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Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => The FRED Workshop => FRED Academy => Topic started by: Akalabeth Angel on September 07, 2004, 12:16:01 am

Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 07, 2004, 12:16:01 am
Black Wolf, I sent you a PM regarding what I had in mind. I hadn't started on the mission itself yet but will draw out some things on paper tonight. More details would be good.

     When ready I'll post a link to the mission in this thread for review and playtesting.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Black Wolf on September 07, 2004, 05:17:46 am
Yeah, sorry - I got it pretty much just as I had to go to class. Replying now
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 07, 2004, 05:05:02 pm
No problem, I wasn't expecting an immediate reply as I didn't need one. I take it you're over in Australia or something because I posted that when I was about to go to bed :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 09, 2004, 02:30:41 pm
Question for BlackWolf:

      What system will this mission be taking place in? (or near what system?)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Black Wolf on September 09, 2004, 10:07:18 pm
Everything takes Place in Polaris to nearer the end of the camp, where it shifts to EP.
Title: Download Avail
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 13, 2004, 04:25:57 am
Version 1 is ready to download:

There shouldn't be any bugs (corrected a bunch) but it may have some balancing issues :)

http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip)

If there are any questions about the .fs2 file let me know. I've also got some text unfinished (it may say Nth Vasudan Battlegroup) because I'm not sure which is appropriate yet.

****NOTE: That there is a newer version at the end of this thread now, so don't grab this one!
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on September 13, 2004, 06:27:09 am
Downloading it but I've got a lot of playtesting to do tonight so I can't say for certain I'll get to this today.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Singh on September 14, 2004, 08:30:08 am
Tried it out - its too hard in the beggining! :(

Either that or I suck at flying - kept getting thrashed by the Cruiser and Kappa wing. you may want to consider reduce kappa's fighters or AI a bit :/
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 14, 2004, 10:02:35 am
I also found that Beta wing usually fails to disable the cruiser(I even I killed off Kappa with cheats).  I would also keep the beams off permanantly because its annoying thinking they are off in first part, and then having them switch on and kill me(twice).
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 01:58:51 pm
Sometimes it helps if you tell Beta wing to "destroy my subsystem" when targetting the engine. I know, Beta wing is woefully inept. Most of the time they just chase it, get hit by a load of flak and then veer off without doing a darn thing. I like to engage a bit outside of flak range the Prom S. It might be an idea to also swap the Subach for Akhetons (not sure if that'd help).

I didn't think the Myrmidons were much of a problem, just tell Alpha wing to engage. But when you do so, start near the Mentu since when you attack the fighters they should still be near its AAAfs. Maybe I'll give one of the flights a difficultly level flag.

The problem with the latter part of the mission is the objective is the transport. As an Elysium, its easy to kill. As an Argo, it looks too big, and when its docked to the Alexander it gets hit by the ships own flak (mega dumb), so I switched on the beams.  Maybe I'll put in some message explaining why they don't use them in the beginning.
If you stay near the Mentu until Omega arrives, the beams shouldn't be a real problem as they'll be out of range until the Mentu makes its pass.

Anyways, there are a few errors so I'll upload a new one right away.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 14, 2004, 02:01:47 pm
Also, more a recomendation for people playing it, I would load up some Stilletto II's.  Although it does take away from other sec weps, it means you can take out those flaks on the Aoulus very quickly.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 02:19:49 pm
Okay, I uploaded a new version where the Omega is an Elysium. I also put medium difficultly flags on Kappa and Gemini wings.

I don't think the Perseus can carry stilettos, but you can probably use them on at least the Herc mk2 (player has a choice of herc, myrm or perseus)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 14, 2004, 02:20:55 pm
No, the Perseus can definetly carry em.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 02:24:05 pm
Okay cool. If the player fails to destroy Omega those stillettos will come in REAL handy later on too.

Anyway, I'm off to go test my mission some more.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 03:00:23 pm
Doh! Stupid FRED. If you downloaded the mission from my previous post and plan to play on Easy, download again because the easy or less skill level wasn't quite implemented right.

Retail Mission 3 Download (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Blitzerland on September 14, 2004, 04:22:42 pm
Quote
Originally posted by Akalabeth Angel
Doh! Stupid FRED. If you downloaded the mission from my previous post and plan to play on Easy, download again because the easy or less skill level wasn't quite implemented right.

Retail Mission 3 Download (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip)



I beat it quite** easily. That was a good mission, Akalabeth Angel.
It was challenging, yet fun somehow.

Keep it up!






** Okay, so I was at 5% hull integrity at the end, but hey, I WON!
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 05:01:04 pm
I prefer the 5% integrity missions to the 95% myself :)

Notice any problems (ie errors with the mission)??
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on September 14, 2004, 05:38:34 pm
Hmmm. Don't see any of the Expert FREDders posting so I guess I'd better take a look :D
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 05:57:26 pm
Doh, I noticed another error (it was impossible to lose, because even if the Alex gets repaired the Damocles still fragged it).

That _should_ be fixed now. Along with Damocles warping out after Alex does. Note I just uploaded a new version :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on September 14, 2004, 06:25:37 pm
Didn't notice that. I got killed, on easy. :o

Anyway I did notice a few things while I was playing.

1) Five ships in Beta Wing. Even FRED doesn't like this one. Although it's possible to have wings of up to 6 ships that doesn't mean you should. If you need more than four bombers to make the mission playable what you could do is this. (I'm making it so that there are 6 bombers in Beta wing rather than 5 cause I'd rather make the mission a little easier).

Delete Beta 5. Open the wings Editor for Beta and set the threshold to  2 and the waves to 2. This means that once 2 ships are killed another 2 bombers will jump in.
 Add an event using percentage-ships-destroyed to check when 2 ships in Beta wing have been destroyed (i.e percentage-destroyer > 33%). When this happens send a message from Command saying that they've managed find an extra two bombers to help and are sending them along.

Doing that will allow you to remove that ugly extra ship from beta wing without screwing up any of the events that refer to beta wing.

2) You might want to add some more vasudans to Gamma wing. Having only 1 ship present in the loadout screen looks odd.

3) Beta Wing has no primaries by default. What are they supposed to use? Harsh language? :D Seriously though, this is cause the Artemis can't actually carry the Akheton SDG they've been assigned.

Sleepy. Will check again tomorrow :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 14, 2004, 06:39:38 pm
Quote
1) Five ships in Beta Wing. Even FRED doesn't like this one. Although it's possible to have wings of up to 6 ships that doesn't mean you should. If you need more than four bombers to make the mission playable what you could do is this. (I'm making it so that there are 6 bombers in Beta wing rather than 5 cause I'd rather make the mission a little easier).


    I gotcha. I wanted 5 in Beta because only have 4 sucked even more.


Quote
2) You might want to add some more vasudans to Gamma wing. Having only 1 ship present in the loadout screen looks odd.


     Gamma Wing is 4 Serapis fighters. I'm not sure why it'd show up as only one.

Quote
3) Beta Wing has no primaries by default. What are they supposed to use? Harsh language? Seriously though, this is cause the Artemis can't actually carry the Akheton SDG they've been assigned.


   Artemis can't carry Akhetons? What kind of bomber is it?? Geesh. Well I'll probably give it Subachs or something instead.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Blitzerland on September 14, 2004, 07:23:37 pm
Beat it at 24% on medium mode :p

Who da' man? :cool:

*Cats applaud

Really solid mission. A few quirks here and there, but no real problems.

Kudos to you for the excellent grammar+spelling!

Nothing takes you out of the vibe like seeing, "Demon 3 ismaking a run , for the jum node!11!"

I've been FREDing for 4 years, and this is a pretty good mission by my standards. Keep at it!

EDIT: Bombers are meant for destruction, not disabling. Send a fighter if you want to disable something, but leave the bombers at home. :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Black Wolf on September 14, 2004, 09:19:33 pm
not too shabby, not too shabby at all. There are sa few minor errors (spelling, a few background gaffs (your planets light sides are misaligned) but those are far from major issues. I would reccomend putting an akheton as the default loadout for the player, just for convenence sake, especially since Beta wing tends to die so easily and it's almost guaranteed you'll end up targetting the Alexander. Also, the hostile fighters seem somewhat ineffectual - not much you can do about this of course, but it might be an idea to take into account the fact that they're not going to last very long and set up Alpha's AI to accomodate that (maybe set them targetting flak turrets on the Alexander?

Overall though, it's a more than passable mission. Run the de/breifing and messages through Word's spell checker and it'll be even better.
Title: Final Version Uploaded?
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 15, 2004, 12:54:34 am
Here's the latest mission:

Retail Mission 3 (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip)

Fixed:
-Beta Wing @ 4 fighters with 2 wave / 2 thresh + Subach-HL7s
-Planets aligned to sun
-All text run through Word for grammar and spelling (only some minor grammar problems persists in the in-flight speech, which is expected because people don't speak perfect sentences)
-Alpha given disarm command after fighters destroyed
-Alpha given Akheton/Prometheus loadout


Quote
Kudos to you for the excellent grammar+spelling!

Nothing takes you out of the vibe like seeing, "Demon 3 ismaking a run , for the jum node!11!"

I've been FREDing for 4 years, and this is a pretty good mission by my standards. Keep at it!

EDIT: Bombers are meant for destruction, not disabling. Send a fighter if you want to disable something, but leave the bombers at home.


      Thanks for the compliments, I have an honours degree in English so my grammar + spelling better damn well be good :lol: (though it is admittedly not perfect, and I still have a few problem words which I always screw up (ie personnel)). I think the campaign specified that Beta Wing was bombers, but perhaps not. Either way, they suffice as they can carry a lot of Stillettos (not that it takes more than three anyway).

Quote
Also, the hostile fighters seem somewhat ineffectual - not much you can do about this of course, but it might be an idea to take into account the fact that they're not going to last very long and set up Alpha's AI to accomodate that (maybe set them targetting flak turrets on the Alexander?


       I know, the AI is pretty crappy. Which is why I was surprised when Singh asked me to turn down their rating :) (I deleted some fighters for him on easy instead). Just so you know, here are the levels of difficulty:

Medium - everything's a go
Easy - Kappa + Gemini Wing (Ulysses guarding Damocles) do not enter mission
Very Easy - Beams remained locked on Alexander during second battle


Also note, that I am Canadian. Therefore I spell the following words in the following manner:

Honour
Centre
Manoeuvring (that one's a b**** to remember).

If someone wants to bring it down a notch in quality to american spelling  :D  they can feel free to do so. Heheheh.

Anyway, if there are anymore problemos let me know.
Oh, and I'm not sure communique is appropriate for what I'm using it for, but it sounds cool anyway (nothing wrong with a dash of le francais)
Title: Re: Final Version Uploaded?
Post by: Black Wolf on September 15, 2004, 04:28:05 am
Quote
Originally posted by Akalabeth Angel

Also note, that I am Canadian. Therefore I spell the following words in the following manner:
 


What...correctly? *Points at location* :D
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on September 15, 2004, 05:52:55 am
Also points at location. :D You'll get no complaints from me about that either.

I'll check this again in a little bit :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 15, 2004, 08:34:16 am
Testing the most recent version ...
I am going to post feedback as soon as I finish.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Singh on September 15, 2004, 08:37:07 am
ill test this again, this time with kick-ass mode on :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 15, 2004, 09:13:42 am
Test results
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 15, 2004, 09:42:02 am
I wrote a couple of hints in the Wiki how to balance missions.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 15, 2004, 10:58:41 am
Quote
# Any particular reason you used neutral(light blue) color in the brieifng on the Alexander and some other vessel names?
# Brieifng icon ship class for the ship which is on screen in the first stage is wrong, the icon ship class shows and Aten and there is no Aten in the mission. I don't know which ship that was.
# Beta and Gamma wing's armaments might be changed for better mission balance. For instance, Gamma wing has Hornets. Also give some Tornadoes for the Artemis bombers.


       The blue was used because I couldn't remember what was usually used. The GVC Khem is an Aten (or was, more accurately). The Fulligan used to be an Aten, but I changed it to a Mentu because I needed something stronger. I wasn't aware that a person could differeniate. All I get is the Mentu-cruiser icon.


Quote
# Yes, player orders. It is a typical mistake. In all Derelict missions you could give orders to transports and cruiser, thereby srewing up the mission. Don't think that if the Derelict FREDers could afford to ignore player orders you can do it as well. Turn player orders for all non-friendly fighters off.


       Uh, well I turned off the orders for Kappa/Lambda. I wouldn't have thought the others would be a problem as they're all enemy to begin with though I didn't investigate it myself.

Quote
# I received no directives after the Democles arrived. It is obvious you will have to defend the Vasudan cruiser, but some people might be 'paniced' without standing directives. It is a general hint for all FREDers: Try to avoid any situations the player does not have directives to do.


        Well, the "Destroy NTT Omega" comes up later. I suppose I could throw in a "protect yadda yadda" and a new "disable this guy"

Quote
# Gemini wing remained out of the battle: They entered 8 clicks away and they moved nowhere.
# Here come the most major issue: The Vasudan cruiser did not leave, it only kept rotating around and did nothing.


     These two are both kind of odd. Gemini is supposed to guard the NTT so they should follow it in. The Mentu jumps out after the primary goal is complete. I've also just now made it jump out when the two failures happen as well.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 15, 2004, 11:10:51 am
Also, Cancer wing (Herc II's) and the wing of Ulysses (the ones escorting Damocles) continue to arrive after the everyone else has departed (bit annoying activating jump drives only to be munched by Herc that just arrived).
It was also slightly weird that when Damocles said the Alexander was of now use there was a considerable gap to when the Damocles fired the rear beam.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 15, 2004, 12:04:34 pm
The NTT Omega was destroyed, so Gemini only started patrolling the area. They were 7 or 8 clicks away when this happened so they detected no enemy in immediate vicinity.
Reading the departure conditions for the Mentu, all I can take as a conclusion is that it did not depart because the Alexander didn't depart as well since its engines have been disabled.
Check if the mission counts with the possibility that your initially fail to destroy the NTT and the engines got partially repaired.
As for repairs: It was quite strange that the engines were repaired after the transport had been destroyed. You can say that enough engineers managed to get on board to repair the engines before the NTT had been destroyed.
I can see the reason why the Alexander was repaired after the NTT had been gone: The Repair Team and the Check NTT Status events were linked with the delay of 30 seconds. This is as much as saying is-event-true / Repair Team / 30, so not this is the problem: The > / hits-left / 0 / NTT Omega SEXPing is not recommended. Use not / is-destroyed-delay / 0 / NTT Omega instead.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 16, 2004, 01:15:43 am
Quote
Also, Cancer wing (Herc II's) and the wing of Ulysses (the ones escorting Damocles) continue to arrive after the everyone else has departed (bit annoying activating jump drives only to be munched by Herc that just arrived).
It was also slightly weird that when Damocles said the Alexander was of now use there was a considerable gap to when the Damocles fired the rear beam.


       I checked out the Cancer wing data, it has the same arrival/departure cues as the other wings so I'm not sure why it would stay while the others have gone. For the Damocles firing, hmmn, the ship should try to fire either the side or aft beam cannon. In my mission it has been the side that was fired. Either way, two blasts should hopefully kill it but maybe not???

Quote
Reading the departure conditions for the Mentu, all I can take as a conclusion is that it did not depart because the Alexander didn't depart as well since its engines have been disabled.
Check if the mission counts with the possibility that your initially fail to destroy the NTT and the engines got partially repaired.
As for repairs: It was quite strange that the engines were repaired after the transport had been destroyed. You can say that enough engineers managed to get on board to repair the engines before the NTT had been destroyed.
I can see the reason why the Alexander was repaired after the NTT had been gone: The Repair Team and the Check NTT Status events were linked with the delay of 30 seconds. This is as much as saying is-event-true / Repair Team / 30, so not this is the problem: The > / hits-left / 0 / NTT Omega SEXPing is not recommended. Use not / is-destroyed-delay / 0 / NTT Omega instead.


Okay, for Gamma I added a chase-any after NTT Omega is destroyed
For the Mentu, it departs in three cases:
-primary goal is true (checks if, victorious event is true, which checks if Alex is destroyed, Damocles has left . . .)
-Alexander Escapes (failure)
-Alexander Escapes being disabled. (initial failure)

It _should_ work. Not sure what happened, but I added a slight delay to the and-in-sequence for the "no survivors" event (I think that's the one)

As for the transport, you hit the nail on the head. The transport isn't doing the repairs, the people onboard + the supplies are. If they have time to get off, it doesn't matter if the transport gets wasted, because it'll be empty. If the transport is docked long enough for the necessary guys/equipment to disembark the engines will get repaired no matter what. (seems to make more sense to me)

EDIT - I uploaded a new zip with the few fixes. There may be something more wrong but it's after midnight and my brain no-worky right now.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on September 16, 2004, 06:37:29 am
Quote
Originally posted by Akalabeth Angel
As for the transport, you hit the nail on the head. The transport isn't doing the repairs, the people onboard + the supplies are. If they have time to get off, it doesn't matter if the transport gets wasted, because it'll be empty. If the transport is docked long enough for the necessary guys/equipment to disembark the engines will get repaired no matter what. (seems to make more sense to me)


I agree. I've used the same logic in a few of my missions :)

Lets see if I can get enough free time to properly check this mission out tonight :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 16, 2004, 10:05:23 am
Quote
Originally posted by Akalabeth Angel


For the Damocles firing, hmmn, the ship should try to fire either the side or aft beam cannon. In my mission it has been the side that was fired. Either way, two blasts should hopefully kill it but maybe not???
 


I think I may have brocken the mission, because the first thing I do when Damocles arrives is I destroy the beam facing the GVC, Maybe to stop this you could not let Alpha get hold of any Stilleto's.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 16, 2004, 12:19:19 pm
Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense :)
I forgot about people doing things they shouldn't like destroying beams and stuff!

Unfortunately I think its impossible to stop Alpha from getting Stillettos because Beta Wing starts with 'em.  So the player could always move 'em over. Unless there's some way I can make it so that Beta Wing's loadout can't be changed by the player. Or I could always cheat and repair the beam prior to it being fired, I dunno. That might tick off the player though.

Or maybe I could do something like if beam is destroyed, send in some Bombers instead. But then I have to rely on some stupid bomber AI to get the job finished against an Aeolus of all things.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 16, 2004, 03:34:01 pm
I would get the Perilous to jump in and kill the Alexander if the Damocles cant shoot.  A way of telling Alpha 1 not to break the mission in future.
Title: What in the hell?
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 17, 2004, 12:14:43 am
Okay, so I changed a few things in the mission:

-added a waypoint where the Damocles will turn to if its side beam is inoperative (to expose the rear beam)
-added the Perilous incase both are destoyed to come in, mop up + leave
-Gave Beta some Tornadoes
-Gave Gamma post-NTT destruction orders
-cleared player orders for all enemy wings
-added protect fulligan directive, and destroy Omega directive


    BUT NOW, the event triggered by the death of the NTT omega  no longer works. I don't get the messages from the Alexander and the Damocles. And I didn't go anywhere near those damned events.

    That's one thing that pisses me off big time about FRED. I've seen it in some of my other missions. For instance in one event I had it setup one way, then I changed it, and then changed it back. And instead of going with the original, it assumed the event was true and sent messages at the start of the mission instead of when it was supposed to. It seems that if you screw around too much, FRED gets stupid and just ignores previous stuff for no damn reason whatsoever.  And it is _really_ aggravating.  :hopping:
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 17, 2004, 08:37:09 am
Can I get the mission? I may be able to detect the error.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 17, 2004, 10:10:22 am
Sure, I uploaded it to the usualy place:

http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3.zip)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 17, 2004, 10:47:57 am
Do not use this SEXPing:

->
--hits-left
---NTT Omega
--0

use this instead:
-not
--is-destroyed-delay
---NTT Omega
---0
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Fergus on September 17, 2004, 10:59:43 am
I got that as well for the GTSC Aeschylus, but I changed.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: TopAce on September 17, 2004, 11:08:32 am
And, did it work?
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on September 17, 2004, 04:33:21 pm
RE: Bad SexP

   Where are you looking? At the "Check NTT Status" event? I changed it to your suggestion right after you told me.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on October 03, 2004, 12:36:10 pm
More playtesting.

Okay. That was fun. Hard but fun (I guess I've gotten crap at Freespace again)  :) This is actually quite a polished little mission now. There's lots of lovely chatter in the mission and your habit of including who says it in the message names is one I'm considering adopting from now on :D

You're not quite finished yet but this mission is definately nearing the finishing line. I didn't notice any gross errors, what I spotted is little nitpicks or easily made mistakes.

1. The terran ships continue to attack the Alexander after it surrenders. They actually knock it down a full 20% in that time. The best solution for this is to protect-ship the Alexander in the MSG: Alex is Disabled event and then unprotect it when you change the IFF to friendly (You could change it later if you wish but as soon as it's friendly is a good time to do it).

2. Command give Beta an order to return if they're intact. Personally I'd rather see this spun off into it's own event that checks if there are any bombers left in beta wing first. Secondly (and somewhat amusingly) beta didn't actually leave. I was actually quite glad of the extra help but I thought I should mention it.

3. If the Alexander gets away you're still given the message in the debriefing praising you for covering it well. That's a little out of sorts with the rest of the chewing out you got for letting the Alexander escape. It would probably be better to only play this stage if the Alexander didn't escape before the Iceni shows up.

4. The NTT ship should be on the escort list as it's a pain in the rump to cycle through all the enemy ships to find it. Bump the Iceni off as the Fulligan and Alexander are mission critical while the Iceni shouldn't be killed.

I forgot to check what happens if NTR transport succeeds in docking , what happens if the fulligan is killed or if the player attempts to disable the Iceni but if you've taken similar care to what you've done in the rest of the mission then the mission is done.

I'll be starting up campaign 4 soon. Feel free to pick a mission from there if you want. :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on October 03, 2004, 08:07:28 pm
Okay, I'll check it out when I get the chance. I'm currently occupied with doing some PDFs for an online magazine, but once that's done I can get back to doing some fredding.
Title: KA-BUMP!
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on November 28, 2004, 10:41:59 pm
Hey, just thought I'd let you know that I've made the four changes to the mission that Karajoma suggested. Though I'm not sure if I got the debriefing one correct, I presume he was saying that I loose the mission I shouldn't have the bit about the Fulligan being protected well. If that's the case, I think I should not show up now, but who knows. I also managed to fix whatever I broke last time, so the Damocles actually blows up the Alexander if the transport dies. I realised I didn't have a pre-docking destruction clause. I played through it on Medium and it was damned easy, though that may be due in part to the fact I was invulnerable :) haha

Anyway here's the file: Retail Mission 3 Version 2 (http://knossos.firenebula.com/fs2/fa-c1m3_v2.zip)

Note on difficultly settings:
Medium - For those who found the Myrmidons hard, do not play at this difficulty as you will face two wings of Myrms. As well, additionally fighters (Ulysses) will show up with the Damocles
Easy - This level drops the extra Myrms and the Ulysses, though some may find it difficult for reasons unbeknownest to me (it may be easier as I have a Wingman joystick to use)
Very Easy - beams on the Alexander are locked the whole mission. Though if you can't beat the Myrms and the Perseuses this wont help you much.

Anyway, I think it's more/less finished. Let me know if something's wrong (other than the fact that it's pretty hard).
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: willy_principal on November 30, 2004, 01:22:46 pm
Excellent Mission...........a bit diffucult though..
In MEDIUM........The Flak alone killed me and all my wingmen.

I noticed some Bugs...
I Destroyed the NTC Alexander, But nobody told me: "Hey, we were supposed to capture it, not to blow it up"...or...something...

Also....it would be REALLY handy a Hotkey for the NTT Omega... when it arrived...i didn't knew where it was until i saw it near the Alexander...............Then, i blew it up 3 seconds before (or after, not sure) it docked with the Alexander. Then, nothing happened.
I opened your mission and checked out the events....
Spoiler:
If the Omega is destroyed, the NTFr Damocles would say that the Alexander is of no use now, and the Beam it down...[SPOILER/], but, that didn't happened...

OOPSSS.............forget ir.....i was playing FAC1M1 Version 1..........................
now downloading FAC1M1 V2..............and preparing for playtesting...
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on November 30, 2004, 01:33:54 pm
Ooops, my bad I'll go and change the other post to say it's an older version.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on December 05, 2004, 02:46:49 pm
More bugs. The bane of any FREDder :)

1) If the Alexander succeeds in escaping you shouldn't really get a commendation for protecting the Fulligan. It would probably look better if that message only appears if the Alexander was disabled.

2) If you're sneaky you can get Beta Wings bombers to stick around to help you out. If Beta have been told to protect the Fulligan then those orders have a priority of 100% compared to the maximum of 89% for the ai-warpout SEXP.  Use the departure cue in the ships editor instead.

3) It is possible to destroy the Alexander instead of disabling it.  Nice try switching it to friendly and SEXPing the ships to stop but if you load up everyone with Tornados you can actually kill it before they kick in. :D Add a SEXP to recall the player and a Debrief to berate the player suitably cause at the moment it completely breaks the mission.

4) After disabling the Alexander the damocles jumped in. Someone (I think it may possibly have been beta wings bombers) then proceeded to blow it up. At this point the mission broke again with the NTT Omega coming in to dock with a non existant cruiser and Striker talking to it too. If it was beta wing then fixing 2 will take care of the problem.

5) You should add some dialog to make it seem as though GTVA marines are fighting on board the Alexander because it isn't quite clear why the player shouldn't just blow it to hell.

6) While looking through the events I've noticed that in the reassign Gamma event Gamma are given ai-chase orders with respect to the Fulligan. Surely that should be ai-guard?

7) My main problem though is that the mission is still too hard. I tried and failed to take out the alexander 5 times using the forces at hand before I gave in and simply gave myself some stillettos to do the job with. You might want to consider hinting in the briefing that the bombers are armed with Stillettos so that the player is at least thinking of using them himself. You may also wish to be less subtle than that :D One method I've used in the past is to suggest that the player (since he is the squadron leader) can choose between a bomber or fighter role. Even though the mission is unplayable in a bomber that would at least get the player thinking of taking down the Alexander himself and turning Beta into a second wing of fighters.

8) Keeping with things being too hard. I like what you did by checking the skill levels but I think you should bump it so that the differences are between missions played on hard, medium and easy rather than medium, easy and very easy. That 5 second change would probably make the mission much more playable.

Apart from that this is a pretty solid mission. I'm impressed by the trouble you've taken to anticipate mission breakage and counter it.  :D
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on December 05, 2004, 07:06:40 pm
Apart from that this is a pretty solid mission. I'm impressed by the trouble you've taken to anticipate mission breakage and counter it.

   That's the problem with my missions, the more complex they are the easier it is for some monkey to break it (not calling anyone around here a monkey, just a figure of speech)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on December 06, 2004, 07:18:22 am
I know exactly what you mean. That's why I was impressed :D

I tend to write overcomplicated missions myself so I know exactly how much playtesting is needed to catch problems like these. I feel that the final result is worth it though :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on December 12, 2004, 10:29:53 am
Okay. Played the mission again. Only thing I have to add to my earlier comments is that you might want to lock Gamma wing. Otherwise you face the possibility of the player putting Terran craft in there to replace the vasudan ones :D

Still enjoy playing the mission a lot. :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on December 12, 2004, 10:53:20 am
Okay. Played the mission again. Only thing I have to add to my earlier comments is that you might want to lock Gamma wing. Otherwise you face the possibility of the player putting Terran craft in there to replace the vasudan ones  

    How do I do that?

    I still gotta do those last updates you recommended, been doing some other stuff of late .
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on December 12, 2004, 11:13:27 am
Pretty simple. Choose gamma 1-4 in the ships editor. Go to initial status and then tick the locked checkbox.

Locked means that you can see a ship in the Team Loadout screen but you can't edit its weapons.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on December 12, 2004, 11:17:12 am
I think I'll do that for Beta Wing too.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on December 12, 2004, 11:19:46 am
Awww. I quite enjoyed changing them to fighters :D Made the mission much easier :D
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on December 12, 2004, 11:21:15 am
Damn players screwing around with my master plan! :)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Kosh on July 11, 2005, 02:14:45 am
I just finished beta testing this mission and here is what I thought:

This mission has some real balance issues. Unless you're packing maxims, attacking an Aeolus with anything less than a wing of Ursas or Boanerges bombers is suicide. It was able to chew through 2 wings of Artemis bombers with barely a scratch. I had to disable it myself, and even then I died twice. The only way I could have disabled it was by loading my fighter up with Stilletos. But when the Damoclese arrives, the new fighters will finish off what is left of my wingmen and by then I am severly damaged. So of course they finish me off too.

It also has a bug in it. I ordered beta wing to disarm the cruiser to keep its guns busy for me to disable it. After I disable it, command wants them to return to base, but they don't. So when the Damoclese comes in with some other fighters, they are wasted.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on July 11, 2005, 01:16:21 pm
Quote
Originally posted by Kosh
It also has a bug in it. I ordered beta wing to disarm the cruiser to keep its guns busy for me to disable it. After I disable it, command wants them to return to base, but they don't. So when the Damoclese comes in with some other fighters, they are wasted.


      Yeah, I didn't realise that you need to do a "clear orders" command for the fighters as Alpha 1's notions apparently override the mission-commands.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: karajorma on July 11, 2005, 01:27:12 pm
Yeah. You have to watch out for that one. If you ever need them to depart  it's best to do it from the departure cue rather than as an AI goal :)

Clearing orders should work though.
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Akalabeth Angel on July 11, 2005, 01:40:03 pm
Yeah, I didn't realise that one either :) I used to do it all via AI commands, but now I've been using the departure cue (in m campaign missions)
Title: [FA] Retail Mission 3
Post by: Kosh on July 11, 2005, 05:09:25 pm
Quote
Originally posted by Akalabeth Angel


      Yeah, I didn't realise that you need to do a "clear orders" command for the fighters as Alpha 1's notions apparently override the mission-commands.



Alpha 1 owns all. :)