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Hosted Projects - FS2 Required => The Scroll of Atankharzim => Topic started by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 08:39:00 am

Title: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 08:39:00 am
We are a people of legacy. It is said that in the earliest days, when our people first walked upon the cooling silver sands of the twilight, that then was prophesied the destiny of our race. And we touched the stars, even as foretold. But in our conceit we forgot the words of the Prophets, and the Destroyers fell upon us in their wrath...

When your children ask of their history, of how they came to be
Atankharz'ythi, then you will teach them the words of this scroll, that they may learn from their ancestors and not repeat their arrogance and folly. The stars hold our fate; we search them for our salvation.


—The Scroll of Atankharzim


After years of development, the Scroll team is pleased to present Part I of this epic campaign.  Featuring 24 mission of epic sci-fi fantasy goodness, this release also includes fiction viewer entries from Sesquipedalian, command briefing animations by mjn.mixael, and contributions from many other HLP members.


Screenshots

(http://scroll.hard-light.net/images/screen-defense.png)

(http://scroll.hard-light.net/images/screen-cbani.png)

(http://scroll.hard-light.net/images/screen-arachnas.png)

(http://scroll.hard-light.net/images/screen-fiction.png)


Downloads

(https://fsnebula.org/static/kn_download.png) (https://fsnebula.org/mod/scroll)

The campaign is on the FSO Installer and Knossos, or you can download it manually here.  All of the following are required.

Root (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-root.7z) (540 KB)
Maps 1 (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-maps1.7z) (110 MB)
Maps 2 (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-maps2.7z) (155 MB)
Models (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-models.7z) (83 MB)
Other files (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-misc.7z) (414 MB)
Voice (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/scroll-voice.7z) (76 MB)

You may want to listen to the audio track that we planned for the intro cutscene.  Download it here (https://perses.feralhosting.com/datacorder/sa_files/cutscene_rough_mix.ogg).


Known issues:

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: TopAce on September 21, 2017, 11:31:47 am
I can't believe this is finally out! Thanks for the memories, Goob!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on September 21, 2017, 11:37:12 am
How many years in development? 15 :P? It's more than half of my life at all... And now one of the most mysterious projects of the HLP is finally released. Congratulations guys!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 21, 2017, 11:52:05 am
I guess I know what I'm doing tonight. Congrats on the release! Hard to believe that this moment has finally come.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: T-Man on September 21, 2017, 12:30:00 pm
Oh wow. Huge congrats to you and the team Goober, can't wait to give it a play :yes:.

I think I remember this project being advertised when I first joined HLP and I've always looked forward to it coming out. Awesome :).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Lykurgos88 on September 21, 2017, 03:02:48 pm
Honestly, I never saw this one coming  :lol: :lol: :lol:

Congratulations to everyone involved!  :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on September 21, 2017, 04:07:36 pm
Okay...
Spoiler:
So far I like what I play. First two missions are a little bit generic and expandable in terms of plot development but later ones are interesting. Asteroids jumping through some unknown node? Very old Knossos device orbiting black hole? Interesting start plus some very good writing and dialogues. It makes my wanting play further. I encountered one bug so far, in Mission M1_02. Nothing happened after attack on third shivan convoy. I mean message about stabilization of the Knossos displayed, but nothing further happened. When I replayed, further messages were present and I was able to complete the mission.

The problem occurs when I try to beat M1_03. What's going on with this mission? I like the initial concept, and proximity sensor script is marvelous. I scanned first batch of freighters, completed scanning of Primary cargo cluster but nothing is happening when I'm done with second cluster. Literally nothing. I tried to scan secondary cluster first, but no matter what I do mission is not progressing any further. Plus sentry guns are insanely annoying, as they are not displayed on proximity sensors.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 04:23:38 pm
I have updated the first post with the soundtrack to the planned intro cutscene.  Our voice actor did a fantastic job with the narration.  Close your eyes and try picturing it in your mind. :)


Spoiler:
So far I like what I play. First two missions are a little bit generic and expandable in terms of plot development but later ones are interesting. Asteroids jumping through some unknown node? Very old Knossos device orbiting black hole? Interesting start plus some very good writing and dialogues. It makes my wanting play further. I encountered one bug so far, in Mission M1_02. Nothing happened after attack on third shivan convoy. I mean message about stabilization of the Knossos displayed, but nothing further happened. When I replayed, further messages were present and I was able to complete the mission.

m1_02: It's possible that in your first playthrough, Rho wing got hung up somewhere while trying to depart.  If anyone else runs into this, let me know.

Quote
Spoiler:
The problem occurs when I try to beat M1_03. What's going on with this mission? I like the initial concept, and proximity sensor script is marvelous. I scanned first batch of freighters, completed scanning of Primary cargo cluster but nothing is happening when I'm done with second cluster. Literally nothing. I tried to scan secondary cluster first, but no matter what I do mission is not progressing any further. Plus sentry guns are insanely annoying, as they are not displayed on proximity sensors.

m1_03: I'll investigate.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: General Battuta on September 21, 2017, 04:43:12 pm
A Vasudan campaign set eleven years after the destruction of Capella, The Scroll of Atankharzim offers a rich and dynamic gaming experience.  A fantastic storyline weaves together elements from the highest examples of myth and epic with the science fiction adrenaline of FreeSpace 2.

Okay but what's it about
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 05:03:23 pm
I don't see anything wrong with m1_03.

Spoiler:
Make sure you have explored every area of the depot.  This phase lasts for about nine minutes, whether or not you manage to target every ship.  And if you didn't get the bonus goal, you didn't target every ship. :p


Okay but what's it about

Vasudans.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on September 21, 2017, 05:28:25 pm
I don't see anything wrong with m1_03.
Spoiler:
Make sure you have explored every area of the depot.  This phase lasts for about nine minutes, whether or not you manage to target every ship.  And if you didn't get the bonus goal, you didn't target every ship. :p
Spoiler:
So the message about shivan corvette is appearing no matter what I do? I was thinking it's happening if I get too close to sentry.

Anyway no matter what I do, mission is always a failure at debriefing stage so I cannot progress any further. Debriefing is about invaluable scans, gathering of shivan ships, and preparations for closure of the Knossos. I don't know if this is intended, but currently I have no idea what else should I scan o__O. I also have no idea what I already scanned.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 06:21:12 pm
Spoiler:
So the message about shivan corvette is appearing no matter what I do? I was thinking it's happening if I get too close to sentry.

Spoiler:
Yes, the corvette appears no matter what.

Quote
Spoiler:
Anyway no matter what I do, mission is always a failure at debriefing stage so I cannot progress any further. Debriefing is about invaluable scans, gathering of shivan ships, and preparations for closure of the Knossos. I don't know if this is intended, but currently I have no idea what else should I scan o__O. I also have no idea what I already scanned.

Spoiler:
Did you read the debriefing recommendation?  You haven't found what you need to change this outcome.

Remember your mission instructions: It's not just about what you scan, but what you target.  Make sure to target all the different types of ship formations you see.  I suspect you didn't target the group of gas miners.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on September 21, 2017, 08:20:57 pm
Spoiler:
So the message about shivan corvette is appearing no matter what I do? I was thinking it's happening if I get too close to sentry.

Spoiler:
Yes, the corvette appears no matter what.

Quote
Spoiler:
Anyway no matter what I do, mission is always a failure at debriefing stage so I cannot progress any further. Debriefing is about invaluable scans, gathering of shivan ships, and preparations for closure of the Knossos. I don't know if this is intended, but currently I have no idea what else should I scan o__O. I also have no idea what I already scanned.

Spoiler:
Did you read the debriefing recommendation?  You haven't found what you need to change this outcome.

Remember your mission instructions: It's not just about what you scan, but what you target.  Make sure to target all the different types of ship formations you see.  I suspect you didn't target the group of gas miners.
Spoiler:
I mean target. There is not much scanning in this mission.

I gave up actually. I tried targetting everything in this mission. Outcome is always the same, no matter if I just stand idle for 8 minute on time-compression or circle like crazy between shivan fighters and sentries and target everything. I guess something is wrong with failure conditionals... Or maybe it's just me, being retarded :P. Anyway I ended up doing suicide run 5 times on shivan fighters. This mission has potential, but it's totally not intuitive. Targeted ships should be marked somehow. I dunno, maybe via different IFF color?

M01_04 has little issue. In theory, we're authorised to use Maxim in this mission but it's not listed in loadout, so we can't actually use it. M01_05 was a real challenge, and I managed to save Mentu cruiser with 6% intengrity. It was anyway mentioned as destroyed in the debriefing. I liked this mission a lot.

I went for ISF branch and enjoyed this. S1_01 is awesome. Arachnas assault has the same issue as M01_04, but with... Helios torpedoes. I managed to fulfill this mission with Trebuchet and Stiletto spam, but this issue is actually more serious. Sekhmet without torpedoes? It affects balance of this mission, but it's still passable.

I'm currently stuck in the middle of nebula, scanning shivan ships... And I can't see a damn thing, because the nebula around me is almost white and dazzle me. I checked nebula poof files, and they are much darker in any external soft. I guess it's actually a bloom shader issue.

So far I have strong felling that Scroll is really well made and solid project, but it wasn't tested at all. Missions are well balanced, interesting in terms of gameplay, and seems to be ready from a long time, but campaign file was assembled in hurry and it wasn't properly tested on newest builds.
Please, tell me this is not related to this recent apocalypse stuff. While I respect your beliefs no matter what, this situation would be... Actually a little bit ludicrous.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 21, 2017, 09:25:11 pm
Spoiler:
I mean target. There is not much scanning in this mission.

I gave up actually. I tried targetting everything in this mission. Outcome is always the same, no matter if I just stand idle for 8 minute on time-compression or circle like crazy between shivan fighters and sentries and target everything. I guess something is wrong with failure conditionals... Or maybe it's just me, being retarded :P. Anyway I ended up doing suicide run 5 times on shivan fighters. This mission has potential, but it's totally not intuitive. Targeted ships should be marked somehow. I dunno, maybe via different IFF color?

M01_04 has little issue. In theory, we're authorised to use Maxim in this mission but it's not listed in loadout, so we can't actually use it. M01_05 was a real challenge, and I managed to save Mentu cruiser with 6% intengrity. It was anyway mentioned as destroyed in the debriefing. I liked this mission a lot.

I went for ISF branch and enjoyed this. S1_01 is awesome. Arachnas assault has the same issue as M01_04, but with... Helios torpedoes. I managed to fulfill this mission with Trebuchet and Stiletto spam, but this issue is actually more serious. Sekhmet without torpedoes? It affects balance of this mission, but it's still passable.

I'm currently stuck in the middle of nebula, scanning shivan ships... And I can't see a damn thing, because the nebula around me is almost white and dazzle me. I checked nebula poof files, and they are much darker in any external soft. I guess it's actually a bloom shader issue.

So far I have strong felling that Scroll is really well made and solid project, but it wasn't tested at all. Missions are well balanced, interesting in terms of gameplay, and seems to be ready from a long time, but campaign file was assembled in hurry and it wasn't properly tested on newest builds.
Please, tell me this is not related to this recent apocalypse stuff. While I respect your beliefs no matter what, this situation would be... Actually a little bit ludicrous.

Spoiler:
I'm certain it's just you.  I tested m1_03 extensively; in fact I spent almost every spare moment in the entire month of June on it.  I tested all possible mission branches, numerous times.  The only missions where we skimped on testing were m2_01 and m2_02, due to the imminent release.

In m1_03, targeted ships are marked by the little scripting popup that says e.g. "Nandi 1 Recorded".  In order to progress to the next phase, you need to 1) target enough of the cargo containers that Zeta 1 identifies the two formations, 2) target enough gas miners that Zeta 1 comments on them, and 3) scan a SAC 3 after Zeta tells you to.

The reason you don't have the Maxim available in m1_04 is that it's granted upon successful completion of m1_03. :p

Glad you liked m1_05, that was also one of my favorites. :)

Macielos also mentioned the dazzlingly white nebula.  I think this is a SCP issue because he said worked fine in 3.7.4.  It also doesn't appear bright for me, so maybe it has something to do with graphics settings.


If it weren't for the apocalypse stuff, you probably wouldn't even be playing Scroll right now, actually. :)  Deadlines have a way of focusing your efforts.

The disallowed Helios is, in fact, a bug.  I will fix this and upload a new root package.  (EDIT: Done.)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: General Battuta on September 21, 2017, 10:24:50 pm
Okay but what's it about

Vasudans.

That's not a log line
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 21, 2017, 10:54:17 pm
Spoiler:
m1-03
I can't get past the part where you're supposed to create a distraction. I get into the secondary cluster, come within 100 meters of a container with a gas miner docked, but the instant I fire my primaries once, the game says "You fired weapons, stealth broken, you failed." I have even tried to use cheats by destroying every patrol fighter and sentry gun, still no luck. Help?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 21, 2017, 11:03:06 pm
Spoiler:
m1-03
I can't get past the part where you're supposed to create a distraction. I get into the secondary cluster, come within 100 meters of a container with a gas miner docked, but the instant I fire my primaries once, the game says "You fired weapons, stealth broken, you failed." I have even tried to use cheats by destroying every patrol fighter and sentry gun, still no luck. Help?

Stuck in the same spot.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 22, 2017, 08:38:39 am
You're right.  I'm seeing the same error myself. :confused:  The mission worked perfectly over extensive testing back in June, so I don't know what could be going wrong.  All I can determine is that the "Distraction Readiness" event isn't working as expected; it isn't detecting that Alpha 1 is in range of the cargo under the proper conditions.

For the time being, I created a modified mission with a "Temporary Hack" event that can be used to bypass it.  Download this (http://scroll.hard-light.net/downloads/sa_m1_03.fs2), then when you are in range of Secundus 03 while Marduk 3 is docked, hit Alt-A.  This will set the proper variables.  Then you can use the "short, controlled bursts" to destroy the container.  If you prefer using a different miner and container, you can modify the "Temporary Hack" event accordingly.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 22, 2017, 08:48:50 am
Thanks, that fixed it for me.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 22, 2017, 11:32:08 am
Spoiler:
So I'am on the mission "Accidents will Happen" and have come up to a problem. Beta wing is not able to destroy the Corvette because they have no secondaries apart from a few rockeyes. Even if their load-outs in the briefing weren't locked, I don't have access to cyclops warheads.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 22, 2017, 12:59:20 pm
Spoiler:
So I'am on the mission "Accidents will Happen" and have come up to a problem. Beta wing is not able to destroy the Corvette because they have no secondaries apart from a few rockeyes. Even if their load-outs in the briefing weren't locked, I don't have access to cyclops warheads.

I fixed the Cyclops bug at the same time I fixed the Helios bug, but if you had already started the campaign then you wouldn't have benefited from it.  The attached campaign file fixes the weapon problems and also starts off at the branch point before the GVTA and ISF branches.  (I think I'll also include this campaign file in the next root update; some people may not want to play through the preliminary missions again before choosing the other branch.)

[attachment stolen by Russian hackers]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: praseodym on September 22, 2017, 02:30:58 pm
Congrats to this campaign.

However, I am running into a problem using Ubuntu with engine 3.7.4. The mission after pink asteroids show up  ;7 doesn't start:

./fs2_open_3.7.4-compiled -mod ScrollofAtankharzim
Code: [Select]
ERROR: "Unrecognized operator.  In sexpression: ( when     ( and        ( or           ( is-event-true-delay              "Freighter reveal 2"              10           )          ( <              ( distance "Alpha 1" "Molech" )              500           )          ( <              ( distance "Alpha 1" "Ba'al" )              500           )       )       ( is-event-true-delay           "Freighter reveal 2"           5        )    )    ( turret-free-all "Molech" "Ba'al" )     ( jettison-cargo "Molech" )     ( jettison-cargo "Ba'al" )     ( modify-variable [] 4 )     ( modify-variable [] 4 )     ( ship-vulnerable        "asteroid#1"        "asteroid#2"        "asteroid#3"  [...] (Error appears to be: jettison-cargo)" at mission/missionparse.cpp:5778
AL lib: ReleaseALC: 1 device not closed
Which build is recommended?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 22, 2017, 04:42:15 pm
Most of the campaign is playable on 3.7.4, but that mission has a sexp that requires 3.8.

EDIT: That mission is the only mission with a 3.8 sexp, so I'll add some version-specific commenting to make it 3.7.4-compatible.  That'll be in the next update which I'll publish sometime this evening.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 22, 2017, 06:43:27 pm
Mission s1-07 throws an error upon attempting to load.
The error reads:
Code: [Select]
Error: sa_s1_07.fs2(line 4500):
Error: Required token = [#Goals] or [$Formula:], found [$end_multi_text].

File: parselo.cpp
Line: 290
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 22, 2017, 07:02:09 pm
Wow, clearly I was not as careful as I thought I was.

Use the attached mission instead.  I'll include a fix in this evening's update.

[attachment stolen by Russian hackers]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 22, 2017, 09:54:57 pm
Damn Goober, we're keeping you busy today.  :P
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 22, 2017, 11:18:20 pm
Well, I'd hate to leave behind unfixed bugs. :)

I've updated the root download with a bunch of mission fixes, both the critical ones as well as some tweaks.  Run the FSO Installer or redownload from the first post to get them.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on September 22, 2017, 11:21:27 pm
Gooby, don't take this offensive but we all survived the apocalypse :P. Pardon me this joke, plz. Time to fix all the bugs, update main files and let Scroll shine.

Spoiler:
I checked mission with nebula and shivan ships on 3.7.4 and it works fine. Nebula poofs files have transparency, and it's probably causing dazzling issue. Will rest of the campaign work on 3.7.4?
.

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 23, 2017, 12:15:25 am
Gooby, don't take this offensive but we all survived the apocalypse :P. Pardon me this joke, plz.

I took no offense. :)  But I caution you that the time window hasn't expired yet.

Quote
Time to fix all the bugs, update main files and let Scroll shine.

:nod:  I've done so while I still have the opportunity.

Quote
Spoiler:
I checked mission with nebula and shivan ships on 3.7.4 and it works fine. Nebula poofs files have transparency, and it's probably causing dazzling issue. Will rest of the campaign work on 3.7.4?

With the latest update, the entire campaign should now work on 3.7.4.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 23, 2017, 12:47:28 pm
Spoiler:
Mission g1_06 (Arachnophobia) says that I should have EMP Missiles to help escort the Helios warheads. One problem: I don't have any EMP Missiles.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on September 23, 2017, 01:29:47 pm
Darn it, this is what happens when I forget to check HLP for a couple of days. That and forgetting that the project I worked on was coming out. :P Sorry.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on September 23, 2017, 01:34:04 pm
Hey Goober, are there any of those bugs that you want me to handle?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 23, 2017, 03:59:44 pm
Spoiler:
Mission g1_06 (Arachnophobia) says that I should have EMP Missiles to help escort the Helios warheads. One problem: I don't have any EMP Missiles.

Darn it, I thought I caught all of those when I fixed the Cyclops and Helios issues.  Bug squashed, and this time I checked to verify that no other weapons have this problem.

New version uploaded, and the Installer will download it next time you run it.  If you don't want to replay g1_01 through g1_05, download the attached campaign.  It'll prompt you for the GVTA branch and the ISF branch, again, but the GVTA branch will start at g1_06.

[attachment stolen by Russian hackers]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 23, 2017, 04:00:48 pm
Hey Goober, are there any of those bugs that you want me to handle?

All of the bugs mentioned in this thread have been fixed, but I'll PM you.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CapellaGoBoom on September 23, 2017, 05:25:05 pm
Bug found in "Irkalla Passes"

When the shivans are dead, the mission refuses to end. The AWACS and cruiser go through the node, but the 2 vettes sit close to it and never move. Help?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 23, 2017, 06:39:41 pm
That shouldn't happen.  I'll take a look.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Vidmaster on September 24, 2017, 12:24:09 pm
Congrats on the release :-)

Please take no offense but I will wait a few weeks till the bugs are all gone.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 24, 2017, 01:52:37 pm
Spoiler:
In playing "Thor's hammer" I successfully defended all 5 Mjolnirs however the shivan Corvette still manged to get away with 23%.
Kind of sucks to fail the secondly objective through RNG and no fault of my own.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on September 24, 2017, 03:19:21 pm
Spoiler:
Mission Arachnophobia may need adjustments. Even if you EMP the cruisers and sentry guns, the station's flak guns still has enough time to shoot down all 6 bombs. I only manged to destroy the Beam cannon once out of 8 try's and unfortunately I died soon after. Very frustrating. :banghead:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 24, 2017, 04:29:50 pm
Well, I finished it. Overall, a fun campaign with quite a few interesting missions, with the only exception being the final mission and ending. I feel like this campaign would have benefited from having a campaign map similar to what Axem used for Just Another Day, which would allow you to replay either branch without needing a separate campaign file. Still, I would definitely recommend playing it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on September 24, 2017, 07:59:52 pm
Well, I finished it. Overall, a fun campaign with quite a few interesting missions, with the only exception being the final mission and ending. I feel like this campaign would have benefited from having a campaign map similar to what Axem used for Just Another Day, which would allow you to replay either branch without needing a separate campaign file. Still, I would definitely recommend playing it.

Hey, glad you liked it! Like any campaign, we have some polishing up to do, but it's good to know that on the whole the team did a satisfactory job. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 26, 2017, 12:35:32 am
When the shivans are dead, the mission refuses to end. The AWACS and cruiser go through the node, but the 2 vettes sit close to it and never move. Help?

Did you by any chance lose the Pallas in the nebula mission?  I found and fixed a bug that only happens if the Pallas didn't survive.


Spoiler:
In playing "Thor's hammer" I successfully defended all 5 Mjolnirs however the shivan Corvette still manged to get away with 23%.
Kind of sucks to fail the secondly objective through RNG and no fault of my own.

Earlier in the project's history you could pretty safely get this objective, but whether due to SCP changes or mission changes this seems to have changed.  I've loosened the arrival conditions and increased the range of the Mjolnir guns.  You can also try disabling the corvette.


Spoiler:
Mission Arachnophobia may need adjustments. Even if you EMP the cruisers and sentry guns, the station's flak guns still has enough time to shoot down all 6 bombs. I only manged to destroy the Beam cannon once out of 8 try's and unfortunately I died soon after. Very frustrating. :banghead:

Hmph.  The bombers are supposed to destroy all the flak guns with their Trebuchets.  I'll just turret-lock those particular turrets.


Well, I finished it. Overall, a fun campaign with quite a few interesting missions, with the only exception being the final mission and ending.

Thanks!  Part II is planned to be even more epic.

Out of curiosity, can you elaborate on why you think the final mission and ending was an exception?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on September 26, 2017, 06:53:34 am
The final mission felt like a BOE with little for the player to do, and the ending was just a three paragraph debriefing. I felt like there could have been more done with both.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 26, 2017, 10:31:03 am
The final mission felt like a BOE with little for the player to do, and the ending was just a three paragraph debriefing. I felt like there could have been more done with both.

The player needs to defend the allied warships; if he doesn't, they won't be able to win the mission.  That's where the player can make a difference.  But the mission was otherwise designed as a massive fleet engagement, so I can see where the BoE feeling comes from.

The last mission isn't actually the end, only the end of Part I.  There is an interlude of a few years before Part II starts.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 26, 2017, 10:53:51 pm
So far it's an awesome campaign.  I ran into a minor technical problem though with "Arachnicide"...there is no voice acting for the main part of that script.  I can hear generic comments like "check your aft sensors" and "enemy wing arriving", but the plot text is silent during the mission and in the briefing/debriefing.

I had the same problem in the following mission.  No audio during the briefing or mission. 

When I tried to use a debug build to get a log it wouldn't let me start "Irkalla Passes".  I was able to get to the briefing screen but then I got this:

Warning: Couldn't find event name "Pallas survived" in mission sa_s1_07.fs2.
Returning false for event_status function.
File: sexp.cpp
Line: 13771

ntdll.dll! ZwWaitForSingleObject + 10 bytes
KERNELBASE.dll! WaitForSingleObjectEx + 156 bytes
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
fs2_open_3_8_0_x64_SSE2-FASTDBG.exe! <no symbol>
kernel32.dll! BaseThreadInitThunk + 13 bytes
ntdll.dll! RtlUserThreadStart + 33 bytes


I made no changes between "Arachniphobia" and "Arachnicide" so I can't think of a technical reason why there would be VA in "Arachniphobia" but not in "Arachnicide" and onward.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 26, 2017, 11:14:06 pm
So far it's an awesome campaign.  I ran into a minor technical problem though with "Arachnicide"...there is no voice acting for the main part of that script.

Thanks. :)

Voice hasn't been generated yet for "Arachnicide", "Irkalla Passes", or "The Tablet of Destinies".  See the first post: "lacking ... synthesized voice in three missions".  I'm waiting for Sesquipedalian to do that.

Quote
When I tried to use a debug build to get a log it wouldn't let me start "Irkalla Passes".  I was able to get to the briefing screen but then I got this:

Warning: Couldn't find event name "Pallas survived" in mission sa_s1_07.fs2.
Returning false for event_status function.
File: sexp.cpp
Line: 13771

You should still be able to ignore that error and continue the mission.  This is a side-effect of the branching campaign structure; "Irkalla Passes" is where the GVTA and ISF branches merge again.  This happens because, since you came from the GVTA branch, sa_s1_07.fs2 isn't in the list of played missions.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 27, 2017, 01:28:49 am
I've run into a technical error on "Irkalla Passes".

I got most of the mission complete.  The Irkalla and that Bryn corvette exited.  Then most of the ISF force exited.  However, when it was time for the Himoltep and Halifax to exit, I think they both wanted to go to the same exit point in the node.  Those two ships literally ran into each other and then instead of jumping out, they both just stopped and were sitting there in the node.  So I couldn't complete the mission officially.  I tried jumping out and I got the "we have no recommendations for you" line at the debriefing but when I tried to advance it said I failed the mission and couldn't advance.
I was playing FSO 3.8.0 and I played the GTVA campaign.


Another issue in that mission (though this one is relatively minor):  the Taurvi bombers shot Cyclops warheads.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: woutersmits on September 27, 2017, 10:53:56 am
I didvworked on 3 missions done tested the full campaign but im still bussy with screenies goober5000 sorry that it toom too long il sand you 3 screens from first e misdions first gonight
While im downloading forza motosport 7
I will hurry up from now on
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 27, 2017, 12:05:56 pm
I've run into a technical error on "Irkalla Passes".

I got most of the mission complete.  The Irkalla and that Bryn corvette exited.  Then most of the ISF force exited.  However, when it was time for the Himoltep and Halifax to exit, I think they both wanted to go to the same exit point in the node.  Those two ships literally ran into each other and then instead of jumping out, they both just stopped and were sitting there in the node.  So I couldn't complete the mission officially.  I tried jumping out and I got the "we have no recommendations for you" line at the debriefing but when I tried to advance it said I failed the mission and couldn't advance.
I was playing FSO 3.8.0 and I played the GTVA campaign.

Another issue in that mission (though this one is relatively minor):  the Taurvi bombers shot Cyclops warheads.

I'll spend some time today working on those.  I've already fixed the Cyclops problem.


I didvworked on 3 missions done tested the full campaign but im still bussy with screenies goober5000 sorry that it toom too long il sand you 3 screens from first e misdions first gonight
While im downloading forza motosport 7
I will hurry up from now on

Thanks!  I look forward to it. :):yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: PIe on September 27, 2017, 08:40:30 pm
I seem to have found a bug.
Spoiler:
In the first mission of the ISF branch, the Draug will not die and the mission will not end.  Damage stalls at 10%, I suspect because neither Beta nor Gamma have the required weapons to kill it.
On the flip side,
Spoiler:
Crashing the Party was the most fun I've had playing FS2 in quite some time.  The Shivan fighters are numerous enough and aggressive enough to make them a threat, but aren't ridiculously overpowering, and dogfighting among the dueling capships only makes the mission more frantic.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 27, 2017, 08:48:38 pm
I seem to have found a bug.
Spoiler:
In the first mission of the ISF branch, the Draug will not die and the mission will not end.  Damage stalls at 10%, I suspect because neither Beta nor Gamma have the required weapons to kill it.

That's the Cyclops bug, which I've already fixed.  Run FSOInstaller or redownload scroll-root, and then switch to the "Scroll Part I at Branch Point" campaign to resume your progress.

Quote
On the flip side,
Spoiler:
Crashing the Party was the most fun I've had playing FS2 in quite some time.  The Shivan fighters are numerous enough and aggressive enough to make them a threat, but aren't ridiculously overpowering, and dogfighting among the dueling capships only makes the mission more frantic.

Awesome. :)  I had fun making that mission.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 28, 2017, 02:11:14 pm
I've run into a technical error on "Irkalla Passes".

I got most of the mission complete.  The Irkalla and that Bryn corvette exited.  Then most of the ISF force exited.  However, when it was time for the Himoltep and Halifax to exit, I think they both wanted to go to the same exit point in the node.  Those two ships literally ran into each other and then instead of jumping out, they both just stopped and were sitting there in the node.  So I couldn't complete the mission officially.  I tried jumping out and I got the "we have no recommendations for you" line at the debriefing but when I tried to advance it said I failed the mission and couldn't advance.
I was playing FSO 3.8.0 and I played the GTVA campaign.

Another issue in that mission (though this one is relatively minor):  the Taurvi bombers shot Cyclops warheads.

I'll spend some time today working on those.  I've already fixed the Cyclops problem.


Will this be a fix I have to go back to the branch point to apply?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 28, 2017, 08:07:26 pm
These particular fixes don't affect the campaign file, so they don't require you to go back to the branch point.  They're almost done; I'll post an update later this evening.

I have to retract what I said about the Cyclops; turns out it isn't sufficient to use the Shivan bomb model, and they would all need changing to the Shivan Bomb table entry or something.  That will require a bit more work.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 29, 2017, 05:16:24 pm
Okay, scroll-root has been updated.  This latest version includes several fixes and quite a lot of polishing for the s1_07, m2_01, and m2_02 missions.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 29, 2017, 10:42:25 pm
I've downloaded the recent update.

However, I ran into a problem with "Accidents Will Happen."  The allied bombers don't have Cyclops torpedoesbombs in their loadout and I can't change loadout (it's locked and they are locked with one bank of Piranhas and two banks of Rockeyes).  So that corvette can't be destroyed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 29, 2017, 11:26:20 pm
I've downloaded the recent update.

However, I ran into a problem with "Accidents Will Happen."  The allied bombers don't have Cyclops torpedoesbombs in their loadout and I can't change loadout (it's locked and they are locked with one bank of Piranhas and two banks of Rockeyes).  So that corvette can't be destroyed.

That's the Cyclops bug that was mentioned earlier in this thread.  You need to make sure you have started or reset your campaign subsequent to downloading the update.  You can use the "Scroll Part I at Branch Point" campaign instead of starting way back at the beginning, if you want.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 30, 2017, 12:49:57 am
I've downloaded the recent update.

However, I ran into a problem with "Accidents Will Happen."  The allied bombers don't have Cyclops torpedoesbombs in their loadout and I can't change loadout (it's locked and they are locked with one bank of Piranhas and two banks of Rockeyes).  So that corvette can't be destroyed.

That's the Cyclops bug that was mentioned earlier in this thread.  You need to make sure you have started or reset your campaign subsequent to downloading the update.  You can use the "Scroll Part I at Branch Point" campaign instead of starting way back at the beginning, if you want.


I tried both after downloading the update (using that branch point campaign you made, and deleting my player profile and starting over) and I was in the same boat with both:
Beta Sekhmet bombers didn't have Cyclops in their banks and I wasn't able to change their banks).


Some good news for what it's worth:  your fix did fix the issue of Taurvis firing Cyclops (though when the Shivan bomb is targeted it says Cyclops, but at least it looks like a Shivan bomb now).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 30, 2017, 10:48:30 am
I tried both after downloading the update (using that branch point campaign you made, and deleting my player profile and starting over) and I was in the same boat with both:
Beta Sekhmet bombers didn't have Cyclops in their banks and I wasn't able to change their banks).

If you're using a fixed campaign file and a new pilot, that shouldn't happen.  I just checked that the latest download contains the fixes.  Make sure you don't have any stray campaign files, and try playing a different mission in case it cached the wrong loadout.

Also, post your fs2_open.log.  And maybe your campaign file too, in case for some reason the Installer didn't pick up the update.

EDIT: Hmm, I just tested it myself.  It shouldn't be happening, but it is.  Currently investigating.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 30, 2017, 01:32:03 pm
Okay, that was an error with the mission file itself, not the campaign.  Curious why the bug only showed up now.  Anyway, it's fixed.  Download an update and restart the mission.  You shouldn't need to restart the campaign.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 30, 2017, 02:42:53 pm
I downloaded the update and then started the mission again, but same problem unfortunately.  Beta's Sekhmets were locked in the weapons selection screen (Beta just had Piranhas and Rockeyes).

Here's a log.

[attachment stolen by Russian hackers]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 30, 2017, 03:31:19 pm
I tested the new mission on a different computer and it works for me.  Try creating a new pilot, or playing a different mission with the same pilot before coming back to this one.

Make sure you don't have any loose sa_s1_01.fs2 files floating around anywhere.  In fact, extract the one you have and attach it here so I can take a look.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on September 30, 2017, 07:29:38 pm
How/where would I extract that particular file?


(BTW, some good news though:  creating a new pilot and playing it through the techroom worked.  It also worked to play it through your special 'branch' campaign link you posted).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 30, 2017, 07:46:48 pm
It's in scroll.vp.  But I suspect switching to a new campaign cleared the cache and allowed the loadout to be regenerated properly.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 09, 2017, 06:06:46 pm
The first post has been rewritten into a proper release-style post. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: TopAce on October 18, 2017, 02:19:54 pm
That's too bad there is no more interest in one of the oldest project in HLP's history. That's it? Four pages of posts?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 18, 2017, 02:27:32 pm
I'm surprised as well. :sigh:

We do know a lot of people play the mods; FSMods regularly gets 3 TB of traffic per month.  But it appears that those who download and play are not necessarily those who post on the forum.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Gloriano on October 18, 2017, 02:50:08 pm
Trying to find some time to play this, been waiting for this a long time Grats on release!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 18, 2017, 03:03:01 pm
Thanks!  Looking forward to your comments. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: General Battuta on October 18, 2017, 10:01:44 pm
I'm surprised as well. :sigh:

We do know a lot of people play the mods; FSMods regularly gets 3 TB of traffic per month.  But it appears that those who download and play are not necessarily those who post on the forum.

What's it about, like what is the poster slogan, the log line, beyond 'Vasudans'
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 18, 2017, 10:59:24 pm
What's it about, like what is the poster slogan, the log line, beyond 'Vasudans'

Yeah, sorry for that earlier explanation, it was rather flippant.

It is a tale of the rise and fall of a group of Vasudans, who came to be called by the term Atankharz'ythi, which means wanderers.  It is a tale of hubris and humility, of the search for meaning and purpose, and ultimately of the search for a force of good that can overcome the force of evil that is the Shivans.

Scroll is also one of the few campaigns that features a branching storyline.  Both Part I and Part II feature sections where the same period of time is chronicled from two different perspectives.

And we also wanted to make a bunch of really fun missions in the mode of classic campaigns like Derelict and Inferno.  The Scroll modpack borrows quite a few ships from the latter.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 18, 2017, 11:49:31 pm
One thing I forgot to say earlier, I loved that new heavy Vasudan fighter you had in the campaign.  The Reshef (sp?) was really fun to fly (it was described in the campaign as a Vasudan Erinyes).

Can we fly that in Scroll II? :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 19, 2017, 12:06:52 am
I think that's a safe assumption. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 19, 2017, 12:25:24 am
I know it's not going to be the main focus of the campaign since this is a Vasudan campaign, but are we going to see new Terran fighters in Scroll II (since we've seen a new Terran cruiser and the Warlock in Scroll)?  IIRC, Scroll took place a decade after Capella and I think you said somewhere Scroll II will take place a couple years later.


Concerning Vasudan ships though, I liked that new corvette (that could hold 32 craft) and it was great seeing the Tanen in action again (I haven't seen it since Inferno).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 19, 2017, 01:37:41 am
We included a bunch of new Terran fighters in the modpack, but we didn't really have an opportunity to feature them.  But they will definitely make an appearance in Part II, along with several additional ships.

Glad you liked the Udjat and the Tanen.  Check out the tech room as well; there are a number of ships that never actually showed up in the campaign.

On a related note, I was particularly excited to see TrashMan's WIP (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=88814.msg1856563#msg1856563).  The Orc/Blade will be making an appearance in Part II, as the Terran counterpart to the Vasudan Udjat.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: General Battuta on October 19, 2017, 11:40:50 am
Okay that sounds pretty cool
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 24, 2017, 12:24:33 am
This continues my discussion on the Lucifer from the Deneb III thread:


In the final level,
Spoiler:
could you explain why the destroying the Lucifer's reactors only brought down the shield and didn't destroy the ship?  In FS1, destroying the reactors brought down the ship.  Could you please explain your reasoning for how you handled the Lucifer at the end of the game here?

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the campaign overall but this plot aspect slightly confused me.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 24, 2017, 03:33:10 am
Yes, this led to an extended discussion in the Scroll internal. 

Spoiler:
I pointed out that the common understanding was that destroying all five reactors causes the ship to explode, and that this was the understanding used in Awakenings, Derelict, and my own campaign Fortunes of War.  Sesquipedalian's contention was that destroying the reactors merely causes the Lucifer to lose power.  When it is not traveling through subspace, this has the effect of reducing speed and deactivating the shield system, but not causing the ship to explode.  Here is his explanation of what happened at the end of FS1:

Quote
Spoiler:
Without power, the Lucifer's subspace drive could not maintain her in subspace, and so she began to erratically "phase out" into normal space. Even during the early stages when it was still mostly existing in subspace, such chaotic "phasing out" would almost certainly have destructive effects on the ship as different parts of her suddenly found themselves momentarily existing in different types of space than their neighbours; this easily accounts for the many smaller, randomly distributed explosions leading up to the large explosion. As the Lucifer's ability to maintain itself in subspace collapsed entirely, it began to exit into normal space, but could not even complete that before being torn apart and losing the entire rear half that had not yet re-entered normal space by the time the collapse became catastrophic.

Neither of us were persuaded of the other's opinion, but as a result of the discussion, we tweaked the briefing and dialogue for the last mission.  The revised dialogue expresses surprise that the Irkalla didn't start exploding but notes that the shields are now offline.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 24, 2017, 04:27:44 am
Since you brought up Derelict:

In Derelict the Lucifer destroyer was stuck in subspace (it still had its reactors) and when it came out of subspace it didn't have its shields.  Also, it wasn't destroyed by having its reactors destroyed, a Helios-stuffed Deimos rammed it. (I think by this point most know how Derelict ends but if you want me to spoiler this part I will)

Bringing it somewhat back to Scroll: 
Spoiler:
Since Derelict didn't have shielded Lucifers, basically we don't have enough canon information on all Lucifers and its up to the campaign creator to decide whether future Lucifers would have shields or not?  Derelict chose one way and Scroll chose another.

That's an interesting opinion he had on the FS1 Lucifer.  Like you, I'm not sure I agree with it, but he's at least made a good effort to justify his position.

I hope I haven't sidetracked things by bringing in Derelict comparisons.  I'll have a specific Scroll post later. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 24, 2017, 02:31:15 pm
I stand corrected.  You're right, in Derelict they just outright destroyed the thing.

Campaign creators can do whatever they want.  Derelict chose to not have shields on the Nyarlathotep, and it worked for their story purposes.

Derelict comparisons are fine.  Scroll took a lot of inspiration from Derelict. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 24, 2017, 07:35:10 pm
Back to Scroll:

1-I liked a new character you brought in.  That new
Spoiler:
Vasudan commander in charge of the ISF branch expedition was interesting and cool.  One of the descriptions of him was something like "He usually goes his own way, but he's usually right."  That was interesting because usually Terrans are the ones portrayed as individualistic and somewhat chaotic and it was somewhat new to see a GTVA Vasudan shown that way.  Most campaigns that I've seen show GTVA Vasudans as leaning more collectivist and less expressive.  Even though I preferred the 'regular' GTVA branch over the ISF mission branch style, I really liked this character.  Hopefully he at least makes an appearance in Scroll II.
Was this character your idea Goober? 

2-Since you said you used a number of Inferno mods and we may see new Terran ships in Scroll II,
Spoiler:
any chance we could see the semi-infamous superfighter Keres in Scroll II?  Vasudans have let Terrans use their fighters so Terrans could return the favor and let them try this.  I say infamous because some say it's too OP. :D
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 24, 2017, 09:09:39 pm
1. Glad you liked Admiral Amethet.  He is a creation of Sesquipedalian; I didn't have much to do with his description or characterization.

2. We don't have plans to introduce the Keres in Part II, and the ship set is mostly finalized.  Though I can take another look at it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 24, 2017, 09:21:00 pm

2. We don't have plans to introduce the Keres in Part II, and the ship set is mostly finalized.  Though I can take another look at it.

Thanks.  I'd appreciate it.  I only know of one campaign (Ghost Revenants) where you can fly the Keres and it'd be cool to have another one.


In any case, I'm really looking forward to Scroll Part 2 down the road.  You and that other guy did a great job on Part 1; by the way, how do you pronounce his name?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 24, 2017, 09:28:49 pm
Sesquipedalian?  It's in the dictionary (https://www.thefreedictionary.com/sesquipedalian).

Sesquipedalian hasn't been active much this year though.  And we had a lot of contributions from other members too: Yarn, Xenocartographer, PVD_Hope, macielos, and FreeSpaceFreak just this year alone.  TopAce, MjnMixael, Galemp, and Admiral Nelson did a lot of work in previous years as well.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Gloriano on October 26, 2017, 03:33:48 am
Soo had a chance to play this and so far really enjoyed myself, so good job. I think the story itself is quite interesting and hope to see the next one soon and not after 15 years  ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 26, 2017, 09:25:49 pm
Soo had a chance to play this and so far really enjoyed myself, so good job. I think the story itself is quite interesting and hope to see the next one soon and not after 15 years  ;)

Glad to hear that. :)  And yes, we plan to release Part II sooner than that. ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on November 01, 2017, 02:53:51 pm
Just FYI, the dl links in the op are broken. Those on the homepage work, though. Lookin' forward to play this. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 01, 2017, 09:30:03 pm
Thanks, I forgot to fix those before.  They're fixed now.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: mjn.mixael on November 06, 2017, 08:25:57 pm
Put it on Knossos and I'll play it. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 06, 2017, 08:28:24 pm
Ooh. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on November 06, 2017, 08:45:10 pm
I forgot to say something else about the plot I liked:

The initial debate on whether or not the
Spoiler:
Terran Gateway project should give spare parts to the Vasudan exploration of this new system was interesting to follow.

Although I could understand why the
Spoiler:
Vasudans would want to do this new project perhaps, I could also understand the Terran reluctance as well.  I mean, if you only have enough parts right now for one project...I could see why they would want to go back to Sol.  Behind one door there is something they've been wanting for 30 some years that they 'know' is there.  On the other hand, behind door #2 is a mystery...so why would they want to go with this other project before Sol is restored?  If I was a Vasudan I might understand why they'd be reluctant to support the new project.

You guys came up with a good compromise to the debate though. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on November 07, 2017, 07:21:43 am
I forgot to post some more detailed feedback :P.

What I dislike:
Spoiler:
- I'm lacking some small plot details between missions. Something more about those systems we explore?
- New ships are a little bit too rare.
- Nebulae. I just don't like this particular style. Looks chaotic, noisy and a little bit like ketchup. Don't you guys prefer something fancy and more detailed (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=93560.0) :P?

What I like:
Spoiler:
- Overall storyline. Mysterious, deep and mystic. Numerous plottwists. Exploring dark, unknown space mood... And I'm really interested what lies further, in unknown space beyond Fornacis.
- Cool new music! Especially main menu is just... Woah!
- Knossos-centered missions are gorgeous. I went for ISF in the branch, and those missions are are also outstanding.
- Like CT27, I like character creation of Admiral Amethet.
- Commanding officer of Narendum is also worth mentioning. He gives me this strange feeling that he's doing something in secrecy, and will surprise us somehow in Act II.
- Voice acting is done in unique way.
- I feel vasudan! Scroll would benefit on dedicated vasudan interface and hud.
- Udjat is the best looking 670-poly model I've ever seen.

Summary: Scroll is solid and worth playing. Campaign has some features which makes it unique. Despite initial proplems with bugs, I enjoyed my playthrough and I will do it again with second branch. Scroll would benefit on some new assets. It's been almost 20 years since Capella, so more new ships and weapons would be welcome.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Asteroth on November 08, 2017, 01:13:37 am
In the fifth mission, I got the "harthenet died" spiel despite it surviving at 4% health, it even gave its "dont let my sacrifice be in vain!" so I'll bet they were unhappy I didn't give them the chance to heroically die. I also didn't get the maxim in the previous mission, but that may have been due to me skipping the mission before it, and mightve missed an allow-weapon maxim.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 09, 2017, 01:52:45 am
I forgot to say something else about the plot I liked:

The initial debate on whether or not the
Spoiler:
Terran Gateway project should give spare parts to the Vasudan exploration of this new system was interesting to follow.

Although I could understand why the
Spoiler:
Vasudans would want to do this new project perhaps, I could also understand the Terran reluctance as well.  I mean, if you only have enough parts right now for one project...I could see why they would want to go back to Sol.  Behind one door there is something they've been wanting for 30 some years that they 'know' is there.  On the other hand, behind door #2 is a mystery...so why would they want to go with this other project before Sol is restored?  If I was a Vasudan I might understand why they'd be reluctant to support the new project.

You guys came up with a good compromise to the debate though. :)

Thanks. :)  You might be interested to know that that entire subplot arose from a plot hole I identified...

Spoiler:
It stretches credibility to think that the Vasudans could repair the Knossos in just a short time.  The best-case scenario would be for them to quickly replace the broken parts with spare parts from somewhere else.  Then I thought that those spare parts might be readily available if another subspace portal was under construction.  And we know from FS2 that the Terrans are strongly in favor of building one to return to Earth.  It made for some good conflict that tied into the whole simmering-beneath-the-surface tension of the different priorities for the Terrans and Vasudans after Capella.


I forgot to post some more detailed feedback :P.

What I dislike:
Spoiler:
- I'm lacking some small plot details between missions. Something more about those systems we explore?
- New ships are a little bit too rare.
- Nebulae. I just don't like this particular style. Looks chaotic, noisy and a little bit like ketchup. Don't you guys prefer something fancy and more detailed (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=93560.0) :P?

1) Good point.  This part of the campaign is more focused on pushing out the Shivans than doing much exploration.  But we should feature this more in Part II.
2) I suppose this is reasonable.  We didn't have a chance to feature too many of the Terran ships, after all.  On the other hand, this is only eleven years (not 20) after Capella, and there is an economic depression; new ships aren't too common yet. :p
3) Wow, those look excellent!  Perhaps we should ask you to join our team! :drevil:

Quote
What I like:
Spoiler:
- Overall storyline. Mysterious, deep and mystic. Numerous plottwists. Exploring dark, unknown space mood... And I'm really interested what lies further, in unknown space beyond Fornacis.
- Cool new music! Especially main menu is just... Woah!
- Knossos-centered missions are gorgeous. I went for ISF in the branch, and those missions are are also outstanding.
- Like CT27, I like character creation of Admiral Amethet.
- Commanding officer of Narendum is also worth mentioning. He gives me this strange feeling that he's doing something in secrecy, and will surprise us somehow in Act II.
- Voice acting is done in unique way.
- I feel vasudan! Scroll would benefit on dedicated vasudan interface and hud.
- Udjat is the best looking 670-poly model I've ever seen.

Summary: Scroll is solid and worth playing. Campaign has some features which makes it unique. Despite initial proplems with bugs, I enjoyed my playthrough and I will do it again with second branch. Scroll would benefit on some new assets. It's been almost 20 years since Capella, so more new ships and weapons would be welcome.

Spoiler:
1) Very glad to hear that. :D  And yes, you will find out more about what lies beyond Fornacis.  In fact, it is one of the most interesting ideas in any campaign that I've played.
2) Sesquipedalian picked out a lot of the music, so he will be happy to hear that. :)
3) Excellent.  Looking forward to hearing your thoughts about the other missions too. :D

5) Interesting that you had that idea.  Dr. Raphah will continue to play an important role in Part II.
6) Sesquipedalian came up with that too.  It definitely added to the campaign.
7) We really tried to think of many FS2 elements using Vasudan perspectives.  Glad it worked!  We did consider using a Vasudan HUD, but I felt strongly that the one suggested was too distracting, so we kept the standard HUD.
8) Glad low-poly models can still look cool. :D


In the fifth mission, I got the "harthenet died" spiel despite it surviving at 4% health, it even gave its "dont let my sacrifice be in vain!" so I'll bet they were unhappy I didn't give them the chance to heroically die. I also didn't get the maxim in the previous mission, but that may have been due to me skipping the mission before it, and mightve missed an allow-weapon maxim.

Heh.  I was never able to save the Harthenet myself, and you're not actually supposed to defend it if you're following orders.  Someone else earlier in the thread saved it as well.  What ship were you flying, and what strategy did you use?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nyctaeus on November 09, 2017, 08:18:01 am
3) Wow, those look excellent!  Perhaps we should ask you to join our team! :drevil:
Exile is done so... What must I sign :P ? Perhaps I may add few polys to Udjat too.

In the fifth mission, I got the "harthenet died" spiel despite it surviving at 4% health, it even gave its "dont let my sacrifice be in vain!" so I'll bet they were unhappy I didn't give them the chance to heroically die. I also didn't get the maxim in the previous mission, but that may have been due to me skipping the mission before it, and mightve missed an allow-weapon maxim.

Heh.  I was never able to save the Harthenet myself, and you're not actually supposed to defend it if you're following orders.  Someone else earlier in the thread saved it as well.  What ship were you flying, and what strategy did you use?
I managed to save it too, with 8% integrity. Saladin had 4% :P. I forgot to mention it, but yeah it's possible and despite that, it's always mentioned as destroyed in debriefing. I'm calling that Nebtuu-syndrome. If I remember correctly, I used Tauret.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Asteroth on November 09, 2017, 02:15:14 pm
In the fifth mission, I got the "harthenet died" spiel despite it surviving at 4% health, it even gave its "dont let my sacrifice be in vain!" so I'll bet they were unhappy I didn't give them the chance to heroically die. I also didn't get the maxim in the previous mission, but that may have been due to me skipping the mission before it, and mightve missed an allow-weapon maxim.

Heh.  I was never able to save the Harthenet myself, and you're not actually supposed to defend it if you're following orders.  Someone else earlier in the thread saved it as well.  What ship were you flying, and what strategy did you use?

Just a tauret with double mekhus and harpoons. I immediately burned to the wing of taurvis, took out their bombs and messed them up enough that the narandum was safe-ish and then burned straight for the Moloch and took out its lower beams with the mekhus and harpoons. A real easy way to avoid this would probably be to redirect some wings to finish off the harthenet if its still there, or even send a special wing that only comes if it survives. The Moloch left it at 4% and it stayed that way for the rest of the mission and the whole time I was deathly afraid it would be taken out by a sneeze from a passing bomber in all the chaos, but it seems like no one targeted it because they didnt even expect it to be there.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 10, 2017, 05:23:33 pm
3) Wow, those look excellent!  Perhaps we should ask you to join our team! :drevil:
Exile is done so... What must I sign :P ? Perhaps I may add few polys to Udjat too.

:D  I've added you to the Scroll member group. :)  I've also sent you an invitation to our SVN system.

I managed to save it too, with 8% integrity. Saladin had 4% :P. I forgot to mention it, but yeah it's possible and despite that, it's always mentioned as destroyed in debriefing. I'm calling that Nebtuu-syndrome. If I remember correctly, I used Tauret.

Nebtuu syndrome is right.  I will add an event to self-destruct the Harthenet if the Ranoth is de-beamed or destroyed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 10, 2017, 07:36:04 pm
All right, Scroll has been updated with voice-acting for g1_07, m2_01, and m2_02. :cool:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: mjn.mixael on November 10, 2017, 11:47:56 pm
Wow mission 2 is suuuuuper finicky. A single laser shot off in the distance? fail. Fly too close? fail. There's not even a directive that says to keep your distance!

Basically the mission opens with 2 minutes of sitting a listening to dialog.. that's not fun. Let me fly around the asteroid field and shoot rocks while I wait. Fail the mission if I shoot AT the Hercs. And if you really don't want me to get too close, then start me waaaay further back so I have no chance of getting too close before all the dialog ends.

Sorry. Didn't mean for my first post about Scroll to be nitpicky.. but after having to restart like 4 times because of Cold, Hard, Reasons.. I was frustrated.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 11, 2017, 12:48:02 am
Wow mission 2 is suuuuuper finicky. A single laser shot off in the distance? fail. Fly too close? fail. There's not even a directive that says to keep your distance!

Basically the mission opens with 2 minutes of sitting a listening to dialog.. that's not fun. Let me fly around the asteroid field and shoot rocks while I wait. Fail the mission if I shoot AT the Hercs. And if you really don't want me to get too close, then start me waaaay further back so I have no chance of getting too close before all the dialog ends.

Sorry. Didn't mean for my first post about Scroll to be nitpicky.. but after having to restart like 4 times because of Cold, Hard, Reasons.. I was frustrated.

I guess I deserve that since my first post about BtA: Mefistofele was highly frustrated and nitpicky... :nervous:

The idea was to emphasize self-control and discretion, since this is a peacekeeping mission, not an all-out assault against Shivans.  I didn't think the NTB would think too well of a trigger-happy Vasudan just itching to shoot at something. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 11, 2017, 11:17:21 am
Sorry Goober, I've been leaving you to handle questions and stuff...
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 11, 2017, 01:39:06 pm
No worries.  Answering questions is a welcome break from fixing the forums and the other stuff I've been doing. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 11, 2017, 06:15:46 pm
Once we reach Christmas break (unless I have to have surgery which is a possibility) give me stuff to do and I'll get some work done.  :nod:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 12, 2017, 01:04:39 am
:nod:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: azile0 on November 23, 2017, 04:38:15 pm
I want to mirror a complaint from the first page about Mission 3.

Spoiler:
I failed the mission three times in a row, not having any idea what I was doing wrong. "Target Every Ship" is ludicrous because beyond the red popup, there's no way of knowing what's been scanned or not. I ended up just holding down H while flying around, still getting a failure. I thought there was something I had to do, so on my fourth try I attempted to blow up the volatile gas containers to distract the corvette, and failed (which is funny because that ended up being the solution). On the fifth run I tried engaging the fighters to lure away the corvette and failed. On the sixth I started searching far outside of the depot, thinking I was missing something because I was positive that I had scanned everything (apparently not!) and failed. I have literally never heard Zeta 1 comment on the gas miners, and now I know it's because I must have been 3001 meters away from one of them when I was holding down H.

Either way, that mission made me pull my hair out and nearly made me abandon what is otherwise an incredibly fun and well made campaign.

Edit:

Spoiler:
So after reading through the thread, I got further in the mission than ever before! Then this happened! I realize it was because I started shooting a half second before I was "supposed" to, but come on.

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 25, 2017, 12:58:21 am
I want to mirror a complaint from the first page about Mission 3.

Spoiler:
I failed the mission three times in a row, not having any idea what I was doing wrong. "Target Every Ship" is ludicrous because beyond the red popup, there's no way of knowing what's been scanned or not. I ended up just holding down H while flying around, still getting a failure.

The thing is, are you flying around randomly, or purposefully?  If you patrol the cargo depot systematically you should get a general idea of where you've been and where you are supposed to go next.

I'll see about adding some sort of additional marker that will tell you which ships have been scanned and which haven't.

Quote
Spoiler:
So after reading through the thread, I got further in the mission than ever before! Then this happened! I realize it was because I started shooting a half second before I was "supposed" to, but come on.

Spoiler:
This isn't a case where you started shooting a half-second too early.  You are shooting a cargo container that is not involved in a transfer operation.  Notice the cargo display: "100% transferred" and not docked to anything.  You are supposed to find a cargo container where the transfer is in progress.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: azile0 on November 25, 2017, 11:54:15 pm
I see; I'm past the mission now, and I'm sorry if my message was grumpy. Now i'm running into technical issues.

Spoiler:
I don't know why, but my nebulas are totally broken. As others have mentioned, they're dazzlingly bright and I can't see ships until I'm literally on top of them. This made the ship scanning difficult, as I had to rely entirely on targeting display and 3D radar to navigate. Now I'm totally stuck on the mission where you need to TAG and disable multiple ships because I am too blind to find them reliably, because sensor range is also cut. How do I fix my nebula files so they're not so obnoxiously bright and opaque?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: TopAce on November 26, 2017, 02:37:33 am
Decrease brightness or turn off background images in options would be my two guesses.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 26, 2017, 02:56:54 pm
Have come across a bug in "Arachnicide". Before your capital ships can engage the installation, all shivan caps defending must be destroyed. I did that, however in the objective window, it reads one target still alive. All friendly ships just sit in place, beams silent.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 26, 2017, 05:20:58 pm
Have come across a bug in "Arachnicide". Before your capital ships can engage the installation, all shivan caps defending must be destroyed. I did that, however in the objective window, it reads one target still alive. All friendly ships just sit in place, beams silent.

Does the bug repeat every time you play the mission? Do you have time to try it again?

Goober, do you want me to try and handle this?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 26, 2017, 05:41:44 pm
Yes, I just played it a third time. Tasked with destroying 6 capships, but only 5 are there. Looking at the briefing, the missing ship is the SC Tvashtri.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 26, 2017, 07:23:52 pm
The SC Tvashtri is present in the mission in FRED. So you say that it's not appearing at all, or just that destroying it doesn't count towards the objective?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 26, 2017, 08:30:51 pm
Not appearing at all. Here is a screenshot from the beginning of the mission.

(https://i.imgur.com/OMYPILE.png)

No SC Tvashtri in the escort list or in sight.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 27, 2017, 12:16:48 am
I see; I'm past the mission now, and I'm sorry if my message was grumpy. Now i'm running into technical issues.

It's all good.  Feedback helps.

Quote
I don't know why, but my nebulas are totally broken. As others have mentioned, they're dazzlingly bright and I can't see ships until I'm literally on top of them.

This should not happen.  Please post this either on Mantis or on GitHub so that the SCP can take a look.  I'm not a graphics coder so I don't know what's wrong.

We did find that it works properly in 3.7.4.  Also, using the following command-line, it works on recent 3.8 builds for me:
Code: [Select]
-mod "scroll,mediavps_2014" -nospec -nomotiondebris -nonormal -noheight -nolightshafts -no_deferred

Goober, do you want me to try and handle this?

Yes, please.

Also, everyone should specify whether they downloaded the mod from the thread, from the FSO Installer, or from Knossos; and also when they last updated their files.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 27, 2017, 07:04:52 am
I'm gonna get to your problem CKid, I've just got classes and other errands today, so it might take me a bit.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 27, 2017, 09:31:08 am
It's cool. I'm in no rush and can replay the ISF branch in the mean time. As for what Goober was asking: FSO installer, last updated around 3-4 weeks ago.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 27, 2017, 07:00:54 pm
So the Tvashtri was present on the previous mission, Arachnophobia? Was it destroyed?

Incidentally it doesn't seem that there are any conditions for the Shivan capships' presence in Arachnicide, that is, if any of them were destroyed in Arachnophobia (is that even supposed to be possible?)  they might still show up in Arachnicide.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 27, 2017, 07:53:45 pm
Yes, I remember I had ordered Delta wing to destroy the Tvashri, then thrash the Jaraxxus after neutralizing the Shivan AWACS. It could explain why the SC Jaraxxus begins the mission with 3% HP. Unfortunately the only way I can think to test this is to restart the campaign and keep an eye on all cruisers HP in Arachnophobia to see if it carries over to the next mission.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 28, 2017, 08:24:47 am
Goober, is it possible to start the campaign from Arachnophobia to test this? Where should I be looking in FRED to find out what conditions there are for the Tvashtri's presence? In the edit ship menu, it's arrival is just listed as "true"
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 28, 2017, 06:36:51 pm
So by selecting the branching campaign start and ~k all the things to quickly get back to Arachnophobia, I checked to see if damaged and destroyed ships carried over. Here is the results:

All Shivan Cruisers carried their HP to the next mission except the SC Jaraxxus which I had Delta wing destroy. It returned with 20%.

(https://i.imgur.com/sKLb32x.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/4EudWt6.png)

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 28, 2017, 09:01:33 pm
Thanks for doing this for me, I really did not have time to get to that today.

This is not right, the Jaraxxus certainly should not be there if it was destroyed previously. So the Tvashtri showed up with proper HP then? I need to determine which ships this problem affects.

And the Arachnicide directive still asked for the destruction of all six capships? Did you finish the mission to see if the directive played out right this time? (sorry for all the questions :P)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on November 28, 2017, 09:17:48 pm
Yes Tvashtri survived Arachnophobia with 59% and began Arachnicide at 59%. Still got the directive to destroy 6 Capships and yes, all allied ships engaged the installation after the six were destroyed. Mission played out as it should.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 29, 2017, 01:42:53 pm
Yes Tvashtri survived Arachnophobia with 59% and began Arachnicide at 59%. Still got the directive to destroy 6 Capships and yes, all allied ships engaged the installation after the six were destroyed. Mission played out as it should.

That's good. I need to investigate how ship and ship health persistence is handled between those two missions.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on November 30, 2017, 01:45:10 pm
Goober, I need some help with this. I can't figure out where ship persistence is handled between those missions. I can't find any persistent variables or events that save ship health values. Arachnophobia is a pretty event-heavy mission, so it's possible that it's hidden under an event with a name that wouldn't imply it, but if so then I have no clue where to start looking. Am I missing something obvious?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 03, 2017, 11:07:16 pm
I'll take a look at this soon.  Had a fairly busy week last week, and that was right after Thanksgiving.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on December 04, 2017, 09:37:25 am
I'll take a look at this soon.  Had a fairly busy week last week, and that was right after Thanksgiving.

Thanks. Now that exams are coming up I'm going to be pretty busy until the end of next week.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: xenocartographer on December 11, 2017, 01:51:45 pm
Maybe I'm just really bad at stealth missions, but I swear, every time I've failed that one where you're supposed to target all the Shivan ships, there hasn't been anything anywhere near the three hundred meter cutoff on the proximity gauge. What's going on here?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on December 12, 2017, 11:41:53 am
Maybe I'm just really bad at stealth missions, but I swear, every time I've failed that one where you're supposed to target all the Shivan ships, there hasn't been anything anywhere near the three hundred meter cutoff on the proximity gauge. What's going on here?

So you say that you're getting the message(s) that will show up when you've been detected by Shivan fighters?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: xenocartographer on December 12, 2017, 03:47:19 pm
I get Zeta 1 yelling at me and a failure debrief, but nothing was listed on the proximity sensor.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on December 12, 2017, 06:41:30 pm
I get Zeta 1 yelling at me and a failure debrief, but nothing was listed on the proximity sensor.

But when he yells at you does he say that you've been detected? Or is it just a general "this mission is failed" message?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: xenocartographer on December 12, 2017, 09:44:54 pm
Yes, she's telling me I've been detected.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on December 13, 2017, 12:30:25 pm
Yes, she's telling me I've been detected.

OH that's right Zeta 1 is a she. :P

Hmm.

Do you remember what the minimum detection range was said to be?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: HLD_Prophecy on December 13, 2017, 12:31:58 pm
I mean the range that you get detected at.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: xenocartographer on December 13, 2017, 01:12:33 pm
300 meters. The display kicks in at 2 klicks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: eragon2890 on December 16, 2017, 05:53:45 am
Okay, maybe I just suck,, but I am finding the mission "perfect vision" where I have to guard the two ships while they are scanning the system in the GTVA branch to be literally impossible, even on very easy difficulty I failed 4 times in a row so far. They are so easy to kill it's simply impossible to prevent the far too many shivan fighters from doing so. And I am ignoring the convoy completely, I stay near the ships all the time,a nd kill about one fighter every 5 seconds, making sure to target the ones attacking either of the ships and that time and ordering my wingmates to do the same. Despite all this, I just failed for the fourth time on very easy.

What am I doing wrong? I want to get to the next mission :(

EDIT: never mind, made it the fifth time on very easy... but you might want to make it a bit easier! ;)

Great campaign overall!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: eragon2890 on December 16, 2017, 11:04:54 am
Allright now I am in the mission where I have to protect the US- I mean GTD Enterprise from the kraken, and I get the message that the kraken has only one beam turret and I should fire 4 trebuchet missiles at it. I target a beam turret on the kraken, destroy it with said 4 missiles, but turns out it had more then one operational after all and it destroys the Enterprise and I fail the mission. Is that supposed to happen? :-/

Also, I already lost the arnku before that, but given that the mission goes on like nothing happened I assume that will not result in a mission failed debriefing right?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 04, 2018, 06:56:42 pm
Apologies for the late response.


Maybe I'm just really bad at stealth missions, but I swear, every time I've failed that one where you're supposed to target all the Shivan ships, there hasn't been anything anywhere near the three hundred meter cutoff on the proximity gauge. What's going on here?

The proximity gauge only indicates fighters, but the sentry guns will detect you as well.

This is intentional, but maybe I should change it.  (Originally, there was no proximity gauge, and it was added in order to help you track the things that moved around, while relying on the player to track things that were stationary.)


Okay, maybe I just suck,, but I am finding the mission "perfect vision" where I have to guard the two ships while they are scanning the system in the GTVA branch to be literally impossible, even on very easy difficulty I failed 4 times in a row so far. They are so easy to kill it's simply impossible to prevent the far too many shivan fighters from doing so. And I am ignoring the convoy completely, I stay near the ships all the time,a nd kill about one fighter every 5 seconds, making sure to target the ones attacking either of the ships and that time and ordering my wingmates to do the same. Despite all this, I just failed for the fourth time on very easy.

What am I doing wrong? I want to get to the next mission :(

EDIT: never mind, made it the fifth time on very easy... but you might want to make it a bit easier! ;)

This mission somehow got quite a bit harder since it was first FREDded.  I can only assume SCP changes are to blame, but I'm not sure exactly what causes it.  That's why I made engaging the convoy a secondary objective - originally, it was required.

Did you try it on Medium difficulty?  Friendly fighters are more intelligent on Medium.

Quote
Great campaign overall!

Thanks!


Allright now I am in the mission where I have to protect the US- I mean GTD Enterprise from the kraken, and I get the message that the kraken has only one beam turret and I should fire 4 trebuchet missiles at it. I target a beam turret on the kraken, destroy it with said 4 missiles, but turns out it had more then one operational after all and it destroys the Enterprise and I fail the mission. Is that supposed to happen? :-/

Also, I already lost the arnku before that, but given that the mission goes on like nothing happened I assume that will not result in a mission failed debriefing right?

That would be one primary beam turret, on the forward prongs of the Kraken.  There are other beam turrets operational, but they are anti-fighter turrets and not a threat to the Enterprise.

It is possible to save the Arnku, but very difficult.  The story assumes that the Arnku will be lost.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: pim on January 13, 2018, 01:26:17 pm
Hi.
 So I'm enjoying the campaign, everything goes smoothly and we Vasudans rulezz when suddenly I get agoraphobia. Sorry, I mean Arachnophobia. Eventually Arachnicide.
 I encountered same issue as CKid and need to restart the branch.
I'd appreciate prolonging the EMP effect and decreasing the station flak radius in Arachnophobia (since it is not players responsibility and it's just an annoyance). Why?

 Arachnophobia has potential to be great mission. I enjoyed it till fifth or so repetition. Maybe I'm just looser or it maybe still needs to be somehow tweaked because results seemed to me to be more dependent on luck than my performance.
 How long does EMP last? After launching EMP missile to the fourth target the first one already started to fire at Helioses again.
 Second beam was even more troublesome than the first one. Even after destruction of both sentries and one cruiser by Delta wing and when the remaining cruiser was constantly spammed by EMP, still 4 Helioses were destroyed by station flak and it's main beam survived. So during final attempt I didn't take any chances and ordered Delta wing to destroy everything before tagging the main beam. This finally helped.
 Side effect was that after progressing to Arachnicide I got stuck - two targets remained on the escort list while there was already no enemy and capital ships didn't start with attack.

 BTW before Arachnophobia is default FS loading screen. I guess that you have some nice picture prepared for it like for the other missions.

Sa Vasuda.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 13, 2018, 03:13:44 pm
It seems that the mission is very easy to break. :sigh:  I tried to ensure that the flak would not bother the player by using certain sexps, but it doesn't seem to have worked reliably.  I'll take another look at it.

I can also increase the EMP duration.  It is supposed to last for 21 seconds, which was barely enough time for me in my tests.  But I'll make it more forgiving.  And I will fix the loading screen; thanks for letting me know.

And I still need to look at the other problems.  This is a high priority, but I have a lot of tasks I'm juggling at the moment.  I'm slowly making progress. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Vidmaster on January 15, 2018, 01:03:33 pm
A bug in "Thieves and Destroyers": I never got the RTB due one of the transports being disabled. Victory music played, so I suspect the SEXPs worked as intended and all but the mission obviously ended it a failure since I still jumped out prematurely.
EDIT: Second attempt, no disabled ship. Everything fine on the transport side. Same bug. On further note, I saw the medical ship jumping around with probably 500 speed units, I suppose it got stuck somewhere and glitched out. Of course, I am playing on fs2_open_3_8_1_20171231_8cf0e8e_x64_SSE2 which might have something to do with it.
EDIT2: Switched back to 3_8_0 stable and kept the finger away from time compression. Worked.

By the way, cracking campaign thus far. A few weaker points but overall very strong. Will give full review when done.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on February 07, 2018, 02:26:22 pm
I played SA shortly after release; I was happy to see this one got released after I already had given this up :). Question - has the final mission been fixed? I remember I saw how
Spoiler:
the Tribute blew up.

I liked the overall athmosphere of this campaign, especially the exploration theme and how the Vasudans are depicted - that was awesome :nod:. Looking forward to part II now... hopefully this doesn't take that long this time.

Spoiler:
Some small Dev tips (unless you already fixed them of course):
-You should clean up the modpack, I'm seeing lots of MVP dublicates in there - mostly maps and effect, but probably models as well. Also there's a bunch of missions in a folder called "old", which pobably shouldn't be there, too.
-Lots of pcx files are present which could be removed or replaced by HQ versions.
-SA Aslesa, ST Xandja, Shivan RBC use retail instead of MVP textures.
-There're no custom cfg files for the flashy death script, that will cause SAs custom ships and weapons to explode without a flash while others do have them.
-The custom SA ships could need some "Check Hull" flags.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: azile0 on February 17, 2018, 11:49:11 pm
I see; I'm past the mission now, and I'm sorry if my message was grumpy. Now i'm running into technical issues.

It's all good.  Feedback helps.

Quote
I don't know why, but my nebulas are totally broken. As others have mentioned, they're dazzlingly bright and I can't see ships until I'm literally on top of them.

This should not happen.  Please post this either on Mantis or on GitHub so that the SCP can take a look.  I'm not a graphics coder so I don't know what's wrong.

We did find that it works properly in 3.7.4.  Also, using the following command-line, it works on recent 3.8 builds for me:
Code: [Select]
-mod "scroll,mediavps_2014" -nospec -nomotiondebris -nonormal -noheight -nolightshafts -no_deferred

Goober, do you want me to try and handle this?

Yes, please.

Also, everyone should specify whether they downloaded the mod from the thread, from the FSO Installer, or from Knossos; and also when they last updated their files.

So, coming back several months later, I have attempted your fixes and am still encountering blinding light on the mission "Masks". This is what I see. (https://imgur.com/a/h69Dp)

Update: Fixed it by disabling post-processing! Was trying various settings and narrowed it down to that.

Edit: Yet another game-breaking impasse.

Spoiler:
In Irkalla Passes, I have three times now failed after jumping out because the Khitteb will not jump out. It sits at the node, and so the Himnoltep and Halifax won't jump out either. I set the time compression to 32 and waited for a minute, and the Khitteb still just sat there. When I jump out, I get a victory debriefing but fail the mission and have to retry. I am just going to suicide skip it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SL1 on February 26, 2018, 10:20:36 pm
Okay, I give up. In Arachnophobia, how exactly am I supposed to
Spoiler:
signal Delta wing?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CKid on February 27, 2018, 07:13:34 am
Spoiler:
When Delta wing jumps in, Hit the Shivan AWACS with a TAG missile
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SL1 on February 27, 2018, 08:50:59 am
That's a bit counterintuitive, considering that
Spoiler:
the whole point of the AWACS is that it supposedly makes TAGs useless
, but thanks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Redox on March 08, 2018, 02:54:49 am
Stuck on Through the Looking Glass. I scan the ships I need to then get a message that something's occurring and I fail the mission. What am I missing here?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 10, 2018, 12:24:21 am
Stuck on Through the Looking Glass. I scan the ships I need to then get a message that something's occurring and I fail the mission. What am I missing here?

Sorry for the delayed response; I missed the last few posts on this thread.

Spoiler:
Make sure you record all the ship types.  You might be missing the gas miners.

I'll release an updated version of Scroll Part I in the next few days that will have some tweaks, adjustments, and improvements.


That's a bit counterintuitive, considering that
Spoiler:
the whole point of the AWACS is that it supposedly makes TAGs useless
, but thanks.

Spoiler:
The AWACS makes the stealth useless, not the TAGs.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 10, 2018, 02:07:21 am
Have come across a bug in "Arachnicide". Before your capital ships can engage the installation, all shivan caps defending must be destroyed. I did that, however in the objective window, it reads one target still alive. All friendly ships just sit in place, beams silent.

I figured this out, with help from your subsequent posts and some testing.  Since the Tvashtri was destroyed in g1_06, it never appeared in g1_07.  Since it never appeared in the second mission, it was never "destroyed".  The mission was waiting for all six ships to be destroyed and this never occurred.

A fix will be included in the next update.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 15, 2018, 02:08:10 am
:bump:

The latest update, version 1.3.0 in both Knossos and the FSO Installer, has been released!  It contains the following changes:

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 02, 2018, 11:07:18 pm
:bump:

Version 1.4.0 has been released in both Knossos and the FSO Installer.  It contains the following changes:

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Galemp on September 03, 2018, 01:21:10 am
Quote
Allowed the GVF Tauret to carry the Maxim

Wut?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 03, 2018, 12:20:12 pm
Yeah the Tauret can't carry it by default.  This was requested more than once, and there were no internal discussions against it, so I figured I would add it.  We could say the fighter was upgraded sometime in the past 11 years.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: woutersmits on September 10, 2018, 02:35:27 pm
hey im continue tormorrow that screen thing
i apolyies for not early done becouse other throuble
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on September 11, 2018, 03:06:55 am
Too late, there's a new sheriff in town now who's taking care of the entire scenery related stuff. :p ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 11, 2018, 06:10:36 am
Woutersmits is talking about screenshots.

We always appreciate new screenshots of the campaign. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on September 11, 2018, 10:44:30 am
Woutersmits is talking about screenshots.

We always appreciate new screenshots of the campaign. :)

Yep I know. :cool:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on November 13, 2018, 06:00:30 pm
Has the team approached Trash Man about making a custom variant of his recently-released Blade Battlecruiser (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=95252.0) for the team?  The Blade is, of course based on the Orc cruiser from the original Inferno R1, of which SA uses a modified version with a fighterbay in the side and slightly different multi-part turrets.  Have you guys asked him about it, or do you still plan on including the Orc beyond Part 1?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 13, 2018, 06:13:06 pm
The Orc will be featured in Part II (possibly with a different name).  I haven't compared the existing version with TrashMan's new version yet.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on November 13, 2018, 07:44:28 pm
The most noticeable change is that the middle of the ship features only one multi-part turret on the dorsal and one on the ventral, whereas the Orc has two on both top and bottom.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: 0rph3u5 on July 14, 2019, 06:56:57 am
I get a script-error during Arachnophobia (sa_g1_06), when the first strike wing is said to arrive:

Code: [Select]
Could not find index 'HomingSubsys' in type 'weapon'

------------------------------------------------------------------
ADE Debug:
------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: hc_fire
Name of: global
Function type: Lua
Defined on: 59
Upvalues: 7

Source: helios-sct.tbm - On Gameplay Start
Short source: [string "helios-sct.tbm - On Gameplay Start"]
Current line: 190
- Function line: 132
------------------------------------------------------------------


------------------------------------------------------------------

stack traceback:
[C]: ?
[string "helios-sct.tbm - On Gameplay Start"]:195: in function 'hc_fire'
[string "String: hc_fire('Alpha Strike', 2)"]:1: in main chunk
------------------------------------------------------------------

1: Userdata [weapon]
2: String [HomingSubsys]
3: Userdata [subsystem]
------------------------------------------------------------------

https://fsnebula.org/log/5d2b1263cb0d332f85b982ff



I really liked the narrative and the mission design in the GTVA branch so far, but I am a bit disappointed with the new weapons and playable ships, to be honest. They are just ... bland, the Reshef in particular (the design just screams directional thrusters to me).

A few things I'd advise:
- The debriefing for Through the Looking Glas could use another stage to convey the failstate that comes from not having "scanned" enough approriate targets. I would say the mission could use more detailed directives as well.
- Shark Bait appears to have a very thin margin on error on Medium, esspecially with regards to
Spoiler:
the SC Achar (if its LRed is not taken out by a lucky beam hit, it can get off up 3 shots before the Trebs hit).
- In many of eariler missions, when support ship are not readily avalible, losing your weapons, sensors and/or communications can cause some stupid quasi-failstates. A simple nested is-ship-call and ship-subsys-guardian could really go a long way.
- Generally, I'd recommend to use "Intercept {wing}" instead of "Destroy {wing}" for directives related to bombers as an additional point of information, I have been doing since at least 2015 and it always tested very well in closed beta.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 15, 2019, 04:25:48 pm
I get a script-error during Arachnophobia (sa_g1_06), when the first strike wing is said to arrive:

Thanks, I'll take a look at it.

Quote
I really liked the narrative and the mission design in the GTVA branch so far, but I am a bit disappointed with the new weapons and playable ships, to be honest. They are just ... bland, the Reshef in particular (the design just screams directional thrusters to me).

Yeah the story is one of this mod's strengths, and that's thanks to Sesquipedalian.  The modpack for Act I was 90% finalized in 2002, though, which is when most mods were happy just to have non-retail ships to play with (and all the more so for Vasudan ships).  Think of the Reshef as the Vasudan Erinyes.

Quote
A few things I'd advise:
- The debriefing for Through the Looking Glas could use another stage to convey the failstate that comes from not having "scanned" enough approriate targets. I would say the mission could use more detailed directives as well.

The player is supposed to be performing reconnaissance, which intrinsically involves exploration and discovery.  I have already added several nudges based on feedback, but I'm not going to spell out "go here and scan this".

Quote
- Shark Bait appears to have a very thin margin on error on Medium, esspecially with regards to
Spoiler:
the SC Achar (if its LRed is not taken out by a lucky beam hit, it can get off up 3 shots before the Trebs hit).

It is meant to be extremely difficult.
Spoiler:
From the mission outline: "This mission is a risky gamble on the GTVA's part, and the final results should leave some Shivans ships still active in the system.  It ought to be a very Pyrrhic victory for the GTVA, including the loss of the destroyer itself.  We've reduced the Shivan threat in the system for the moment, but at a very heavy cost.  This mission will include the Ravana destroyer, multiple smaller vessels, and a nice assortment of enemy wings.  The Ravana should be destroyed in this mission along with the Hatshepsut.  Some Shivan vessels escape, including corvettes able to launch fighters for later missions."  If the player does manage to save the Arnku despite the odds, he is awarded a medal, but he is not expected to.

Quote
- In many of eariler missions, when support ship are not readily avalible, losing your weapons, sensors and/or communications can cause some stupid quasi-failstates. A simple nested is-ship-call and ship-subsys-guardian could really go a long way.

Other people have asked for this too.  I suppose I could add it.

Quote
- Generally, I'd recommend to use "Intercept {wing}" instead of "Destroy {wing}" for directives related to bombers as an additional point of information, I have been doing since at least 2015 and it always tested very well in closed beta.

That's a good idea.  I'll add that too.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: 0rph3u5 on July 15, 2019, 08:41:41 pm
Quote
A few things I'd advise:
- The debriefing for Through the Looking Glas could use another stage to convey the failstate that comes from not having "scanned" enough approriate targets. I would say the mission could use more detailed directives as well.

The player is supposed to be performing reconnaissance, which intrinsically involves exploration and discovery.  I have already added several nudges based on feedback, but I'm not going to spell out "go here and scan this".

I can respect that. Maybe there is a lesson in there about me approaching recon missions too rigidly.

But maybe there is room for a "hidden checklist" of task completed, beyond marking each ship as "recorded" - that means basically that you don't give a directive to do a task that has been programmed into the mission, but instead give feedback when one has been completed (similar to Bonus Goals).

Quote
- Shark Bait appears to have a very thin margin on error on Medium, esspecially with regards to
Spoiler:
the SC Achar (if its LRed is not taken out by a lucky beam hit, it can get off up 3 shots before the Trebs hit).

It is meant to be extremely difficult.
Spoiler:
From the mission outline: "This mission is a risky gamble on the GTVA's part, and the final results should leave some Shivans ships still active in the system.  It ought to be a very Pyrrhic victory for the GTVA, including the loss of the destroyer itself.  We've reduced the Shivan threat in the system for the moment, but at a very heavy cost.  This mission will include the Ravana destroyer, multiple smaller vessels, and a nice assortment of enemy wings.  The Ravana should be destroyed in this mission along with the Hatshepsut.  Some Shivan vessels escape, including corvettes able to launch fighters for later missions."  If the player does manage to save the Arnku despite the odds, he is awarded a medal, but he is not expected to.

Spoiler:
My big issue here would be that the Shivan warships pose less of a threat to the Arnku than Aquarius wing does. In most attempts I lost the Arnku, she was lost because the bombers got a good salvo in, even before the Arnku's power fails. By comparison only the Achar and the Kraken appear as supstantial threats while the corvettes and cruisers do much less damage and are more easily prevented from doing damage to the Arnku, not to mention that sometimes you just luck out and one of the BVas shots just takes out a beam turret randomly.
With bomber damage being inherrently being more preventable than warship damage, I though it to be a bit lopsided.

I recognize that some that is simply Retail AI at work - your AI wingmen allowing the Aquarius wing to go into "stop and shoot"-mode while you are off doing something else.

If one were to shift that balance somewhat, maybe by increasing the survivability of the enemy warships (e.g. by increasing the fire wait on Arnku's beams) and/or taking the "lucky shot"-factor out of Arnku's beam fire (e.g. instead of letting it fire its beams dynamically, tailoring the beams hit to be just off to the side of the main cannons of a Shivan ship; Note: to do right might be too much work for too little effort though), I think it would look more like what is intended here.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: 0rph3u5 on July 20, 2019, 01:09:48 am
I now completed the campaign on the ISF-path.  I must say that liked it very much, and it will definitively on my "to recommend"-list.

There a few moments at which you can basically hear grinding in the gears with some missions, the finale esspecially. But the presentation and the narrative are top notch and the mission design, while there are obvious seams between missions of older and newer execution, is very good.

Can't wait (rheorically) for the continuation/conclusion.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 20, 2019, 09:26:45 pm
Thank you very much!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Colt on October 22, 2019, 12:39:00 pm
So I'm looking through the music folder for the track that plays in the first half of "The Tablet of Destinies"... and then I came across spinning.ogg  :lol:

Did I find an easter egg, or does this actually play at some point in scrolls?

"you spin me right round, baby right round"
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 22, 2019, 04:53:54 pm
:lol: I wondered when someone would find that. :D

It was a developmental easter egg.  When the Narandum reactivates the Knossos in "Crashing the Party", I switched the soundtrack to spinning.ogg.

I took that easter egg out before release because I couldn't think of a good way to have the player trigger it.  I should probably put it back in. :drevil:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Colt on October 22, 2019, 06:34:07 pm
:lol: I wondered when someone would find that. :D

It was a developmental easter egg.  When the Narandum reactivates the Knossos in "Crashing the Party", I switched the soundtrack to spinning.ogg.

I took that easter egg out before release because I couldn't think of a good way to have the player trigger it.  I should probably put it back in. :drevil:
Alternatively, it could play whenever the player destroys cargo attached to a Mephisto. Those freighters spin faster than the speed of light!

On a more serious note, that would be pretty funny to put in back in. :yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on October 22, 2019, 07:08:08 pm
Well you're free to, um, 'enhance' your own campaign with it too. :p
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 01, 2019, 10:13:10 am
On a more serious note, that would be pretty funny to put in back in. :yes:

I put it back in. :drevil:

There will be a new Scroll release shortly with some minor tweaks and small enhancements, and it will include the Easter Egg.  You'll need to enter a cheat code to activate it. ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 08, 2019, 02:53:51 pm
Version 1.5.0 has been released on both Knossos and the FSO Installer.  It contains the following changes:


There's one extremely trivial change I want to highlight.  Way back in 1999 (https://web.archive.org/web/20020203181445/http://www.freespace2.com/bfod.cfm), Volition wanted to name a medal "Distinguished Intelligence Cross" but could not because the medal name was one character too long.  Thanks to the $Alt Name feature in FSO, the medal now has its originally intended name. :)

EDIT: And just updated to 1.5.1.  The $Alt Name feature for medals is only available for nightly builds, so I added a version-specific comment so that Scroll remains compatible with FSO 3.7.4.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 24, 2019, 09:12:00 pm
Knossos is throwing some debug errors on launch with the latest release. It doesn't keep the game from starting or running, but it may bork things up later in the campaign.

~

Could not find index 'LuaSEXPs' in type 'Mission'

------------------------------------------------------------------
ADE Debug:
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------


------------------------------------------------------------------

stack traceback:
   [C]: ?
   [string "misc-sc-functions-sct.tbm - On Game Init"]:19: in main chunk
------------------------------------------------------------------

1: Userdata [Mission]
2: String [LuaSEXPs]
------------------------------------------------------------------

~

LUA ERROR: [string "misc-sc-functions-sct.tbm - On Game Init"]:19: attempt to index field 'LuaSEXPs' (a nil value)

------------------------------------------------------------------
ADE Debug:
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------


------------------------------------------------------------------

stack traceback:
   [C]: ?
   [string "misc-sc-functions-sct.tbm - On Game Init"]:19: in main chunk
------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 24, 2019, 10:11:12 pm
That's actually a file for Part II that I left in the new release, thinking it wouldn't matter.  Unfortunately, LuaSEXPs is a feature that wasn't added until after release 3.8.  So I'll take it out.

Part I should be compatible with FSO 3.7.4.  Part II will require FSO 3.8.2, aka FSO 19.

EDIT: New version of Scroll is now on FSO Installer and Knossos.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 25, 2019, 10:01:38 am
Doof.

Kicked to desktop with a debug error upon loading the first Red Alert mission (after destroying the Shivan cargo depot). The game didn't crash, but it was very rude.

~

Error: Argument count is illegal.
In sexpression: (when
(true)
(close-sound-from-file)
(change-soundtrack "7: Revelation")
)
(Error appears to be: close-sound-from-file)
File: missionparse.cpp
Line: 5769
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 25, 2019, 01:02:07 pm
Ugh, that's another compatibility bug.  A sexp argument that is optional in 3.8.2 isn't optional in 3.8.  I have uploaded another new version.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 25, 2019, 04:29:49 pm
A couple of problems in Captain Nemo:

1) Sometimes the mission doesn't progress; the Shivans never arrive, and we all go sailing off into the void. I have no clue what causes this to happen (you don't do anything that early in the mission), but found that I had better luck when turning up time compression.

2)
Spoiler:
The Kraken's fighterbays didn't appear to be taking any damage from my Trebuchets. If this is intentional behavior, then it makes the "remember you can rearm your ship" mission recommendation kind of pointless; why stock up on missiles if they won't work?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 25, 2019, 07:08:20 pm
For 1:

The first problem probably depends on Zeta 1's goal prioritization.  It never happened when I played the mission, but CT27 experienced a bunch of problems in a different mission where the AI simply wouldn't depart when it had an active goal, regardless of that goal's priority.

Also, it turns out that Zeta 1 was able to accept player orders.  If ordered to guard a ship, for example, that would be a higher priority and Zeta 1 would never jump out.  I've edited the mission accordingly.


For 2:

This is unfortunately a more difficult task with the MediaVP model than it was with the retail model.  Instead of attacking the subsystem from any angle, which worked in retail, it is now necessary to attack from the side.  Attacking head-on will impact the edge in the middle and will not cause damage.


I am uploading another version to fix the Zeta 1 departure issue.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 26, 2019, 07:16:24 pm
Hit a firm brick wall in Thor's Hammer. The first freighter jumps in, drags the first Mjolnir into place (damaging it the whole way) and then stops. It never moves to jump out, and the mission does not progress.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 26, 2019, 10:22:45 pm
I guess I'll need to see a debug log.  That mission works fine for me on the 20191112 nightly build (and it worked on release as well).

Damage shouldn't occur between two docked objects.  It sounds like the Mjolnir got undocked somehow, but there's nothing in the mission that should cause that.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 26, 2019, 10:38:50 pm
What directory are debug logs saved to?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 26, 2019, 10:44:36 pm
%AppData%\HardLightProductions\FreeSpaceOpen\data.  If you're using Knossos, you can also select "Upload Debug Log" from the list of options.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 26, 2019, 10:53:27 pm
Let's see what this does. (https://fsnebula.org/log/5dde00ffcb0d3322e768473f)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 27, 2019, 12:48:54 am
I don't see any obvious problems, and it works fine for me on 3.8.0.  Try a recent nightly build.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 27, 2019, 06:18:13 pm
Running on a nightly from late April (for reasons (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=95868.msg1890007#msg1890007)) throws this error when the first Mjolnir spawns:

~

Warning: Dockpoint dock01 could not be found on model Mjolnir.pof
File: missionparse.cpp
Line: 1759

EDIT: It doesn't look like the Triton is actually docked with the Mjolnir at all; it's physically pushing it into place, little by little, and damaging it in the meantime. When I fly close to it, I can actually hear the metal-on-metal 'you're rubbing against something' sound effect.  :wtf:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Solatar on November 27, 2019, 06:42:55 pm
Running on a nightly from late April (for reasons (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=95868.msg1890007#msg1890007)) throws this error when the first Mjolnir spawns:

~

Warning: Dockpoint dock01 could not be found on model Mjolnir.pof
File: missionparse.cpp
Line: 1759

EDIT: It doesn't look like the Triton is actually docked with the Mjolnir at all; it's physically pushing it into place, little by little, and damaging it in the meantime. When I fly close to it, I can actually hear the metal-on-metal 'you're rubbing against something' sound effect.  :wtf:

This is what happened to me when I tried to play Scroll using the new 2019 Mediavps, I think the new hi-poly Mjolnir has its dockpoints named differently. I changed the name of the dockpoint in PCS2 and the mission worked fine. Probably needs a fixed mission file to make it compatible, though.

EDIT: I put this .pof into my scroll/data/models folder as a temporary fix.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 27, 2019, 07:09:34 pm
This is what happened to me when I tried to play Scroll using the new 2019 Mediavps, I think the new hi-poly Mjolnir has its dockpoints named differently. I changed the name of the dockpoint in PCS2 and the mission worked fine. Probably needs a fixed mission file to make it compatible, though.

EDIT: I put this .pof into my scroll/data/models folder as a temporary fix.

That did the trick. Thanks much!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 27, 2019, 09:31:22 pm
Ack.  I didn't see this earlier because I didn't have MVPs 4.0 installed, so "newest" meant 3.8.

We use a modified Mjolnir model, but the MVPs 4.0 overrides our ship.tbl entry and changes it to their version.  I'll need to figure out how to change it back.

In the meantime Antares, I may have figured out why newer builds don't work.  I'll PM you a test build.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 27, 2019, 10:09:19 pm
You could do what we did and install your version in data/models as part of the mod. That's kind of hack-ish, but it would serve until you come up with something more permanent.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 27, 2019, 10:17:30 pm
That is what we did.  Then MVPs overrode it.  So I need to override the override.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 27, 2019, 10:31:26 pm
Ok, figured it out.  New version is on FSO Installer and uploading to Knossos.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 28, 2019, 12:09:35 pm
Finished the campaign last night. A few thoughts:

- One of the hallmarks of a good campaign is how cohesive the story is, and Scroll does that quite well. I completed a playthrough of FS2 earlier this week. I hadn't played the game from start to finish in years (there were several missions that I couldn't even remember, so it was like playing the whole game fresh), and I was struck by how many missions seemed nonsensical or poorly designed (although this may be a side-effect of playing on a game engine that is significantly different from the 1999 retail version). In contrast, most of Scroll's missions are tight and clean, and the story never seems to drag. There are a couple of exceptions, but I'll get to those.

- I love little touches and small details that show how much care and polish have gone into a project. Scroll is Vasudan-centric and written from a Vasudan perspective, and it shows: they call the Alliance the GVTA rather than the GTVA, and I believe there's also mention of the "Vasudan-Terran War." The tech room entries are rewritten from a Vasudan point of view. It's interesting to get a detailed look at things from the other side, and it goes a long way toward helping see the Vasudans as real characters with their own sense of morality and justice as opposed to generic aliens. Because everyone is Vasudan, this allows the campaign to get away with entirely synthesized voice acting, which is kind of a cheat but never feels like it (although some of the synthesized voices used are the same ones in those "Xtranormal" videos on YouTube, which will provide you with a whole other level of entertainment). Also, the briefings use absolutely gorgeous, retail-quality CBanims. Mjn.maxael is to be commended.

- There are a bunch of other little things that I'm sure I'm forgetting. How some missions end with actually returning to your mothership rather than just jumping out, the custom Vasudan comm channel animations, etc. The use of non-standard cockpit controls like the proximity sensor and the "calculating current location" thingy are great touches that show what can be done with the game engine.

- It's refreshing to see the Alliance kick some ass, for once. The Shivans take a beating throughout the campaign and never really give one back, although this may not mesh well with canon, as both FS1 and FS2 involve overwhelmingly large Shivan fleets; the Shivan forces in Scroll seem to be spread pretty thin, and that never really changes throughout the campaign except for the last couple of missions. (Also, I don't think there's a canon example of Shivan ships ever retreating from battle, although they may depart if their target manages to escape.)

- The soundtrack is good, but the quality is a little uneven. The calm, atmospheric music that plays the first time you jump into Marnakh, for example, is a gorgeous track, but I'm not sure you ever hear it again. I think I would have preferred more of that over the OMINOUS LATIN CHANTING that plays during "Irkalla Passes."

- All that being said...

- Scroll appears to be ignoring my resolution settings in Knossos; I have huge HUD icons and message windows, some of which overlap with each other, and when there's a special effect going on (like the location finder), it blocks some of my text. This may be a problem with the 4.0 MVPs, as the FS2 main campaign is also doing this, but none of my other campaigns are.

- Certain missions feel "gimmicky" or are difficult for the wrong reasons. You might be penalized for selecting a loadout that excludes weapons you don't know you'll need, or you'll have to take a "trial-and-error" approach and replay a mission several times because you don't know what specific thing the game wants you to do in order to proceed. (This is especially true of "Arachnaphobia," which has to be played in one very specific way in order to succeed.) All of the stealth/infiltration missions play out this way, requiring you to scan something (or several somethings) in a specific order (but you don't know which), or go to a specific location (but you don't know where) while avoiding a dozen sentry guns and patrolling fighters. The checkpoint system helps to alleviate this somewhat, but sometimes you have to just throw up your hands and replay the mission (or the previous mission!) from scratch in order to get a better outcome. There's something to be said for innovative mission design, but there's a difference between "innovative" and "frustrating."

- FS1 and FS2 usually required you to fully perform a task (blow up x targets, scan x objects, etc.) before an objective or mission was considered "complete." Scroll is less consistent about this, with new tasks popping up before you complete the old ones, and you may receive orders to jump out while you still have things to do. This may be more realistic (or more subversive) mission design, but it leaves you with the sense that you've left things unfinished.

- Some missions are very "chatty" and contain a lot of exposition; you may simply sit around for five minutes or longer just listening to people talk to each other before getting to the action. Time compression is your friend.

- Other missions are short and end kind of abruptly. "Thor's Hammer," for example, is very brief for a warship blockade mission; the whole thing is over in a few minutes.

- The new Vasudan fighters simply aren't needed. I played through the entire campaign using Taurets and Seths and was better off for it; every time my wingmen were assigned Shus, without exception, the AI wiped them out. (The ship selection art for the Shu also looks out-of-place, as it lacks the detail of the other fighters; one glance at it immediately tells you, "I AM A FAN-MADE SHIP.")

- The Vasudans have a very muted reaction to both the Shivans' return and the appearance of a certain destroyer. No one seems to make a big deal out of it, and considering the kind of existential threat that the Shivans have posed in the past, you would think they'd show more concern.

Spoiler:
A number of plot points are left unexplained, presumably to be addressed in Part II. What were the Shivans running from in Alpha Nareasi? Where did that Shivan debris field come from? Why did the Shivans attempt to steal that Vasudan cargo? Why were their freighters carrying "organic material"?

Overall, however, I enjoyed this campaign, and it left me wanting more, which I guess is the whole point. My compliments to the entire project team. I eagerly await Part II!

A couple of other things I noticed:

- In the tech room, at the bottom of the list, there are five craft with a "PT" prefix. One of these, the Herc, has an actual description; the others simply read, "Tech description. Write me!"
- There doesn't appear to be an entry for the SD Demon, even though one appears in the campaign. (This may be because I played through the "GVTA" half of the campaign last.)
- There's some non-regulation behavior going on aboard that Ra...  :eek:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 28, 2019, 01:34:07 pm
Thanks so much for the kind words, and comprehensive review! :)

- We took particular care with the polishing and the aspects of Vasudan culture, so it's great to see that appreciated. :)  Especially the tech room database; I'm not sure how many players read that nowadays.

- We were very pleased to get MjnMixael to do the command briefing animations.  Hopefully he'll be willing to do some for Part II as well.

- There are a few examples of Shivans retreating, but this is rare, and mostly seen in FS1.  Sesquipedalian has a particular reason for this, but I think it's supposed to be explained mostly through fiction viewer entries, and he hasn't finished all of them yet.

- The soundtrack is supposed to set the mood.  When you first arrive in Marnakh, there is a sense of wonder and expectation.  When the Irkalla arrives, the defecation is about to hit the ventilation.

- The HUD gauge wonkiness is probably due to the MediaVPs.  We'll have to take a look at it.

- Hopefully you didn't find the stealth missions too frustrating.  You blasted right through Through the Looking Glass without posting about it, so the modifications based on feedback from previous players must have paid off. :)  That mission and Arachnophobia were intended to be "puzzles" in a sense, where you take a break from shooting to sneak around and use your brain rather than your brawn.

- Strange to hear about the balance of the Shus.  What difficulty were you playing at?

- I think the Vasudans would have had a greater reaction to the Shivans in FS2; by the time of Scroll the shock may have worn off a bit.  You make a good point though.  This might be another thing that's fleshed out more in the fiction entries.

- The PT craft are Pirate, aka NTB.

- You're right about the Demon; we never tech-added it.  I'll fix that.

- The Ra was like that in the original model too, it's just much easier to see in the MVPs. ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 28, 2019, 02:55:09 pm
I generally play on Medium unless I have a reason not to, though there were a couple of times when I had to scale things back to Very Easy for the sake of completing the mission. One of these was Arachnaphobia (because I knew that one would be a chore), but I don't recall the other one offhand.

That was something else I forgot to mention. When the campaign started out of the gate with the NTB, I was bummed because it seems like rebels and pirates are a recurring theme, both in the canon and in fan-made campaigns (Derelict is just one of many examples). My first thought was, "Oh, great, this again." I was glad to see them fade into the background after the first couple of missions, because all of the real action and story is over in the New Systems.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 28, 2019, 11:02:00 pm
Indeed.  Although... will you be disappointed if the NTB return in Part 2? ;)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 30, 2019, 04:44:04 pm
Also, I've uploaded a new version with tech entries for the pirate/private ships, tech-add sexps for the missing Shivan ships, and a couple of minor tweaks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: starlord on December 01, 2019, 02:14:32 am
It would be great if someone made a longplay of this.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 01, 2019, 11:04:13 am
In "Through the Looking Glass," Zeta 1 tells you that your computer will tell you when it has recorded the necessary data, but I'm not seeing anything like that. Is that for individual ships, ship wings, or for the whole cargo depot?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 12:55:08 pm
It would be great if someone made a longplay of this.

I agree. :)


In "Through the Looking Glass," Zeta 1 tells you that your computer will tell you when it has recorded the necessary data, but I'm not seeing anything like that. Is that for individual ships, ship wings, or for the whole cargo depot?

It's for individual ships.  When you target the ship and get close enough, your HUD will display "<shipname> recorded" above your target view.  This is persistent, i.e. for the remainder of the mission, any time you target a ship you have previously recorded, it will display this indicator.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Colt on December 01, 2019, 01:14:26 pm
It would be great if someone made a longplay of this.

I agree. :)
I'd love to do one for Scrolls (including the two branch paths), but I'm a bit skeptical because of youtube's copyright system since Scrolls uses music from TSFH and Firefly among others. I don't want to wake up one morning to find my channel taken down

That's actually why I never continued my Exile playthrough after the first part, since I got demonetized for that video, and I kinda don't want risk seeing how far I could push it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on December 01, 2019, 01:25:34 pm
Would it be possible to create a different music.tbl that features FS1/FS2 tracks instead of the copyrighted ones instead?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 01:33:25 pm
That's actually a pretty good idea.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 01:55:59 pm
Attached are all* the missions with new music tracks, modified to use existing FreeSpace music.

*Not quite all.  There are two remaining non-FreeSpace tracks, Calantha and Subterfuge, but I highly doubt they would get flagged - they fit extremely well but are also extremely obscure.  If they do get flagged I can make further edits.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Colt on December 01, 2019, 02:11:48 pm
Attached are all* the missions with new music tracks, modified to use existing FreeSpace music.

*Not quite all.  There are two remaining non-FreeSpace tracks, Calantha and Subterfuge, but I highly doubt they would get flagged - they fit extremely well but are also extremely obscure.  If they do get flagged I can make further edits.
Ohh, neat! I'll definitely do a playthrough now once my current project is done (hopefully February). :yes:

Maybe Scrolls 2 will be released by then. ;7
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 02:20:06 pm
That would be awesome. :D

Part 2 won't be released by then, but hopefully we should have a preview mission for your enjoyment. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 02:38:35 pm
Whoops, missed an event music soundtrack in m1_03.  I've edited the previous post with modified-music.7z.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 01, 2019, 06:32:59 pm

In "Through the Looking Glass," Zeta 1 tells you that your computer will tell you when it has recorded the necessary data, but I'm not seeing anything like that. Is that for individual ships, ship wings, or for the whole cargo depot?

It's for individual ships.  When you target the ship and get close enough, your HUD will display "<shipname> recorded" above your target view.  This is persistent, i.e. for the remainder of the mission, any time you target a ship you have previously recorded, it will display this indicator.

I'm seeing nothing of the sort. Even when I'm ramming my fighter against my target, I see nothing to indicate that a target was recorded. Zeta 1 makes no comments about ships I'm targeting either.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 07:11:37 pm
I've attached a screenshot.  See "Nandi 1 Recorded" in the lower-left corner?

If you don't get that in your playthrough, then please upload a FSO log.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 01, 2019, 07:25:03 pm
I'm not seeing that. I'd like to upload a log, but Fast Debug is getting hung up on an "illegal counter increment of 0" and isn't letting me continue past that.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 07:29:46 pm
It sounds like you're using 19-RC1 (which is why I wanted the log).  There's a bug with one of the sexps in that build, so try a recent nightly.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 01, 2019, 07:38:26 pm
Mission works on most recent nightly, apparently. Thanks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 01, 2019, 07:48:46 pm
Glad to hear it. :yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 02, 2019, 01:46:06 pm
Whenever I try to start Irkalla Passes on the ISF branch the game CTDs.
Have a log, I'm not sure how much help it will be:
https://fsnebula.org/log/5de568cccb0d3322ec68474d
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 02, 2019, 02:11:58 pm
Hmm.  Can you zip and attach your .plr and .csg file so I can try?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on December 02, 2019, 02:32:32 pm
File attached.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 02, 2019, 05:55:10 pm
Ok, I've been able to reproduce the crash.  It's very odd though, because it's never crashed in this place before.  I'll have to try debugging this for a bit.

In the meantime, try another build and see if you have better luck.  That mission does not use for-counter, so the 19-RC1 is a good candidate.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 02, 2019, 10:52:32 pm
Bug identified.  Here's the PR to fix it:
https://github.com/scp-fs2open/fs2open.github.com/pull/2175

Unfortunately the bug was introduced on July 13, so 19-RC1 is affected.  But any build prior to that date should work.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 04, 2019, 10:17:45 pm
Second playthrough. Stuck on Irkalla Passes, ISF branch.

The Khitteb won't jump out at the end of the mission, after the action is over. Because it won't jump out, the Imnoltep and the Halifax won't jump out. I can fly to the node and depart, but this results in mission failure.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 05, 2019, 10:37:28 am
:wtf:

This sounds exactly like the problem CT27 had:
https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=93993.0

But the latest fixes worked for him.  Are you playing the latest version of Scroll?


As an aside: the latest nightly build should have the fix for the crash reported by Thisisaverylongusername.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 05, 2019, 01:22:55 pm
Knossos is showing version 1.5.7 for Scroll. Maybe something got borked with all the recent revisions you've been making.  :P

The Khitteb took some damage during Masks (it's down to 23% hull integrity), but all of its systems are operational. Unfortunately, I can't replay Masks to try for a better outcome because this isn't a Red Alert mission; I'd have to restart the entire campaign.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 05, 2019, 04:25:48 pm
Yeah but the hull strength shouldn't matter.  The engine and navigation subsystems are intact, right?  There's nothing blocking its way?

The latest version of Scroll contains the fixes that worked for CT27.  Try playing on the latest nightly build and see if that makes a difference.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 05, 2019, 08:01:29 pm
No problems with the latest nightly!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 05, 2019, 08:23:40 pm
Well, that's good to hear. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 05, 2019, 11:00:58 pm
In Thor's Hammer, Upsilon wing jumps in right before you're told that Upsilon will be jumping in. This is silly and should be fixed.

Also, the Bryn is a dragon, lol.  :D
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 06, 2019, 12:27:42 pm
In Thor's Hammer, Upsilon wing jumps in right before you're told that Upsilon will be jumping in. This is silly and should be fixed.

Will fix that, thanks.

Quote
Also, the Bryn is a dragon, lol.  :D

I assume you mean it's a tough ship, as opposed to a bug you found where it shows up as SF Dragon instead of SCv Bryn. :P
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 20, 2019, 01:47:00 pm
- Live Trapping may need to be rebalanced. In my latest run-through of the campaign, I had to replay this mission about a dozen times. The Nahema is not a particularly agile target, but its engine subsystem is tiny, located on the back of the cockpit--and, incidentally, located nowhere near the bomber's actual engines, which do an excellent job of blocking any shots to the center. It's very odd to see multiple wings of fighters showering a Nahema with disruptor blasts, to no effect.

- In Masks, if the Khitteb starts taking hits, it will give a message about how it is "taking taking damage."  :P

- If you destroy the SC Vayu in Masks--which is definitely possible, but takes a little doing--it will still manage to report for duty in Irkalla Passes.  :nervous:

- When the Vayu is destroyed in Masks, you get a message that the SC Kullab has been "intercepted," long after it has jumped out. (Disabling and destroying the Kullab is theoretically possible, but given that it's a Lilith and jumps out a few minutes into the mission, it would probably take a lot of work.)

- The version of Irkalla Passes playable through the tech room defaults to the GVTA version, even if you're playing on the ISF branch.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 20, 2019, 02:13:42 pm
I appreciate all these reports.  We'll have to ask you to beta test Part II for us. :D


- In Masks, if the Khitteb starts taking hits, it will give a message about how it is "taking taking damage."  :P

Fixed.

Quote
- If you destroy the SC Vayu in Masks--which is definitely possible, but takes a little doing--it will still manage to report for duty in Irkalla Passes.  :nervous:

:confused:  Did you somehow destroy it as it was jumping out?  There are sexps that specifically check for each Shivan ship in that mission.  (They also check for each of the ISF ships.)

Quote
- When the Vayu is destroyed in Masks, you get a message that the SC Kullab has been "intercepted," long after it has jumped out. (Disabling and destroying the Kullab is theoretically possible, but given that it's a Lilith and jumps out a few minutes into the mission, it would probably take a lot of work.)

Oops.  I copied and pasted the sexp for the Kullab and forgot to change the ship name to Vayu. :nervous:

Quote
- The version of Irkalla Passes playable through the tech room defaults to the GVTA version, even if you're playing on the ISF branch.

The tech room has no way of knowing which campaign branch you're on, since it's not in campaign mode.  I had to pick one branch to default to in that situation, so I picked the GVTA branch due to the extra stuff at the beginning.


I am now uploading a new version to Knossos and the Installer.  I'll upload a new version pending additional info on the Vayu.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 20, 2019, 02:17:07 pm
See me kvetching about Live Trapping.  :P

The Vayu was getting close to jumping out, but didn't make it. When it showed up in Irkalla Passes, it came in at 35% hull integrity, and was well below that even before it made it to the node in Masks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 20, 2019, 03:02:33 pm
See me kvetching about Live Trapping.  :P

Noted.  Will test.

Quote
The Vayu was getting close to jumping out, but didn't make it. When it showed up in Irkalla Passes, it came in at 35% hull integrity, and was well below that even before it made it to the node in Masks.

Hmm.  That means the sexps worked correctly, but you managed to destroy it in the process of departure.  So I'll just change the events that are actually checked.  It turns out that I had already made sexps for checking whether the ships were destroyed, but in Irkalla Passes I checked the departure cues instead.  Simple to fix.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 20, 2019, 03:11:11 pm
I did some testing (using cheats  :ick:), and it looks like my first playthrough of Masks didn't properly register the Vayu's destruction. I did a little better this time around and disabled its engines before it got anywhere near the node, and got a different debriefing about routing all of the Shivan ships.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 21, 2019, 12:58:00 am
I modified the Irkalla Passes sexps and also edited the POF data on the Nahema.  It turns out the HTL model has the engine nearly embedded in the model, instead of on the surface.  A new version has been uploaded with all the fixes to date.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 24, 2019, 10:50:26 pm
Is it possible to save the Harthenet in Crashing the Party? Every time I seem to be doing a good job of defending it and going after the Ranoth's beam cannons, its hull immediately counts down to zero. Is it scripted to explode?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 25, 2019, 12:48:46 am
Is it possible to save the Harthenet in Crashing the Party? Every time I seem to be doing a good job of defending it and going after the Ranoth's beam cannons, its hull immediately counts down to zero. Is it scripted to explode?

It is.  For story purposes the Harthenet is an acceptable loss because the Narandum is the primary objective.  After Part I was released, we discovered that a few players managed to save it (whereas none of the beta testers did), so I added a self-destruct sexp.  The sexp triggers if the Ranoth is destroyed or if its beams are disarmed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 25, 2019, 11:00:34 am
In any mission where you are asked to scan any class of Shivan corvette, the scan takes about two seconds to complete. This may have been done for balance reasons in Lucifer's Cloak, but it's a little jarring when it takes you so long to scan everything else.

In both versions of Irkalla Passes, after the Lamarask destroys the Ranyakan and asks Command for reinforcements, Command replies that the entire allied fleet is in Alpha Nareasi. However, the text for that line says that the fleet is in NGC 6402.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 27, 2019, 03:13:26 pm
In any mission where you are asked to scan any class of Shivan corvette, the scan takes about two seconds to complete. This may have been done for balance reasons in Lucifer's Cloak, but it's a little jarring when it takes you so long to scan everything else.

It's literally the same scan time as in retail FS2.  But you make a good point.  For reference, the Cain, Lilith, and Rakshasa all have 15 second scan times, and the Demon 10 seconds per subsystem.  I've changed it to 12 seconds for the cruisers and 15 seconds for the corvettes.


Quote
In both versions of Irkalla Passes, after the Lamarask destroys the Ranyakan and asks Command for reinforcements, Command replies that the entire allied fleet is in Alpha Nareasi. However, the text for that line says that the fleet is in NGC 6402.

Yeah, this is a minor tweak I made to the message.  That voice file can't really be updated without Sesq's auto-generation, and he's pretty busy these days.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on December 27, 2019, 04:45:58 pm
Does Sesq use some sort specail software? Would probably be good to have it available elseway.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 27, 2019, 06:52:00 pm
He has his own customized setup.  I'll bump the thread in the internal.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on January 08, 2020, 04:34:53 pm
In missions where the Knossos has a friendly IFF, the Shivans will try to attack it.

In practice, this means they will move to the center of the portal and fire into empty space.  :P
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 08, 2020, 06:21:28 pm
Really?  Neat. :)

I'll fix that, of course.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on January 08, 2020, 06:48:28 pm
I really should test the whole thing properly one day...
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on January 20, 2020, 01:24:08 am
Quibbles in The Tablet of Destinies:

- Leo wing (the Manticores) appears out of thin air rather than jumping into the battlefield. Other fighter wings are deployed from the Irkalla, but these just spawn out of nowhere. At first I thought this was an attempt to simulate their being deployed from the Bryn that jumps in (since they always spawn in that general area), but according to the tech room, the Bryn has no fighter complement.

- According to the mission briefing, the fighters and bombers that are deployed from the Tribute will not be under the player's control. This is untrue; you can issue orders to those ships the moment they appear on the battlefield.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Su-tehp on January 20, 2020, 02:46:24 am
Just installed TSoA. I was happy to see voice acting in this campaign, especially since it's an appropriate Vasudan-esque synthesized voice. It does stumble a bit with some few pronunciations, but it's still awesome. :D
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 22, 2020, 10:09:10 pm
Quibbles in The Tablet of Destinies:

- Leo wing (the Manticores) appears out of thin air rather than jumping into the battlefield. Other fighter wings are deployed from the Irkalla, but these just spawn out of nowhere. At first I thought this was an attempt to simulate their being deployed from the Bryn that jumps in (since they always spawn in that general area), but according to the tech room, the Bryn has no fighter complement.

This is a mistake.  I'll have to think about how to fix it.

Quote
- According to the mission briefing, the fighters and bombers that are deployed from the Tribute will not be under the player's control. This is untrue; you can issue orders to those ships the moment they appear on the battlefield.

Thanks, fixed.


Just installed TSoA. I was happy to see voice acting in this campaign, especially since it's an appropriate Vasudan-esque synthesized voice. It does stumble a bit with some few pronunciations, but it's still awesome. :D

Glad you like it. :D  Sesquipedalian is the one who came up with the speech generator used in this campaign.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on January 23, 2020, 12:52:35 pm
Was the Zod-speech generator ever released to the public?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 23, 2020, 04:36:37 pm
No.  Sesq hasn't responded to my post in the internal forum.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on January 23, 2020, 05:08:10 pm
He hasn't been around since September
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Thisisaverylongusername on January 26, 2020, 08:51:44 am
In S1-05, the nebula is a very bright greenish-white, and I can barely read my HUD as a result.

Have an screenshot of this mess.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 27, 2020, 10:46:22 am
Yeah, this was a tough problem to debug -- not helped by the fact that things changed between 3.7.4 and 3.8 and the guy who changed them is no longer around.  A workaround will be in the next Scroll release, but in the meantime you can fix the brightness by turning off post-processing.

The next release is also planned to fix the positioning of the "determining location" box.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Su-tehp on January 27, 2020, 01:12:48 pm
Do you have a rough date of when the next Scroll release will be?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 27, 2020, 02:32:31 pm
Ideally within the week, but my estimates aren't always accurate.  Also, I had hoped to include the voice line fixes but Sesq hasn't responded to me this month.

The Scroll update should take less time than the FSPort MVP update, so I'll probably fix Scroll first.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 30, 2020, 03:28:51 pm
New update posted on both Knossos and FSO Installer.  It contains a number of minor mission fixes as well as the nebula brightness fix.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on March 29, 2020, 05:47:20 pm
Is there a changelog for Scroll (or other campaigns in Knossos)? I've seen multiple updates, but there's no way to look at what's changed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on March 29, 2020, 05:51:46 pm
Nope there isn't.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on March 29, 2020, 11:38:27 pm
Well, there's the SVN revision log, but there are plenty of spoilers for Part II mixed in with the Part I updates.

If there is a major change of public interest, I'll almost certainly say something in the thread.  But the vast majority of Scroll updates are mundane tweaks or minor bug fixes.  The most recent update added MediaVP-style annotations for primary and secondary weapon banks to the Scroll ships, and the next update will add annotations to the Scroll weapons.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on April 14, 2020, 03:27:44 pm
Among the confirmed kills in my pilot file: several pirate fighters and bombers, all listed as "Unknown#" Comanche, Navajo, etc., and one Asteroid#Large.  :p
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on April 15, 2020, 03:20:33 pm
and one Asteroid#Large.  :p

Good work, to hell with these Asteroid#Larges :D
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on May 21, 2020, 06:15:55 am
I was surprised to see that I had actually posted in this thread back in 2017. Because I never got to actually play this campaign until a few days ago, which was a mistake.

Because this is a fine piece of FREDing. :)

The Scroll of Atankharzim clearly breathes the spirit of the old days, e.g. the player is a mute rather than an actualy character and you cannot oversee that the classic masterpiece of Derelict was a main source of influence on the authors. Yet, it contains plenty of modern-day SCP features to improve mission design which was overally flawless. I liked that very much. I don't think that you have to re-invent the wheel in every mission and TSoA proves it.

The campaign does a good job at not just telling the player but actually have him feel to fight in the wilderness, beyond the Frontier. The choice of music is just right here. Especially during the early missions you have a nice impression that something mysterious and wunderful is happening here. Yet I have to agree with Antares that this impression created by the score is somewhat counteracted by the tedious reactions of the player's copilots who are neither particularly excited about the discovery of the Knossos nor the appearance of the Shivans in general nor the Lucifer in particular.

By far the biggest point of critique I have is that story-wise the campaign does not exploit its potential. I understand that this is merely the exposition. Yet this beauty is 24 missions long and I think you could do a little more than show bringing up the questions of what is going on with those Shivans and introducing some minor background information which does not have any significant influence on what is happening in the campaign itself (e.g. there is something called the NTB or that the Sol Knossos is actually being built). While I don't believe at all that the lack of actualy characters is much of a problem, it certainly gives you, as campaign authors, additional opportunities to make your missions more exciting by adding interesting dialogue. I very much enjoyed the interaction between the Terran and Vasudan pilots in the first mission after the GVTA loop. Especially the first couple of missions, while feeling nicely feel a little anaemic and could benefit from denser dialogues. Let your copilots talk about what is currently going on, not only in-mission events like the discovery of the Knossos, but also political/economical/social background events, what they do in their free time, what they did before they joined their current assignment. This contributes a lot to world building and gives an impression that this is a world populated by actual people. I very much liked that ISF admiral and hope to learn more about him in the future.

Overall, however, despite the somewhat lean story, this is definitely a campaign I'd recommend to anybody to play. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 22, 2020, 05:43:00 pm
Thanks for the kind words. :)

The Scroll of Atankharzim clearly breathes the spirit of the old days, e.g. the player is a mute rather than an actualy character and you cannot oversee that the classic masterpiece of Derelict was a main source of influence on the authors. Yet, it contains plenty of modern-day SCP features to improve mission design which was overally flawless. I liked that very much. I don't think that you have to re-invent the wheel in every mission and TSoA proves it.

This is very much in line with my thinking.  I still like the feel of some of those older campaigns, and we tried to keep the classic atmosphere and experience while bringing some new things to the table.

Quote
The campaign does a good job at not just telling the player but actually have him feel to fight in the wilderness, beyond the Frontier. The choice of music is just right here. Especially during the early missions you have a nice impression that something mysterious and wunderful is happening here. Yet I have to agree with Antares that this impression created by the score is somewhat counteracted by the tedious reactions of the player's copilots who are neither particularly excited about the discovery of the Knossos nor the appearance of the Shivans in general nor the Lucifer in particular.

Sesquipedalian found some really nice music, and of course credit should go to the composer of that music (http://amethystium.com/), who did a fantastic job.  I tried to evoke a sense of wonder in the first couple of missions, and I'm glad to hear it worked.  I disagree that the reactions of the Vasudans to the Knossos were "tedious"; I tried to communicate excitement in the in-mission dialogue and the following command briefing.  Maybe I should have made them even more excited? :)  I can, however, see that the Vasudans more or less took the return of the Shivans in stride.

Quote
By far the biggest point of critique I have is that story-wise the campaign does not exploit its potential. I understand that this is merely the exposition. Yet this beauty is 24 missions long and I think you could do a little more than show bringing up the questions of what is going on with those Shivans and introducing some minor background information which does not have any significant influence on what is happening in the campaign itself (e.g. there is something called the NTB or that the Sol Knossos is actually being built). While I don't believe at all that the lack of actualy characters is much of a problem, it certainly gives you, as campaign authors, additional opportunities to make your missions more exciting by adding interesting dialogue. I very much enjoyed the interaction between the Terran and Vasudan pilots in the first mission after the GVTA loop. Especially the first couple of missions, while feeling nicely feel a little anaemic and could benefit from denser dialogues. Let your copilots talk about what is currently going on, not only in-mission events like the discovery of the Knossos, but also political/economical/social background events, what they do in their free time, what they did before they joined their current assignment. This contributes a lot to world building and gives an impression that this is a world populated by actual people. I very much liked that ISF admiral and hope to learn more about him in the future.

These are some fair points.  There were supposed to be several more fiction viewer entries in Part I; I really hope that Sesquipedalian can one day complete them.

The NTB was originally not going to appear at all in Part I; they are much more important to the story in Part II.  I added them to Part I to provide foreshadowing and to give the player something to do before the jump node is discovered.  The Sol Knossos was actually intended to do exactly what you describe: add some additional depth to the story that goes beyond what you see in the missions.

I added the Terran-Vasudan dialogue for the purpose of demonstrating how far the relationship had come since ST:R and even FS2, more than just for the sake of the conversation itself.  But you raise a good point, there aren't many other conversations in Part I that are of similar length or density.  I'll keep this in mind for Part II.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on May 25, 2020, 02:47:12 pm
Sesquipedalian found some really nice music, and of course credit should go to the composer of that music (http://amethystium.com/), who did a fantastic job.  I tried to evoke a sense of wonder in the first couple of missions, and I'm glad to hear it worked.  I disagree that the reactions of the Vasudans to the Knossos were "tedious"; I tried to communicate excitement in the in-mission dialogue and the following command briefing.  Maybe I should have made them even more excited? :)
I have to add here that I've played through the campaign once which means that I didn't have all details left in my mind when I was writing the review. I'll pay more attention to this next time.


Quote
There were supposed to be several more fiction viewer entries in Part I; I really hope that Sesquipedalian can one day complete them.
Since I don't know to what extent you plan on using the fiction viewer, please read this only as a general note. Even though I make use of the fiction viewer and other out-mission dialogue in Storm Front III, I think that FREDers should not overuse the fiction viewer. Simply because it's still a game and not a book. We should try to tell as much of the story as we can in-mission.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on May 25, 2020, 06:45:07 pm
Sesquipedalian found some really nice music, and of course credit should go to the composer of that music (http://amethystium.com/), who did a fantastic job.  I tried to evoke a sense of wonder in the first couple of missions, and I'm glad to hear it worked.  I disagree that the reactions of the Vasudans to the Knossos were "tedious"; I tried to communicate excitement in the in-mission dialogue and the following command briefing.  Maybe I should have made them even more excited? :)
I have to add here that I've played through the campaign once which means that I didn't have all details left in my mind when I was writing the review. I'll pay more attention to this next time.

Well, I've heard that there might be even people on the modding team who played the campaign exactly once and omitted the GTVA arc entirely :nervous: :warp:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on July 15, 2020, 05:43:55 am
First of all, congratulations for delivering SA, I remember being a fan of it back in the day and I'm glad it's been released. I'm now playing through the ISF branch of this campaign.  :cool:

Spoiler:
I'm currently stuck in Lucifer's Cloak. I get to the point where I manage to scan *most* Shivan ships, and pull back to the AWACS in order to slain Arjuna wing with impunity. 3 out of 4 primary objectives are complete, yet the outcome of the mission is considered an unfavorable one, and I'm forced to play the mission again. I tried many times using both checkpoints, yet the outcome is always the same. I think I failed this mission 6 or 7 times already. What am I missing that's so fundamental about this mission? I haven't performed any searches using FRED because that'd kill immersion, at least from my perspective.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 15, 2020, 12:12:56 pm
The four primary objectives are the conditions for advancement.  So, if you've got 3 of 4, you need the 4th. :)

The other objectives will get you more information and more points, but they are not required to continue.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on July 15, 2020, 02:42:44 pm
Spoiler:
The best thing to do would be restarting the mission right from its beginning, as the checkpoints repeatedly lead me to a condition (especially the second one) where the mission is essentially doomed to fail, yet I'm granted the possibility of doing something and obtain intel from the Shivan fleet. I tried many times right from the second checkpoint and it's extremely difficult to perform all scans before Arjuna's close approach. I'll give it another try.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on July 26, 2020, 10:22:49 am
Both branches completed. Very, very nice campaign indeed. Also, congratulations for the very high quality voice acting, I love how you set it in order to make it work from the perspective of a Vasudan. Looking forward to its sequel.  :yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 26, 2020, 10:42:11 am
Thanks for the kind words. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 06, 2020, 12:40:01 am
Version 1.7.0 is out with MVP 4.3.x support, plus a few things...

a) a new Delta Naraesai planet image (png instead of pcx)
b) Axem's markbox script to indicate which Arachnas turrets need to be bombed in Daddy Longlegs and Arachnophobia
c) better model support for bombing the Kraken's fighterbays
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 06, 2020, 12:09:37 pm
Good thing I finished my re-run just this afternoon.  :p :hopping:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 06, 2020, 12:44:30 pm
:lol:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Su-tehp on August 06, 2020, 01:16:33 pm
Good thing I finished my re-run just this afternoon.  :p :hopping:
:lol:

OMFG, that's hilarious.  :lol: :lol: :lol:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on August 06, 2020, 01:56:58 pm
Allright, you may replay then~
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 10, 2020, 08:52:59 am
Is that intentional that the Stiletto II is now a dumbfire missile?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 10, 2020, 09:04:49 am
True dumbfire, or heat-seeking?  It has always been a heat-seeking missile.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 10, 2020, 04:10:19 pm
True dumbfire. Like big, fat Greek slow Tempest.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 10, 2020, 04:27:41 pm
That's definitely a bug.  Can you see what nightly build this started happening on?  I assume it's related to multilock, which looks to have been introduced in the July 27 nightly build:
https://github.com/scp-fs2open/fs2open.github.com/pull/2207
https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=96763.0
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on August 10, 2020, 05:46:11 pm
I'm still using 200727 for testing purposes and yes, the Stiletto behaves just as described by SF-Junky. I haven't tested it on more recent builds.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 10, 2020, 05:52:15 pm
Well, try testing the Stiletto on the build before that one.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 11, 2020, 01:14:43 pm
Oh boy, what's going on here? (see attachment) Phi 1 was not destroyed, according to the mission log.

How can I switch to an older build? I'm not exactly familiar yet with Knossos. I take it have to change the following line on the mod.json file, but what's the oldest build I can run Scroll 1.7.0 with?

Code: [Select]
"version": ">=20.1.0-20200804"
[attachment deleted by admin]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 11, 2020, 01:49:48 pm
Heh.  That's a bug which should be solved in the next nightly build, if you can wait 12 hours.  Otherwise, Scroll should work on builds as early as 3.7.4.  However, builds prior to 3.8 cannot be launched through Knossos.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 12, 2020, 10:04:03 am
That's a bug which should be solved in the next nightly build, if you can wait 12 hours.
No, I couldn't. :p

Finished it this noon. I came across a few more points of critique or rather things you could improve on.

- The Hyperion turrets seem not to reset when idle.

- In several missions you do not have sufficient secondary ammunition if you choose to change your fighter class, especially during the earlier stages of the campaign.

- Sometimes the Shivans fire Terran weapons (Cyclops, Piranha).

- Some of the earlier missions are unnecessarily long imho, especially Upon the Horizon. I think it would benefit from cutting the number of hostile fighters, particularly since the mission makes a point of the NTB being short of materiel and in the need of scrapping their fighters.

- Shark Bait! I was whining and *****ing at this one when I was playing it. Alright, saving the Arknu is not necessary to proceed with the campaign. Yet I tried and I tried hard and after 10 or more attempts I finally succeeded. What I disliked about this mission is not that it offers the player a huge challenge in fulfilling a secondary objective, but by the way it does. Because it contains a few things which are pretty much at the top of my personal list of things that make a bad Freespace mission:
1. Enemy capital ships jump within 1,000 meters or so and just do two things: fire a volley of beams and then get blown to pieces by my own capital ship. That sure makes for nice fireworks but there is absolutely no role for the player here. Plus, it adds a credibility problem. Conveniently, most Shivans jump in right in front of the Arknu's main guns. Why would they do that?
2. Why are the sentry guns protected? I can't think of any reason why neither the Arknu nor my wingmen would not want to kill them. Sure, there might be higher-priority targets. At least give the player the option to un-protect them globally, e.g. by pressing [1].
3. We have a destroyer deployed, but for some reason it fails to launch more than two fighters wings even when it gets blown to pieces. I know the mission setup is to play bait and under normal circumstances you would not deploy 150 craft to kill a cargo depot. A few more reserves would add to credibility, though.

- In The Tablet of Destinies I think the bombers should not fire torpedos at the Lucifer until its shields are down, because why would they waste their ammo when it effectively does zero damage?
- Also I don't really get what the great strategy is behind parking a huge target (Tribute) right in front of a hostile superdestroyer. I know, deploying huge warships in the dumbest conceivable way is kind of a Freespace tradition (Hades, Phoenicia, Colossus, anyone?), but I'm not convinced this is one we necessarily should move over to fan-made campaigns. :doubt:

That said, I very much enjoyed my second and third runs through Scroll of Atankharzim and I'm sure those won't be my last ones. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on August 12, 2020, 11:03:31 am
I know this is gonna sound like a stupid question, but have the downloads in the first post been updated with the new files?  I didn't see a link to a knossos page.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 12, 2020, 01:39:20 pm
That's a bug which should be solved in the next nightly build, if you can wait 12 hours.
No, I couldn't. :p
:D

Quote
Finished it this noon. I came across a few more points of critique or rather things you could improve on.

- The Hyperion turrets seem not to reset when idle.

I'm not a model guy.  Does anyone have a patch that can handle this?

Quote
- In several missions you do not have sufficient secondary ammunition if you choose to change your fighter class, especially during the earlier stages of the campaign.

This might be accidental, or it might not.  Which missions, and which fighters?

Quote
- Sometimes the Shivans fire Terran weapons (Cyclops, Piranha).

I thought we fixed all of these.  Which missions does this occur in?

Quote
- Some of the earlier missions are unnecessarily long imho, especially Upon the Horizon. I think it would benefit from cutting the number of hostile fighters, particularly since the mission makes a point of the NTB being short of materiel and in the need of scrapping their fighters.

Well, maybe.  However I like the mission, and I'm not really inclined to try rebalancing it now that we're hard at work on Part II.

Quote
- Shark Bait! I was whining and *****ing at this one when I was playing it. Alright, saving the Arknu is not necessary to proceed with the campaign. Yet I tried and I tried hard and after 10 or more attempts I finally succeeded. What I disliked about this mission is not that it offers the player a huge challenge in fulfilling a secondary objective, but by the way it does. Because it contains a few things which are pretty much at the top of my personal list of things that make a bad Freespace mission:
1. Enemy capital ships jump within 1,000 meters or so and just do two things: fire a volley of beams and then get blown to pieces by my own capital ship. That sure makes for nice fireworks but there is absolutely no role for the player here. Plus, it adds a credibility problem. Conveniently, most Shivans jump in right in front of the Arknu's main guns. Why would they do that?
2. Why are the sentry guns protected? I can't think of any reason why neither the Arknu nor my wingmen would not want to kill them. Sure, there might be higher-priority targets. At least give the player the option to un-protect them globally, e.g. by pressing [1].
3. We have a destroyer deployed, but for some reason it fails to launch more than two fighters wings even when it gets blown to pieces. I know the mission setup is to play bait and under normal circumstances you would not deploy 150 craft to kill a cargo depot. A few more reserves would add to credibility, though.

1) Sometimes, nice fireworks are the main reason to do something. ;)
2) I don't actually remember why the sentries are protected.  It's possible this is to encourage the wingmen to attack the cargo.
3) Fair point.  Maybe not all of the ships in the hangar were ready for launch.

Quote
- In The Tablet of Destinies I think the bombers should not fire torpedos at the Lucifer until its shields are down, because why would they waste their ammo when it effectively does zero damage?

Another fair point.

Quote
- Also I don't really get what the great strategy is behind parking a huge target (Tribute) right in front of a hostile superdestroyer. I know, deploying huge warships in the dumbest conceivable way is kind of a Freespace tradition (Hades, Phoenicia, Colossus, anyone?), but I'm not convinced this is one we necessarily should move over to fan-made campaigns. :doubt:

Well, the Irkalla is trying to get to the Knossos, and the Tribute is exiting the Knossos.  It's inevitable that they would be face to face.  Also, who knows how long it takes to charge a carrier's jump drive.

Quote
That said, I very much enjoyed my second and third runs through Scroll of Atankharzim and I'm sure those won't be my last ones. :)

Glad to hear it. :)


I know this is gonna sound like a stupid question, but have the downloads in the first post been updated with the new files?  I didn't see a link to a knossos page.

All downloads - Knossos, Installer, and manual - have been updated.  I'll add a Knossos image to the post though.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on August 12, 2020, 04:19:53 pm
Thanks Goob!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on August 12, 2020, 05:54:45 pm
IIRC "Reset When Idle" flag needs to be added to the turret subsystem.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 13, 2020, 08:47:58 am
I'm not a model guy.  Does anyone have a patch that can handle this?
Like Nightmare says this is a subsystem flag.


Quote
However I like the mission, and I'm not really inclined to try rebalancing it now that we're hard at work on Part II.
This is not a huge point. Something to maybe consider when you do a facelift in five or ten years, but I'm glad to see your priority is Part II.


Quote
2) I don't actually remember why the sentries are protected.  It's possible this is to encourage the wingmen to attack the cargo.
Which doesn't make much sense to me, honstly. Why ignore a threat to kill harmless cargo containers first?


Quote
Well, the Irkalla is trying to get to the Knossos, and the Tribute is exiting the Knossos.  It's inevitable that they would be face to face.  Also, who knows how long it takes to charge a carrier's jump drive.
The Tribute isn't even trying to move away from the Irkalla's main guns, though. Plus it's parked across the Knossos, implying it deliberately maneuvered into this position after it had jumped in. It's not something that kills the mission for me, just something that sprang to my eye and which I'd personally avoid.


Regarding the Terran weaponry and lack of secondary ammo, I'll take notes in which missions those appear during my next run.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: SF-Junky on August 13, 2020, 10:49:45 am
Oh, and another thing: Are SoA assets free to be used by other mods? :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on August 13, 2020, 12:58:22 pm
Oh, and another thing: Are SoA assets free to be used by other mods? :)

I think pretty much all assets shown in R1 were taken from other mods in the first place (except the skyboxes, and they're free to use too).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 13, 2020, 01:30:45 pm
Yup.

Also, I've added the "reset when idle" flag to all ships with initial-position settings for turrets.  That'll be in the next update, whenever it is.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on August 21, 2020, 06:06:24 pm
What was in the 1.7.1 version released recently?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 21, 2020, 06:56:54 pm
Two things.  One is in the post literally right above yours.  The other is a bugfix in Axem's markbox script.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on August 24, 2020, 06:03:12 pm
Are you planning another 'branch' for Scroll 2 like Scroll part 1 had?

I.e., one set of missions is more 'conventional' and the other branch more stealthy?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 24, 2020, 07:06:26 pm
Scroll 2 has a branch in it, as well as an optional SOC loop.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Su-tehp on August 24, 2020, 11:03:45 pm
So glad to hear Scroll 2 is going to be a thing. I'm playing through Scroll 1 right now and am enjoying it immensely.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 24, 2020, 11:15:47 pm
Thanks for the kind words. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on September 09, 2020, 10:03:40 am
If the Prasna spawns in the tech room version of Irkalla Passes, it is virtually impossible to destroy. It appears to have a flag on its engines that prevents it from being disabled, and the Halifax approaches it with a weird attack logic so that it won't fire its beams until it's behind the Prasna. (The Halifax also won't fire its beams on the Irkalla at all, although that's kind of a moot point.) This probably isn't as much of an issue in the campaign, since the Prasna will be either damaged or destroyed in Masks.

EDIT: lol, Pallas got it as it was jumpin' out. Eat it, Shivans.  :drevil:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on October 15, 2020, 12:31:07 am
So in Arachnicide, if you lose the Enterprise, but the Arachnas is still destroyed...

(https://i.imgur.com/eDAjQBL.png)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 15, 2020, 08:10:28 pm
Well that's weird, because the mission contains this event:

Code: [Select]
$Formula: ( when
   ( is-destroyed-delay
      0
      "Arachnas"
   )
   ( ship-guardian-threshold
      10
      "Python"
      "Seshat"
      "Chons"
      "Nekhbet"
      "Enterprise"
      "Lamarask"
      "Hathor"
   )
)
+Name: guardian everyone
+Repeat Count: 1
+Interval: 1
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on October 15, 2020, 08:28:08 pm
code
Enterprise is destroyed, then Arachnas.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 16, 2020, 01:13:34 pm
Ah.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on December 01, 2020, 06:01:05 am
I see that changes have been made to the list of Scroll team members on the Wiki, and it's mostly new additions to the active team. Fingers crossed, I really hope to play Scroll II in the near future.  :yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 02, 2020, 01:32:32 pm
The new team members were added a few months ago; it's just taken this long to update the page. :)

Work on Scroll II is progressing.  It probably won't be ready in the near future, but we hope to release a Part II demo soon.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Mobius on December 02, 2020, 01:49:59 pm
Great news! By the way, is Scroll II going to feature two branches just like Scroll I did?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 02, 2020, 01:57:13 pm
Yes, but the branch will be in a different spot and for a different reason.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 11, 2021, 04:38:04 pm
Version 1.8 of Scroll adds support for the latest version of the MediaVPs.  Additionally, it migrates from the script-eval checkpoint system to the newer Lua SEXP checkpoint system (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=96939.0).  They work the same way, but the newer version is easier to use and has been optimized.

There are also a few very minor mission tweaks, such as making it a little easier to signal Delta wing in Arachnophobia.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on March 09, 2021, 03:37:02 pm
I just hope there aren't as many scanning missions in part 2, or that they are at least easier and don't take place in nebulas
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on March 09, 2021, 08:27:58 pm
I just hope there aren't as many scanning missions in part 2, or that they are at least easier and don't take place in nebulas

:warp:

Well, uh... it should be easier, anyway...
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 06, 2021, 10:15:25 am
I uploaded version 1.8.1 to both Knossos and FSO Installer.  This adds some maps that were removed in the latest MVPs, fixes the issue Trivial Psychic reported with the Lucifer's Cloak mission, fixes the Knossos rotation due to recent FSO changes, and makes a few other minor mission tweaks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on June 10, 2021, 02:18:03 pm
Version 1.8.2 is uploaded with the mission fixes described in this thread (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=97566.0).
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on June 24, 2021, 12:39:28 am
Version 1.8.3 has the following fixes:

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: woutersmits on June 24, 2021, 07:05:22 am
goober if theres news tell me
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on June 24, 2021, 10:01:59 pm
The recent Scroll releases have all been patches.  If we have something bigger to show, I will let you know. :yes:

(Did you see the Part II Mystery Pic (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=97610.0)?)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on July 17, 2021, 02:28:34 pm
There are certain missions where you can only rearm once; even if you issue a direct order to support to rearm, you'll be ignored. You can observe this easily in Live Trapping and Irkalla Passes. This might be for storyline reasons, but there's a difference between "we can only deploy so many support ships" and "support will refuse to resupply you."
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 18, 2021, 06:01:52 pm
That shouldn't be happening.  The support restriction in Live Trapping shouldn't restrict you to only one support ship.  And there are no support ship restrictions in Irkalla Passes whatsoever.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on July 19, 2021, 12:24:29 am
I did some testing to try and narrow this down. I was mistaken; it's not that you can only rearm once, it's that after a certain point in the mission, support stops responding to rearm requests. (You can still order support to depart.)

This is hard to pin down in Live Trapping, but it seems to happen late in the mission, around the time Kidnapper captures its third bomber. In Irkalla Passes, however, it can reliably be reproduced after the Lamarask is destroyed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 19, 2021, 10:36:45 pm
I stand corrected; there are support ship restrictions in Irkalla Passes.  Not sure why my search didn't pick it up before.

What happens is that support arrives from the Lamarask's hangar bay, so after it is destroyed there are no more support ships to send.  However, that shouldn't prevent a support ship from docking if it's already in the mission.  I'll have to work on that.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on July 20, 2021, 12:53:57 am
In Live Trapping, support stops responding as soon as the Ishara jumps in.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 21, 2021, 01:14:23 am
Excellent detective work. :yes:  Live Trapping and Irkalla Passes are the only two missions where this bug could occur.  I've released a new version with a fix.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on July 26, 2021, 02:51:08 am
- If you play Masks and then load up another mission, the default weapon selection in your briefing loadout will be the Shivan Advanced Laser.  :eek:

(https://i.imgur.com/d3uRcjp.png)

- This may be a bug or a feature, but you can issue orders to the Halifax during Irkalla Passes. This makes the mission a great deal more fun to play, as the Halifax is essentially a controllable beam weapon, but it also breaks some of the event sequencing; the Halifax's default waypoints lead it to a position near the Himnoltep, which both triggers some dialogue and the deployment of Pisces wing (Taurvi bombers). If you order the Halifax around, it won't get close enough to the Himnoltep for these triggers to fire until the end of the mission (meaning the dialogue will make less sense and you'll get an objective to intercept Pisces that can't be completed, since they were never deployed). This also means that the Kullab won't use its beam weapon against the Halifax if it deviates from its default flight path; the Kullab apparently has a very narrow field of fire and won't shoot at the Halifax even if the corvette attacks it head-on.

EDIT: In the same mission, the Irkalla will occasionally deploy "dead" Astaroth fighters in Aquarius wing. They kill their engines as soon as they leave the fighterbay and just sit around waiting to be shot at. This doesn't happen all the time and I have no idea what triggers it; maybe certain Shivan cruisers being destroyed?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on July 27, 2021, 03:33:10 pm
1) Odd.  I didn't notice this in the campaign.  Did you play the mission in the tech room?

2) I'll remove the orders from the Halifax.

3) Not sure what could be causing this.  There aren't any ai orders being issued to that wing.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on July 27, 2021, 07:30:50 pm
1) Odd.  I didn't notice this in the campaign.  Did you play the mission in the tech room?

Yes. Note that you can't actually select the laser, as it's not really in your inventory; the weapon data is just left over from being loaded in Masks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on August 01, 2021, 01:11:37 am
Borked Terran speech file: "Hull integrity failing! Get me out outta here, Command!"

EDIT: I'm not sure if this is a model issue or a weapon issue, but I'm running into instances of Stiletto IIs impacting enemy ships without causing subsystem damage. This is relatively easy to reproduce in Masks when trying to disable the Enki's engines, but it doesn't happen consistently and I think it might be based on the angle at which the missiles strike the ship. I know Stilettos can be shot down, but is it possible to have duds?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on August 01, 2021, 02:05:43 am
Borked Terran speech file: "Hull integrity failing! Get me out outta here, Command!"

EDIT: I'm not sure if this is a model issue or a weapon issue, but I'm running into instances of Stiletto IIs impacting enemy ships without causing subsystem damage. This is relatively easy to reproduce in Masks when trying to disable the Enki's engines, but it doesn't happen consistently and I think it might be based on the angle at which the missiles strike the ship. I know Stilettos can be shot down, but is it possible to have duds?

From my experience using stilettos, I think it is a model issue.  Some ships have subsystems that are really hard to damage with stilletos.  IN the case of engines, Orion and Demon Class destroyers are the worst offenders
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on August 01, 2021, 11:57:05 am
Weapons like that would have better effectiveness if they had a shock-wave associated with them, but then there'd be the risk of getting your subsystems fried by your own bomb if you fire from too close or it gets shot down near you.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on August 01, 2021, 12:10:26 pm
Stilettos are honestly much better for taking out a ship's weapons rather than its subsystems. 
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: 0rph3u5 on August 02, 2021, 07:03:15 am
Stilettos are honestly much better for taking out a ship's weapons rather than its subsystems. 

That's because the collision detection for subsystems is appears to be different than the one for subobjects (which turrets are).

Weapons like that would have better effectiveness if they had a shock-wave associated with them, but then there'd be the risk of getting your subsystems fried by your own bomb if you fire from too close or it gets shot down near you.

That's a simple fix of giving the shockwave damage a damage type and all fighter subsystems an armor type that negate (most of the) damage applied. Probably would snowball if applied retroactively.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 06, 2021, 02:56:15 pm
Yes. Note that you can't actually select the laser, as it's not really in your inventory; the weapon data is just left over from being loaded in Masks.

Well that would be a loadout cache problem.  Sounds like an engine bug.


Borked Terran speech file: "Hull integrity failing! Get me out outta here, Command!"

I guess "outta" wasn't in the simulated speech dictionary.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on August 16, 2021, 01:30:05 am
A few things in Masks:

- Alpha wing has a lousy default attack vector toward the Ashkelon, as many of their Stilettos impact the "shield" on the back of the ship instead of hitting the engine. This might be intentional, as it gives the player more time to attack other ships, but it also means that the player must attack the Ashkelon in order to make up the difference; otherwise, it has a good chance of getting away.

- If the Ashkelon is able to repair its engines and is subsequently destroyed without being disabled a second time, the "Disable the Ashkelon" objective will register as failed.

- The sensor subsystem in the Nahema bombers is fragile and can be easily destroyed even if shields are still up; because the Nahema cannot be rearmed, its subsystems also cannot be repaired. This doesn't make the mission impossible to complete, as TAGs can still be dumb-fired, but it does make things significantly more challenging, requiring you to get up close and personal with your targets.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 16, 2021, 10:07:27 pm
1) I don't know if it's intentional or not, but I guess we'll have to live with it.  Changing this would affect the mission balance, which I don't want to mess with at this stage.

2) I've fixed this, and it will appear in the next update.

3) I've added a subsys-guardian to Alpha 1.


You've made several posts now with some pretty clever bug sleuthing.  Thanks for reporting them. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 22, 2021, 12:55:49 am
Version 1.8.5 is up with

a) the aforementioned mission fixes,
b) nameplates for all Terran ships (thanks to Colt)
c) a fixed Rahu model (thanks to Durandal)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on August 22, 2021, 08:45:00 am
A few things in Masks:

- Alpha wing has a lousy default attack vector toward the Ashkelon, as many of their Stilettos impact the "shield" on the back of the ship instead of hitting the engine. This might be intentional, as it gives the player more time to attack other ships, but it also means that the player must attack the Ashkelon in order to make up the difference; otherwise, it has a good chance of getting away.

Personally I don't like it when this "attack vector" thing happens, it feels so unnatural. I think all that would need to be done to change the balance would be a SEXP that controls when the ships start firing, or limit their ammo.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 22, 2021, 09:51:50 pm
Version 1.8.6 is up to fix an incompatibility between the new Rahu and the existing missions.


Personally I don't like it when this "attack vector" thing happens, it feels so unnatural. I think all that would need to be done to change the balance would be a SEXP that controls when the ships start firing, or limit their ammo.

Would you like to try experimenting with this?  If you can come up with something that fixes this issue while minimally affecting balance, I'll be happy to include it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Nightmare on August 23, 2021, 12:21:59 pm
Personally I don't like it when this "attack vector" thing happens, it feels so unnatural. I think all that would need to be done to change the balance would be a SEXP that controls when the ships start firing, or limit their ammo.

Would you like to try experimenting with this?  If you can come up with something that fixes this issue while minimally affecting balance, I'll be happy to include it.

Im not an expert on balance testing but the problem of attack vectors is rather trivial; I'll certainly look into it when I get there but I don't remember the mission atm.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 24, 2021, 08:19:29 pm
It's sa_s1_07.  I wouldn't mess with the attack vectors; just experiment with locking the wingmen secondary weapons until they get close enough.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on August 24, 2021, 11:45:32 pm
The Kraken's fighterbays still don't take damage from the front in Captain Nemo.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 26, 2021, 05:26:49 pm
I don't think that can really be helped.  It has to do with the way the model is designed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on August 26, 2021, 11:49:44 pm
I see new updates with new ships.  I see the Claymore MKII (though listed as just Claymore) and the Gagana, both from INF-R1.  Have you considered using any of the high-poly versions?  Are they considered proprietary or just not the designs you were looking for?

I think there is a hi-poly version of that Vasudan station kicking around somewhere.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on August 27, 2021, 11:39:49 am
The speech synthesizer appears to render all instances of "defeat" as "defeature."

There's some kind of scripting issue going on in Daddy Longlegs. It looks like once your primary mission objectives are complete and at least one of the three cruisers is destroyed, your wingmen immediately receive orders to depart. This makes it very difficult to destroy the remaining two cruisers, especially with the heavy Shivan fighter cover and all the fire you're taking from the Arachnas.

You've made several posts now with some pretty clever bug sleuthing.  Thanks for reporting them. :)

Scroll is probably my favorite user-made FS2 campaign. It's very well-done and pays such great attention to the lore, plus it has plenty of beams and explosions to go around. I'd never even played it before you asked me to take a look at it, and I'm glad I did. I want new players who find the campaign to have the best experience they can, so when I notice things that don't quite work right, I try to report them so they'll get fixed and make the campaign even better. I hope it's not annoying.  :nervous:

EDIT: MORE PROBLEMS  :warp:

Things got a little wonky on my last playthrough of Live Trapping. Not enough of the first wave of bombers survived to be captured, so the second wave was sent in. When the last bomber in this group was disabled, the "capture" objective was triggered as soon as the bomber was disabled, even though Kidnapper hadn't actually captured it yet. I destroyed the bomber (thinking that Kidnapper had already gotten out and that one was left over), which triggered a failure message. I jumped out and passed and failed the mission at the same time.

(https://i.imgur.com/A2WBok1.png)

And blurk, something is definitely up with the ship survival logic. It might be this issue (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=97694.0), but I did a perfect run of Masks, and when I started Irkalla Passes, the Himnoltep was the only task force ship to jump in. The Pallas, Mem Hardot, and Khitteb were nowhere to be found.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on August 29, 2021, 11:50:03 pm
The speech synthesizer appears to render all instances of "defeat" as "defeature."

Not much we can do about that without access to Sesq.

Quote
There's some kind of scripting issue going on in Daddy Longlegs. It looks like once your primary mission objectives are complete and at least one of the three cruisers is destroyed, your wingmen immediately receive orders to depart. This makes it very difficult to destroy the remaining two cruisers, especially with the heavy Shivan fighter cover and all the fire you're taking from the Arachnas.

Each fighter in Delta wing receives orders to depart when its hull integrity falls below 50%.  Is that what you're referring to?

Quote
You've made several posts now with some pretty clever bug sleuthing.  Thanks for reporting them. :)

Scroll is probably my favorite user-made FS2 campaign. It's very well-done and pays such great attention to the lore, plus it has plenty of beams and explosions to go around. I'd never even played it before you asked me to take a look at it, and I'm glad I did. I want new players who find the campaign to have the best experience they can, so when I notice things that don't quite work right, I try to report them so they'll get fixed and make the campaign even better. I hope it's not annoying.  :nervous:

Thanks for the kind words. :)  It is annoying, but if there are legitimate bugs, I'd rather know about them so they can be fixed.

Quote
EDIT: MORE PROBLEMS  :warp:

Things got a little wonky on my last playthrough of Live Trapping. Not enough of the first wave of bombers survived to be captured, so the second wave was sent in. When the last bomber in this group was disabled, the "capture" objective was triggered as soon as the bomber was disabled, even though Kidnapper hadn't actually captured it yet. I destroyed the bomber (thinking that Kidnapper had already gotten out and that one was left over), which triggered a failure message. I jumped out and passed and failed the mission at the same time.

It took me a while to figure this one out, but I think I have it.  The objective was set to complete when the respective Kidnapper clone had departed, not when the bomber had departed.  And each Kidnapper will depart if its bomber target is destroyed.  This should be fixed in the next update.

Quote
And blurk, something is definitely up with the ship survival logic. It might be this issue (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=97694.0), but I did a perfect run of Masks, and when I started Irkalla Passes, the Himnoltep was the only task force ship to jump in. The Pallas, Mem Hardot, and Khitteb were nowhere to be found.

Can you upload your checkpoints, just like ShivanSlayer did?


Also, would you be interested in joining the Scroll team?  Given your enthusiasm and your contributions, you'd make a great team member.  And we would welcome contributions in other departments (primarily FREDding) as well. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on August 30, 2021, 12:25:26 am
Quote
Can you upload your checkpoints, just like ShivanSlayer did?

I've attached everything that was in my scripts folder for Scroll.

Quote
Each fighter in Delta wing receives orders to depart when its hull integrity falls below 50%.  Is that what you're referring to?

No. At a certain point late in the mission--but before the mission is actually over--all of your wingmen receive an order to depart and simultaneously jump out. I haven't played around with this a lot, but as near as I can tell, here are the steps to reproduce:

1. Destroy the Bryn (Primary Objective 1).
2. Destroy one of the Arachnas's main turrets (Primary Objective 2).
3. Destroy any one of the three Shivan cruisers in the area.
4. Completing Step 3 triggers automatic wingmen departure before the surviving two cruisers have been destroyed.

EDIT: I've done some testing using cheats and have confirmed that completing your primary objectives and destroying any of the three cruisers immediately triggers the "Well done, pilots. You are authorized to return to the Himnoltep," message, which results in wingmen departure.

Quote
Also, would you be interested in joining the Scroll team?  Given your enthusiasm and your contributions, you'd make a great team member.  And we would welcome contributions in other departments (primarily FREDding) as well. :)

I appreciate the offer, but I really wouldn't be good for anything other than testing, so you can invite me to the next beta, if you like. FREDding scares me.  :shaking:

[attachment deleted to save space]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 01, 2021, 09:15:26 pm
I've attached everything that was in my scripts folder for Scroll.

Thanks.  Your checkpoints confirm it - only the Himnoltep is stored for the next mission.  I think I figured out why, though.  There's a subtle error on the sexp logic that's allowing the mission to complete before all the other ships have been saved.


Quote
No. At a certain point late in the mission--but before the mission is actually over--all of your wingmen receive an order to depart and simultaneously jump out. I haven't played around with this a lot, but as near as I can tell, here are the steps to reproduce:

1. Destroy the Bryn (Primary Objective 1).
2. Destroy one of the Arachnas's main turrets (Primary Objective 2).
3. Destroy any one of the three Shivan cruisers in the area.
4. Completing Step 3 triggers automatic wingmen departure before the surviving two cruisers have been destroyed.

EDIT: I've done some testing using cheats and have confirmed that completing your primary objectives and destroying any of the three cruisers immediately triggers the "Well done, pilots. You are authorized to return to the Himnoltep," message, which results in wingmen departure.

Ah yes.  I've confirmed that the mission logic works essentially as you say here.  I think this is within the parameters of the mission, as the Bryn and the primary beam cannon are the primary objectives.  If you really want to get everything done, I suggest leaving one of those until last.


Quote
I appreciate the offer, but I really wouldn't be good for anything other than testing, so you can invite me to the next beta, if you like. FREDding scares me.  :shaking:

Fair enough.  Good testing is valuable on its own. :yes:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 01, 2021, 10:02:17 pm
I think I solved the checkpoint problem.  Download the attached files, put them in data/missions in the Scroll mod, and then choose the "Masks and Irkalla Passes" campaign from the campaign room.  Click on the ISF emblem to jump to Masks.

Try these scenarios:
1) Normal mission success with all ships surviving, entering the hangar as soon as the Himnoltep tells you to
2) Normal mission success with all ships surviving, but not entering the hangar until the other three ships have departed
3) Mission success but only the Himnoltep survives
4) All enemies destroyed but the Himnoltep is also destroyed

[attachment deleted to save space]
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on September 02, 2021, 12:39:39 pm
Try these scenarios:
1) Normal mission success with all ships surviving, entering the hangar as soon as the Himnoltep tells you to
2) Normal mission success with all ships surviving, but not entering the hangar until the other three ships have departed
3) Mission success but only the Himnoltep survives
4) All enemies destroyed but the Himnoltep is also destroyed

1) All task force ships appear in Irkalla Passes.
2) All task force ships appear in Irkalla Passes.
3) Only the Himnoltep appears in Irkalla Passes.
4) Mission failed, died in the cold of space.  :snipe:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 02, 2021, 09:54:58 pm
Very good; those are all the correct outcomes.  Thanks for testing!

Version 1.8.7 uploaded to Knossos and the FSO Installer with the mission fixes for Crashing the Party, Live Trapping, and Masks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on September 03, 2021, 05:00:02 pm
Okay, this one's pretty wild.

At some point in Live Trapping, a support ship turned hostile. I've seen this happen before, and I would guess that it's a result of friendly fire; there's some pretty heavy dogfighting in that mission, so it's probably caused by splash damage from all the missiles flying around. (Then again, with how support is scripted in Live Trapping, it could just as easily be FREDding wonkery.)

What I haven't seen before is that the enemy support ship repaired and rearmed one of the disabled Shivan bombers. This caused Kidnapper to follow the bomber around, trying to capture it while it attacked the Khitteb and caused its hull integrity to fall below 50%, resulting in mission failure.

(https://i.imgur.com/q30HyQb.png)

Must be some Hammer of Light aboard that ship.  :mad2:
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on September 03, 2021, 05:44:10 pm
A support ship turning hostile? Outside that one Hygeia in the 2nd SOC mission in Freespace 2 Vanilla, I never heard that one before
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on September 03, 2021, 06:22:07 pm
A support ship turning hostile? Outside that one Hygeia in the 2nd SOC mission in Freespace 2 Vanilla, I never heard that one before

This looks like it might be a scripted event.  :nono:

The mission is set up so that a Moloch jumps onto the battlefield about thirty seconds after the fourth bomber is disabled (disabled, not captured). If the other three bombers have already been captured by this time, then Kidnapper will jump out with the fourth one right around the time the Moloch arrives, and the mission will just end. However, if all four bombers are disabled relatively quickly, Kidnapper will capture them one at a time (which takes a while), and the Himnoltep will jump in soon after the Moloch does in order to provide fire support.

A hostile Vasudan support ship deploys from the Himnoltep the moment it jumps in, so either the Shivans are calling for help, or someone on the Scroll team did a sneaky.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on September 03, 2021, 07:15:30 pm
Well, the Freespace 2 lore indicated there were some Hammer of Light possibly still out there, and I wouldn't put it past the modders to foreshadow.  I doubt the idea of the Shivans communicating with Vasudans, and it can't be NTB because a Terran would stand out too much
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on September 04, 2021, 01:58:38 pm
Well, the Shivans are apparently calling for support, since they are being specifically changed to an IFF that allows support ships.  It used to be the case that no support ship could be deployed because there was no Shivan support ship in ships.tbl, but maybe support ship behavior has changed.  Regardless, we have the no-disabled-self-destruct ship flag now - and, in fact, it's already used in that mission - so I'll remove the IFF trick.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 13, 2021, 07:46:53 pm
Will there be an update to make this MVP 4.5 playable or is it already playable with 4.5 and we can just manually change the mod.ini?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 13, 2021, 09:37:22 pm
Scroll is compatible with MVP 4.5, so if you want to edit the mod.ini or mod.json, you can do so.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 09, 2021, 10:23:33 pm
Version 1.8.8 is out (belatedly) on Knossos and FSO Installer.  This fixes the support ship bug in Live Trapping, and also fixes some ship references in Crashing the Party that are caught by newer FSO builds.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on December 23, 2021, 03:45:21 pm
Irkalla Passes fails to load from the tech room. Using the latest nightly.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on December 23, 2021, 05:51:02 pm
Thanks.  Uploading 1.8.9 to fix it.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on March 09, 2022, 06:48:47 pm
I forget the name of the mission, but it's I believe a few missions into the GVTA path (after you choose the branch point).  It's the mission where you're trying to escort cargo to establish a supply chain to assault the NGC system. 

When the Shivans send their own ships to capture some of your cargo people speculate about why they did that as it's unlike what people have seen from Shivans.  Even the debriefing is confounded by it.


Will we learn more about that atypical Shivan behavior in Scroll 2 or was that a one off incident?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on March 09, 2022, 07:22:52 pm
There is an explanation for it, but it exists only in the mind of Sesquipedalian.  Unfortunately he is not around these days to provide story guidance.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 04, 2022, 11:33:29 pm
Version 1.8.10 is out with the following updates:
* Use a 22.0 flag to fix turret impact detection on the Arachnas
* Fix which turrets the AI targeted in Arachnophobia
* Restore shields on the Irkalla in Lucifer's Cloak
* Use fixed AI pathing behavior
* Fix a bug in Through the Looking Glass that made the distraction event impossible in 1/3 of situations
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on May 06, 2022, 09:06:05 pm
Thank you for the update.

A minor suggestion:  I noticed that the newest version of Scroll is on the FSO Installer.  However, I also noticed that the most recent official build on the Installer is 21.4.0.  Since the newest update needs 22.0 (also assuming you want to continue to post stuff on the Installer), could the Installer be updated to have 22.0 as well?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 06, 2022, 09:18:05 pm
Yeah, I'll update that.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on May 11, 2022, 09:46:40 pm
Thanks.   :)

Sorry to bug you about this, but since you're still working with the Installer, could you put on the new 4.6.X MediaVPs as well if possible?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 14, 2022, 01:51:52 pm
I'll do that.  I want to wait for a week for any more patches to be released though.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on May 30, 2022, 01:58:53 pm
MVPs 4.6 are on the installer.  A Scroll update will follow after FSO 22.2 is out.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 09, 2022, 04:36:04 pm
Version 1.9.0 is now available on Knossos and the FSO Installer.  This is a major update with the following changes:


The new changes, particularly in the scripts, require FSO 22.2 stable.  Another minor update will follow once 22.4 stable is released.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on October 09, 2022, 08:26:02 pm
It crashed on mission 5 for me, and not at a point where I could have used the "die 5 times" trick to skip.  I sent a bug report in Knossos. On a minor note, the Hercules fighter uses the vanilla non MVP model
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 09, 2022, 10:06:44 pm
I don't get the bug reports submitted through Knossos unfortunately.  Can you be more specific about the mission 5 crash?  What were you doing at the time, and did the crash have any sort of error message?

Also, to double check that we have the same mission in mind, what was the mission name?  Or if the mission didn't load, what was the mission before it?

The Hercules bug is easy to identify so I'll be able to make a fix for that quickly.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 09, 2022, 11:24:56 pm
In any case I've uploaded 1.9.1 with an important MV_Compatibility dependency, plus the Hercules fix, plus a miscellaneous few table tweaks.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on October 10, 2022, 01:28:50 am
I don't get the bug reports submitted through Knossos unfortunately.  Can you be more specific about the mission 5 crash?  What were you doing at the time, and did the crash have any sort of error message?

Also, to double check that we have the same mission in mind, what was the mission name?  Or if the mission didn't load, what was the mission before it?

The Hercules bug is easy to identify so I'll be able to make a fix for that quickly.

It was Through the Looking Glass, the scanning mission where you investigate the Shivan presence around a gas giant. The Mission crashed as I entered the area where the Shivans were.  I do not remember the error message
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 10, 2022, 09:20:18 pm
I just want to make sure I downloaded things (I downloaded from the FSO Installer and looked at some things on the FSNebula page for this campaign) right since the newest folder I have for Scroll (version 1.9.1) looks a little different than the previous version I had (version 1.8.10 I believe):

-In the newest one there is a "maps 3" file where there wasn't that one before...is that correct?
-In the previous version I had a 'data' folder with a 'scripts' subfolder but not on the newest one (there is no 'data' folder present to begin with in this newest version)...is that how things should be too?  (https://fsnebula.org/mod/scroll  Usually a data/scripts folder would be under the 'content' section of a mod's page like this but I downloaded 'content' from there and it just had the scroll vp, 2 BMPs, and the mod.ini)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 10, 2022, 09:36:14 pm
It was Through the Looking Glass, the scanning mission where you investigate the Shivan presence around a gas giant. The Mission crashed as I entered the area where the Shivans were.  I do not remember the error message

Thanks, that helped identify the problem.  There was a script that was missing from the release.  I've published an update so it should be available on FSO Installer immediately and Knossos in a few minutes.


-In the newest one there is a "maps 3" file where there wasn't that one before...is that correct?

That's correct.  These are the maps for the new Udjat.

Quote
-In the previous version I had a 'data' folder with a 'scripts' subfolder but not on the newest one (there is no 'data' folder present to begin with in this newest version)...is that how things should be too?  (https://fsnebula.org/mod/scroll  Usually a data/scripts folder would be under the 'content' section of a mod's page like this but I downloaded 'content' from there and it just had the scroll vp, 2 BMPs, and the mod.ini)

All scripts included with Scroll are packaged in the VPs.  However I think this folder can be created by saving checkpoints.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CT27 on October 10, 2022, 10:02:41 pm
A minor detail question:

Was the picture (BMP) for Scroll updated?  The Vasudan looks a little darker than before and his/her cloak a little more red than before.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on October 10, 2022, 10:25:51 pm
A minor detail question:

Was the picture (BMP) for Scroll updated?  The Vasudan looks a little darker than before and his/her cloak a little more red than before.

It was not only updated, it was completely redone, using all-new assets.  Here are the before and after images:

(https://scroll.hard-light.net/website/banner_old.jpg)

(https://scroll.hard-light.net/website/banner.png)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Antares on November 01, 2022, 08:58:31 pm
Is there a way to toggle MediaVPs content, or is that baked into the campaign file? The recent addition of more hi-poly models is causing some graphical corruption on my end because my GPU keeps running out of memory.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 12, 2022, 06:27:40 pm
Is there a way to toggle MediaVPs content, or is that baked into the campaign file? The recent addition of more hi-poly models is causing some graphical corruption on my end because my GPU keeps running out of memory.

Unfortunately, the most recent versions of Scroll contain very high-poly models such as the Udjat and Arachnas, so even if you disabled the MediaVPs, your GPU might struggle.  I would suggest rolling back to a previously released version.  Try 1.4.0 (https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=93943.msg1873012#msg1873012).

And to specifically answer your question, no, the MediaVPs are pretty heavily intertwined with Scroll at this point, so it's not really possible to run without them.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Galemp on November 15, 2022, 01:32:30 pm
Can I suggest that the nUdjat and similarly high-poly models go into a Scroll_Advanced VP?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: CP5670 on November 16, 2022, 10:43:24 pm
I've had Scroll on my radar for a long time but only just got around to playing it. Great missions with a very Vasudan atmosphere and dialogue. I actually really liked the scanning stealth missions and the stealth HUD is a big improvement over older campaigns with stealth missions. It's fun to play through both branches and see the same events from different points of view. The music is also very fitting for the missions. I especially like the piece in the first stealth mission. The voice acting works well and took me a while to understand. The Terran speech sounds garbled to you as a Vasudan, and then the translator says it in a way you understand. I totally lost it when I heard what audio was used for the Vasudan laugh. :D

Like BTA, Scroll gets a lot of small details right to create a world that sucks you in, without ever feeling very dramatic. I like how all the tech room descriptions express a Vasudan point of view and the "GVTA" follows that idea too, V comes before T from the Vasudan perspective. However, I agree with SF-Junky that the story doesn't really explore its potential, at least in Part 1. What are the Shivans doing in these systems? They seem to be in a defensive posture compared to FS1 or FS2 and are easily deceived until the last two missions. I'm guessing that will be for Part 2. The scroll verses also feel disconnected from the campaign plot, as nicely written as they are. Maybe in Part 2, you can have the scroll describe missions in an allegorical manner from a "narrator's" perspective and you then see it play out from a pilot's perspective (the game Cryostasis is a great example of this).

I'm definitely looking forward to Part 2 of this.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on November 19, 2022, 04:28:38 pm
Can I suggest that the nUdjat and similarly high-poly models go into a Scroll_Advanced VP?

That's an idea.  However, we would need additional features in the modular POFs toolbox to make full use of it.  Currently, we need to duplicate the Mjolnir, Triton, and Ravana models (and possibly others) to augment the POF data.  I'll put it on the list.


I've had Scroll on my radar for a long time but only just got around to playing it. Great missions with a very Vasudan atmosphere and dialogue. I actually really liked the scanning stealth missions and the stealth HUD is a big improvement over older campaigns with stealth missions. It's fun to play through both branches and see the same events from different points of view. The music is also very fitting for the missions. I especially like the piece in the first stealth mission. The voice acting works well and took me a while to understand. The Terran speech sounds garbled to you as a Vasudan, and then the translator says it in a way you understand. I totally lost it when I heard what audio was used for the Vasudan laugh. :D

Like BTA, Scroll gets a lot of small details right to create a world that sucks you in, without ever feeling very dramatic. I like how all the tech room descriptions express a Vasudan point of view and the "GVTA" follows that idea too, V comes before T from the Vasudan perspective. However, I agree with SF-Junky that the story doesn't really explore its potential, at least in Part 1. What are the Shivans doing in these systems? They seem to be in a defensive posture compared to FS1 or FS2 and are easily deceived until the last two missions. I'm guessing that will be for Part 2. The scroll verses also feel disconnected from the campaign plot, as nicely written as they are. Maybe in Part 2, you can have the scroll describe missions in an allegorical manner from a "narrator's" perspective and you then see it play out from a pilot's perspective (the game Cryostasis is a great example of this).

I'm definitely looking forward to Part 2 of this.

Thanks for the comments. :)

Some of the explanations are known and planned; others only exist in the mind of Sesquipedalian and he hasn't told us yet.  In particular, Sesq has a lot more Scroll excerpts written in various stages of completion - hopefully they will see light one day.  As for the Shivans, part of it is what you see - Shivans being driven out as Vasudans and Terrans claim new systems - and part of it will be disclosed in Part 2.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Ariel on January 07, 2023, 05:05:44 pm
Hey you guys ,

I really love the  campaign  ,  i can't pass the   scanning  of the shivan base.
is there any way to beat this  mission  i alwys faile cause i'm  trying to get didected.

Why there  i can't choose to continue without passing the  missing aftre 5 times like in the normal  freespace2?

Any workthroughs?

Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on January 11, 2023, 01:19:20 pm
Thanks for the comments!  Can you tell us the mission title?  I'm assuming this is "Through the Looking Glass", but I want to be sure.

To avoid being detected, make sure your proximity monitor is on, and don't get closer than 300m to fighters or sentry guns.  Also, listen to the recommendations from Zeta 1.

It should be possible to skip the mission like in normal FS2, but make sure you actually view the failure debriefing 5 times.  Simply restarting the mission in the middle of it will not count.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: ShivanSlayer on January 11, 2023, 03:46:28 pm
 If you really don't want to play the mission (and I wouldn't blame you for it), just turn the difficulty up to insane and crash 5 times.  You should get the skip option.  I have done that a few times when I get a bad autosave
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 11, 2023, 09:59:45 pm
Version 1.10.0 is up with a few scripting refinements that require 23.0.  A few voice files have also had pronunciations fixed.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 08, 2024, 09:31:04 pm
It may have been a while since this was posted in, but I had a question.  I've decided to give SA another run-through, as part of a desire to keep FS in my life, while I work on other unrelated projects, so I won't forget or lose interest in my FS-related projects.  Anyway, after a browse through the list of user-created ship models on the Wiki, I see that there's a higher-detail Hyperion model, and the image caption lists it as being in SA, but it isn't in the newest update.  Does this caption indicate that it is slated for the next release of SA (whenever that is), or is it a mistake?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 08, 2024, 09:36:30 pm
It's currently in SA in the sense that it's in the development modpack.  It's not in a publicly released version.

But SA will release an update for MediaVPs 4.7.x in the next week or two, and the new Hyperion will be included in that update.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 08, 2024, 10:56:49 pm
That news is pleasing to hear.  I'm almost tempted to suspend my play-through until the update comes through.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 08, 2024, 11:25:06 pm
That's something worth considering.  You could also play it again. :)
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 16, 2024, 09:09:58 pm
Version 1.11.0 has now been uploaded to FSO Installer and Knossos, and brings with it the following changes:


The new changes require 24.0.0-RC2.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Shivan Hunter on February 16, 2024, 10:12:32 pm
Hype! Will play it this weekend :D Also

  • GTC Hyperion model updated by Nyctaeus
  • GVCa Tanen model updated by Galemp

yoink and yoink ;7 These look awesome!
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 17, 2024, 07:15:52 am
Excellent!  I'm just about to play 'Irkawa Passes,' as part of the GVTA branch, so I might just replay the entire thing from the beginning rather than jumping in at the split-point to get to the ISF branch.

So, how far are we from R2?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 17, 2024, 02:12:47 pm
That's Irkalla, the Mesopotamian underworld. :)

I've released version 1.11.1, which fixes a crash bug with a script and also fixes some interactions between MediaVPs and Scroll game settings.

R2 is currently in progress but some distance away from release still.  Several missions are complete, but several missions are in progress, and a couple are not yet started.  Work continues.  There is one surprise for Part 1 we hope to release in the next month or two, though.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 17, 2024, 07:21:19 pm
I figured I'd get the spelling wrong.  I'm glad work is continuing, and I hope to see it released some day.  Thank you for all you're putting into it.

[Edit] I just got a warning message when viewing the Hecate in the lab under RC3:

Error: Invalid subobj_num or model_num in subsystem 'Turret28' on ship type 'GTD Hecate'

Not linking into ship!

This warning means that a subsystem was present in the table entry and not present in the model.It should be removed from the table or added to the model.
Ensure subsystem names are spelled correctly, and that submodels or special points intended to be subsystems have '$special=subsystem' in their properties.
File: ship.cpp
Line: 7504

[Edit2] Love the new Tannen, and is that a new Dis & SAC3?  Are those in the newest MVPs, or is that introduced for SA, because I don't recall seeing those before.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 17, 2024, 11:28:38 pm
Glad the work is appreciated. :yes:

The Hecate warning doesn't occur on my end, either on the computer I uploaded from or the one I downloaded the newest update to.  I recommend looking for any loose files or mod conflicts.

Yep, the Dis and SAC3 are new.  Those were added in the new MVPs.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 18, 2024, 12:11:07 am
And version 1.11.2 is now up.  I had neglected to include the most recent version of the FSPort MVPs music .vp, with the result that there were file extension mismatches.  This is fixed now.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 19, 2024, 08:05:22 am
I cleared out all older versions of Scroll from my Knossos library, and checked all MVP folders for any stray Hecate model or table file that might be responsible, and found none.  The odd thing, is that it only complains in the lab, and not in the techroom.

I decided to run a debug build to see if it generated any clearer error message, but have so far found a few more, though most are minor.  Some of the civilian objects, like the Comet, are complaining of Model-to-table LOD mismatch, and the Mirage complains that there are 3 secondary banks in the table, and only 2 on the model.  The Subspace Sath complains of a duplicate docking bay "Front Docking Bay".

I tried extracting the Hecate model from the Scroll VPs into data/models subfolders in Scroll, but got the same result.  Where else might something be interfering?
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 19, 2024, 12:21:28 pm
That's weird.  You're right, it appears in the lab, even though it doesn't appear in the tech room.

I'm assuming all of these other debug messages are also in the lab, because one of the things I did before release was to go through the tech room and check each ship for warnings.

This could be a FSO bug.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Trivial Psychic on February 19, 2024, 12:32:22 pm
FRED also complains, but hitting 'debug' can at least bypass this.  I checked under the 'table entry' tab in the ships editor, and I see that while the base ships.tbl file has the entry for Turret28, none of the associated .tbm files reference it, since they're from the MVPs, which doesn't have that turret, but it shouldn't complain.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 19, 2024, 02:05:08 pm
Ok, it's not a FSO bug.  The MediaVPs override some of Scroll's settings.  I'll need to process the files and figure out the relevant differences introduced in 4.7.
Title: Re: RELEASE: The Scroll of Atankharzim, Part I
Post by: Goober5000 on February 20, 2024, 10:54:32 pm
Ok, version 1.11.3 has been uploaded that fixes the Hecate and a few weapon overrides.