(Review Completed) [SP] Chemical Warfare (BAS D/R)

[asmodeus]

Greetings Beta Testers!   ;D

Asmo here with a brand new Desert Delta/Ranger mission!    

Chemical Warfare

Overview:

You are the commander of a highly regarded Delta unit whose mission is to attack and destroy a Chemical Weapons manufacturing Facility on an enemy Island.  The enemy plans on boosting their defenses in the area soon, so we must take advantage of this opportunity to decimate their production abilities on this Island.  

We are not able to use any form of air strike because you must also locate some secret documents vital to our operations in rescuing the Rangers lost in Operation City of the Dead.  Intelligence reports these documents are on an Officer in the base and they are reputed to have information leading to the location of the hostages...  We must find a way to help them!

You can find the mission here:

http://www.everoncartel.com/CW.zip (1.98 MB)

Edit: This mission has been reviewed and is available, with required addons, from the Missions Depot.


This mission takes place in the desert of Northern Sarugao with you as a Delta squad commander and the idea is to meet the objectives as fast as you can and then exit the area as quickly as possible with your team intact.  (This is not a kill 'em all mission unless you want it to be, generally it is strictly objective based)

Things included

• Overview
• Briefing
• Mission
• 3 Custom Music tracks (adds to the atmosphere a lot, IMO)
• AI reaction tuned for maximum realism
• Benchmarking at 1300 and 2300 (you won't notice what you're missing, but the mission should not lag for any benchmark)   ;)
  
• Other details that you'll see!

   

Addons Required:

OFP V1.91 *edit*  (requires 1.91)
Sarugao Island http://ofp.gamezone.cz/index.php?sekce=islands&archiv=true&page=1
BAS Delta/Rangers http://www.concept-5.com/ballistic/default.asp
AGS Industrial Pack http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard301/ikonboard.cgi?s=3e9157a26c2dffff;act=ST;f=4;t=28827  or www.ofp.info posted on the news on 04/04/03 or http://www.of.fpp.pl/?en:pages:show:414:::
ECL_Safe and ECL Documents http://www.everoncartel.com/news.htm  (go to downloads section)

Things to note

The notes section of the briefing has useful information..  

This mission can be as easy or as difficult as you want.  (to a certain point)  If you want it to be harder, just take a longer period of time...  

For now the objective for the documents only involves killing the Officer that holds them.  I didn't know quite how to make the objective check off depending on the player "picking it up"..  (LCD?)    

You can use the radio menu for a few things on this mission:

• Savegames (this is only for BETA mission)
• Stopping music (if you need to hear the enemy at any time)
• Calling backup, ordering backup to retreat

You can find the mission here:

http://www.everoncartel.com/CW.zip (1.98 MB)

Edit: This mission has been reviewed and is available, with required addons, from the Missions Depot.


As always I greatly appreciate any and all feedback you can give me!
 ;D

Asmo

P.S.  Oh yeah, here's some q's I have for any who play this:

1.  Was there any noticable lag and if so when?
2.  How long did you take?
3.  What was your score/how many kills?
4.  Do you like the music usage?
5.  Was it too difficult, too easy or juuuuust right?   ;)
6.  Did the briefing make sense?   8)

Thanks!

[macguba]

Bloody hell Asmo, you're making them faster than I can test them. ;D

[asmodeus]

lol  

Well, I'm trying to go slow actually...  I waited what seemed like a long time after putting COD and LL on here..  

Also, I can multi-task and I have a lot more missions on the back burner!  (I've had a lot of mission ideas lately)  

Asmo

[Wolf]

lol Macguba, Asmo knows that feeling. I used to put out missions here so fast.  
Heck, I still got seven missiosn that could use testing. I'm serious.

I have all those addons already, so I'm downloading mission. Get back to you ASAP.

[macguba]

Yeah Wolf, I remember ... it's nice to have you back.    I keep trying to test one of your missions but the timing never seems to work, or I get distracted helping out some noob who's got no tests.   Or by Asmo, of course  ;D

[deaddog]

Just downloaded all the stuff for the mission.  I need to take a break from working on all the stuff macguba and you gave me to do on my mission  ;D

[BoNeCoLLeCToR]

Played this great mission I had 25 kills alot off enemy there man I havent completed it the backup team was there so I had to retreat but nice atmosphere I likked alot
Make it allitle more easy it was to difficult and a intro some cutsenes would make it much better can't wait for the new version

[asmodeus]

@ Wolf

LOL  yep, I remember that well...  You crank out missions faster than I do for sure!    

Thanks for checkin this mission out!   ;D

@ Mac

Yeah, I can be very distracting..  Especially when riding this Blue Mongoloid Whooping Llama!       ;D

@ deaddog

Thanks!   ;D

@ BoNeCoLLeCToR  (whew, lot's of capitals and stuff..   )

Thanks a lot!   ;D  If there was a lot of enemy there, then you took too long!    Unless you're talking about the base as it is when you attack it..  If so, IMO there isn't a lot of enemies down there, they just react well to any attack you can muster!    And then they call for backup!    

What part, in particular, did you find too hard?  What direction did you attack from?  When did you call your backup?  When did the alarm go off?  

All these things will help me to make things more "universal" for all players on the difficulty scale.   ;D

The intro is on it's way!  I'm real glad you like the mission and that you had fun!   ;D  

@ everyone:

Thanks!   ;D

Asmo

P.S.  I am also doing an outro-win, lose and custom voices!    

P.P.S.  For the next version the enemy's will shoot flares and smokeshells when you attack the facility if your benchmark is above 1300.  

[Wolf]

ok, well I'll tell you about as far as I got.

Breifing was really good, didn't notice any problems, and it seemed quite detailed.

Started mission after picking my weapons.
Ended up restarting because stupid AI drove into a tree.

didn't care much for the first set of music, so I shut it off, but that's just me. Drove succefully to site. Got some more music for a minute. Used a flankinh manuaver to send my squad around to the other side of the base, and slowly moved closer to the camp, parked myself in some rocks. Realised I wans't going to be able to sneak in easiely, so when my squad was in position I called in the backup squad. As soon as they came and started to fire on camp, I ordered my squad to open fire from the other side, and I myself started taking out guards, M2 first, then some tower guards. Enemy backup started to come, but my squad was right there, and ambushed and killed them with one casaulty. I was simply massacuring the force in the camp, and then some more music started playing, I was moving into the camp when the game just froze up, the music that had started playing went into a loop, seemed like it was trying to load something, but it was too much. That's when I had to cut power to my computer and reboot.
Then I came here. I will try again in the morning.
I like the mission.

[asmodeus]

Hey there Wolf!   ;D

Thanks for testing it!  

Yeah, that first music isn't for everybody.. That's why I have that option to shut it off.   ;D

When that music started and it froze up for you there was nothing special happening..  Maybe the music just overloaded your comp?  If it happens again, I will make the music benchmark conditional.  

Thanks a lot and I'm real glad you like the mission!   ;D    

Asmo

[Nazul]

Asmo, SLAYER!!!! omg, good stuff i dont normaly play with music on, gets distracting.
ill list my kills 1st, so i can quit the mission...
t72
3 x offivcer
2 x bmp
medic
9x crew
4x law soldier
jeep
4x grenadier
7x machine gunner
3x sniper
crew
4x soldier

1 casualty- 23mins. i think the mission was juuuust right on difficulty. it got tricky becoz i hung around and the large counterattack came in, b4 then was fine. maybe some more units at the factory for the initial attack, i didnt use PUMA for that, i called them in after. the initial attack was mainly handled by my squad from the hill east of the factory. that industrial pack is hella nice and it goes off with a big bang. i didnt notice if burn script was used for them.
lag was only noticeable at the end, when the 4x t72s and all those squads started attacking. wasnt too bad tho, P4 2.4.
PUMA started to retreat without me giving the order to. they got caught E of factory and were wasted by the t72's. are they meant to go after a while?
great mission, best ive played for a while. im off to play it again
cheers
 :cheers:

[Sui]

Very Nice mission here, Asmo!

I didn't find many things wrong with it, so this list of points is going to read a bit more like an after action report than a list of beta issues

Briefing

• Just one issue... the pictures you use could be a little clearer. I suggest using a very large size (say 512x256) and then reducing them in the .html code... this way you get very high resolution, making them much easier to read

Mission

• Right... first time I armed my guys up like a standard infantry squad (2 fire teams, 2x MG's etc.) I attacked from the NE and got absolutely whalloped ;D (did I mention I suck).
• Then I twigged that this is supposed to be a special op, so I armed 6 of my guys as an infantry squad (and 1 AT guy) and the other two as a separate sniper team. This was much more effective. I had my sniper team in the cluster of rocks to the E of the base, and moved my infantry squad in from the NE.
• The music... I don't like heavy thrash music, and I'm getting old ;D So the music seemed a bit loud. I'm very glad you had the option to turn it off
• I moved in under the cover of a bit of sniper fire, and found the documents, and planted charges on both the chemical tank areas and in the middle of the scud launchers. I also called in Puma for a bit of overwatch while I was high tailing it out of there.
• Now I moved out to the maximum range of my charges. I had told Puma to retreat just as I planted the last one. Well, it was 5 minutes later, and as far as I could tell Puma was still in there (as they hadn't run past me). My sniper team had been killed as the counter-attack was starting, so I decided I couldn't wait any longer.

*Boomfa!*
"One, Cease Fire!"

Bugger... looks like I took some of Puma with the chemical tanks...
Might I suggest having Puma make a radio call when they're clear of the base, it would make the best part of the mission (the part where you get to blow stuff up ;D) much nicer

• I hit the chem tanks and the scuds simulatneously... a couple of radio calls popped up... good good

However, apparently I had taken out the spud launchers !! ;D ;D
Now I've seen a spud gun shot through a wooden fence, but they're hardly dangerous enough that a Ranger task force needs to be sent out after them ;D

• So I ran really fast out of there, hugging the coastline along the north... unfortunately, a T72 spotted my squad, and took out another two of my guys... bah

I got to the FUP for Puma, and jumped in a Hummer. I headed for the Evac point, and the mission ended. Success... apart from the fact that I had lost half my squad, and I don't think any of Puma got out alive...

• A couple of suggestions for the ending... maybe you could get the chinook to fly back in to pick the guys up... maybe get (whatever's left of) Puma to board it as well
• I suggest having different endings depending on how many guys (of your squad and Puma) you lose. You could also use addrating to give the player more points if they manage to keep more guys alive :)

Anyway, this is a mission that utilized the strengths of the BAS rangers Brilliantly!!. I highly recommend it... I ended up playing it a few times, just because I could :)

To address the things you were really interested in:

• CPU slowdown:

Benchmark 1808, the only real time I got nasty slowdown was when I blew the living bejesus out of the base (lots of smoke!) and one time when two BMP's got blown up in the space of about 1/2 a second... lots of smoke made for bad FPS :)
Overall, no big problems though

• Time taken:

25 minutes... however that was with several retries :)

• Score/kills:

-100
9 x infantry
5 x vehicles

2 x Rangers :(

I also lost 4 guys in my squad

• Difficulty:

Very, very good. I especially like the fact that if you take too long the Counter attack turns up, making things very difficult :)
Might I suggest having an infantry squad that runs out the S entrance of the base and tries to flank your squad though? It would make things just that little bit more interesting :)

• I didn't see anything wrong with the briefing

Overall, an excellent mission... I'm hanging out for the next version! :)

[asmodeus]

 ;D

@ Nazul

Glad you liked the music!     For me it really makes that drive through the desert fun (and it covers up the loudness of the dirtbikes' engines).  

Good job on the mission!  The initial attack part is going to be tricky, so far some have said it's too easy, some too hard..  I am looking into making an option for 2 difficulty levels...  That should solve that problem.  

Yes, I did use the burn script on a lot of things, but it is benchmark conditional.  

That's weird the Puma was retreating on their own!    Maybe they weren't really retreating as I do have them on a guard waypoint until you give them the order to leave..  So they could have been moving to attack someone maybe?   :-\

great mission, best ive played for a while. im off to play it again

 

Thanks a lot!!      

@ Sui

Thanks!   ;D

Great suggestion on the briefing!  Hopefully that will fix those pics.  Also I noticed that it doesn't specify what those pics are of in the text and I have fixed that.  

I like the fact that you used the weapons selection like that!  Sometimes it's really helpful to split up your team like that too!  That's cool.  

Great suggestion about having Puma give a radio when they're clear of the base!   ;D  They can be a real pain in the :moon: because they have a tendancy to get stuck in the trucks and/or buildings..    

However, apparently I had taken out the spud launchers !!

 

ROTFL!  That's a little made-up military slang for you!  Thought it'd be a funny thing to see as you're running for your life out of that base!   ;D

That's great that you knew to go to Puma's FUP to get a ride!  I was hoping that would be apparent.  

The thing about having a chinook come and pick up the squad at the end is that it would create lag for people..  I've found that any amount of choppers or planes really add to lag for people with low benchmarks...  However, I am going to do that in the outro-win!   ;D (I really wish I had the MH-47E from BAS to use in this mission..)  

I'm working on the different endings, but am not too sure how to do what you're suggesting for the "how many guys I lost" idea..  Would it be an array or something?    And I have no clue as to how to use addrating...  Is it in the description.ext or a script?

Anyway, this is a mission that utilized the strengths of the BAS rangers Brilliantly!!. I highly recommend it... I ended up playing it a few times, just because I could

WOW!    Thanks a lot!   ;D      :beat:  Don't know what else to say but Thanks!  

Also Thanks for the answers to my q's!  

Might I suggest having an infantry squad that runs out the S entrance of the base and tries to flank your squad though? It would make things just that little bit more interesting

Hmm.. I'll have a look at it, but in order to have them flank the players squad I'd have to assume the player will attack from the East..  At this point a squad should come out and attack you wherever you are..  Sometimes they flank you and sometimes they don't..  It's kinda up to the AI.    Maybe I'll add something like that when/if I can add the option to choose a difficulty level.  

I'm real glad you liked the mission and thanks for all the great compliments!   ;D      

Asmo

[Sui]

Fair enough on not bringing in the Chinook... I reckon you've got the right idea. It'll make for a very cool outro

I'm working on the different endings, but am not too sure how to do what you're suggesting for the "how many guys I lost" idea..  Would it be an array or something?    And I have no clue as to how to use addrating...  Is it in the description.ext or a script?

I did the same thing in Facile Ground, but I was using a script as I used that anyway to trigger the ending
What you could do is put a line like this in the OnAct line of your end trigger:

"player addrating 20" foreach (units group player); "player addrating 50" foreach (units Puma)

That would give the player 20 points for each unit of their own group still alive (including themselves), and 50 points for each unit of Puma still alive

Hmm.. I'll have a look at it, but in order to have them flank the players squad I'd have to assume the player will attack from the East..  At this point a squad should come out and attack you wherever you are..  Sometimes they flank you and sometimes they don't..  It's kinda up to the AI.    Maybe I'll add something like that when/if I can add the option to choose a difficulty level.  

Check out the reply I posted up for Kali, in Umbrageous Beaver. That has an example of how to make a squad move to a sector depending on where the player attacks from. I'd suggest having 4 sectors, which means 4 sets of move-move-cycle waypoints

[asmodeus]

Suit!  (Sweet)     ;D

That's really cool!  (Now I remember reading that too...)  

A question though..  In what order do you place the waypoints?  They are sequential so I always got confused as to how to make it branch off and be synchd to 2 triggers at the same time...    

That's also really cool about the addrating!  I love it when it's way easier than I thought!  (it's rare, but it's sweet)   ;D

Thanks for the info!  Will help make this mission even better!  

Ahhhhhhh..........smo  (excuse me, I sneezed)