(Review Completed) [SP] Abandoned Armies

[macguba]

Abrams and other tanks:  it does feel as if they are harder to kill when you are shooting at them than when you are inside them.  In fact it isn't.

When you are shooting at a tank most players keep going until the tank is a smoldering ruin.   Sometimes you stop when you can clearly see that the gun is u/s, but you can never know if the gunner is dead.

However, when you are in a tank you sometimes get killed before the tank is destroyed.   You also feel you have been defeated if the gun is useless.  Consequently you get the impression that tanks are easier to kill if you are inside them.

It is also the case that the AI can reload rocket launchers slightly faster than the player, which does make you slightly more vulnerable inside a tank than the AI are.

Your squad can carry 15 rockets with a normal loadout, which is enough to kill two Abrams with enough left over for a T72.   Note that the Abrams armour is slightly stronger to the rear, against LAWs/RPGs at least.  Bit of a cockup in the armour model I'd say.  

[THobson]

And the AI in the tanks are a damned sight better at spotting a soldier that has just hit them with a LAW than I am.

mikero:
Civilians peeping from behind the windows heh?  Watch this space.

[Mikero]

Your squad can carry 15 rockets

Oook? I coun t 4 x 3.

Bit of a cockup in the armour model I'd say.  

read somewhere that a real life godzilla has 100 tons at front and 70 tons at the blunt end.

>fog/mist

fix the ratios / denstities as only an author would know how to , but I hope you don't dramatically reduce / remove this 'feature'. It was part of game immersion for me. I *particularly* liked it turning ON, just as I had laid my well laid plans

[THobson]

Alexi, Karl, Yuri, Marek and Sergei are all AT capable.

Ruslan, Erik, Irena and Pavel are not.

but I hope you don't dramatically reduce / remove this 'feature'. It was part of game immersion for me

My intention is to increase the impact of the fog but not to the serious level it was at in v1.00

[Mikero]

>watch this space.

At this point in the game Irena and I felt like bloody heros, or heroines, take your pick.

It was a street parade without the ticker tape. Treading over dead bodies, rubble everywhere, wrecks, smoke CLEARING. (St Louis was particularly powerful)

It was that magic moment, where you 'knew', the enemy weren't coming back, you felt like saying here people, have your homes back. A definite stake in the ground that no matter what these two armies were going to do in the future, the Island was no longer theirs to loot.

Suggestion: an ambient sound of dog barking, or possibly one of the bird chirps, providing the bird doesn't sound syruppy.

The effect was further enhanced by the clearing, almost sunshine, lack of fog.

[THobson]

Nice one.  I understand the feeling.  Some good ideas there.  You should make some missions of your own.  (btw this is not British irony it is a genuine comment)  

St Louis was particularly powerful

I think the fact that the town had not been destroyed might have helped with this - another thing to separate the two sides.  I will shortly be getting the contractors in to repair Larche.

[Mikero]

>contractors in

Apart from army distinctions get civilians to do it, progressively as towns are cleared, one building only stuff. Civils dont necessarily have to be 'seen' for this to work.

YAY! I've found another hell for Thob

[Henderson]

Seems I've missed a lot. I haven't touched OFP in a while, hopefully once I'm done with the other game I got I'll be back playing it.

[macguba]

I'm so befuddled this morning that, to find out where I've got up to in this mission, I've just scrolled back through the thread.    Rather than just picking up the mission and figuring it out that way .... anyway .... the answer is that we are all at Cancon, in good order.   It's 13:05 and the weather is overcast.    There are runners in the woods to the north but the war has started so whether anybody much will come to look for us remains a moot point.

13:25.   We moved north through the woods and dropped one runner.     Heard explosions in the distance, sounded like a small tank battle.    Approached the fuel station very cautiously and found one squad standing still nearby, facing Chapoi.   They were "hull down" to use and I suspect my loons couldn't register a shot.   It was just a like a target range:  I'd snipe one and they'd all drop out of site.   Then a bit laterthey'd all stand up, I'd shoot another one and they'd all drop down again.     We crawled up to finish off the last couple, who seemed to have worked out the not-standing-up thing.   Fuel station was deserted other then them and with no vehicles either looked a bit bare.    Consider losing the tents and adding something more interesting.     Sky has cleared a lot but the fog is coming in.    The mission is a feeling a little heavy again, presumably since we're close to Chapoi.   In Un-Impossible I combined fog and viewDistanc commands to help keep the lag down.   It may not be possible to do that here but think about it.   Anyway its totally playable, not a problem.

Reckoning that a direct approach from the fuel station to the town is likely to end in tears, we circle round to the south.  (I've keeping south of Chapoi to avoid getting trapped between two armies, since I know the war started only recently.)     At long range I spot a patrolling infantry squad and I can't resist popping off, since I know they'll never spot me at this range and foggyness.   I drop two or three but the rest run off into the mist and the town.    We wait in case there is a response:  in the distance, tank tracks.   We move to the cover of some bushes and suddenly, there before us on the plain on the south side of Chapoi, there is a full scale tank battle.    What I think was a northron battlegroup of vulcan, Abrams and others came in from the west, so lucky we didn't stay in the fuel station area they would have run over us.    A southron T72 just sat there and valiently blew several northron vehicles to bits, but the abrams got him in the end.    The melee continued - see pic.   We just sat their on hold fire, laughing.

[THobson]

Nice picture.  

I did have a repair truck at the fuel station - I can't remember why I took it away.  I shouldn't have.  That is where the jeep patrol get repaired. Good spot.  Thanks.

On the fog:  I have looked again at the fog script.  After a bit of experimenting I decided not to change the max or min levels from the version you are playing but I have changed the cycle time from 5 to 6 hours to approx. 3  (it was approx. 2 in version 1.00, also version 1.00 had a max level of 1 now it is less than that, and the max level decreases as the smallest side gets smaller - if you see what I mean)

EDIT: I would be interested in any reports of choppers, or absence thereof.

[macguba]

Had this been for real at that point we would have retired to the woods for brew while the two armies sorted themselves - or rather, each out - out.    Since OFP, unaccountably, does not have a tea making facility I considered leaving the mission running and having one in RL ... but we all know how that would end.

Intermittant MG fire and explosions from around the village.   We retreat to the fuel station so I can pick up a rocket.    Move slowly towards the village down the road - no opposition now of course.    There appears to be a battle going on on the east side of the village, though there are two many houses and mist to see.   Assuming everybody is looking that way, we stand up and run to the bushline coming into the village from the WNW.     Sure enough a sniper is watching the battle so we give him the good news.   The northern gate M2 gunner is alive, which tells me what I really need to know - the southrons have not been defeated.   I've been watching for flags but seen only one, a northron one on a burnt out tank on the western side of the village.   Shame they don't transfer to the new group leader.

I'm not convinced by the size of the line of barracks to the west of the village.  I can see another line to the east.     Adding buildings is good, but you don't need so many, particularly in a heavy mission.    One, orientated the other way, might be much more effective.  

We crawl up to the sandbags and I peer over:  there is one loon in the road who  I shoot but it brings all hell down on us.  Blackops run right up to us, a T72 comes nosing around.    We lose 8, the medic on the wing.    I could pick up a save but its about time I accpted a casualty so on we go.   A tank shell explodes right in the compound but Stamenov is still alive.

We wait.    It is clear that there are more baddies on the way and moving would not be a virtue.    Sure enough they straggle in and it eventually dawns on me that the "everybody come home" trigger has fired.    A cobra is getting annoying but we have (deliberately) no AA:  must find a loon.  But then a long blast of cannon fire and the cobra comes down near us - no wait, there are two dead choppers smoking.   They must have shot each other down:   I saw parachutes from one so I don't think they collided.   However, with their smoke and all the static objects round here the lag is too bad and we have a disaster or two.  I decide to wait till at least the smoke clears.     I know my benchmark is technically 3000 but its worth nearer 6000 for gameplay, assuming my old 5660 was right.   It's just about playable but not in the snap-shooting environment of a town with occasional runners just coming round the corner at you from all directions.

[macguba]

Just seen your post.     I have no complaints about the weather in this version, although it does change quite fast sometimes.

Choppers:   see above.   Haven't seen or heard any for quite a while till now.   There were none around during the recent big tank battle.

Time for a spot of lunch I think.

[Mikero]

know my benchmark is technically 3000 but its worth nearer 6000 for gameplay, assuming my old 5660 was right.

Mac,, could you explain whcih part of the lunch you were having at the time you wrote this? Can't make head nor tail of it.

 

[macguba]

My comp used to have a benchmark of 5660 or thereabouts.   Then it went wonky and I ended up with a new motherboard (better) and a new chip (sempron rather than athlon).    From these changes I would have expected the benchmark to go up sightly:  some things were worse but gameplay performance while actually playing ofp was slightly better.   However, the benchmark dropped to 3000.    

I suspect this is because benchmark is a blunt instrument which measures only the speed of the processor.   However, other things in your setup can be just as important.    

My point is that my setup is better than you would expect for a benchmark of 3000.   If you assume my old benchmark was "correct", then my new one is worth 5770 or something.


Continuing the tale ....

We keep still and dropped a few loose loons.    6 claimed to have destroyed a Bradley at 500m but I'm not sure I believe him.    The lag falls off even though the choppers are still smoking, but I wait till they stop anyway.       Leave the tailenders of the squad where they are around the sandbags at end of the northern street and take 2-5 with me as we sneak through the town.    One enemy dropped.    The little bit of fence at the crossroads isn't neat, there is a loose end.   Either shift the fence along a bit so more if it is buried in the house, or use a diagonal.     These loose ends without poles can be a nuisance as they are quite hard to see sometimes.

M2 on the north road still manned, and a loose loon.    We have been clearing from west and south, but they are all facing east and north.     There is a battle somewhere in the distance:  long bursts of cannon fire, occasional stutter of small arms and what sounds like FFARs, so maybe there is still a chopper up.   Yup, Mi24 flies over.

A damaged Abrams turns up.   Somebody - no idea who - blasts it as I take aim.     There is an exchange of infantry fire and 4 is down.     More infantry arrive and we lose more loons.   I've played this very badly, we should have legged it when we had the chance.

Time for a little judicious cheating.  I pick up the last savegame and order everybody to crawl out of town while I pick off the loons who we got in the last attempt.   I take them out no trouble, but the compound gate beckons ... rashly I move in, shoot the one remaining black op then hear more firing as my loons take out some stragglers.    I run into the building, catching a glimpse of a woman upstairs as I do so and then hear the "No" file.    Sneak upstairs, shoot him (he was prone), get the thinking aloud and then, aware that I shouldn't be here and that there is probably trouble on the way, I jump off the balcony and leg it.    My squad are having more contacts but, as they are prone and in bushes, are not taking casualties.   After a few nervous moments we meet up and head southwest.    9 can't walk so we have to go back for him.  there is firing in the middle distance.

Got my green tick though the army is not dead yet.   We'll make a new assault on the town in a wee while, at which point I'll have time to observe the new layout.   I want to pick up some armour if possible too.   (We have a T80 already in stock in the hills.)

It's 14:20 and the weather is still foggy.   Visibility has been about 300-400m for this whole episode.

[THobson]

How on earth did you get that screen shot of the choppers?

EDIT:

I found the untidy fence - I can't imagine what I was thinking of.