Hard Light Productions Forums
Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The FRED Workshop => FRED Academy => Topic started by: Primus on March 18, 2005, 02:07:36 pm
-
Working hard...
First version of the FA campaign 5 (TBP), mission 2.
DOWNLOAD (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v1_Primus.zip)
Note. In the briefing there's 'system ??' because the systems hasn't been decided yet.
85% of this mission was done tonight. Been fredding all day long...
-
:) Well this will make a nice break from working on the FAQ :)
-
I'll get testing this too.
-
I quite liked the mission :) The sentri were tough but killable. I didn't feel particularly threatened by them at any point but I was playing on easy.
Technically I found a few flaws with the timing of the messages but when I look at the mission in FRED I can't see anything you've done particularly wrong. I'll try the mission again with the voice synth turned off and see if that makes things better.
Apart from that
- The first wing of centauri fighters appear to jump in though and that's just wrong. Fighters can't form a jump point on their own. Have them appear with no warp effect and say that they've sneaked in on a low power approach.
- Why does the G'Tok have beam free orders for a sensor subsystem? In the g'tok lock main guns and g'tok free main guns You appear to be locking and freeing the wrong subsystem.
- The Narn fighters will all accept a depart order from the player. Since fighters can't jump out on their own this needs to be fixed from the player orders options.
- :lol: The last one made me laugh. I thought you guys knew by now that I always check for an AWOL debrief. I noticed you've fixed the mission so that Alpha 1 can't leap out (which I was impressed by) but you made one error. Start the mission and immediately press Alt-J. You'll kick yourself when you see what happens.
Not bad for a first go though. This one is pretty close to being done as is.
-
You know.. I played the mission without any pilot anis, because they messed up the timing of the messages. I thought it was because I have a low-end PC.
I'll fix those things. And why? Oh, why did you press Alt-J at the beginning? :lol:
[EDIT] The mission is pretty easy on medium too. Although the Sentris knocked out my sensors five times.. Anyway, I was thinking maybe adding a one more wing of Centauri fighters jumping in with the Vorchan..
-
Originally posted by Primus
I'll fix those things. And why? Oh, why did you press Alt-J at the beginning? :lol:
Cause sooner or later someone playing the mission will. :) Notice the whole form up and jump. Anyone not used to TBP would probably press Alt-J as soon as it appears and then be confused as to how their fighter was able to make its own jump point.
I found another error. One of the centauri fighters took it into their head to go fight with T'Bok wing. Don't give them attack any ship orders or you will find them doing that occassionally. :)
-
Originally posted by karajorma
I found another error. One of the centauri fighters took it into their head to go fight with T'Bok wing. Don't give them attack any ship orders or you will find them doing that occassionally. :)
I have to say that I didn't find that error. But, I noticed that few times a Centauri fighter heads for the gate. Is it because the gate isn't marked as 'invisible to sensors' (or what is was called)?.
-
He's probably heading to the gate cause that's where T'Bok wing are :)
That said I suppose it's possible that he might consider the gate a target too (It's probably a good standard practice to protect and beam protect jump gates in TBP).
-
Yeap. The gate is protected, beam protected and invunerable and now invisible to sensors. And I've fixed those little problems too.
Off to playtest it... Soon...
[EDIT] ...Hidden From Sensors. :p
-
Okay.. I don't get it. For some reason, couple of Centauri fighters head for the jumpgate. The gate is marked as: Cargo Known, Protect Ship, Beam Protect Ship, Invulnerable, Hidden from Sensors. And the team is friendly.
-
You sure that they're not going after that wing of narn fighters that jump in from the node? That's what I mean when I say that they're going after T'bok wing. T'Bok wing jump in about 10,000m away from all the action. The first time I played the game I actually saw them fighting with the sentri that went over to the jump node.
I think they're ignoring the jump gate all right. They're not ignoring that wing of fighters though. I had a mission once where I gave a wing of Maras orders to attack alpha wing. For reasons I won't go into Alpha 4 was 100,000m away and yet Cancer 4 decided to go have a fight with it.
It appears that the game doesn't pick and choose the targets it goes after based on how close it is to the enemy fighter.
-
It may be a good idea to make the player wait for the wing that arrives, maybe do this by increasing the time it takes to scan..not sure how you would do this. So far nothing seems to have gone horribly wrong, my only realy gripe is that the mission is not very challenging, the player gets 10 other fighters, don't be afraid to swarm the player a little bit. Also the comms msg telling the player to stay away from the Centari cruiser does seem a bit odd as my wing had no probs killing it several times. Still for a first draft it is very impressive.
Also, what ambience is recommended?
-
I was playtesting the mission and noticed something what makes it easy. When the Centauri cruiser and fighters jump in, the defence platform shoots the Vorcan and the blast damages the CR fighters severly.
That's why it's pretty easy to take 'em out.
So I'll remove or re-position the platform...
-
Ah. I noticed that. I thought shooting the Vorchan was intentional though :D
-
Yeah.. But fighters getting damage was not.
-
Move the fighters then.
-
Problem with that is that they have to jump in next to the Vorchan since B5 fighters can't form their own jump points.
Moving the gun would improve the mission. In fact you'll make the mission a lot better if the player and the G'quon have to take out the Vorchan.
-
I will do that. I always wondered why the first two CR fighters are harder to take out than the rest...
I'll probably release the mission tonight.
-
It wasn't the defence platform that damages the Vorchan and Centauri fighters. It was the G'Quan shooting it's goddamn energy mines...
-
I noticed that it was an energy mine. I didn't know that it wasn't the platform firing it. :)
I guess you can break the turret and say that it's offline for repairs.
-
Well, my solution was to remove the mines from weapons editor. Maybe they're out of mines?
-
DOWNLOAD (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v2_Primus.zip)
Balancing problems... It was too hard with six Sentris. I removed two and now I think it's too easy.
But let me know. :)
-
^ Above mission will be tested sooner or later ^
-
That was fun :D I've adjusted my FOV and I was playing on easy cause a narrow FOV makes things harder but I found the mission perfectly balanced :) First time I failed the mission cause the shuttle was destroyed but the second time I passed it :)
There still are a few minor issues with the mission though.
1) There were a couple of messages out of place still. For instance the G'tok mentions that there is only one thing left to do only after it has started shooting.
2) AWOL Debriefing. Haven't you learned to check by now? :lol: The solution you've instituted doesn't actually work yet. It does prevent the G'tok jumping out early but if you press Alt-J at the start of the mission then play to the end you'll find that it doesn't actually jump out (I haven't actually tested that but I looked at your FREDding and I can't see any reason why it would jump out).
The reason for this is because you've used and-in-sequence to prevent the G'Tok jumping out. That's a reasonable use of it but if the player presses Alt-J any time before the "DIR - jump A" event triggers then the game will read key-pressed as being true first (preventing the G'tok from ever leaving).
The solution is actually quite simple. In the "DIR - jump A" event change the do-nothing into key-reset>>Alt-J (You may also need to change the and-in-sequence to AND because Key-Reset is an exceedingly bug-filled SEXP and I never tested it with and-in-sequence so I have no idea what would happen).
3) The reason why I tend to come down on the AWOL bug is because it's actually a little hard to get the form up event to trigger. You've requested that the player gets 100m from the G'tok which might be a little too close. I can't remember if distances are calculated from the centre of a model or from its bounding box but either way some experimentation might be worth doing (changing it to 200m would probably be enough though).
4) Not a complaint. I believe in giving praise where it's due so I always mention thing I saw that were well done. I never noticed it the first time but kudos to you for using alternative wing names for the Narn fighters. :) I'm sure that you're not the only one doing so but that is the first time I've seen anyone apart from myself using that feature and it's twice as good to see it being done by someone in the FA :D
-
2) I noticed once that the G'Tok didn't jump. *kicks himself*
4) :D
I'll fix those things and maybe even add a AWOL debrief (finally). :lol:
[EDIT] Kudos?
[EDIT2] You scared the s*** out of me with that long post. I thought everything was FUBARed. :lol:
-
ku·dos
n. Acclaim or praise for exceptional achievement.
:)
I tend to be long winded when I'm posting on here cause I like to make sure people understand exactly why something didn't work :) I hope it helps you see why the event isn't working.
That said I do feel that you're reaching the level where you don't need long explainations from me any more. It's certainly good for me if I can state the problem and a short hint or two and leave you to fix it :)
Fact is I'm starting to think you're definately looking like the next person who'll graduate from the Academy. If I needed another FREDder on the MG team I'd definately have sent you an invite by now :D
-
*smacks head*
Forgot about this mission, testing today....
[EDIT] I was stupid, this is a B5 mission and I don't have any B5 mods.
-
Jesus Christ man! I didn't release the third version because I was waiting for your test report. But I forgive you.
j/k ;)
But seriously. I'll release my FA missions when this place is back to normal. Right now I'm keeping myself busy with my website, DT and the Club.
-
If it's ready you might as well post it up now. Lots of bored people who can't access TBP's forum = legion of free playtesters (Hopefully) :D
-
I have to be honest.. I have no idea if it is ready. Really. I don't remember what was the last thing I did with the mission. :nervous:
I'll check it later tonight...
-
What I noticed is that the "Protect Ra'Mak" directive is marked as "faliure" although only the shuttle has been destroyed. The Ra'Mak is destroyed afterwards, anyways, but - I think that's quite strange, anyways.
And one small thing: Recommendations for completing the "Protect Shuttle" dircetive are missing; if you fail it it just says "We have no recom...bla, bla...."
And, the G'Tok starting shooting before it said something, too, of course:nod: .
But besides of this a nice piece of work. No really bad errors - thumbs up! Already waiting for the campaign:yes:
-
Originally posted by n00by
What I noticed is that the "Protect Ra'Mak" directive is marked as "faliure" although only the shuttle has been destroyed. The Ra'Mak is destroyed afterwards, anyways, but - I think that's quite strange, anyways.
I was thinking that the shuttle is Ra'Mak's only hope. So if the shuttle gets destroyed, it's also the end of Ra'Mak as no one will be able to help them in time.
-
But that happened after the shuttle left the Ra'Mak with the remaining crew. Should have said it before...
-
DOWNLOAD (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v3_Primus.zip)
o Fixed things
o Added AWOL debrief
o Added Recommendation
x Didn't find the error that n00by described :nervous:
-
Gonna have a look once more - as soon as I have free time... ;-(
-
I have to reinstall FreeSpace tonight anyway so I might as well use this as a test :)
Might as well take a look at the mission in FRED and test out the new build of that too :)
-
FreeSpace? You do mean TBP? :p
-
Nope. I mean FreeSpace. I run TBP as a mod :D
-
Sorry to take so long but I finally got around to trying this :)
Basically I couldn't fault it. Admittedly I lost my comms about half way through and there may be some message errors but apart from that it worked fine.
Feel free to pick another mission if you want to. :)
-
...Ok. It's done?
But I'm working on my first FA mission and I'll try to finish it, before I pick more missions. And I think I'll release a new version of it, today or tomorrow. Been busy too.
-
I couldn't see anything wrong with it. Might be worth getting someone else's opinion though :)
-
Tested it, and to be honest I can't find any faults in it. The difficulty is balanced well and it seems to be near finished status, though I may of course be missing the obvious. It seems finished to me and I'll get testing the next version.
Oh one thing not really related to this mission specifically, but what kind of ambience level should be used for this campaign, is there a specific one wanted or just pick your own?
-
Just played it, overall I think a very well created mission. Though I do have some things to point out -
*Mission Briefing - Is it possible to make this a little more in-depth? I understand your going in with little intel as to what has happend but maybe a little bit more detail here?
*Messages - Maybe space these out a little? I seem to be flooded with conversation the moment I enter. Pilot chatter is a plus to any mission but try to space it out a little more.
There the only two nit-picks I have with the mission, overall I liked it. :)
-
Briefs are hard to write for me. Language barrier is my excuse.
Flooded? Too much, too fast or both? Any specific situation?
-
I think the messages can come in a little too close together at points in the mission. That's why with voice synth turned on things can get out of sync.
-
I gave this mission a whirl last night. Its pretty good, although I agree that the timing of some of the messages and events could be spread out a bit, along with some gramatical fixes here and there.
-
Ok. I'll make some changes.
-
In general - a very well done mission... !!!
Small, weaknesses whic are
Just cosmetic...
1. I agree that some of the messages are often too close each other...
2. The briefing - what's the name of that star system? :confused:
It could be a little longer briefing, with a bit more intel data...
3.The debriefing- positive mission ending should be spelled "to engage T'Karli in another star system..."
If you like you could also add that Citari " was one of the starships that destroyed T'Karli" and "to help engage T'Karli in another..."
- it would give a little more insight to the role of Citari in previous
engagements...
OVERALL ':)' :yes: for your hard work Primus!
-
Here. (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_Primus_v4.zip)
Sorry for the delay, RL is keeping me busy.
Anyway. The message delays are now 1-3s longer. I hope that's enough. The briefs are edited. But they're still pretty simple. I added one debrief for Ra'Mak's destruction.
I wonder if I messed up anything. :nervous:
-
I'll get testing it, but if it's just window dressing you've updated then I think, in my view, that this is the first campaign five mission done...unless I've missed one, in which case I'll go look and test that one.
-
It's the same as v3, but with longer message delays, a bit longer briefs and one new debrief. Also some spelling and grammars are corrected.
-
The comms during mission are now very clear...
You have enough time to fly and read them all down to the last letter... ;)
The briefings and debriefings are now without any flaws - this is a quick scramble mission, so there's enough intel data, because the command doesn't know the current situation and goals change during mission...
No major grammar mistakes spotted...
OVERALL - another well deserved ':)':yes: for the minor changes
-
I can't see anything wrong with mission either.
-
Thanks you two. :)
-
I'll trust those two to have caught anything I missed in the earlier tests. What are you going to work on next Primus?
-
Finally finish C1M7. :)
-
Fair enough. Look forwards to seeing that one finished :)
-
I'm sorry to bump this, especially after you've declared this finished, but I thought I should point out a few issues. First, the minor. When T'Bok wing arrives through the jumpgate, you should make sure that you remove the wing's self-generated warp effects, and make a giant SEXPed warp effect at the jumpgate, since that's how things work in the B5 universe.
Secondly, at the end of the mission, when the Ra'Mak gets destroyed, the G'Tok should be a little further away before destroying it. When the ship gets destroyed, often pieces of debris end up hitting the G'Tok and causing heavy dammage.
Next, in the briefing stage 1, you have one line that is an incomplete sentance, beginning with "but". This should probably be something like "the ship suffered heavy dammage and we have had no further communication since the attack".
I'm also curious about your choice of secondary weapons. You appear to have given the player wing some heavy anti-capital bombs rather than anti-fighter weapons. I would have issued the later, so that the beams of the G'Tok can take down the cruiser.
Finally, I am somewhat concerned over the ingame messages. Its not that they are too closely clustered, its that certain key messages get delayed by others. For example, you finish scanning the Ra'Mak, but you don't get the message commenting on their results until more messages have gone by. Same thing for the arrival of some hostile wings (not the automatic messages, as these are deactivated). You see the hostiles on your radar, but the message warning you about them may not come for 10 seconds or so.
-
Originally posted by Trivial Psychic
I'm sorry to bump this, especially after you've declared this finished, but I thought I should point out a few issues. First, the minor. When T'Bok wing arrives through the jumpgate, you should make sure that you remove the wing's self-generated warp effects, and make a giant SEXPed warp effect at the jumpgate, since that's how things work in the B5 universe.
Secondly, at the end of the mission, when the Ra'Mak gets destroyed, the G'Tok should be a little further away before destroying it. When the ship gets destroyed, often pieces of debris end up hitting the G'Tok and causing heavy dammage.
Next, in the briefing stage 1, you have one line that is an incomplete sentance, beginning with "but". This should probably be something like "the ship suffered heavy dammage and we have had no further communication since the attack".
I'm also curious about your choice of secondary weapons. You appear to have given the player wing some heavy anti-capital bombs rather than anti-fighter weapons. I would have issued the later, so that the beams of the G'Tok can take down the cruiser.
Finally, I am somewhat concerned over the ingame messages. Its not that they are too closely clustered, its that certain key messages get delayed by others. For example, you finish scanning the Ra'Mak, but you don't get the message commenting on their results until more messages have gone by. Same thing for the arrival of some hostile wings (not the automatic messages, as these are deactivated). You see the hostiles on your radar, but the message warning you about them may not come for 10 seconds or so.
No probs. :)
1) Do you believe me if I say that I planned to do that? But for some reason I didn't...
2) Good point.
3) Ok. Probably happened when I added stuff. Should have noticed that.
4) Willl be changed. Should have noticed that too.
5) Well, there's conversation going, so they tell the scan results after that. I'll check the hostile msg thing...
-
Ok I gave v4 a try, three times:
1. Normal approach [easy]
- Was ambushed by the Sentries after my scan of the Ra'Mak. Was quite a surprise.
- Ordered one wing to attack the Centauri Vorchan with missiles. The G'Tok finished it of easily.
- Then took care of the fighters.
Conclusion:
- There never seems to be any threat for the shuttle.
- The red light is too intense. And the sun emitting it should be changed to a more reddish type. But that's just cosmetic.
2. Approach with knowledge of what would happen [easy]
- Was already in a dogfight with the Sentry Patrol when G'Tok sends message "Centauri Wing".
- Attacked the Vorchan as soon as it appears with all wings. Destroyed it after 20 secs in a T'Kor salvo. Fight was pretty short then, but it worked alright.
Conclusion:
- Message "Centauri Wing" should be send sooner.
- The number of T'Kors should be limited.
3. Approach with the intent to break the mission [easy]
- Destroyed Ra'Mak, disabled G'Tok when Narn turned hostile.
Conclusion:
I don't think the mission should be adapted to fit any "mission breaking attempts of that sort" :nod:
-
Thanks for playing. When I've made the changes (see a post somewhere above), I hope you can play the fifth version too. ;)
-
I certainly will. Looking forward to it. :)
-
Look ma! I can FRED! :D
I've some changes as suggested, finally. I've been very busy last few months. Sorry the delay. :)
The message timing... Don't remember if I said this before, but I play the mission without headanis, the message timing is correct. :confused:
[EDIT]
Download link could be useful :D : -DL- (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v5_Primus.zip)
Also, the balance may need adjusting due the new narn fighter armament...
-
The mission is fine, just like the previous versions... :)
message timing is ok for me, as well as directive update
except for the strenght balance...
Now there isn't much to do... the centauri are wiped out in a matter of seconds ;7
That means no dogfighting and so the player doesn't have much influence on the course of events :sigh:
Solution: either more ( +2 or +4 centauri fighters or no secondary loadouts for Narns)
To be honest the previous strenght balance was ok...
The narns always had 1-3 losses and the fight was challenging...
:nervous:
And if you have TBP 3.2 you could implement beatiful "starfield.pof"
insert this text into skybox model line in background editor :nod:
-
Yea, like I said, the balance needs adjusting. :) I just want to solve the message timing problem now. Some say it's fine, some say it's not.
-
Play on Medium and tell me what you think about the difficulty.
The mission has a name now, Jump In, Jump Out (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v6_Primus.zip), which may not be that good, don't know...
I made some additions to briefing too.
-
The engament 1 ( vs 3 Sentris) - eradicated with 1 missle volley
The engament 2 ( vs 10 Sentris) - eradicated with 2-3 missles and
short cannon salvos, almost no dogfight, hull integrity 100%...
The Cruiser itself didn't had any chances vs 9 Frazi's ;7
DIFFICULTY tested: Medium
-
Hmph... *adds a battlecrab to centauri's side*
Ok, I'll make some minor adjustments. ;)
Thanks for playing, hopefully you'll play the next version too. :)
-
I've played it again but this time I reduced the number of fighters
in Val'drog and T'bok wings by 1 which gives a total of 7 Narn fighters...
The second fight was longer and it took also some dogfighting skills to take out all centauri fighters... Narn lost 4 fighters... And I got my sensors wiped off by a Asari missle... :cool: blind dogfight...
So to conclude after i reduced the number of Frazis by 2 everything was more balanced...
-
:yes:
I was going to remove one NR fighter and decrease the # of missiles. :D
Thanks, man.
-
Ah... Primus... the link to your mission is dead.
-
:o Sorry TP. I only now noticed your post. But here's the seventh. (http://www.geocities.com/primus_nova/FA_C5M2_v7_Primus.zip) :)
-
Good mission, works fine, very difficult.. to my surprise I found the odds quite impossible on insane.. I mean you got 7 frazis then first 4 sentris then 10! :) Finished it on hard after a couple of attempts though.
Oh, and i don't play on medium unless its impossible on harder levels, because I like having skilled AI pilots and fighting against ones.
-
Thanks for the playtest Stuger. Any other faults or complaints about the mission?
I'm sure Primus can take it :)
-
I can take anything from another finn. :D
-
Sorry to jump in rather late, but all d/l links mentioned in this thread are dead and bring up a yahoo search page. Can somebody post a working link for the final / latest version, please?
Thanks!
Uwe
-
I'll see if Primus has a newer version than the last one I got from him. If not I'm pretty sure I still have it somewhere.
-
I'll see if Primus has a newer version than the last one I got from him. If not I'm pretty sure I still have it somewhere.
Do you still have it?
-
Yep.
[attachment deleted by admin]