Author Topic: RELEASE: Walls Closing  (Read 16370 times)

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Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Something I did when adding the markboxs did that. No idea what though.

EDIT: Found the issue (I think). Make sure you're running with nightlies on and with build 3.8.1-20190406 from your FSO settings.
« Last Edit: April 28, 2019, 02:01:21 am by Colt »

 

Offline CT27

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
I don't think that will work for me.  Any nightly after 10-31-2017 seems to break graphics for me (in all campaigns).


The thing is, this campaign worked fine in previous versions (1.0.4 and prior) with using that particular nightly I mentioned.  In other words, I didn't get the error box and was able to play the campaign.

 

Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
I see. I can make a copy of 1.1 without the markboxs while running on the previous version and pm it to you then. I wanna shift gears back to my other campaign so the only update WC will be getting in the immediate future is if something breaks (which seems to often be the case :p)

 

Offline CT27

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Thank you.  That worked.

I wasn't using Knossos but rather 'regular' FSO so I didn't use the mod.json provided (I created a mod.ini for the folder).

 

Offline Mito [PL]

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
I don't think that will work for me.  Any nightly after 10-31-2017 seems to break graphics for me (in all campaigns).
I'm pretty sure you should grab a debug log and ask FSO staff some questions about the bug, then.
How do you kill a hydra?

You starve it to death.

 

Offline Nyctaeus

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
:bump:

...is good. Very good. Last mission has some stuff I dislike, but overally very enjoyable. Another project I owe a simple review.
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Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Glad you liked it! As for the stuff that didn't go over well, might I ask what it was? It may be something I could look out for or implement into my current work.

 

Offline Nyctaeus

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Spoiler:
Basicly I had no way to prepate myself for Lilith. I already used majority of my Trebs on bombers, with only pair to take down Lilith's main beam... And unfortunately it's not enough. In such scenario I tried to finish off that beam close-quarters but she fired before I reached the destination and Phoenicia died. It's about player being capable of doing anything to keep mission progressing. This time I wasn't capable of doing anything and had to replay. Next time I saved 4 Trebs for this Lilith with success, but forcing player to replay mission is bad mission designer practice. WiH: Tenebra is perfect example.

Plus the Demon. I don't buy the thing with Demon-class destroyer idling outside battle area for her ships to strike untill she finally rush her engines to strike. It's not how Shivans work. She should jump close to Phoenicia. Fire delay is acceptable here for gameplay resons [She is charging power after jump or something?] This kind of stuff.
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Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Spoiler:
Basicly I had no way to prepate myself for Lilith. I already used majority of my Trebs on bombers, with only pair to take down Lilith's main beam... And unfortunately it's not enough. In such scenario I tried to finish off that beam close-quarters but she fired before I reached the destination and Phoenicia died. It's about player being capable of doing anything to keep mission progressing. This time I wasn't capable of doing anything and had to replay. Next time I saved 4 Trebs for this Lilith with success, but forcing player to replay mission is bad mission designer practice. WiH: Tenebra is perfect example.

Spoiler:
I'll keep that in mind. Unfortunately it's a bit easy to make a challenging mission too challenging (in this case having to fail at least once), and I agree that's not fun at all.

Spoiler:
Plus the Demon. I don't buy the thing with Demon-class destroyer idling outside battle area for her ships to strike untill she finally rush her engines to strike. It's not how Shivans work. She should jump close to Phoenicia. Fire delay is acceptable here for gameplay resons [She is charging power after jump or something?] This kind of stuff.

Spoiler:
In regard to the idling part, I'll admit I did that for a number of reasons. Having it approach from a realistic distance without the fight commencing too early was the big one for me, so easiest way was the develop the "they're probably saving strength to go home" narrative.

On that subject, that is super weird Shivan behavior! Perhaps my next campaign will explore that more in depth  ;7 (not an excuse to avoid more engaging fleet behavior however). Also that engine/beam power usage scenario sounds good. I'll remember that. Thanks for the response!


 

Offline Mito [PL]

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Regarding the last mission:
Hidden Text: Show
Nyx, I personally think that the sole reason for using Trebs is to have a way of killing beam cannons if they're out of your primary/other secondary weapons range. They're an extremely valuable asset, and you by going all out on some random bombers and then losing your emergency life saving measures, the Trebs, are kinda violating one of the most important rules of FS tactics.

If you run a defence of a large friendly target with Trebs available and a possiblity of enemy warships showing up, you need to always save your Trebs whenever possible (unless there's an important target that isn't a warship in play, but that happens extremely rarely). This allows you to defend your charges against all but the most precisely and quickly executed shock-jumps.

IMO, this mission puts a large emphasis on the player planning ahead for possible incoming warships and rewards you for restraining yourself when it comes to spending vital resources. If you decided to save up on these, you should be able to pass this mission in the first go.
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Offline Nyctaeus

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Spoiler:
Treb is anti-bomber, long range missile. Anti-damn-bomber. It's not anti-subsystem missile for unexpected issues so I mostly use it according to it's purpose assigned by V. At the same point I actually saved pair of them knowing nature of fanmade campaigns, as mission designers often require me to use Treb as anti-subsystem ordinance... I actually expected Moloch with additional beam or Ravana, than Lilith jumped and ****ed me up.

So no - mission designer has no right to expect that I will read his mind and predict correctly what will happen. I often try to do so, but this time I failed. It's common issue of aspiring mission designers - they're omnipotent about their missions, they know the way to play it correctly but they sometimes forgot that other, potential players are not them.

It's not a serious issue and obviously I'm not gonna cringe about it, especially when I enjoyed rest of the campaign. Some simple message would help. Something like "Pilots, save your Trebs. We're expecting heavy shivan reinforcements, so be ready for taking down their beam cannons."   It's just a small nitpick I found worthy to be noted, to help Colt in his future fredding endeavours... And hoping to play any, if he decide to make such :P

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Offline Mito [PL]

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Quote
It's not anti-subsystem missile for unexpected issues so I mostly use it according to it's purpose assigned by V.
Whatever V makes the Trebuchet to be in their descriptions, realms of gameplay tend to disagree. Both the Treb and Maxim fill a very specific role that is met pretty often during the game, and it's a real waste to use the ammunition to shoot down secondary targets that could be dispatched just as easily with dogfighting weapons or by your wingmen. Two Trebs can take down a single bomber, or efficiently get rid of a corvette's worth of beam cannons or even defang a Ravana with some luck. What's worth more?
Of course, there are instances where the relative value of multiple beam cannons is lower than a couple bombers, but that's usually due to the ship with these beam cannons being massively displaced in the battlezone.

IMO these arguments are rather self-evident after several years of playing Freespace?


The mission designer isn't supposed to expect the player to read his mind, of course. However, I believe that the mission designer should be at least allowed, if not also encouraged, to create scenarios that reward and/or require the player to employ certain ways of thinking about possible future developements in the battlezone. This also works very well when combined with immersiveness. Look at this like: you're military. The responsibility of the military is to be always prepared for whatever comes and threatens you. You're fighting Shivans of all things. With such an enemy, you must always expect the worst. This means you need to manage your resources carefully to minimise the chance of being caught with your pants down.

This is exactly why after a fight you should always rearm and let all your ship's energy reserves recharge. Or why you take a bank of Trebuchet or Maxim with you for an escort mission, if possible - even if it isn't said that there will be a capship to defang around the place, you have to be prepared for one. Or why warships join formations - to be more resilient in case of fighters and bombers, and to be able to more efficiently respond to threats.
For me, it's a large part of the immersiveness of a mission. Treating the player as if he's thinking like the pilot he is - fighting against an extremely dangerous foe, expecting and preparing for danger and always trying to make the best out the current situation, as compared to a person who sits there and thinks "well I'll just follow the common mission design tropes, what can go wrong?".

I just think, Nyx
Hidden Text: Show
That you've been simply caught with your pants down thanks to you following one of the popular escort mission cliches and there's nothing in your defense for that :P

That's why I think this mission is better than the average, at least in this respect - IIRC you're being informed during the briefing that there are enemy capships around the place and you're getting a slight slap for assuming the size of the force or following the common mission design trope.
Ultimately, it's nothing tragic - the worst that happens is you lose several minutes of gameplay and give yourself a slight mental facepalm and then replay it and win the battle. And if you manage to be prepared, you can give yourself a mental self-high-five and then feel like a pro :D.
How do you kill a hydra?

You starve it to death.

 

Offline Nyctaeus

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Dedicated anti-subsystem weaponry in both FS games is Stilletto and official doctrine dictated by GTVA is taking down subsystems with Stiletto... But we all known that Stiletto is useless piece of crap and Treb or Maxim are just significantly better. In fact it's your statement that breaks military vibe, because it renders GTVA non competent as it requires you to use useless weapons to achieve the goal with better solutions already available in their arsenal.

But let's not get sooo far and let GTVA do their job. FS was always somewhat rough on the edges as a game, and Treb is actually one of the most OP weapons available for player in FS2, while Stiletto is underwhelming. It has inferior range and it may be intercepted... But Treb is awesome. I'm not surprised why mission designers prefer to give player a Treb when it's about disarming enemy beam cannons. V screwed up, but background they made for individual missions remain valid.

Dude, you're approaching dangerously close to overestimate your ability of judging how other people think. Even if you joke :]. My point is not derived from "****, this thing is not intuitive! I'm so frustrated like a child, because I can't beat this! Who freded that?!".

A well-freded mission may be hard, pushing you to the limits and if you can't beat it, it means you need more skill and perhaps you should play on easier difficulty level. One of the most annoying missions of FS1 - the Tenderizer is excellent example. But this case is different. You have your Pers equipped in Trebs by default, but other player may pick different fighter or not pick Trebs at all in favour of more Harpoons/Tornadoes/Tempests whatever. Mechanics of this mission does not accept that, as you have no other way of dealing with Lilith than quad Trebs. In fact, mechanics of this mission play tic tac toe with you, and leaves you with no option to handle things without loosing it if you decide to go with other approach than the one the mission designer prefer. I'm not sure if team loadout is available in this mission, but even if it's not, tic tac toe issue remain valid. In fact every mission play tic tac toe with player, but it's up to player to win. In this situation, there may be no way to win simply because you use Trebs for what Trebs were bloody hell made for :P . With more time for player to approach the Lilith and kill it's beam by primaries/harpoons, it would be acceptable. Currently this part of the mission is designed for imminent failure.
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Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
And hoping to play any, if he decide to make such :P
Oh there will be  :yes:

 
Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Really enjoyed this. I always appreciate a good "meanwhile, off-screen" campaign. The battles were fun, but not overwhelming with good wingmen commands. It helped I played Windmills a few days ago.

 

Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Really enjoyed this. I always appreciate a good "meanwhile, off-screen" campaign. The battles were fun, but not overwhelming with good wingmen commands. It helped I played Windmills a few days ago.
Glad you enjoyed it!

 

Offline Colt

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Update 1.20 1.21 is out on Knossos!

1.20
1.21 is both a late spring cleaning update and an update that brings it up to the same standard of the still-WIP campaign called Shepherds. New features include Axem's BP-like HUD, scripts and effects from Between the Ashes and Ancient-Shivan War, and a hot retexture of the GTD Phoenicia, courtesy of Nyctaeus. Also loading screens!



Screenshots:







« Last Edit: June 15, 2020, 11:56:32 pm by Colt »

 
Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
That's the problem with all these upgrades, I have to play everything again. *sigh* The struggle continues. ;)

 
Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Oh cool an upgrade~ :yes:

  

Offline unsrm

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Re: RELEASE: Walls Closing
Colt,

I've just finished your campaign, I really enjoyed it, thought the logs added to the tension and at no point did I feel like 'rage quitting', it felt like 'classic Freespace 2' which as far as I'm concerned is a compliment.

One bug that I encountered was no debriefing on mission 1.
One comment - I'd prefer that mission designers not use the message noise as for those of us that use text to speech to 'hear' messages in mission that noise 'replaces' the text to speech.

Overall, massively enjoyable and I hope you decide to work on a new project in the future, new creations are always welcome :D

Chris