Author Topic: Join Neo Terra Victorious!  (Read 128449 times)

0 Members and 4 Guests are viewing this topic.

Offline dragonsniper

  • 29
  • Master of the Irrelevant
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Here is the mission I've been working on. I've been de-bugging for some time now so I hope there aren't any bugs left.

[attachment deleted by necromancer]
Do or do not, there is no try...
~HLP Member and Modder~
          ~~2008-201x~~

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Holy mother of God, 202 kbs?!? ;7

I'll let you know... :)
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Romanmolf

  • 27
  • n00b... And loving it
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Did you test my fixed mission, Mobius?

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Sorry, I didn't notice your edit. Are you sure you prefer to send me an upgrade instead of a completely new mission?

Anyway, I've updated the first post. For now on there will be a naming convention for samples.


dragonsniper: Your mission makes use of the GTF Kelpie and the new score features so I couldn't play it.. It should be on FSO standards with no mods.

Romanmolf: I didn't notice major changes in your mission...
« Last Edit: March 27, 2010, 01:46:45 pm by Jeff Vader »
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Romanmolf

  • 27
  • n00b... And loving it
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I did what you told me to. Well, anyway, I'll start another now.

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Well, I also told you to arrange a better strike force...I can still see "<insert wing name> 25" in that mission.
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Snail

  • SC 5
  • 214
  • Posts: ☂
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Here is the mission I've been working on. I've been de-bugging for some time now so I hope there aren't any bugs left.
Hint: By right-clicking on "when" you can use 'Add Operator' to do more than one action for each event. You'll find it'll be a lot more efficient and easy this way.

 

Offline Droid803

  • Trusted poster of legit stuff
  • 213
  • /人 ◕ ‿‿ ◕ 人\ Do you want to be a Magical Girl?
    • Skype
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
So THAT's why its huge!
(´・ω・`)
=============================================================

  

Offline dragonsniper

  • 29
  • Master of the Irrelevant
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Here is the mission I've been working on. I've been de-bugging for some time now so I hope there aren't any bugs left.
Hint: By right-clicking on "when" you can use 'Add Operator' to do more than one action for each event. You'll find it'll be a lot more efficient and easy this way.
I realize that. I just didn't take the time to edit it. It's also all the ships that are in it that racks up the size.

dragonsniper: Your mission makes use of the GTF Kelpie and the new score features so I couldn't play it.. It should be on FSO standards with no mods.

Romanmolf: I didn't notice major changes in your mission...

I checked and couldn't find any Kelpie. Will it affect at all if I have the Transcend VP folder in use so I can play the campaign? And does "the new score features" mean music played from a folder instead of a soundtrack?
« Last Edit: November 05, 2008, 07:59:29 pm by dragonsniper »
Do or do not, there is no try...
~HLP Member and Modder~
          ~~2008-201x~~

 

Offline dragonsniper

  • 29
  • Master of the Irrelevant
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Here is the mission with music playing from a table. Hope that helps. And as I said up above, I checked each individual ship and never saw the Kelpie being put in use in the mission.  Hope it works :)

[attachment deleted by necromancer]
Do or do not, there is no try...
~HLP Member and Modder~
          ~~2008-201x~~

 

Offline Romanmolf

  • 27
  • n00b... And loving it
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I'm halfway my new mission now, please wait...

 

Offline Snail

  • SC 5
  • 214
  • Posts: ☂
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
So THAT's why its huge!
That, an the absolutely insane amount of fighters, bombers and caps in the mission......

 

Offline dragonsniper

  • 29
  • Master of the Irrelevant
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
So THAT's why its huge!
That, an the absolutely insane amount of fighters, bombers and caps in the mission......
I know it's a lot of ships, but atleast I didn't put FRED's limit of ships in like I was going to do. :drevil:
Do or do not, there is no try...
~HLP Member and Modder~
          ~~2008-201x~~

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I hope it's not a BoE, I don't know how to come to conclusions about someone's FREDding skills by testing that kind of missions.

I'm damn busy now...Droid, can you please test the mission? :)
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Snail

  • SC 5
  • 214
  • Posts: ☂
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I tested it, and I'm afraid to say, it wasn't as good as I expected. Read on if you can take criticism, skip to the end of the rant if you can't.

dragonsniper, I'm not trying to discourage you, but I couldn't help but notice the numerous flaws of your mission.  What follows is a long rant.

[rant]

Firstly, it throws me into the fray with no bearings and no objectives, immediately crashing into the Julius with an innumberable amount of friendly and enemy craft in the mission. Sometimes this can be a good thing if you want to give the player a real surprise, but this chaotic beginning made me struggle to keep alive on medium difficulty, a display of bad balance if you ask me. I couldn't get my situational awareness due to the immense amount of ships in the mission, which made me pretty disoriented. Again, this could be a good thing but in this case it wasn't. Additionally, since there was so much action at the beginning, I didn't have time to actually read the messages streaming by and had to press F4 to access the mission log to re-read the mission log. This is another common error.

The most fatal flaw in your mission, however, was the absolutely pointless Battle of Endor mission going on in the background. Apart from a bit of chaotic, insane action at the beginning, and a bit more fighting at the end, the entire mission was uneventful, and, I daresay, pointless. The battle between the 2+ Saths and the I don't have any idea how many allied ships had no significance to the player whatsoever. None of them attacked the Julius, and only fired on each other. This sucked up the resources on my computer, which usually runs at around 50-60 FPS. During the mission I had 20 FPS, due primarily to the pointless battle going on in the background. There's a time when you have to stop thinking about storyline and atmosphere and start thinking about gameplay.

It also struck me as pretty strange that Command seemed to have no problem sacrificing numerous allied destroyers and superdestroyers (!!) to save a corvette, and also the fact that Command seemed to have an ever lasting supply of warships which he only sent in on a whim. That was a nonsense. 10+ destroyers, sending them in to kill a few Shivan ships, ordering them to depart, and when the next Shivan wave came, Command sent yet more ships. Random violence in the background that made no sense whatsoever. There is a point where you have to stop thinking about how cool it would be to see a Hades fighting two Demons and a Sathanas and start thinking about realism and storyline.

Not only was the massive battle going on in the background pointless and of no significance to the player, it was also horribly scripted. All of the ships seemed to have either no orders or orders to attack other warships. Chase orders for warships are known to be very stupid as the AI does pretty idiotic things when given orders to attack other warships. The allied craft wobbled around, crashed into each other, and shot into each other's backs. When the Arcadia warped in (!!) it smashed into the Demon which went flying backwards at 500 m/s. One of the Orions at the beginning started moving around and splattered a fair amount of my wingmen.

From what I could see, NONE of the extra ships in the mission were needed. The only necessary ships were the Julius, the allied escort, and the enemy fighters. None of the Ravnas, Demons, Orions, Hades', Hatshepsuts or Sathanes needed to be there. Their presence was unjustified, badly scripted and, most of all, pointless.

[/rant]



I'm sure that you put a large amount of effort into this mission, dragonsniper, and I appreciate that. Unfortunately, a mission's quality is not determined by the size of the mission file nor the amount of effort that goes into it (though effort does play a large part). What matters is how much fun the mission is. To make a mission fun you need a mix of gameplay, storyline, atmosphere, etc. etc. This mission was not fun.

What you have made is commonly known as a Battle of Endor mission. Though it's not as bad as some Battle of Endor missions I've seen (namely my own), I do have to say it isn't the best. Mobius is capable of making excellent Battle of Endor missions. They work, they are fun. But that's because he is an exceptional FREDder... I'm not saying you're not one either, but it seems to me like you're just starting with FREDding. When you start FREDding I know it's tempting to use huge amounts of ships, because it's cool. But when you start off, you have to aim a bit lower. You can't run before you know how to crawl.

What I recommend you do now is start over. This time, make a simple mission. A convoy escort mission, or a little strike on an enemy cargo depot or something like that. Over time, as your skills get better, you'll be able to go back and make a better version of that huge mission. But for now, you gotta aim low and actually make some quality missions.

Every FREDder has made these mistakes at least once. I know I have. I know this may sound a bit patronizing but it's the truth. What you have to go back and do now is learn from your mistakes. :)
« Last Edit: November 07, 2008, 04:13:11 pm by Snail »

 

Offline dragonsniper

  • 29
  • Master of the Irrelevant
    • Steam
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Thx for the advice. It's nice to have someone that has FREDing talent over me to tell me the flaws. I'm working on another mission, however if you didn't like this one then you may not like the other one. Time to start from scratch I guess.

So for now can I take the FREDing spot as a no? And thanks for testing it. It's helped me realize a lot.
Do or do not, there is no try...
~HLP Member and Modder~
          ~~2008-201x~~

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
It's not a no. We simply let you design another mission. :)

The following is just a suggestion: you may wish to join the FSCRP...you'll need to test missions and do minor FRED edits. The FSCRP is being quite inactive(I can barely work on INFA, I don't know how to find spare time for the FSCRP) and needs more people. :D
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Romanmolf

  • 27
  • n00b... And loving it
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I'm going through briefings\debriefings on my mission right now... stay realy tuned!

EDIT: HERE
« Last Edit: November 11, 2008, 04:17:29 am by Romanmolf »

 

Offline Mobius

  • Back where he started
  • 213
  • Porto l'azzurro Dolce Stil Novo nella fantascienza
    • Skype
    • Twitter
    • The Lightblue Ribbon | Cultural Project
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
Can someone test it for me, please? :)

Droid, are you there?
The Lightblue Ribbon

Inferno: Nostos - Alliance
Series Resurrecta: {{FS Wiki Portal}} -  Gehenna's Gate - The Spirit of Ptah - Serendipity (WIP) - <REDACTED> (WIP)
FreeSpace Campaign Restoration Project
A tribute to FreeSpace in my book: Riflessioni dall'Infinito
My interviews: [ 1 ] - [ 2 ] - [ 3 ]

 

Offline Snail

  • SC 5
  • 214
  • Posts: ☂
Re: Join Neo Terra Victorious!
I playtested it.

It's a satisfactory mission. It's what I'd call a 'bare essentials' mission, it's short, and gives exactly what it says on the label. Not bad, but not great either.

First, there were quite a few spelling mistakes spattered around the mission. Should be easily fixed and not too much of a problem, but it does damage the professionalism.

I do have to point out that I did see a fair amount of workaround techniques. By this I mean doing the smallest amount of work possible to get the job done. The most notable of these is the waved wings. There are only a few ships in the mission, and it looks to me like you only waved them to keep the mission going without you needing to do so much work. Waved wings isn't the way to keep a mission moving, you should add more twists such as additional NTF cruisers warping in to reinforce the position and such. Waved wings are predictable and are a sign of laziness, especially if they're the only enemies in the mission.

A second thing was the lack of messages and events. There were so few messages that I didn't notice most of them. It's a major part of the mission which you're missing there and it doesn't help with immersion in the storyline. A few more messages would've been nice.




All in all, a good mission (really good seeing as you're just starting out). It was a lot better than I expected, but still, it could have some improvements.

:yes: