[freespacegundam]

All finished, where can I upload this puppy?

[karajorma]

Best thing to do is to get one of the free webspace accounts like geocities, tripod etc.

Someone can probably reccomend a better site than those

[Singh]

or you could pass it one of us and we'll upload it for ya

[freespacegundam]

Ah, finally, got my geocities site up.  Here's the link for mission six.  Opinions and comments are welcome.

mission6

Please inform me if the link does not work.

[karajorma]

Got it. I'll test this tonight if I get the spare time.

[karajorma]

Well 2 nights later but I finally got some free time to play it.

Well I had fun playing but there are a few things that need fixing.

1. In section 3 of the mission brief the text below one of the icons was partially offscreen. I know it's just a little thing but it's the little things that make your mission look professional

2. The Damocles isn't on your escort list at the start of the mission. There's no good reason it shouldn't be. Make sure it has a higher priority than the cruisers too since it is the main reason for the mission after all.

3. Alpha wing will quite happily sit still where they start, about 4km from the enemy. Any reason for this? If not give them a waypoint to head towards (with a low priority) and cancel the order once the fighting begins.

4. The last couple of wings of bombers jump in and engage the fighters leaving the Actium alone. It would probably be better to have them attack the Actium even if only half-heartedly cause thanks to the fact that you've given them piranhas they are quite lethal. It might be an idea to swap around some of the attackers so that the bomber waves have some fighter cover.

5. I felt the first half of the mission a little too easy and the second half a little to hard. Maybe it's cause I nearly got run over by the Actium both times I played the mission but cause I was so close to it the enemy ships were killed by it before I could do more than fire off a few shots. The NTF cruisers died very quickly too. Maybe starting the Actium further back might help with that a little.

Okay. That's what I noticed in the mission. Lets open it up and take a look at it in FRED.

6. As far as I can see there's no actual way to fail the mission short of dying. Making the Actium a target and making the missions success dependant on it's survival would help a little.

7. The Debriefing need a message for if you jump out without permission to do so.

8. There is no return to base directive. Chain one to your return to base event.

9. Your last message need a better name than Since you named all the others I'll assume this was an oversight.

10. There's no use of the Y-axis in the mission. Have some of the enemy come in on that axis. Or better yet move alpha 1 about so he doesn't come at the enemy from exactly the same angle the Actium does.

11. The Actium has been given the order Waypoints rather than waypoints-once. Since I'm looking at the mission in the borked version of FRED2_Open it's hard to see where you've placed the waypoints but Waypoints is used for setting up a patrol route. Waypoints-once is the better choice if you just want a ship to go to a certain location.

12. Your first event uses

when
-has-time-elapsed
--1

I doubt anyone would notice the difference if you simply used

when
-true

and had the mission chatter start as soon as the game does.

13. You have three events to trigger beam-free-alls for the Actium and two NTF cuisers. There is no need for this as they have the same triggering conditions. When you have an event like this

when
-has-arrived-delay
--1
--GTCv Actium
-beam-free-all
--GTCv Actium

you can add extra SEXP's by clicking on the the when with your right mouse and choosing add-operator to make the event look like this

when
-has-arrived-delay
--1
--GTCv Actium
-beam-free-all
--GTCv Actium
-beam-free-all
--NTC Resolute

It makes things much tidier to do things this way. That said the NTF cruisers should be beam-freed at the start of the mission to deal with the player if he just afterburns his way all the way over to them.

Okay. That should be enough to be getting on with for a while. Sorry to take so long about it.

[freespacegundam]

Revised, reloaded, and ready to go.  I made a few extra changes, just some things I didn't like about the mission at first.  Its ready for more opinions in any case.

[karajorma]

The first part of the mission has gone from way too easy to way too hard. I got the crap kicked out of me three times in a row. Mostly by the beams on the Adjunct. But also by the fact that Beta wing now jump in too far from Alpha wing to be any help (So I end up facing two enemy wings and a pair of cruisers with only one wing. In addition the Adjunct now swings round to attack the Actium which means that it gets the chance to pummel me with beams for a fair while before I'm even within range of it.

Having Beta wing leap in closer to the Actium might help some. You might also want to move the Actium a little closer to the action so that the player can run and cover first.

Basically it needs some more play-balancing before it will be playable again.

Kinda wish I'd kept my mouth shut now

About the AWOL Debriefing. One thing I should have mentioned earlier. When making the debrief you need to be careful that other parts of the debrief that don't fit with you going AWOL don't appear.

For instance in this mission if you jump out early the game will look at the goals and decide that you failed to protect the Actium. So you'll get the Stage 4 AWOL debrief but you'll also get the Stage 5 Actium not protected debrief. That seems a little odd since you'll be dismissed and then called back for a second chewing out for the destruction of the Actium (which will certainly seem odd if you jumped out before it was destroyed).

I find the best way to avoid this is to have an event called mission complete which comes true when any of the conditions that allow the player to jump out (win or lose) come true.
 This gives me an easy way to check if the player has gone AWOL (i.e is-event-false-delay>Mission Complete) and can also be checked to see if the other stages should be played.

[freespacegundam]

Okay, fixed most of the errors, or so I hope.  One thing about attacking the Adjunct, its beam cannons can't hit you if you attack it head on, just an observation I've had while playing.  Mission is updated, so check it whenever you can.

[freespacegundam]

Bumping, I know this is double posting, but if I just edit my last response no one will notice.  The mission has been fine tuned a bit more, but comments are always welcome, from anyone.  Same link, more developed mission, I hope.

[karajorma]

It's not a double post when there's a week between posts

Downloading Been testing MG missions tonight so this will have to wait till tomorrow (Next time don't keep me chatting on ICQ for over an hour )

[karajorma]

It's a personal preference but I didn't like the reccomendation text that much. Especially for objectives you completed.

When I played the mission I enjoyed it but I found something quite interesting. If you just stay where you are and put the time advance to the maximum the corvette makes it to the node and jumps out before the leviathan arrives about 50% of the time. The rest of the time it still manages to beat the leviathan and jump out. I've only seen it lose once (when I whacked the difficulty up to insane).

Now I'm not suggesting you make the mission harder but swapping a couple of arrival cues so that the enemies appear 1500-2000m from Alpha 1 should stop the player doing that while not making the mission much harder.

I've not checked but there doesn't seem to be any provision for the Deimos being disabled. It's unlikely to happen but if it does it will cock up the entire mission won't it as mission completion is dependant on the deimos being killed or departing isn't it?

Apart from that, short but sweet Looks like someone else is  almost ready to start on campaign 4.

[magatsu1]

excellent feedback as always K.

[karajorma]

Glad someone noticed It's actually quite nice doing this job. You get to complain at someone and have them thank you for it

[TopAce]

I also tested this mission. Let's make it clear first that I am not sure if I downloaded the most recent version. I used the link you named simply as 'mission6' in an earlier post. If I mention something that had been fixed since then, shoutl at me.

• The correct spelling is Epsilon Pegasi, your spelling was Epsilon Pegasai
  
• I have some problems with the node simply changing name in the briefing. If you want to mention Capella, place a different node in the screen, do not only rename the one that was Epsilon Pegasi
• I am not sure about the storyline, so the question may be stupid: Why do the NTF have another Iceni-class?
• In the ship selection screen, you get 5 Hercules IIs, but you can only give Herc IIs to four places(for the 4 Beta). Reduce the number of available fighters to 4.
• Note on the weapon selection screen: Give the best possible weapons for your wingmen. If you have Tornadoes available, it is no use you put Hornets on the fighters unless you want the player to do massive hull damage with secondaries.
• The 1st briefing stage had nothing on screen. Insert something
• Use the Alternate names feature. Name the NTR ships as NTF, NTC and NTB.
• Spelling mistake again: Pices -> Pisces
  
• Are you sure the NTR has Helios warheads? It is minor, but some people would notice. The Helios is a warhead that was developed after the NTF had been crushed.
• Set the initial speed for the Damocles to 100%. It SHOULD have already accelerated by the time the player arrives
• I can give orders to the GTCv Actium. Go to the player orders menu from the Ship editor and untick the 'Attack my target'.
• There is the desertion debriefing stage, which is nice. But I have got something to nitpick with it. :drevil: It says your mission has failed, but think of why should they say that if the player jumped out after all the hostiles had been destroyed and nothing threatened the Actium.
• Make sure the bombers will depart/will not arrive when the Actium is destroyed. Use a SEXP structure like this:

and
-not
--is-destroyed-delay
---0
---Actium
-[other SEXPS]
It will say that the event(arrival/departure cue] will not go true if the Actium is destroyed. For the departure cue, say: is-destroyed-delay --[any number, preferable not 0] --Actium.

• I don't receive the Return to base directive after the Actium is destroyed. Here comes a suggestion: Make one event which turns true if the pl;ayer receives authorization to go home. Chain the return to base directive's event to that one.

[karajorma]

Just sticking my oar in.

Originally posted by TopAce
I am not sure about the storyline, so the question may be stupid: Why do the NTF have another Iceni-class?

Cause they wanted one The full story is explained in the other thread.

Originally posted by TopAce
There is the desertion debriefing stage, which is nice. But I have got something to nitpick with it. It says your mission has failed, but think of why should they say that if the player jumped out after all the hostiles had been destroyed and nothing threatened the Actium.

I do this one myself. Something else jumped in after you left and kicked the crap out of the Actium. Command don't court marshal you and have you executed just cause you left the battle scene early to avoid the traffic you know

Originally posted by TopAce
Make sure the bombers will depart/will not arrive when the Actium is destroyed. Use a SEXP structure like this:
and
-not
--is-destroyed-delay
---0
---Actium
-[other SEXPS]
It will say that the event(arrival/departure cue] will not go true if the Actium is destroyed. For the departure cue, say: is-destroyed-delay --[any number, preferable not 0] --Actium.

I'd leave that one to be the FREDders choice actually. The briefing does say that the bombers are all attempting to rendezvous at that location and just cause the Actium is gone doesn't mean that the GTVA won't be sending any more caps.

Originally posted by TopAce
I don't receive the Return to base directive after the Actium is destroyed. Here comes a suggestion: Make one event which turns true if the player receives authorization to go home. Chain the return to base directive's event to that one.
[/list] [/B]

I prefer to have seperate directives for each exit point as it makes them easier to find but the way you describe is fine.

[TopAce]

Feel free to 'stick your oar in', but you know that we all have our own preferences. I only gave him a way how the RTB could be done. The RTB was missing when the Actium dies anyway, that's a fact.

[freespacegundam]

Updated, new version is ready for download.  A few notes, however.

1. The Helios were added to increase difficulty, given the fact that even with a clear shot and a bank full of cyclops, the enemy bombers couldn't do much damage.  I altered this a bit so that only one wing has them.  As for the NTR having them, I figured it isn't exactly impossible in a post Capella era for them to buy them on the black market or steal them.

2.  The desertion debreifing has been fixed, *crosses fingers*.

3.  The alternate name feature seems to go a little haywire when I try to use it, I think I can correct it, but its a minor issue at this point.

[TopAce]

FURTHER TESTINGS

• Epsilon Pegasi is still spelt incorrectly everywhere

Hint:Open your mission in WordPad and use he CTRL-H window to fix spelling everywhere in your mission. It is much easier than hunting down and fixing every single places you wrote Epsilon Pegasi. This method is also more effective unless you mispelt the same word in two or other ways.

• New spelling mistake: Jeapordy, instead of Jeopardy
  
• The new briefing = :yes: (just fix the Epsilon Pegasi spelling!)
• There are so few Tempest missiles available. Since there are Herc IIs in the mission, baloon the available number of Tempests by and extreme extend(to at least 700).

Hint:[/u] You make better impression to the player(=evil tester) if you keep ratio to the number of missiles available. While 100 is too many for the Helios or Cyclops, it is too few for Tempests. In this mission, you get 500 Harpoons, which is way too much.

• I receive the desertion brieifng stage(as well) if I leave the area after the Actium is destroyed.

[karajorma]

Originally posted by TopAce
Feel free to 'stick your oar in', but you know that we all have our own preferences. I only gave him a way how the RTB could be done. The RTB was missing when the Actium dies anyway, that's a fact.

Didn't deny it I find it better if the FREDders here give several suggestions and let the students figure out which way they like best.