of markers a little bit, added insertion marker, and added "propaganda pic" to mission package.
Beta 0.7 - Fixed end trigger, added black out at end of mission, fixed some stuff in briefing, moved checkpoint trigger, fixed some errors in outro, added some (very little) ambient sound.
Beta 0.8 - Fixed bas_o addon error, fixed failure ending instead of death ending bug, added outro loose.
Final - Minor polishings were made to the mission, fixed no-ending because of black out, and did minor fix to outro, costumized the overview, and polished ending a bit.

To-do list:
Fix the "search last loon" problem.
Build Soviet base at Levie.
Remake the briefing.
Add some radio-chatter
Add some support for player.
Casualties of war.
Re-remake the briefing.
Re-remake support.
Add some personalization.
Add more variety.
Make intro.
Make outro.
Fix some bugs.
Fix some briefing grammar.
Add insertion marker.
Fix marker sizes.
Minor changes to "propaganda pic".
Fix some briefing stuff.
Move checkpoint trigger.
Add a black-out at the end of mission.
Fix outro.
Fix end triggers.
Some minor mission editing.
Fix addon problem.
Fix failure at Vernon.
Prevent outro from appearing when player fails instead of wins.
Add outro loose.
Minor polishings.
Fix the end trigger.
Prevent tanks from exploding in outro, yet keep them destroyed.
Polish the ending a bit.
Costumize the overview.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
All beta test are appreciated!  

Thank you,
Krieg

[savedbygrace]

Missing addon kkb gate? Also, your addon link takes you to the site but not the actual addon. There are two versions of that m46 I think, You will want to specify which version to use. Or provide an accurate link

[Krieg]

Ohh yes! I forgot about kkb gate. Sorry.

About M46 artillery piece addon, I see only one on the page. And, to be honest, I copied the link from your "The Kolgujev Contract" mission. But anyways, I will update link to it.

Edit: Updated link to M46 addon and added KBB Gate.zip as attachment.

[savedbygrace]

Dog gone it, your right. That darn gamepark. It seems everytime they add something it shifts content further down. Sorry about that pal. Yeah the latest version is 1.2 of that piece. Thanks for correcting things partner.


EDIT:
Tried again, this time Its telling me I am missing "Danger". I opened the pbo to make sure that was the last of them and sure enough that is the last of the addons required. Could you give us a link for that one too, please?

[Krieg]

And I thought it was OFP resistance addon made by BIS.
Stupid me!
I will update it ASAP.

Edit: Can you tell me exact name of addon you are missing? Since I can't find danger.pbo in neither of my addon folders.
Edit 2: No need. I managed to find it myself. It is bbs_Dangerschild.pbo. Look in first post for download. And sorry for all this addon problems. Next time I will look more on what I am putting in the mission.

[Walter_E_Kurtz]

OK. I installed the three required addons and started the mission. I managed to get halfway through this, before being killed by a landmine (or rather a trigger, probably). Here's what I think needs dealing with:

Red Wolf
   - there's no explanation of who/what they are or what they will do once I give them the order to Go.
   - I think you should synchronise their latter waypoints to the objective triggers, then they'd keep up with the player and not move too far ahead of him.

Support
   - there is none! Why no Repair trucks in the base south of Levie? Why doesn't this base and Levie look occupied?
   - My understanding is that if you place support vehicles (ie. Repair / Rearm / Refuel trucks and maybe even BMP Ambulances) and give them a Support waypoint, the player will be able to call them to his position. Of course, Red Wolf might monopolise them.

Triggers
   - last loon hunts are no fun in tanks. It would help the mission flow if it was possible to move on while one or two Americans were still alive at each objective. It would be in keeping with the doctrine that infantry should assist tanks by mopping up the remaining enemy soldiers.
   - amend the condition for the triggers as follows

Code: [Select]

("alive _x" count thislist) <= 2

[Krieg]

Thank you for beta test, Walter!

Red Wolf
   - there's no explanation of who/what they are or what they will do once I give them the order to Go.
   - I think you should synchronise their latter waypoints to the objective triggers, then they'd keep up with the player and not move too far ahead of him.

Yes, I should mention them in briefing. And also do synchronization thing.

Support
   - there is none! Why no Repair trucks in the base south of Levie? Why doesn't this base and Levie look occupied?
   - My understanding is that if you place support vehicles (ie. Repair / Rearm / Refuel trucks and maybe even BMP Ambulances) and give them a Support waypoint, the player will be able to call them to his position. Of course, Red Wolf might monopolise them.

There actually is a repair and ammo truck in enemy base at Durras, but since they are likely to be destroyed, I will do support thing.

Triggers
   - last loon hunts are no fun in tanks. It would help the mission flow if it was possible to move on while one or two Americans were still alive at each objective. It would be in keeping with the doctrine that infantry should assist tanks by mopping up the remaining enemy soldiers.
   - amend the condition for the triggers as follows
Code:

Code: [Select]

("alive _x" count thislist) <= 2

That is another thing in "to-do" list now.

I managed to get halfway through this, before being killed by a landmine (or rather a trigger, probably).

Heh, there were actually few indications that that town is actually a mine-field. It was deserted, and if you looked closely, you could see few landmines on road.

Anyways, thanks for beta test !

Edit: New version is up!

[Walter_E_Kurtz]

Testing version 0.2 beta. I'd like to draw your attention to the following:

Briefing
   - spelling is inconsistent: sometimes correct, sometimes wrong. eg. southern, Vernon
   - the precision is not natural or reasonable. Scholastically it may be admirable, but it's not how things pan out, for instance:

It is easier to count soldiers than their weapons.
at least six Anti-Tank infantry   ---> at least half a dozen infantry armed with anti-tank weapons

You never meet statisticians in real life (Well done for adding up to 100%, but where is the excluded third?)
I give us 75% of defeat and 25% of victory   ---> Our odds/chances of victory are, perhaps, one in four


Out of Area trigger
   - these are the wrong way round, so the mission ends before the warning is received


Durras Trigger
   - I got a nasty surprise in that, after this objective was marked as done, the infantry squad mounted a relatively succesful counter-attack. Consider making the trigger area slightly larger and adding some more LAW soldiers to the squad.
   - on second thoughts, maybe leave it as it is.


Support Waypoints
   - The support group remained stuck behind the woods and did nothing to assist me. I'm not quite sure what the problem was: that their first waypoint was to 'Hold' or that this waypoint was placed over one of the units.
   - I'd suggest moving them behind the players starting point and using only 'Move' and 'Support' waypoints (Behaviour: Careless, Speed: Full).
   - If you want to speed up how quickly they reach the player, they could be teleported beyond the road-block. Ask if you need this explained (Basically, place markers where they should appear and use a setPos getMarkerPos a_place)


Chat on Requesting Assistance
   - it still could do with some acknowledgement that Red Wolf or support units are on their way.
   - try the following. Write this in the init line of the leader of the four T72s

redwolf = group this

    then call the next script from Radio Alpha ( [] exec "RedWolf.sqs" )

Code: (RedWolf.sqs) [Select]

player sideChat "Red Wolf. Red Wolf. You may begin your advance. Over."
~3
(leader redwolf) sideChat "This is Red Wolf. We are getting under way. Over."
~3
player sideChat "Acknowledged, Red Wolf. Out."
exit

Edit: (Forgot to add)
Casualties of War
   - if you don't fancy having the Russians occupy the base south of Levie, why not have a few wrecks (jeep and m113) strewn about.
   - as in The Final Stand, they could also be incorporated into the Americans' defensive lines.

[Krieg]

Thanks for the test.

Briefing
   - spelling is inconsistent: sometimes correct, sometimes wrong. eg. southern, Vernon
   - the precision is not natural or reasonable. Scholastically it may be admirable, but it's not how things pan out, for instance:

It is easier to count soldiers than their weapons.
at least six Anti-Tank infantry   ---> at least half a dozen infantry armed with anti-tank weapons

I'll try to fix spelling and KGB Intel Report.

Out of Area trigger
   - these are the wrong way round, so the mission ends before the warning is received

Fixed that, I still can't believe I made them opposite of needed sizes (aka warning trigger outside of ending trigger is useless pretty much).

Durras Trigger
   - I got a nasty surprise in that, after this objective was marked as done, the infantry squad mounted a relatively succesful counter-attack. Consider making the trigger area slightly larger and adding some more LAW soldiers to the squad.
   - on second thoughts, maybe leave it as it is.

I agree more with "leave as it is" option, because this adds a bit of realism at least.

Support Waypoints
   - The support group remained stuck behind the woods and did nothing to assist me. I'm not quite sure what the problem was: that their first waypoint was to 'Hold' or that this waypoint was placed over one of the units.
   - I'd suggest moving them behind the players starting point and using only 'Move' and 'Support' waypoints (Behaviour: Careless, Speed: Full).
   - If you want to speed up how quickly they reach the player, they could be teleported beyond the road-block. Ask if you need this explained (Basically, place markers where they should appear and use a setPos getMarkerPos a_place)

Did you use your radio? Anyways I did it like that in order to prevent them from being monopolized from both player and Red Wolf. I'll do teleport thingy.

Chat on Requesting Assistance
   - it still could do with some acknowledgement that Red Wolf or support units are on their way.
   - try the following. Write this in the init line of the leader of the four T72s

Done.

Casualties of War
   - if you don't fancy having the Russians occupy the base south of Levie, why not have a few wrecks (jeep and m113) strewn about.
   - as in The Final Stand, they could also be incorporated into the Americans' defensive lines.

On to-do list.

Edit: I'm having a little scripting problem.

Code: ("supportmovetoplayer.sqs") [Select]

_cam = cam1 camcreate [0,0,0]
_cam camsettarget player
_cam cameraeffect [Internal, Back]
titlecut [" ", "BLACK IN",2]
~3
a setPos getMarkerPos a
b setPos getMarkerPos b
c setPos getMarkerPos c
~1
titlecut [" ", "BLACK OUT",2]
camdestroy _cam
For editing purposes, I edited Durras objective trigger to be activated by EAST once not present. Activated it and got disappointed. Unit C (aka refuel truck) did not teleport. Instead I got error "type object..." and forgot the rest. Can someone please fix this script?

[zwobot]

Nice to see an armour mission again! But where is the download link for the actual mission?

[Krieg]

It seems that attachments have been deleted. I will upload it shortly!
Edit: Uploaded all addons and mission! Look in attachments.

[Walter_E_Kurtz]

Sorry, Krieg, for not noticing that you had updated your message before things went wrong during the week.

First off, please try to reduce how much you quote from prior emails. It is fine to keep section headings, or a simple point that you are responding to, but quoting almost everything reduces readability.

Regarding your scripting problem, the syntax of getMarkerPos requires the marker name to be in quotation marks, so

Code: [Select]

a setPos getMarkerPos "a"
b setPos getMarkerPos "b"
c setPos getMarkerPos "c"

[Krieg]

No problem for not noticing. Posts update a lot without me ever noticing it.

I will cut down on that, I am sorry, I got used to quoting on some other forums.

Uhh! What I actually said to game to do that time is to teleport objects to marker that was listed as object? So that's why nothing would teleport! Thanks for assistance!

Edit: I have updated the mission, check the first post.
Also, I know that I did not did black-out-black-in thing in support teleporting script, that's because I encountered a bug. Black-out would work fine, but it would never black-in.

[Walter_E_Kurtz]

Looking forward to it, but I'm afraid it'll take me a week to sober up get back home.

[Walter_E_Kurtz]

OK. I've finally applied myself and completed it.

Readme
   - doesn't list ALL the required addons, yet
   - you might consider including the URL for this thread

Red Wolf
   - consider having their waypoints go around Vernon. When I played it, one T72 got knocked out on the road through Vernon, the others went around
   - on second thoughts, I'd probably leave it - one T72 isn't too high a cost

Support
   - needs waypoints, the last one of which should be "Support"

Code: (supportmovetoplayer.sqs) [Select]

titleText ["", "BLACK OUT", 0.5]
~1
titleText ["Support group is moving into position.", "BLACK IN", 9999]
a setPos getMarkerPos "a"
b setPos getMarkerPos "b"
c setPos getMarkerPos "c"
~4
titleText ["", "BLACK IN"]End Trigger
   - the mission ends very suddenly, use a TimeOut delay. Consider making this quite long (60 seconds or more) if you want the player to have a chance of raising the flag
   - the third objective is not ticked off

Personalisation
   - add the following, or similar, to Description.ext:

Code: [Select]

onLoadMission="T80 Armoured Spearhead, Levie, Everon"   - and you can also include the player's name instead of Alpha Black 1:

Code: (redwolf.sqs) [Select]

~0.5
player sideChat format ["This is %1. Red Wolf you may begin your advance. Over.", name player]
~3.4
t2 globalChat "Red Wolf here, received and understood. We are proceeding to objective. Over."
~3.5
player sideChat format ["Roger that. Good luck Red Wolf. %1 Out.", name player]Variety
   - I only spotted one unit with a Probability of Presence less than 100%. Have more AT infantry with very low probabilities (10%)
   - add some other vehicles to the mix. Definitely Vulcans, but Bradleys seem the wrong era. Attach them to existing groups and adjust the probabilities.