Author Topic: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)  (Read 8331 times)

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Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
I think there are too many directives in this mission. I was focused on disabling beams of enemy ships, and destroying shivan fighters so that jump-plotting remain unnoticed for a long time. I realized that I can call bombers when both Cains were destroyed, and Moloch was about 50%. Still, they saved my ass when Apocalypse appeared.

I wasn't able to finish next mission due to blocked jumpdrive. Rakshasa jumped out, I got the orders to cross the node but I wasn't able to jump. Messages in this mission were somehow chaotic and appearing too fast. Like there is a bug with mission event sequence.

Hm. Well, I'll make sure that's fixed in the patch. I checked that mission since someone else said that things were appearing in the wrong order, but I didn't see anything wrong...

  

Offline Mito [PL]

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  • Proud Member of Slavicus Mechanicus
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
In the mission with the fancy jump node (lots of subspace flashes) messages seemed to be in the wrong order. That's all.
How do you kill a hydra?

You starve it to death.

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
it crash if i play this mission
i have an debug log

[attachment stolen by Russian hackers]

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Good to see this on knossos :) Is part 2 still in the works?

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Good to see this on knossos :) Is part 2 still in the works?

Oh, it's on Knossos? Neat. I've been out of the loop for a while.

Part 2...is not in active development currently, but it's going to happen sooner or later. I actually have a big update to the existing segment that was close to being finished when I stopped working on it. I should probably finish that up and release it, although it'll have to wait a little while; my desktop is out of commission atm.

 

Offline QuakeIV

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Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
whorehouse/10

Seriously though this is quite good I tell you.

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Thanks!

 

Offline SL1

  • 26
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Just finished this a little while ago. Very good overall. Good mission design, and some interesting dialogue and story.

That said, it's a little rough around the edges. There are several little things that I think could be improved.

In Amenophis's meditations, it's not really necessary to have (cont.) at the beginning and end. I don't need to be informed that the next briefing stage is being spoken by the same person. I only need to be informed when the speaker is changing, like if you started with Amenophis meditating and then switched to someone else giving information. And in that case, you'd just put some kind of title at the top of the briefing stage when the speaker changes. In my opinion, the (cont.)s are awkward and unnecessary, and this really stood out in one or two command briefings where I scrolled down to find that the only thing there was (cont.).

The same goes for mission briefings. You don't need to put "Runihara:" at the beginning of every paragraph Runihara speaks if he's the only one speaking in that briefing stage. I assume it's still him talking until something tells me otherwise. At most, I'd put Runihara's name only at the start of the briefing stages where it's just him speaking.

In-flight messages are going by way too fast. It would also be good if they had sounds. I don't mind reading text, but I do like it when I'm given some kind of audio alert to let me know there's a message, even if it's just one of the generic message beeps. Adding some head anis to the messages would also help. Black Wolf's Vasudan anis could be put to good use here, especially the ones where the Vasudan is wearing sashes.

Briefing icons would be good.

Now for a few mission-specific things:

Spoiler:
There was a very long delay on the Revelation first going hostile after the Apocalypse destroys the Emissary. At least ten seconds between the Father telling me to execute them as traitors and their IFF changing.

In Pergamum, Cheops and Madu somehow died long before their dialogue had finished. I never actually fought either of them at all.

For the second-to-last mission, you might want to make it more clear that using the Sekhmet isn't strictly necessary. The first time I played that mission, I assumed that I'd have to take down capships at some point, because I was being given a bomber and torpedoes were available, so I loaded two banks with Cyclopses only to find that it's strictly an anti-bomber mission. I ended up using the Sekhmet anyway for its missile capacity, but took Tempests instead to take down bombers more quickly.

The briefing for the last mission tells you to do the wrong thing. You're told to only use torpedoes on corvette class ships and above, but that is plainly not what you're supposed to do. I'm not saying you should tell the player exactly how to win, but telling them to do the exact *wrong* thing isn't a good idea either. However, I did appreciate how the briefing informed me which wings were bombers.

Also for the last mission: Giving us command over every single wing probably isn't necessary. I had my hands full just managing all the bomber wings. Having all those other wings under our command just clutters up the comms menu. On the other hand, this could also be a deliberate design choice on your part to increase the challenge level of the mission and force the player to use more advanced gameplay elements like ordering wings with hotkeys. You pretty much have to use hotkeys to command the bombers effectively. That's a legitimate design choice, so if that's what you're going for, I'm all right with it.

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Hm...interesting. Most of what you mention I can fix easily enough (or was already planning to fix), but re: the last mission --

Spoiler:
You are not really meant to use torpedoes on the cruisers, and it's quite easy to beat the mission without doing so -- although admittedly I rarely end up using my own torpedoes until the destroyers show up. The way I usually do it is this: order all fighters to engage enemy. This allows them to shred the first wing of cruisers very quickly. The Cains are a bit more of an issue, and I often have to C-3-1 one or two of them. The corvettes show up, and the bombers' torps are unlocked. I direct each bomber wing to take out one corvette. Then I throw everything that's left at the destroyers. I tend to play it almost exclusively as a command-strategy mission.

I think the instruction not to use torps on the cruisers...I think it was actually not supposed to be directed at the player, but rather to indicate that the bombers would have their torpedoes locked until the corvettes showed up. I think that's why that was there. I've actually never tried using my own torps on the cruisers.

Restricting command to the bombers is an interesting idea, and would make commanding them a lot less annoying. I'll have to think about that.

Oh, and on using the Sekhmet in the previous mission -- yeah, I'll have to make that clearer. I just figure that the Sekhmet is still the best option for the defense mission, despite being a bomber, simply by virtue of having FS2 stats rather than FS1 stats. And it's one of the better ships, besides.

 

Offline SL1

  • 26
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Hm...interesting. Most of what you mention I can fix easily enough (or was already planning to fix), but re: the last mission --

Spoiler:
You are not really meant to use torpedoes on the cruisers, and it's quite easy to beat the mission without doing so -- although admittedly I rarely end up using my own torpedoes until the destroyers show up. The way I usually do it is this: order all fighters to engage enemy. This allows them to shred the first wing of cruisers very quickly. The Cains are a bit more of an issue, and I often have to C-3-1 one or two of them. The corvettes show up, and the bombers' torps are unlocked. I direct each bomber wing to take out one corvette. Then I throw everything that's left at the destroyers. I tend to play it almost exclusively as a command-strategy mission.

I think the instruction not to use torps on the cruisers...I think it was actually not supposed to be directed at the player, but rather to indicate that the bombers would have their torpedoes locked until the corvettes showed up. I think that's why that was there. I've actually never tried using my own torps on the cruisers.

Restricting command to the bombers is an interesting idea, and would make commanding them a lot less annoying. I'll have to think about that.

Oh, and on using the Sekhmet in the previous mission -- yeah, I'll have to make that clearer. I just figure that the Sekhmet is still the best option for the defense mission, despite being a bomber, simply by virtue of having FS2 stats rather than FS1 stats. And it's one of the better ships, besides.

I think you've made me realize that I might have made that mission more difficult for myself by trying to be too clever. I'm looking at all these wings and trying to figure out how I can micromanage them all with hotkeys and so forth, then I think there's something wrong with me for feeling overwhelmed, and then I just give up entirely. I hadn't considered good old C-3-9 and C-3-1. So maybe it's my fault for overthinking things. I wasn't even aware that weapons could be locked like that.

 

Offline Hellstryker

  • waffles
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Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
I'm sad this thing doesn't have its own forum section. This is the best campaign I've played in eight years and is a true masterwork of both story and game design. Hats off to you, dude.

 
Re: RELEASE: The Mantle, Segment 1 (Preliminary)
Hm...interesting. Most of what you mention I can fix easily enough (or was already planning to fix), but re: the last mission --

Spoiler:
You are not really meant to use torpedoes on the cruisers, and it's quite easy to beat the mission without doing so -- although admittedly I rarely end up using my own torpedoes until the destroyers show up. The way I usually do it is this: order all fighters to engage enemy. This allows them to shred the first wing of cruisers very quickly. The Cains are a bit more of an issue, and I often have to C-3-1 one or two of them. The corvettes show up, and the bombers' torps are unlocked. I direct each bomber wing to take out one corvette. Then I throw everything that's left at the destroyers. I tend to play it almost exclusively as a command-strategy mission.

I think the instruction not to use torps on the cruisers...I think it was actually not supposed to be directed at the player, but rather to indicate that the bombers would have their torpedoes locked until the corvettes showed up. I think that's why that was there. I've actually never tried using my own torps on the cruisers.

Restricting command to the bombers is an interesting idea, and would make commanding them a lot less annoying. I'll have to think about that.

Oh, and on using the Sekhmet in the previous mission -- yeah, I'll have to make that clearer. I just figure that the Sekhmet is still the best option for the defense mission, despite being a bomber, simply by virtue of having FS2 stats rather than FS1 stats. And it's one of the better ships, besides.

I think you've made me realize that I might have made that mission more difficult for myself by trying to be too clever. I'm looking at all these wings and trying to figure out how I can micromanage them all with hotkeys and so forth, then I think there's something wrong with me for feeling overwhelmed, and then I just give up entirely. I hadn't considered good old C-3-9 and C-3-1. So maybe it's my fault for overthinking things. I wasn't even aware that weapons could be locked like that.

Eh, if the player is confused it's basically my responsibility. Within reason, at least. Yeah, I think I'm going to restrict wing command to the bombers.

I'm sad this thing doesn't have its own forum section. This is the best campaign I've played in eight years and is a true masterwork of both story and game design. Hats off to you, dude.

Oh! Well...thanks! I really appreciate that!