KolgujevConflict/Arma

[Special Ed]

Well, been mulling over wether not to post about this mission for about the last week or so, as it would be nice to feel some sort of rewarding feeling after so much has been done.

This mission started in Ofp (hence the name) and havent gotten around to changing the name yet (low priority http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif), it did take up the entire map of Kolgujev, although I expected once it was ported into Arma, it would leave a vast gap of unused territory, that has proven to not be true, the entire northern main island is being used, from Corazol to that lil town in the far NW corner.

Porting it was alot easier than expected, but Armas complexity of towns and cities has created quite a challenge in trying to defeat problems with units/tanks stuck in towns, and that in itself has caused tons of extra scripting added.

Other problems and bug fixes have been addressed, details have been added, huge time testing has been spent, so far, so good - although id expect once the whole town battle function is complete in all primary areas, beta testing of that function of course will reveal some more things to be addressed.

Yes, this is single player, although it had originally been dreamed as mp, I decided I didnt want to spend the next 2 years on it, so it went from that to single...

What is this mission?

KolConflict Ofp (http://operationflashpoint.filefront.com/news/Kolgujev_Conflict;27128)

A complete selection of photos from Ofp version of Kol Conflict, on this page at bottom and a few more on page 3 as well

KolConflict Photos (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=55;t=51605;st=15)

To make a long story short (for those of us that hate long stories)

The idea was to make a mission that does two things :

Have a continually moving 'alive' envionrment, ever changing, and immersive.
Within that envionrment, make many opportunities for interaction with other ai units, and make sub missions, and even some sub missions that are integrated within the system.

theres 25 or so various town battles possible, involving 13 towns,of which there are 14 various 'clan' factions of all sides which initally occuppy various towns, some freindly, some not.

As time goes on, battles will erupt between various factions holding towns, which may result in a clan taking a town over - the player will be able to assist freindly clans in a battle, or can try to take a town themselves (difficult, but possible), and will have that town as their own, which could then be reinforced by garrison troops choppered in (yes, the enemy nearby may not like their new neighbor http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Theres alot more involved, not gonna go on forever - but, all of the above paragraph, aside from the helo part (not put in yet) IS TOTALLY FUNCTIONAL http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Anyhow, aside from all this, heres what else has been done.

All towns have been populated with proper clan groups, all clan group paths are *almost* complete, only remaining parts there are 3 more battle areas to be refined (paths go thru, but wp positions and triggers need refining)
Those paths, some of them go thru up to like 5 or six towns.
Towns under attack now send their clan groups to defensive positions depending on where they are being attacked from.
Huge work was put into scripting for tankers, its not quite finished, and still needs to be throughoughly tested, but its looking really good - most tankers initally start outside their vehicles, more-less hanging out, and when a battle starts that involves that clan, if they got tankers, they will get in, and assist the ground units in defense or offense.
Huge work has been put in to address lag issues, some scripts that could have more easily just been ran multiple times have been compressed into one larger script (more complex), and VERY pleased to say, so far, there is very little lag at all in comparison to a clean map with nothing going on! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif
Also, return to town function is now working (flawlessly so far), which sends clans back to their towns during a battle under 'certain' circumstances.
Artillery script, which is ColonelSandersLite's script, is fully functioning, needs fine tuning for the mission application (my job http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif ), but during town battles there will often be artillery barrages of towns involved - the actual artillery itself hasent been put in, but thats really the easy part.
ColonelSandersLite has massively contributed to the mission, having created a large number of scripts directly for the mission, unfortunately most of which have not yet been implimented, but that is not far off now as the primary townbattle elements are nearing completion.
His scripts:
Helo Reinforcement - a large, complex appliction that will allow the two "main" bases (freindly, enemy) to send in reinforcements to various clans that have depleted unit strengths.

Barrage - already explained this, basically a very refined system for barraging towns which randomly selects certain targets and allows for desired randomness in accurracy as well.

DynamicUnitReduction - a helpfull tool for lag management, allowing for the hiding and showing of editor placed group units

Also theres a ton of 'utility' type scripts he made, from unlimited ammo script (only used once in a great while, dont worry http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif), to random selection type scripts for a few applications, to 'incriment move' scripts, which actually take a given destination for a group or unit, and moves that group in 150 meter doMove position incriments, which removes the chance of DoMove failing because of long distances.

Theres a ton more thats going into the mission, but a ton has been put in. Corazol has been selected for the freindly merchant town (basically, freindly main base really), and it will be quite a task fully populating and making that place alive when the time comes, actually, I cant wait for that, should be a mountian top experience, but thats a ways off still.

As time goes on, id like to post some screen shots, right now, ive had some time off of work, and having pouring that time muchly into the mission, and dont want to get distracted.

Any input, feedback, questions are welcome.

Some time in the distance, there will come a point where addons will be introduced into the mission, not only to individualize various clans, but also to enhance appearance of towns, making them look more like town 'bases' rather than just towns.

[Special Ed]

Well considering the huge response towards this mission, which has been in the making now for about 6 months on and off, again have gone into the advertising business and made a ton of screen shots, and refined them all to be less than 100kb (only took totoal of 3 hours solid http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif )

So here you go, all these shots are from one town battle instance, and these shots have not been edited nor re-created for appearance, their directly from the mission.

Keep in mind this is one battle, from a total potential of 25 or more, and that all of these battles are randomly chosen (although once a clan takes a town it can continue to advance thru more towns from there after being reinforced), so, hence, every mission is a totally different experience.

First, a few shots of the map from the editor

btw - most of the wp's seen here look kinda big for some reason - thats because theres actually like 3 -5 waypoint plans going thru each wp position for various groups from various towns

Editor view of map, with markers on (all of these will be hidden markers in mission)

mapview1 (http://img116.imageshack.us/img116/7440/mapview1ir5.jpg)


Editor view of map with marker view turned off, most of the triggers shown are actually temporary, showing radius distance checks around marker and gameLogic positions used in scripts

mapview2 (http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/515/mapview2mt3.jpg)


editor map view of Eponia

Eponia (http://img127.imageshack.us/img127/7868/eponiamapte7.jpg)


the two closest towns on map, showing all the waypoints, markers and townbattle area between them

2CloseTowns (http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/7632/2closetownsmaprz3.jpg)

Lovely view of the hard work put in to get all this running right
Current mission folder size with only .sqm and mission files is almost 1 meg

MisFolder (http://img117.imageshack.us/img117/9086/kolconflictfilews1.jpg)


To the battle sequence


Tankers hanging out near tank in Bagango
Tanker scripts are now up and running, this is the first application of tankers in the mission, only need copy and paste paths now

Tankers In Bagango (http://img123.imageshack.us/img123/72/tankerinbagangozj6.jpg)


Morkan clan ground forces in Bagango

Ground troops in Bagango (enemy) (http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/6412/troopsbagango1gy1.jpg)


2nd group of Morkan ground forces in Bagango

Ground troops Bagango 2nd (http://img118.imageshack.us/img118/4228/troopsbagango2xu8.jpg)


The battle is then started, both clans, Morkan (enemy) in Bagango and Povar (freindly) in Naritus move to the battle area to settle the dispute
There is always a global chat declaration of each battle, didnt show it because of all the debug stuff sourounding the declaration right now, nonetheless, each battle is currently declared via 'ErudinFM950' (radio station located in Merchant town (Corazol))

Freindly Povar Clan units moving to battle area to confront Morkan

PoverMovesIn (http://img50.imageshack.us/img50/4420/povarmovestobattleareafz1.jpg)


Following Povar Clan (freindly) to the battle area(between towns)

Following Povar To battle (http://img117.imageshack.us/img117/4939/followingpovarintobattlux7.jpg)


Freindly Povar clan units hit the dirt in preperation for the oncoming battle

Povar Gets Down (http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/7194/povarclangetsreadyjm5.jpg)

Povar Clan returning fire against Morkan forces (Morkan forces in distance)

Povar Returns Fire (http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/2985/povarclaninfightrz6.jpg)


Povar Clan taking heavy casualties

Povar Gettin Hit Hard (http://img116.imageshack.us/img116/4323/povarclanhithardse8.jpg)


Enemy forces (Morkan Clan) engaging remaining Povar Clan forces at battle area

Morkan Engages Povar (http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/9904/morkaninbattleua2.jpg)


Morkan Clans tank shows up along with a second group of ground units

Morkan Tank Moves In (http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/1031/morkantanksmovesinrc0.jpg)


Morkan forces moving into the battle area

Morkan Advances (http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/3114/morkantankstroops2ya4.jpg)

Morkan forces moving thru battle area 2

Morkan Moves In battle Area 2 (http://img260.imageshack.us/img260/8327/morkantanktanktroopsmovzv5.jpg)


Final shot of Morkan forces moving into battle area

Morkan In battle Area Final (http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/4499/morkantanktroopsmovetotku9.jpg)


Morkan Clan forces (enemy) has secured and taken over Povar clans town (Naritus)

Morkan Takes over town of Naritus (http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/43/morkantakestownpt2.jpg)


Morkan forces moving thru Povars previously held town searching for stragglers

Morkan Searching (http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/2315/morkanintownsearchingwf2.jpg)


Morkan now holds the town, showing what was a group of 12 enemy units holding in the town, with the tank still roaming the streets in the background

Morkan Settles in (http://img239.imageshack.us/img239/8356/morkansecuredtownvy2.jpg)


Player at flag in Naritus, new flag texture shows for Morkan Clan symbol, whom now holds the town

Player at Naritus Flag, Morkan Symbol Shows (http://img126.imageshack.us/img126/2748/playeratflagxx0.jpg)

wow, that took friggin forever to transfer into URL's, anyhow, if this doesent give a small peice of what this mission currently does (and it is a small peice of it) dunno what does...

Primarily what remains, again, is putting in Helo reinforcements script from CSL, completing the barrage app (relatively easy), and putting in a Garrison spawn script (not too difficult), and, (to my astonishment) thats basically it for the whole town battle function, aside from a number of details.

Right now, if one let the mission run, it will progress itself thru all battles possible, there are also 'attack' type battles, which occurrs when a clan has considerably depleted forces that is involved in a battle, in this case that clan will hold at their town while opposing clan attacks them...

Anyhow, I do hope this gives a picture of whats going on here, alot of work has been put into this mission, and not just by me, but also from ColonelSandersLite to get it where its at now, and alot more will be put into it.

[NeMeSiS]

Ok it was quite a read, but is seems very interesting, and its good to have a few missions which use a large part of the map http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

I am sorry about the extremely lengthy read, although ,to accurately describe much of what the mission does, requires a lengthy description.

[Special Ed]

Maybe quoting myself looks bad, but quote from previous post->"Tanker scripts are now up and running, this is the first application of tankers in the mission, only need copy and paste paths now"

lol, what part of this mission is 'only' copy and paste, did just copy and paste some pre-made wp plans directly into the mission.sqm for the tankers, although, refining these paths in areas where tankers getin/get out is (of course) taking alot of time, and is kinda finicky work...

Ah well, about half the work is now done for those tankers paths, a few of them go thru 5 towns http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif ....

[Special Ed]

Can kind of understand the lack of responses due to the fact the pics are sort of 'standard', as I recall in the Ofp version for this mission, practically all the addons where already in, therefore the pics were very 'eye candyish', and almost as soon as the pics went up, there were a bunch of responses, there will still be a time to re-insert the addons again, spiff up towns into bases, individualize each clan with their own unit addon type, and all that other stuff - although, truth be told, I did things backwards in the Ofp version and did all that 'fun' stuff first, this time, that stuff will be put in last-

Only thing I can really offer up, in pictures, is the potential possibility of a short video being released once all the major elements of the town battle function are in (helos, town garrison troops, artillery placement) - this is a while off still, but either way, for this mission to be completed 'properly', the right way to do that is to do that addon stuff last, so, ya, picks are gonna be simplified right now, still, just to give a little feel, an average battle consumes about 30 - 45 min of mission time, and theres potentially 25 + battles possible, just to give a little scope of the mission here..(not including down time between each battle)

Of course, I truly enjoy seeing this thing slowly transpire into a fully functional dynamic mission, my desire to make a mission that comes close to fully utilizing much of Armas/Ofp's capabilities has been a dream for a long time, I guess when the going gets tough (which it does often), its nice to at least put something down during various stages of progress.

O, btw - OfpForum gets the 'FirstAndOnly' award for posting (and actually reading all this http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif) on this mission http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Either way, c u guys around, takin a lil break and gonna see what free-Video editors there are out there and see what I can throw together for future use http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[orlok]

Looks great!

cant wait to get my paws on it.

keep up the good work

rgds

Lok

[Special Ed]

Thanks Orlok, muchly appreciated http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Took all of half an hour to figure out how to form a video thru multiple clips from fraps, and with music put in - pretty cool stuff, already got me geeked about gettin a video up http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif (just need to snap my fingers and have everything ready for it..) *snap*..... *snap*..., hmm, think im gonna hafta get this video up the hard way... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Thanks again for the response http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

Wow. This is EXACTLY ***the kind of mission I would fall in love with, the attention to detail is quite staggering and really shames BI that they couldn't have done something like it to be honest. I mean, what is the point of having such a large beautiful sandbox to play in if you know what's going to happen next and moving away from the "mission" will just moving into a sterile, non living world where people AREN'T trying to slaughter each other?

Thank you ***so much for this. Seriously. I'm sure interest will pick up when more people have the game (and hardware to do it justice) and they want a more real experience. But, you've got my vote and support.

Do you think the mission is perhaps a few weeks/months away? Not that I'm going to hold you to it or anything. Just really really excited!

[Timblesink]

Looks great! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Keep up the good and incredibly time-consuming work! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/thumbs-up.gif

[cavtroop]

WOW, this looks great! I can't wait to see it in action!

[Killerwatt]

OMG! I cant wait for this to be released. This is the kind of mission ArmA was made for. Cudos for the immense amount of work that must have been put into the creation of this mission. As I lie dying on the battlefield I will offer a final thank you up just for you lol.
Cheers,
Stewart.

[Special Ed]

Wow. lol, thanks for the responses http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Time to target, really, that is dependant on how much time is put into the details once the remaining elements of the town battle function are implimented completely. This would really be moving into a whole new area, of populating towns with civies, making sub-missions, putting in addons for various areas - it will certainly be months, not weeks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif, lol, but, better time taken to completion for this to be done right rather than rushed and lacking in areas.

Spent all day working on a 'demo' video, which is pretty lite (11 megs), see if I cant get it hosted over the next few days, should be much more revealing than 'still' photos.

Great stuff, cheers to all of you for taking the time to read/look at this stuff here, really makes my day - yes, its been a long road to have gotten the mission to where it is, thanks for the good cheer http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I fully intend to update this thread regularly as things continue to progress, and will try to do it in a manner that is non- spoiling to the mission.

Thanks again guys http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Sniper Pilot]

cool man...ill be looking forward to its release!

[cavtroop]

Yeah, really looking forward to it! Any chance we can get a 'tech-demo' or something? Maybe just three towns, with three factions? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Sounds like a good idea, but the mission is planned to have alot more in it than just the town battles occurring, and so it wouldnt really do the mission justice, and would not result in the final atmosphere im looking to attain, and it could spoil the mission early as well.

No way around it, gonna take a while still, this is one of those projects that, every time I get a day off work and think im gonna crank out a list of 4 areas to complete, the mission slaps me in the face and I end up maybe getting 1 area done, with this many factions mixed in, theres alot of checks, duplication of various apps, etc for each faction-

c u's around http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Much thanks goes to El Nino Foxhound for hosting this video http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

This is a short video, which runs thru one battle scenario, from start to finish.

In this battle scenario, it is an 'attack' type, meaning the enemy town will attack the freindly town, the freindly town forces will find defensive positions once the battle has been declared via ErudinFM950 radio station

The video is only 11 megs

KolConflictArma Demo1 (http://www.public.armaholic.com/KolConflictArmaDemo1.rar)

The script debug stuff still shows btw, but anyhow, its my first video, should show a little more than pics of one battle scenario playing out in the mission within its current state, hope you like it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

A fine example of time consumption for certain apps-

Working on finishing the refinement of the battle areas in the editor, there are 3 left including current one.

Started on this one at 10:00 am, its now 12:30 pm, and have just finished the editor work for battle 3 area, leaving testing, which will take another hour at least -

Battle 3 area (http://img400.imageshack.us/img400/1452/battle3areamapie9.jpg)

might just look like a jumble of waypoints, but theyre not, every waypoint is specifically placed for a reason, a number of them wait on globals, or initiate globals that are registered in the scripts-

This is actually the first attempt to put a battle right in a heavily wooded area, with tanks running the road, hopefully tests reveal it will work, really neat place to have a battle, although if tanks start running alover/getting stuck, will have to move the battle area out of the woods...

[cavtroop]

thanks for the movie, provides for an interesting snapshot! Keep up the good work, looking forward to this!

[Special Ed]

Thanks for the reply, glad you liked the video

The battle in the woods is up and running, working really good even with tanks (suprisingly), although with all scenarios involving tanks there are problems because of Arma's bugs, unfortunately tanks of opposing sides sometimes like to go right by each other and wave, without firing a shot, other times tanks in combat will run alover the dam place even when their target is clearly in view, as if their trying to find a better spot to fire at them? Even more odd, I find often that a tank sitting in a defensive postion will get killed by a tank moving into its feild of view.. where that tank sitting there *should* have easily killed the enemy tank moving in, wierd stuff.

Simply can only do what can resonably be done with Arma's current flaws, maybe 1.5 patch will make it a lil more realistic...

[Special Ed]

Well what the heck, while im on a posting spree for the last week here http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif...

Spent prolly about 16 hours this weekend, and got alot done (of course, time consumption estimation for tasks completed far exceeded expectancy)

As with any amount of work done in the mission, "done" does not always mean done, later 'Beta' testing may require tweaking/editing

ALL waypoint pathing has been finished, including battle areas, spent huge time testing those battle areas to ensure (within reason) that all is functioning well, and scenarios play out in appropriate manners

Fixed another issue with units slipping thru battle areas and running off to opposing towns too early (good greif, how did that guy get thru? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif) which took some time,with a seperate script app (had *thought* I already completely addressed this issue)

All 'advancable' clan units on map have been refined to various types (which werent after porting from Arma- they used to all be rifleman)

Bmps have been removed, because the dumb things dont fire on ground units, guess theyre broken...

thats knocks alot down off the current toDo list, oh the joy, get to go thru each town and write some ID numbers down of offending fences on Sahrani that cause in town units to get stuck, and knock a few sections down... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Gettin close to being ready to put in the artillery peices for clans towns now, the script that lands the rounds is already 'near' completion (needs refinement)

Now... time to look at some fence iD's http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

Just a quick note to say that this campaign you are making is the number 1 mod that I'm bursting to play with ArmA, I'm sure once it is done and word of mouth (and forum) spreads it will become very popular. You should work for BIS man!

Cheers
Johnny

[Special Ed]

Thanks for the positive feedback johnny vet boy b, although this isnt *truly* a campaign, its one mission, but many missions within this mission http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

A quick update, have been working on the artillery added for towns (batteries are spawned), kinda slow finishing the test bed, then will integrate it into the mission. Many, if not all the arty batteries will be spawned in random positions, so one mission play wont reveal all these positions for the next. Not just the artillery is being spawned, these will be fully created batteries, defensive gaurds, a patrol group, and later will prolly put in some eye candy stuff (camo nets, bunker, etc)

[Foxhound]

Great to know everything is going ok with your mission http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Definatly on my "to play" list.


About the artillery, is it active AI artillery or is it just there for eye candy together with the patrols and guards?
If you need some help making AI use artillery on the players gimme a shout, have made something past few weeks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[edit]
Sorry, forgot to mention.......it still needs to be tested in MP and SP.
I have done local tests but more are needed.

[Special Ed]

Artillery is an essential part of the dynamic town battle system, and is fully functional in town barraging enemy towns. So ya, when two clans begin 'fueding', provided both still have functional artillery (hasent been destroyed), they will being barraging each others towns.

This is a single player mission only. As stated before hand http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif, the original idea was Mp, but I quit on it because of massive complexity and time consumption.

Thanks for the offer for testing, will get in touch with you m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[fasad]

Heya Special Ed,

Am I correct in reading that your project uses CSL's DynamicUnitReduction scripts? If not, at what level are you saving reduced unit data? One global variable = group, or 1 GV = unit, or all local vars with lots of running scripts?

I'm curious as I'm working on a similar scaled SP mission (still in OFP land), and am having some difficulty avoiding the big savegame bug. I am trying to completely abstractly simulate distant groups, to overcome the group limit (ie, groups are completely removed with their data array being manipulated to simulate activity).

[Special Ed]

hey Fasad

Have not yet implimented CSL's dynamic unit reduction, although in this particualr mission, large groups are roughly limited to 2 large groups per 13 towns, therfore plans are probably to only run those scripts on those groups only. Theres gonna be a ton of smaller groups (1,2,3 man groups) but many of these are going to be spawned once player is in a radius area of their spawn positions, and the 1 man groups are of little concern towards lag, so I cant really help you in your question. In fact, it seems Arma is actually more efficient at lag reduction for tons of units on map outside of viewing area, really my only plans to deal with small groups that arent spawned *might* be to 'doStop' them once player leaves that town area, if their movement is causing lag, but their actual presence seems to have no effect (maxxed out Civie side groups in 13 towns with them all moving, no lag)

It is a bummer about Ofp's limits in groups allowed, and this mission would have eventually had problems in Ofp due to that for sure.

As you know, even with Csl's Dynamic Unit Reduction, it only removes all group units and leaves one left over, so that prolly wouldnt help you with your situation there in group limits.

Edit - sorry, could you elaborate on what save game bug u may be refferring to? I know of save game breaking disable Ai, which can be fixed (with some difficulty)...

[fasad]

The large savegame bug is a bit hard to pin down, but it can be caused by a combination of lots of GV, lots of scripts running at the time of save, and even (apparently random) incompatible variable name combinations. The mission would save correctly, but loading would either take an extremely long time, freeze or crash OFP. I beleive there is a workaround involving renaming savegame files. The good news is I've not heard mention of it in ArmA yet.

CSL reduction seems to work (I've only taken a quick look) with a script running for each group, saving reduced unit data to local variables. Unfortunately this is a scenario likely to cause the save game bug. I've been using GV arrays for each group (saving more details too) and am working towards a single master script as thobson did for Abandoned armies.

Getting back towards your mission, I've found that a moving unit will cause about 2~3 times the slow down of a static unit. Thanks for you reply and good luck http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Wow. 2 to 3 times, that certainly says doStopping units in towns that player is not near will make a big difference then, thanks for the info on that http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I give you credit towards your workings with saving all that data for group units, im certainly no master scripter, and for me thats prolly a bit out of my league, but this mission doesent have tons of 'roaming' units, battles occurr periodically, but they are not overlapping, so I can just de-activate the unit reduction on those groups at that time.

Nice to share some info here with you, good luck with your mission

[Special Ed]

darn double posting, - edited

[Special Ed]

Lots has been done over the last week, artillery battery templetes for spawning are done (not yet tested) - the spawn script is 64 kb - tok alot of work, theres something in the area of 30 spawn areas total, having a random selection of a number of areas per town.

Basically, just putting in the markers in the mission now that the scripts will use - and im having a problem with some thoughts occurring here..

What id like to do is get some constructive feedback here from the community, really - heres why


Initally, all batteries were going to be in towns, now ive switched to placing them in randomized positions outside of towns (within say 100 - 500 meters of towns) -
The reasons I switched to outside towns:

Artillery peices wont get destroyed regularly by the town being barraged

Artillery peices wont have to be re-manned by new town holders (wouldnt look right if a clan takes a town and captured intact enemy arty in town just sits there)

Alright, those are the primary reasons.

Now, with arty out of towns:

Arty for a particular clan will still be functional even if the town near the arty gets taken over, new problem: Im thinking this might look bad, even if the arty is 400 meters away from town, with that battery still working, firing away for a clan in battle even tho the town near the battery is enemy?

Not going to mess with trying to send units to take over the arty, considering the size of this mission, that would truly suk, be complex, and have to replicate it tons of times for all clans/towns-

I could try to keep most batteries a distance away from towns, but the farther back they go, the less effect in the mission theyl have during a battle.

Easiest fix: just disable ai for the arty battery units if that town nearby is taken over - problem: well, now ive just lost that particular clan having artillery for the rest of the mission, and lost part of the reason why I did this....

Worst case scenario, toss this spawn thing and just put the Artillery in the towns, work on a new script to allow new town owners to use that artillery peice, and, kind of cheat and prevent artillery barrages from killing in town artillery (by one means or another) - Im still thinking of maybe putting in some peices in towns, but again, this will require making new town takers man the thing when a barrage is called in, which may prove to be difficult..

I would appreciate some feedback, or opinions, going to have to do some stinkin testing here and decide what to do before going any farther on this arty app...

[Special Ed]

After looking at the complexity of having certain artillery peices change hands during the mission, just going to leave it as is - and probably forever more lol - sometimes I think I just think ahead to far - still alot to be done and certainly dont want to waste another whole week on the artillery app here. Time to git er done http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

ehh, double posted by accident again, sorry

[Foxhound]

I could try to keep most batteries a distance away from towns, but the farther back they go, the less effect in the mission theyl have during a battle.
Why dont you put a trigger over each town, condition east not present (or west, whatever you need).
And in the activation of the trigger set a variable to true and in the script for the artilley just let that variable condition true cause the Artillerty to have no more ammo, or destroy them, or get the units out of the artillery pieces.
You could even "spawn" them on a different location as if you taking over the town caused the artillery to pack up and leave the area.

Or maybe I misunderstood the issue here..........hard day of work behind me so thats definatly very possible http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

You hit the nail on the head http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

This is the final issue, that hasnt been addressed yet - but you managed to mention a number of the options ive been considering too ..

Having them pack up and leave seems like a good plan, although, im not sure where to send them lol, in fact, that could get tough to manage over time as units accumulate, and there are enemy towns scattered alover the map, so I dont want them running into them causing problems that the scripts dont pick up -

Have been thinking about also maybe, mayyybe sending units from the groups that took the town towards the artillery pos to try to take it over, but, its another tough spot, as those groups will likely be very depleted until reinforcements arrive, and this may cause them to get wiped out - lol

Only other thing I can think of is spawning a strike team in the town taken over (hate viewable spawns http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif ), and send them after the arty position to try to take it over.

Either way, the scripts have changed, and the whole Arty thing is becoming totally dynamic, I wont say this is the way it will be tho, because if tests being up all sorts of issues, going back to the way it was , but, right now, once scripts are finished - Artillery will be in some towns, and outside of other towns, randomly placed, and now clans that take over a town *can* take over that artillery and use it. Its certainly gotten more complex than desired, but if this works out, itll be pretty neat lookin.

[Special Ed]

Heres a little peek at the infrastructure of the dynamic artillery in the mission (some of this was already described) of which is still in the creation and fine tuning.

At mission start, artillery batteries are spawned per town, randomly placed, some will be outside towns, some within.

Batteries will vary in composure, some will have a patrol, a guard, or even multiple gaurds, some also having an mg station (manned) -(may even add in a script to have mg gunners scan) including crew for artillery peice. Most batteries will have only one gun, could add more, but the effect will be devastating enough to towns being barraged with just one gun, a few batteries at larger towns will probably have more guns. Artillery peices are not manned until they are actually fired, the crew will standby until that time, and get out after firing is complete.

As Ai clans take over towns, even if batteries are outside of towns, they will attempt to seize them, and will take them over, using them to barrage enemy town they may end up battling from that town. May go as far as to even have new town holders send new units to become Arty patrols, Mg gunner, gaurds for that battery - this would be off in the future tho.

A clan may hold multiple batteries as they take over various towns throughout the mission, in the event this clan is involved in a battle with another clan, that clans closest *functional* artillery to the battle area will commence firing - this is already almost finished in the scripts, and should make a very nice - up - close and personal effect of the artillery during a battle (even better at night http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif )

Lastly, speaking of night -

There is plans also to impliment CSL's accelerated time function later on, this will be optional at mission start, hence if this option is selected, one mission will likely go thru weeks of in-game days, and will allow effect of both night and day experiences.

Would like to get some pics up of a few artillery batteries (and them in action) once this application is done (night barrages are pretty neat http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif )

Thanks again for all you folks taking the time to post here now and again, c u's around http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[nubbin77]

I really enjoy reading your updates Special Ed. Keep it up!

[Special Ed]

Thanks for the response and the good cheer m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

How's the progress on your campaign coming? I have itchy fingers, can't wait to play it!

[Special Ed]

Very good progress. Havent posted in while as work continues on finishing and refining the town barrage function.

As it stands now, theres been 350 + markers put in for the 30 some random locations for the artillery batteries, lots of additions put in for the barrage function to make it as dynamic and realistic as I (reasonably) can. As with every application that goes into the mission, theres always a level of learning new commands, what they do/dont do, what bugs may be caused by them, and what issues arise with new types of vehicles being used (artillery for example).

Also, after having a little *discussion* with ColonelSandersLite regarding Arma's in-ability to give a whole lot of effect from a town under fire from artillery (unlike Ofp, where we had mods that allowed buildings to burn/smoke) theres a new addition forming that CSL is working on, which will allow buildings struck by artillery rounds to plume smoke and show some fire, and eventually collapse. Hes already sent me over a Demo of the function in its current stage, looks very good. Should be a very nice touch to the artillery strikes.

Still want to post pics of the artillery barrages in action (including CSL's buildingBurn), going to wait a while longer until the function is either near complete or complete before tho.

Thanks for the ongoing support http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

If anyone wouldnt mind, Im kinda just typing a thought here -

The barrage function is (finally) nearing completion, this will leave helo reinforcements and town garrison units restored -

The helo reinforcements I *expect* to go pretty quick, using CSL's helo script, its really almost ready to go as is, just need to fully integrate it.

The garrison thing... -

Could REALLY use some input here, feedback from anyone is welcome - this is just an opinion thing.

Heres the deal.

The original concept was to spawn garrison units in a town taken over, this would occurr after one helo is sent in and drops off additional offensive troops.

Then, I started thinking about maybe creating 2 or even 3 helos, and flying in ALL town forces that are to be 'restored'. Problem, this could get complicated, as right now, the helo scripts run on only one helo at a time, there would have to be possibly alot of modifications, then concern about helos crashing into each other, also concern towards lag for the helo script (large) running multiple times at once... Really, what this boils down to, is alot more time, and alot more effort to fly in garrison troops (talking an additional month?) - If I just go with one helo, and only one helo drop, then, it may only take a week to get it done.

Conlusion, I really want to stick with just spawning the garrison troops per town, talking an average of 8 - 20 units spawned in seperate individual locations throught a town, guards, tower guards, a few patrols - they are spread out pretty well, so its not like one big ugly spawn in full view, player may see one or two units spawned - and, this occurrs after the helo comes in and drops off additional *offensive* units to restore depleted groups. Going this route will probably decrease time, by even a month, as opposed to flying them all in. If you guys dont mind the spawn, considering all the other stuff in this mission (alot), I dont think its really that big of a deal - but, I would like to get some feedback on this, Id appreciate it, it would give me a better feel for what impact this spawn may/may not have for the player.

[nubbin77]

I'm not sure what condition needs to be met for the garrison to be spawned so that could influence it a little, but my assumption is that the town has been (re)occupied by that faction. In order for that to have happened, the enemy would be wiped out. Therefore spawning units would not really be visible to an enemy. I think most people could move beyond suspension of disbelief to have the town re-occupied.

Also respawning will allow you to put the people in more specific, strategic defense points, rather then having an extra squad dropped off by a heli and stand there in formation.

If I were you I'd go with the spawining option for now. If it becomes an issue later and people are finding they always see it happen then you can work towards a better solution. Perhaps garrsisons can even be resupplied with trucks. or something else that wouldn't conflict with the chopper script.

Maybe in the future when people have 6000 meter view distances and they are spying on towns it could become a problem. But I think your good to go with spawning for now.

[Special Ed]

Thanks for the reply nubbin77

The original concept was to use trucks for all reinforcements sent to a town taken over, but unfortunately there are so many problems with this approach, it got scrapped - trucks navigating around enemy towns, getting stuck, getting damaged, and worse of all, getting there so late, they would cause problems in the scripts if the particular town they were going to reinforce had been taken over by a new owner during its transit - its a good idea, but, its pretty much impossible to be done within reason -

I agree with what your saying about the appearance of the spawn, it is really a *reward* if nothing less for a town taken by an enemy/freindly clan, and being it occurs after the helo has come in, its kind of more subtle that way, rather than a clan takes a town and *bink*! garrison spawn - the helo has to drop in offensive troops first before garrison spawn.

Even with using helos to fly in Garrison troops, it would still be scripted to send each unit to a particular position, although, thats just another peice of the massive complexity of trying to do it this way.

Lastly, your right, helo reinforcements and garrison spawns are only initiated if a town has been taken by a new clan, and a town cannot be taken if there is still an enemy presence within it, so the spawn wouldnt conflict with any sort of enemy presence.

I appreciate the detailed response m8, very helpfull http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

Ed - I agree with NUbbin that the additional time and complexity doesn't soUnd worth it at this stage, I woUldn't mind the spawning at all.

It coUld perhaps be a "polish" after yoU've released it?!

Cheers.

[Special Ed]

Thanks johnny vet boy b for the input

Had thought of that too, maybe doing something else with it way later, although, even the garrison spawn will take some time, talking 12 towns, and exact placement/facing for various units, equals still a large script for the spawns, and alot of markers, so what im getting at is, once this is all done, it wont be compatable with a different aproach, it would have to be re-done completely (markers might be able to be re-used, thats it tho)

Theres alot more 'detailed' and personalized stuff to go in tho after the town battle function is done, so id think its not that big a deal to have this one instance where a viewable spawn is possible.

[Special Ed]

Phewwwww

Why cant I just take one shot? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif

The Artillery is up and fully running, all batteries are placed, its running really good. Each town has 3 possible spawn areas at mission start, interior and two exterior possible, so, you wont be counting on going after the same locations to knock out enemy artillery on the second mission run http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

There are still a number of bugs, theyve all been documented and will be addressed when I get that that, right now im savoring the moment of having this thing up and running, and will be moving on to putting in CSL's helo reinforcement application next. Also, the batteries will be populated with various Objects and refined as well, and a great thanks goes to El Nino Foxhound for taking on this task, as it will be a time consuming process of refining positions of spawn markers and adding in objects (bunkers, sandbags, ammo crates, tents, etc) for each battery, should look very cool with this additional work put in, so hats of to you El Nino http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Heres some shots of a few batteries in action, and also shots of a town getting hit by ary rounds http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Boondaba!!!! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif (he exclaimed with great relish http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif)

Bango Arty Battery (http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/4384/bangoempty1pw7.jpg)

Bango Arty BatteryShot2 (http://img385.imageshack.us/img385/4036/bangoempty2la0.jpg)

Bango Arty Battery/GetIn Arty (http://img249.imageshack.us/img249/9854/bangogetinrg9.jpg)

Bango Arty Batter Fire (http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/1391/bangofire1iy3.jpg)

Bango Arty Batter Fire (shot 2) (http://img79.imageshack.us/img79/1219/bangofire2lz6.jpg)

Arty In Mountians (http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/5323/town13emptysi9.jpg)

Arty In Mountians Fire (http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/9563/town13firehe9.jpg)

Out There Arty Battery Fire (http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/6934/town9fire1fm4.jpg)

Out There Arty Battery Fire (shot2) (http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/1112/town9fire2qo6.jpg)

Barrage1 (http://img386.imageshack.us/img386/7607/barrage1wt6.jpg)

Barrage2 (http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/2297/barrage3ra5.jpg)

Barrage3 (http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/8786/barrage4hj6.jpg)


http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/xmas_o.gif

[CharveL]

What an incredible effort! I have to say I'm looking forward to trying this mission more than any other atm. If this thing plays as good as your posts read I think we're all in for a treat as this is exactly the kind of potential ArmA is waiting for someone to take advantage of.

I'm thinking it's time you stepped slowly away from the computer and let this thing go free at last. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Muchly appreciated CharveL, thanks for the kind response, it has been a huge effort, sometimes fun, sometimes not http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif ... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif


Quote[/b] ]
I'm thinking it's time you stepped slowly away from the computer and let this thing go free at last.


You must understand, this mission has not gotten to where its at thru quickly completing tasks and preparing for release, its now been in the making for about a year (ported over from Ofp). Some various applications have taken a month or more to complete, aside from remaining bugs.

It will still be months, maybe many months before release, there is so much more that can be done with it because the backbone of the mission has been designed to be very flexable. Just like a high quality mod, simply to release it before everything is put in to satisfaction robs the project of its full potential, these things take time.

Thanks again for the response http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

I understand. It's only that you have to be mindful of the tendency to allow 'feature creep' get in the way. If game companies waited till the games were perfect we wouldn't see them for a year later and they would be out of business. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Of course you have to do what you have to do to let your baby live up to it's potential but there may be nothing wrong with a sort of beta release since all of the major functions are in, and add the additional functionality as you go along. You can likely catch a larger audience this way as well - and keep them. Perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea for some of the more hardcore to try it and give you some feedback then start adding features based on that and other suggestions.

This is a purely selfish rationalization of course. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/whistle.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Special Ed]

lol

I was aware of the fact that when I posted this topic, that it might be hard pressed to get responses aside from people wanting to see it soon, but, its also rewarding to me to post after ive spent a month or more on a particular area, post some pics, etc, it feels more like a single mission has been completed, rather than looking at the entire project still incomplete.

There are many more things that are going into the mission once all the townbattle elements are in. Interaction with Ai(dynamic dialogs), towns built up into bases, convoys transporting goods to be traded, and more.

Really the only difference I think in this mission to be compared to a few other Ofp large scale missions, is that ive decided to post a topic about it far before its release, so I can enjoy releasing info about it thru its many stages.

Also this is why I post occasionally normally, when a milestone has been reached, not interested in draggin people alover the place, normally, if something significant has been accomplished, ill prolly post on it, which may take a month to get there. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[nubbin77]

Just out of curiosity... since this is such a large mission, how are you going to handle saving? Will the variables and game state be saved? Seems like they removed some of that functionality in Arma. Is it like some of the dynamic missions of the past where you have to save in base?

[Special Ed]

Honestly thus far there has not yet been an issue with saveGame, there are about 100 globals (I think) or so atm. Can only say again, that thru testing occasionally ive saved game, then loaded, and have never seen any issue with lost data.

I suppose when the time comes, if there is an issue, then it will have to addressed, by whatever means, Ive heard of a few fixes in Ofp to the possible saveGame bug, including creating a file to hold globals. Being able to save game properly of course is a must in this sort of mission, but I have no fears that if any issue arises, before release it will be addressed. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Alright, here we go.

Ive been giving this some thought, and its time to ask the community for some help.

Before I go on, Id like to describe in simplest terms what this mission does now, and what it is projected to do, also, I have NO desire to make this mission appear in some way better than others, I do have a desire to show how unique it is, and that it certainly is worth a peice of someones time to assist in its creation. Also, anyone who participates will have credit given to them in the initial credits, which will show at mission's begining intro sequence.

Both Ofp and Arma have given the potential for a mission to be created that is the size of a meduim scale Rpg. Those that have played games like Star Wars Galaxies, Oblivion, etc, have a good idea of what Im refferring to here. The difference in this mission concept tho, is I wanted to make a fully functioning dynamic *backdrop* within a large scale Rpg type mission, my complaint with really all great 'personalized' Rpg's is that there was always a dead feeling to the enviornment. This mission goes far beyond what those games provided, to allow ai clans to battle it out over days or even weeks of mission play, and in a realistic way. This part is almost done now in its main functions, there are bugs and whatnot, all of which are documented to be addressed, but it works, and works darn good.

Heres what im getting at, if this mission in its final stages even comes close to what is envisioned, it will be something people can enjoy for a very long time, and be able to be played over and over, and things have been done professionally, put alot of time in to make things happen in a realistic/believable way.

As this townbattle function slowly draws to a close, it leaves a vast area incomplete in the mission. This is the complete and thourough population of towns, and also turning towns into bases to a degree. The towns currently are occupied by attacking forces only, which can potentially advance across the entire map, but, there are still garrison troops and civilians to be placed.

This is where the mission can use some help http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Theres a total of 14 towns that are to be populated, 13 of those towns are primary towns which are involved in the town battle system. Now, I had done part of this work in the Ofp version, it took me at least a month just to turn those towns into base like atmospheres alone, aside from populating them with garrison forces/Civies, which hadnt been completed. Of course it all has to be done again, cept this time the towns are bigger, some of them very large, yep, this mission can use your help.
What I have in mind here, I want to offer to the community, for anyone willing to contribute some time to the mission, that each person can take on a town of their choosing, and, basically call it their own. That person can be creative as they desire in turning the town of choice into an alive atmosphere, put in objects, paremter walls, bunkers, guard towers, doodads, whatever, and populate it. That towns creation will be fully credited to that person in the inital mission credits. I want to also say that by splitting this up in this manner, a town a person, should keep the load lite, might take a week or two to do a town up, rather than trying to take em all on.

Now there will be some parameters to go by, a limitation to number of garrison units in a town, and civies as well. But this seems like a thing that some folks with some experience modding might enjoy, will get full credit for that towns creation, and wont have to devote some massive amount of time to the mission, and, if enough people are willing to asisst, this can easily take off months from the missions time to release, which is huge.

Really, every town that is populated is another peice of this puzzle put together to really start making the enviornment come to life.

Basically, what is needed tho is a simple commitment to the particular town that is chosen to do a quality job on it, I dont want anyone to rush it. One might say, all these different people working on different towns, wont that kinda make the mission unbalanced, see, this is the beauty of it, every town should be unique, as each town is held be a different clan, and I think it will turn out quite nice this way.

So far, two people have joined in the project in different areas, ColonelSandersLite and El Nino Foxhound, which has helped significantly.

Its really this simple tho, if you would like to donate a town to the cause, just drop me a Pm, or a post here, and Ill send you a copy of the parameters document, and a testbed mission templete to put your town together on, which will include the current units in it now, artillery and any tanks (not all towns have tanks). There are currently three towns which are left out of selection, Corazol, the Mil Base to the far NE and also "town14" (unnamed as of yet), town 14 being unimportant atm as its not involved in the townbattle system. All other major towns on the main northern Island are fair game, please dont take on a large town if your not prepared for taking the extra time for that size of town. There is no time limit either, you can take your time, if you want to spend time here or there on it, and if it takes a month (not that it should), then fine, only please try to complete the town, as no two people will of course be working on that, so if it doesent get completed I will have to finish it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif I also reccomend experience with editing, this is primarily editor stuff, but there's alot of waypoint usage involved.

I do need to decide what the best approach is on using a universal Editor Update everyone, Im leaning towards using the G85 editor update, only because of its simplicity in (apparently) not needing to be updated constantly as Arma is updated, but I need to confirm that it allows placed buildings/objects to collapse, if not, it will be 6th Sense EU then.

Cmon Guys! Lend a hand, contribute a town, make that puppy your own, I assure you this mission is worth its wieght in gold. I know just from the views that people are interested in this concept/type of mission, and considering the scope and scale of it, its really almost rediculous to think one person (me?http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/whistle.gif ) can do it all in a reasonable time frame, kind of why games like Oblivion, Kotor, etc, were created by *more than* one person, its like one person trying to make a movie while being camera man, director, editor, designer, etc, etc http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Im going to spend some time and compile what is needed to send over to you guys for creating each town, which will certainly be some work on my part, and will make it easy to understand and do.

Heres a few shots of the old version from Ofp, when some of the towns were actually completed, just to give a little feel for what this can turn out like with your help http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

KolConflict Photos (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=55;t=51605;st=15)

Theres photos there on bottom of that page, and on the next page as well. Please do take a quick look at a few, they are worth it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I await your responses gentlemen (hope there are responses http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/help.gif )

Regards

Special Ed

[Special Ed]

A huge thanks to a few people (wont names names yet http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif) who have offered to help, cheers!

Been bustin me tail this evening working at completing this TownCreation mission templete, which will not only make creating/populating a town alot simpler, but will also allow anyone to give civilians their own *homes*, that they can go into and out of thru waypoint plan just by merely executing a script ive created in the activation line of a waypoint that is placed next to the door of a non-enterable building. (script handles the rest)
Hoping to have this ready to go by tommorow evening for you guys http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Thanks again for the offers to help so far, really makes my day.

Nice to see people in the community lending a hand here http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

SpecialEd - If I new how to use the editor I would definately lend a hand! But, I'm more of a "5 minute mission maker" kind of guy...

Keep up the sterling work sir.

Johnny

[Monkwarrior]

A very impressive idea.
Support this guy gents: adopt a town inside his map and make it a deathtrap for the rest of us http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Monk.

[Special Ed]

Alright guys, heres the scoop http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Been working on this town creation mis. Ive decided to go for broke and make this as easy and less time consuming as possible, and, its going very well.

Im going thru and setting off to the side all units that are to be placed per town, everything is done for them as well - any code in Init feilds is put in, any waypoints that have specific code is in, tower guards are placed in their towers, ready to be moved, Mg gunners are in mg's. Civilians and patrols have waypoints set aside as well for easy placement, with any code in wp's already in. Of course waypoint plans can be edited/added to as desired.

Basically, what this amounts to is, if you want to help and take on a town, all you will have to do as far as unit placement goes, is just drag the units set off to the side to your desired positions, again, this includes tower guards, mg stations, etc. Of course you can still change unit types, tower types, mg bunker types, add/remove waypoints for units.

Im also setting up a reference town, that has most of the military buildings provided by 6ThSense EU, these buildings also will have MapFacts lights in them for nightime use. All one has to do is copy and paste to use one. Street lamps for lighting towns up at night will be in that reference town as well, again, just copy and paste.

So, basically, most of what most people will probably use will be in the editor, to either move to your desired position, or copy and paste.

Again, the main thing here is quality, even tho Im making this alot easier, I still need time taken to make each town alive, good looking, and good experience with editing is still required.

This is the best I can do to provide you guys the easiest way to put a town together, once this is done, the time that would have been taken to do a town has probably been cut in half.

Being that im doing all of this, Im realistically hoping for either tonight or tommorow to have this finished and ready to go.

This is the last attempt on my part to get some help in this area, I understand that im asking people to spend their time on this project, but I also consider this not just *my project*, as a number of people are participating in it, and everyone gets credit for their work.

I'm going to look into getting a link up here for the TownCreation mission, if I can get it hosted, once its done, to make things easier for everyone. If I do get a link up, heck, you can even just download the thing and check it out, see if its something for you or not.

Stay tuned guys, and thanks for the support http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[CharveL]

If I wasn't new to this game I'd love to help out but I haven't fired up the editor yet. I've done this kind of thing in a few other games before but I'd end up slowing everyone down getting used to the interface.

I'm going to have to stand by the sidelines and cheer you guys on.

[Special Ed]

Still finishing up the work on the TownCreation mission, everything is a go actually, except Ive ran into a few problems with the civilians new function of going into/out of their homes, and had to change the script due to lag that was being caused by teleportation, and now deleting/spawning instead, its up and running good now, just need to hardcode faces into it, so each time a civie comes back out of his/her (well, no her's yet http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif) home, their facial/skin appearance is same as when they went in.

Aside from that, its done, and should be putting up a link soon to anyone interested in taking part and helping with this project.

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

SpecEd - when you say "the rest is done", does that mean the project is almost ready to play, or are you talking about being ready for a beta testing session? I had a feeling it was still several months away?
Regards
Johnny

[Special Ed]

Sorry, meant rest is done as far as this TownCreation mission goes, didnt realize I might have been misleading on that, sorry http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[PaveQ]

I could do one town. Are you using urban patrol script for patrols and civs walking around?

[Special Ed]

Thanks for the offer m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

No, a randomized script would not present the appearance Im looking for in the mission, all units that are not static have waypoint plans.

Once I get the TownCreation mission up here, you can check it out, and if still interested you can choose a town a take on.

Thanks again

[Special Ed]

Because of the number of people currently participating in the town creation area, and also because after spending a week (week and a half actually) on this town creation mission, Im going to stick with the current number of people assisting and decided not to put up a link to the town creation templete for possibly more people to join in. Really even just having a few extra is helping alot, and I dont want to get overwhelmed by trying to take on too much too fast here.

Thanks a TON guys for your help, and also thanks to PaveQ for offering as well, I would have taken you up on that, but as I say, I just think I came to the realization that for my comfort zone there are probably enough people for now, but again, big thanks for offering http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Really, its neat to see people coming up being willing to help here on the forums, just confirms what ive seen in the past as well, lots of good people here http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[PaveQ]

Sure, np. I just wish this would be out soon as possible, as it sounds one of the best missions that arma will have. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

I appreciate your support PaveQ, ya, there really is no way around the time factor in this sort of mission, certainly both Mike Melvin - creator of Cti and Thobson - creator of Abandoned armies (both Ofp), proved this to be true - in fact I know Thobson spent around 2 years on his mission, and im not sure about Cti, it may have been more than 2 years on that before the most recent more/less final versions were released. Kinda just goes to show, the more time put into large scale missions, the more u get out of it before release, its a double edged sword I guess.

Working on the Helo reinforcements now, yup, decided to go for broke and fly in all reinforcements rather than spawn, using three helos, just got the base script for spawning waypoint plans for each town fly in, working dang good! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif As a backup, just gotta make a collision avoidance script that changes altitude if too close to each other.

[Darkseed79]

This mission really sounds outstanding, I just wish it could be played as a coop with perhaps 5 people max. How much extra work would that be?

[Special Ed]

35 scripts right now, with about 600 Kb of script material alone, mission sqm wieghs in curently at 850 kb... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Estimated wieght once just the townbattle function is done, prolly 650 - 700 kb scripting material, 1 meg for mission sqm.

At least to me, it would be an impossible task. Did want to make it Multiplayer originally, but really, it would have taken much longer to do, and Im very uninformed in MP scripting.

Honestly tho, Multiplayer would have taken out some of the good stuff too, planning on having lots of ai interation with player (dialogs), similiar to your average SP Rpg, and, in a multiplayer form, of course this gets messy, having to re-spawn interactable ai units, having dialogs repeat for various players.

But anyhow, once this thing gets done (some day http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/icon_rolleyes.gif ), people are welcome to do waht they want with it, add missions, even try to convert it to mp, although I suspect it would be too large a task even for a Mp scripting pro.

[PaveQ]

As a backup, just gotta make a collision avoidance script that changes altitude if too close to each other.
Why not group the helos to the same group when they are flying.

[Special Ed]

I appreciate the input, sounds good, but -

Each helo is really to itself - each helo leaves at a different time, once it is fully boarded, theres alot of checks for each helo individually, also there are specific landing zones for both DZ and base, some very distant from each other, some within 50 meters. Theres actually a seperate script for each helo to manage its boarding proceedures, wp plan, etc -

no worries, its actually going really well, helo scripts are building quicker than projected, although also heck of alot more complex than expected as well - alot of checks involved in just dynamically boarding reinforcement troops at base (most of these checks due to the possibility of the helos under attack during boarding process)

[Special Ed]

On a good note here, due to all the questions about what might need to be done about the potential save game issues, I went ahead and took the current mis version, dropped it into Arma missions, and did a little test...

I waited until a town battle started up in the mission, which at that point is running basically the most scripts at once, and went ahead and saved right in the midst of it..

Loaded saved game, and it completely picked up where it was at during save in the scripts, no crash, no issues -

Only thing I did notice, I wanted to test this after closing Arma, and starting it back up and loading save as well, when I clicked on 'resume', it picked up where I aborted the mission at, and there was an error message ('value' is not a value, revert to old 'value&#39http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif something like that, so I clicked ok, and noticed nothing wrong with the mission state, then from there I went ahead and loaded the actual saved game, which brought up no error, and worked fine -
That error that did come up upon 'resume' might be an indication that players must actually load a saved game, not just run from 'resume' point (resume point being of course most recent abort mission), Im getting the feeling that manually saving the game is working great, but the auto save done when aborting the mission may not be as thourough in saving precious mission info - either way, its all good, as long as manually saved game's work in the mission, good enough for me, considering I was kinda expecting the worst http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

Ed - have you tried playing the current version yet, just to see how it's panning out? What does it feel like? Does it feel unpredictable in what's going on around you? (which is what I'd really like, never knowing what might be around a corner or in the next town etc).

[Special Ed]

Absolutely, each town is unique in its setup, they are not simply replicated http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Dont really know how to explain it, ive gone to huge lengths to make each mission different as well, even after playing it thru once.

Right now, due to testing I have the town battle selection selectable thru a radio command, now, in a regular mission, all I have to do is drop in a random 1 - 5 number, and at each mission start the battle between two towns first off is randomly selected from 5 initial battle scenarios.

Now, thats not just it, if a clan wins over its enemy during a battle and takes the enemies town, once it has been reinforced the scripts will attempt to move that clan forward thru more attacks on nearby enemy towns - hence player does not constantly have to traipse alover the place trying to join in battles, clans will advance thru enemy towns progressively.

The sort of testing you are refferring to was actually done alot in the Ofp version, spent litterally weeks seeing how the battles worked out thru the scripts, ya, its not predictable, and now with artillery batteries randomly spawned, its even more unpredictable.

If you cant tell just from this short description, to get these results has been a heck of alot of work - but its worth it to me if it makes re-playability that much better.

The artillery put in has certainly also put an intersting twist on battles http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif, I find it alot more immersive now when advancing with a freindly clan to assist in battling an enemy clan while hearing distant artillery firing and rounds landing in towns.

Even more impressive should be the implimentation of CSL's building burn script once he gets it refined to allow smaller radius fires/smoke on various building types. I envision something on the lines of the video shot from Enemy At The Gates when u get the over look of StalinGrad on fire when Vissili gets his ammo clip with no gun http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif Of course towns will probably not be quite this "lit" up normally, but even a few smoke/fire plumes should make it look pretty wild after being barraged for a while.

When I think of how close this is to having the townbattle function complete, well, it makes me want to kick back and see it there, but theres still some more work to be done here to get there...

egghhhh back to the helo script here http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

[johnny vet boy b]

Thanks for that description Ed, sounds great. Salivating at the thought of all that tactical freedom.

[CharveL]

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif

[23-Down]

Hi. didn't read anything here right now.

But your mission sounds good i remember your project for the ofp variant..

good to hear that u continue your project in arma.

But now a little question will u delete the damn gras in the mission?

i ask because it's very laggy for me and other people, not all have a high-end computer...

u can disable it with:


Quote[/b] ]setTerrainGrid 50

in a .sqs or an initline.

Arma Beta patch 1.05 required.

[Connors]

If its only in an initline or .sqs the you could do one with one and one without.

[Special Ed]

Sounds like a simple change to mission, I suppose I could make one with and one without -

Thanks for the replies everyone -

The helo reinforcement thing has been an interesting learning experience so far, the main structure of the script is done and built, and in testing phases, lots of oddities coming up with helos Im discovering here, but its going good http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Lots of folks here have been kind enough to continue to contribute some time to reading some of all this mess about the mission, of course I feel indebted to you guys to a degree, so I would like to make another video once the helo thing is done and towns are all polished up, not that this will be soon, but it should be worth the download and watch.

thanks guys, really appreciate it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

So are ya done yet???

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/whistle.gif

[Maddmatt]

Why make a seperate version of the mission to remove grass? From what I have read it's an SP mission, so the player can simply turn off grass in the video options.

[Special Ed]

So are ya done yet???

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/whistle.gif
http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/rofl.gif



Quote[/b] ]
Maddmatt

Why make a seperate version of the mission to remove grass? From what I have read it's an SP mission, so the player can simply turn off grass in the video options.


Ya, I figured there was an alternative to making a whole new version, just really wanted to be accomodating to the question regarding that, really not something of big concern right now (nor prolly will be for months)

Helo script that boards/sends out/drops off/rtb's helos is almost finished, and still needs to be replicated 5 times, once for each helo, where a number of globals need to be changed for each helo's script.

The function is very dynamic, units, including pilots are spawned at the doorway of various barracks buildings around the helos landing area, and run to board helos, might seem easy to type from here, but it was not easy confronting all the possibilities of what may happen to units/helo during a boarding sequence if under attack - very lengthy and somewhat complex script.

After this script moving on to making a script that will send garrison troops dropped of to various positions within the town theyve been dropped at, which will include turning some units into patrols, some will man exisiting Mg's, some will get in watch towers, others will be static guards. The script is expected to be lengthy, but not as complex as the helo script was.

[Special Ed]

Just for a little fun here's a few issues discovered, and dealt with during the process of putting together this helo script that runs up to 3 helos at once http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/icon_rolleyes.gif

Join command issue - if the last unit in a group is joined to a new group, this officially destroys the wp plan stored for the group the last unit left, and possibly (unconfirmed) destroys the group name as well. This bug has caused all sorts of issues to deal with, helo scripts add units to temp groups to send them on various scripted waypoint plans, had to make sure this unit joining temp group was never last unit in an important group.
In Arma, all units Can die, or be deleted in a group with a waypoint plan, and that waypoint plan, and group, will still exist, you can join a unit to a totally dead group and it will resume that groups waypoint plan.

Locking player out of pilot seat of helos, can be done easily thru the method suggested to me by adding an event handler to the helo "GETIN", and boot the player out if in pilot seat thru this, problem, if AI pilot was enroute to the pilot seat, and player gets in for even a Mili second, then gets booted out, still the AI pilot will freeze in his tracks, never to board again unless re-ordered -
Solution, Lock the Helos, created a three script application that adds new action to the helo that allows player to get in secondary gunner seat, which was sort of involved, because added actions have like a 15 meter radius around their object by default, so a on/off switch sort of thing was created that allows the action to show at only 5 meters from helo.

Helo problems : heh, I wont waste the next hour typing all of the issues discovered with helo Ai behaviour problems, had to work out a number of bugs - and got CSL to create a new ForceHeloDown script that runs once helo is on the ground, which uses setVelocity, basically, these helos aint goin nowhere if that script is running, which has been very helpfull. Overall result of the helo script functionality for moving helos around?--> Works great, helos 90% of the time land within a few meters of their specified LZ's, sometimes off a little more, all three helos take off and later land back at base within 30 or so meters of each other, havent had one crash yet, I suspect it will always be a possibility, but ive reduced the chance about as much as I care to attempt to.

A silly little thing, a helo that gets the pilot killed with engine on will continue to run the engine forever, and the only way ive found to have a backup to kill that engine for an empty helo is setFuel 0 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

All of this dealt with, combined with a script that is 65 Kb, which there will be six of total, just need to copy and paste, change a few globals, plus the few smaller scripts in there as well, total weight just for this application will be around 400 Kb in script.

[Special Ed]

While im thinking on this, id like to post a few things ive decided not to have in the mission, primarily due to either complexity or time consumption, or both, or even potential impossibility. The reason im posting this is because of realization of how long the entire reinforcement application is taking, and how difficult it has been in areas, and once this entire function is complete, I want to move on and finish final "to do list" and then call the entire battle function DONE, and later be able to move on to beggining to create interactable ai units, put various missions in, etc -

Hers a list of things decided not to put in http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif .... :

Helo Reinforcement stuff:

From the player group, only player can get in and "hitch" a ride on a freindly reinforcement helo. Normally, player will find the opportunity to pick up one, *maybe* two ai units later in the mission, so this is not a huge sacrifice. This position that player can take in these "special" helos is the secondary gunner turret, cannot pilot them (they are ai driven).

A bug that I have given up trying to fix - if player attempts to send one of their ai units into a reinforcement helo while it is enroute to DZ, or base, it can frig up the helo, so it will be stated in readme do not attempt tp send an ai unit to a freindly reinforcement helo, (prefferably, ever) cause it can cause that helo to not just fly in and try to pick that ai unit up, helos do sometimes get stuck in the air, flying in circles forever. Again, it is pointless to send an ai unit to one of these three helos anyhow, they will not be able to get in, scripts will deny them once they reach the helo.

A few other things:

There will be a few buildings, and in all towns a number of gaurd towers, and mg stations that will be litterally invincable. You can still kill the ai occupants of these buildings/objects, but the objects themselves cannot be killed. These objects potentially can be used multiple times by various ai units sent to them, or sent out of certain *important* barracks, so, to keep it simple and not worry about later having to deal with these being destroyed, these objects are indeed invincable to being destroyed. Certain barracks in the major enemy base that do spawn enemy troops on occasion can be deactivated by taking over that town, so they can be stopped... just not easily http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Convoys -

I may end up not doing full fledged convoys moving from town to town, not sure yet, really depends on time and difficulty of the application. If they are not put in, then I will certainly at least put in roaming town to town individual vehicles. Anyone interested in helping? The convoy thing is a seperate application and the concept is laid out, if someone wants to attempt to put in a convoy system of course it would be called their application completely and credit to them totally for it in the mission.

Town taking:

It may remain that in order for a town to be taken over, all enemy presence must be removed, was considering allowing a unit or two, but its not that simple, having to descide what to do with residual enemy units left over, etc, so, basically just in the few really big towns, it may be a little time consuming for player to take their own town over- Idea, may end up putting in some sort of heart beat sensor that picks up enemy units in a small radius around player later, maybe....

Player does have to goto town flag to take a town, and can only do so if the town has been cleared, both an inconvenience and a help, as of course if the flag does not change, it means there are still enemies in the town. Ai clan groups only need be in a towns area to potentially take the town, that is if the town has no opposing side units left in it.

Player will not be able to ransack freindly ai manned tanks, they will be locked at start, and probably will remain locked to prevent players from stealing them. All enemy tanks are fair game.

For those that keep an eye open, there should be some sort of transportation reachable within reason from many places during *most* of the mission, major exception would be some time after the begining of the mission, where player may not have much more than a few rounds and a can of beans to start of with.

Thats the most important ones I can think of. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

Sounds great.

Now get back to work!

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Sounds great.

Now get back to work!

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif
I work on this when I feel the desire and have spent easily hundreds of hours on it, if someone is looking for a mission now or in a week, or even in a month, best not pay attention to this thread http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

Just trying to work my inspiration. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

You are doing a great job as it is so don't mind my impatience.

[Maddmatt]

Town taking:

It may remain that in order for a town to be taken over, all enemy presence must be removed, was considering allowing a unit or two, but its not that simple, having to descide what to do with residual enemy units left over, etc, so, basically just in the few really big towns, it may be a little time consuming for player to take their own town over- Idea, may end up putting in some sort of heart beat sensor that picks up enemy units in a small radius around player later, maybe....

Player does have to goto town flag to take a town, and can only do so if the town has been cleared, both an inconvenience and a help, as of course if the flag does not change, it means there are still enemies in the town. Ai clan groups only need be in a towns area to potentially take the town, that is if the town has no opposing side units left in it.
You could have the last few AI drop their weapons and surrender. The BIS coop mission 'Seize the Base' does this. As for what to do with them after that, I guess you can just delete them.

[Special Ed]

You could have the last few AI drop their weapons and surrender. The BIS coop mission 'Seize the Base' does this. As for what to do with them after that, I guess you can just delete them.
Now im thinking on this lol

Id still probably leave the ai groups that take towns to deal with all opposing side units, because (heh), after they have gone thru a lengthy waypoint plan in the town, once they hit a certain waypoint it will execute a script that will doMove left over units in the town after each other, which has worked so far in the event they missed someone -

As far as the player goes this could be an idea added for them taking a town, to make it easier, only, as with everything else, this would have to implimented very carefully, and deleting the units would be an appearance issue. Honestly, even with say 5 units left in like Bagango, or a few other larger towns, it could be tough to find even those tho - Im thinking on the lines more of having some sort of "sensor" avaliable (maybe a mission reward) that player could use, that, when turned on, would show direction from player to nearby enemy units, something similiar to what ghost recon has as a heartbeat sensor, where its limited in "exactly" locating units, but at least points u in the right general direction.

Whatever happens there, I appreciate the input Maddmatt


Quote[/b] ]
Just trying to work my inspiration. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

You are doing a great job as it is so don't mind my impatience.


Thanks, had alot to drink last night http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif after 5 hours of bug squashing in the new helo script, guess I was a little touchy and just took your post the wrong way.. (reminds self that he's human, not part human part computer http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif). I appreciate the support and interest http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

bumpage

[liljb15]

Is special ed still working on the mission, I really hope it wasn't scrapped.

[johnny vet boy b]

Hey SpecialEd - how's it all going? Any news on your progress? It's gone a bit quiet and was worried you'd given up!
Johnny

[liljb15]

Hey if you just gave up on this mission could you at least release what you got!

[Special Ed]

Hello all

Been a long time, no, I have not given up on it, but I have taken a welcome break, it was essential because RL work picked up significantly and I managed to utterly burn myself out on the mission during the winter/spring.

Whats going on here now then, honestly, the main structure of the mission is indeed *relatively* near completion considering the time spent so far overall, but, as I had previously stated, this mission will not require "roleplaying" to get into, what I mean is that the town battles and such and the whole system is not going to be the end of the mission work, there must be personalized life breathed into the mission thru numerous missions avaliable in various towns of various types, and, this is where concern towards time length extension of mission completion comes in my face.

Consider this then, what we have now:

Fully functional across the island randomized town battles initiating. The system is somewhat strategic, allowing clans that take a town to "potentially" advance to attacking other nearby enemy towns, this goes for both freindly and enemy clans.

Basically the assets allowed to the various clans are also complete, most towns have artillery, larger towns have tanks, all have infantry. Artillery is fuly functional, dynamic, and ai will man the guns and barrage enemy towns during a town war.

Town battles that involve both towns attacking each other (some are attack/defend) have the most "interesting" locations picked for the two clans forces to meet and duke it out, I went to great lengths to make some really spectacular battle scenarios in a wide variety of unique terrian settings, although I have gone to great lengths to prevent tanks from getting stuck, in a few areas it is just a simple reality it is possible due to woods.

Player clan can take towns, and declare these their own.

Where its at now, moving towards finishing Helo reinforcements, which is now up and running, 3 helos in Corazol that sit empty waiting can be intiated thru scripts to be manned and boarded by troops (all units spawn at various barracks doors nearby and run to helos, very difficult script, fully dynamic).
A clan that takes a town will be allowed reinforcements flown in, Corazol is the home to freindly reinforcement helos, and will send in up to three helos to drop off troops in the newly taken town.


Thats that -

The helo App will still take considerably more time, helos right now merely drop off their troops and RTB, and even this needs to be finished, helo collision avoidance has not yet been done.
Once this is complete, a new script system will be implimented that will send theses troops dropped of to move to various defensive positions within the town, yep, this will take time.

Ok, so, say give another month or so to complete helo reinforcements completely (including the replication of various flight paths to all towns, replicating the current scripts for the enemy helos at their base)

Here is what I will have after the Helo thing:

Complete the town creation - A dynamic universal system (townCreation V1) has been created to take the hard work out of peicing together external appearances of towns, and putting in their inhabitants as well, nonetheless, this will be another month easy consdering were talking 13 towns.

Dynamic Town hide script - a script that will check on player distance to towns, and will keep most, if not all units hidden in towns that are a certain distance away from player, this will make gigantic difference in gameplay for lower end puters, and will be neccessary once all towns have been fully "populated" with units and objects. Another potential month here.

Ammo Replenishment script - I know, CSL made on already, problem is that it runs a script looping endlessly per unit, and its a nice script, but I need to make one universal script that runs on all desired units currently on the island, for simplicity and lag purposes. Prolly a week to 2 weeks.

Attack the bug list - I have a list of known bugs, most are small, that will need to be addressed, Id expect a decent month to clean upo the entire town battle function completely, some of the bug fixes will involve seperate scripts made, which remove certain island objects due to ai pathing problems even.


so

Talking potentially 4 months give or take, to actually complete the entire town battle function, including bug removal, I dont expect to get *all* the bugs, a mission this size will probably always have a few here or there, I am only 1 man.

Chances are most of this work may very well be truly completed this winter, when RL work slows down enough for me to have time to dive back into the scripting and get stuff done.

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

OK

So thats all done say, was huge work and effort, somehow I *actually* get it done http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

This leaves still a vast area open, the missions/quests - the detail, the personality...

Think about it

To just release it this way, it would be fun and dynamic, etc, but, everyone will have to do the good ol standby "roleplay" to get into it, to compensate for the lack of story, and personalization, the lack of "life" breathed into the various units, and overall scenario.

And HECK ya, were talking huge here man, frikkin big, Oblivion scale -

Initally, I had wanted to hand over the town creation to a number of people, but once I finished making the townCreation function, I realized that 1 - I can do this myself already knowing the entire layout in a month or so, 2 - people could, probably Would, have a hard time just understanding what they can/cant do in just placing units/objects that may severely interfere with the way the townbattle scripts function, and so I decided to do this myself (my appreciation still towards those willing to help http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif )

So, here is what I am looking at:

I am intending to complete the entire town battle function solely, I know it inside and out, and to expect someone to try to figure it all out is asking to much, talking 5K some lines in scripts. This is still reasonably doable for me.

This huge area of creating missions/ dynamic dialogs involving npc's in various towns, this is a truly seperate application, a few small parameters to comply with for mission compatability reasons, but seperate nonetheless.

What I am leaning towards here is in the future is asking, asking around ALOT, for people to join in and start putting in missions on the island here, which will involve dialogs with npc's - using the already Arma converted SOW dynamic dialog (thanks to CSL for the conversion http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif ), new npcs, missions. When the time comes, the missions is going to need help from the "gifted" mission designers within the community here, the mission I can see now will only be all it truly can be by having this help, I simply will never have the time alone to do all of the missions/npc interaction myself, I can only do a limited amount.

I know there are ALOT of very gifted people who can do great things with missions/npc interaction, and the mission is going to need you guys, I will only ask for the help once the town battle function itself has gotten close enough to completion where I can send the mission over and people can play thru it get all of the primary elements in their time, maybe buggy, maybe lacking a few elements still, but the mission must be very close to having the battle function complete, this is only fair, and this way all of you will know what the mission has to offer, wether its worth its weight in putting something in, and if the mission is close enough to completion to call it ready for the details.

I had already began a dynamic dialog system that complimented SOWs dynamic dialog, my script system allowed dialogs with npcs to happen in real time, covering issues with npc's getting shot during animations/dialogs, even npc's reactions to player being "bad" and attacking them during a dialog, etc - these functions will be easily implimented into dialogs with npc's, and prevent some really nasty potential results from player trying to mess around during an npc dialog. These dialogs function no different than in a high quality Rpg like oblivion, mutiple player responses can be allowed, multiple npc responses, npc animations can easily be put in along with their voice responses.
My only "stipulation" will be primarily on the voice files for npcs. Meaning they will have to be high quality. I spent about a month putting some dialogs together for a few npcs in the old Ofp version, and used dialog voice files from another game which I edited, and used to create the dialogs, and these were absolutely excellent, as of course the voice files were of great quality, and it ended up being good enough to be put into a real Rpg being sold on the shelf, with mission updates and all mixed into the dialogs, and, it was dang good fun to put it together with SOWs dynamic dialog, the animations put in here and for the npc's reactions was just icing on the cake.

Anyhow, I hope some folks might feel a tad of interest in helping out with this later on, heck, send me an email if you want, I cant offer up anything just yet, but someday in the future here, the mission just "might" get to where its time for such, where people can be free to put in their own mission content within the dynamic enviornment, be happy to hear from anyone if they might feel inclined to "potentially" contribute later on.

Thats pretty much it for now http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

L8er guys

[liljb15]

OH MY GOD you're back!! I thought you died or had given up, man I was planning or bribing the CIA to give me your personal information so I could torture you (not really). Good to see you back man.

[Special Ed]

heh

yes, ive been around, didnt really mean to leave people hanging, just needed to more/less stop on the mission for a while, considering the scope and scale, certain apps, like the helo reinforcements have turned muchly into work more than fun due to complexity, which was fine, but once RL work kicked in, I had to let this go for a while, just the way it goes.

The only consolation I can provide exists also in the previous post of mine, which is the same as here, this will still take alot more time to finish, and those few of you guys that have read this stuff and posted now and again, I appreciate your support, this entire thread has really made this mission feel a little (or a lot) more than just an unfinished *idea* sitting on my hd thru its progress, I appreciate that alot.

See what happens, I doubt unfortunately that I will be able to truly get any decent amount of work done thru the coming weeks/months due to Rl work, although this is actually a good thing, as Rl work does truly *pay* http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif and its not easy right now to just peck away at it, as the helo scripts almost require an amount of focus to complete that I just dont currently have the time to afford...

If Bis would just "sponsor" the mission, then I could prolly get the whole thing done with dialogs and sub missions and all in 2 months! :P .... Prolly not going to happen lol

Do wish I could release some sort of sample mission, but it would end up consuming, again, more of my time to extract a mission with just a few towns, have to work with townCreation to spiff up those towns, etc, in the end, it would not do the mission justice really, the whole concept is to provide an island full of conflict - a few towns? There are plenty of high quality missions from creators here that would offer up the same, with even missions intertwined and prolly voice speech/intros/etc, I realistically cant see making a sample mission that would be worth its weight without wrecking the final product, to release a beta as it is would do this, in its unfinished state.

Just have to see waht happens in the coming months, really my guess is as good as anyone elses, this is just a game, a hobby, I chose a really huge project here, and I dont think I realized the scope until I was already half way thru it, but thats ok, its been very rewarding to see it come this far, just have to let it ride for now and see what time reveals.

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[WolfFlight]

I am still boggled by the fact that he says he has working artillery and that the AI will get in and man it and use it against you....

at ranges exceeding their sight? to support other units??

artillery has ranges in Kilometers (and miles&#33http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

don't usually see AI engage outside of about 500 meters.... even takes usually engage only withing about a kilometer

[Special Ed]

I am still boggled by the fact that he says he has working artillery and that the AI will get in and man it and use it against you....

at ranges exceeding their sight? to support other units??

artillery has ranges in Kilometers (and miles&#33http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

don't usually see AI engage outside of about 500 meters.... even takes usually engage only withing about a kilometer
your response is a little boggling, not exactly what I said regarding this, actually not at all

various towns do have artillery peices, thesse are actually artillery batteries, some with up to 3 peices, mg stations, patrols, and gunners on standby.

When a war erupts between two clans holding towns, these towns are usually right next to eachother, and if either town has artillery batteries still functional, the gunners will run and get in the arty peices and begin to barrage the enemy town... see now? lol

Artillery barrages can last up to half an hour to an hour, targets are randomly selected within the area of the town of the enemy.

I dont know the exact details on waht arty can and cant do, but I suppose in the event two towns fighting are spread out too far for what would normally be an acceptable distance for artillery to function, or for some reason due to LOS someone doesent like it, well, then maybe do some other mission? LOL

The addition of the artillery system HUGELY boosted the intensity of the town battles, in fact, it frikkin knocked my socks off for a while once implimented watching all these various assetts working together to create a symphony of combat elements. Even better, at some point planning to impliment CSL's burning buildings, so after a long barrage a city should look really awsome, with huge smoke pluming from arty struck buildings as well.

[liljb15]

Hey special ed I really want to try this and instead of waiting 4 months why don't you release a beta of what you have done and periodically update it with missions and whatnot. Maybe I'm speaking for myself but I hope alot of other people agree with me.

[Special Ed]

Honsetly the only way Id even consider doing such would be to spend the time to do the full town creation, where towns would have everything they should have, actually a fun thing to do -

Ok, so I do this. Towns now got all the 'cosmetic' fixes, gaurd towers, patrols, walls, mg bunkers, spotlights, etc, prolly wont even take a month.

You guys grab this thing up like hotcakes, in its unfinished state, and have fun with it till ur bored of it. Then I end up making various updates, but... guess what, no one really cares about updates cause theyve already played the heck out of it, seen all the towns, and participated in the battles. Basically, what will happen is, once released that will be the end of the mission, updates im sure will draw "some" people, but how many folks are willing to play the same mission over, and over, and over just because of new updates, it would only get older, and older, and older...

My suggestion, if u enjoy missions of large scale, try Mike Melvins CTI, even alone, its a great mission, I used to love spending hours just playing a cti game even alone in Ofp, and it looks like its finally been properly converted in Arma, but I think eventually people will get bored of my mission in its current state, there is too much unfinished business to hand it out.

[liljb15]

Well then...umm let me beta test, you need beta testers right?

[Special Ed]

@ liljb15

heh lol, your persistance is admirable http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Unfortunately the mission is not in beta stage yet, nice try tho.... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Sorry, mission like this takes huge time to complete, there is no miracle workaround for this except for having multiple people working on it, which has seemed impossible to find someone willing to take part - although understandable considering the complexity and effort required for mission apps, this is just the way it is, and most of us have RL prioritized, so time to spend is almost always limited. Sure, if there was a team of say even three people working on this, it would prolly be done, but, there is me, CSL has assisted in a number of applications, but for the most part, there is only one person working on this mission...

Anyhow, I dont want to drag this topic out, for fear of moderators closing it until progress resumes, so Im not going to post again for a while until there is something to post about, or else Im in the end just spamming the forums, these guys here do a good job of keeping the forums clean and proffesional, I want to adhere to this.

[johnny vet boy b]

Glad you're alive and well SpecialEd. Keep boffing the muff.

[Chip360]

Wow! Ive never even seen this thread, mustve been burried. I have to say, Im Flabergasted http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Just reading about the artillery, and all the other details really made me crave this new mission (Which will be SP! THANK GOD&#33http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif ArmA is a great game and all, but its really missing a lot of the little details and personal touches, this mission gives me hope that some day ArmA will be a whole new game, through the help of modders and mission makers like you. Thankyou for embarking on such an ambitious project, I hope all the best for you, and I can wait however long you need to take to get it released, good luck!

[CharveL]

I see I'm going to have to brush up on mission editing if this cool project is going to see the light of day. Hehe, balancing with RL time is a tough one I agree.

Till then, this bump is for potential project help. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif

[Special Ed]

Thanks all for the kind words guys http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Update:

Working on the TownHide function now.

Descided to make this application standalone, meaning it will be released as a seperate app, partly so I can actually release *something* from my work on this mission rather than having to wait x more months, and its essentially a stand alone style anyhow.

The performance boost from this app will be gigantic, it will litteraly be able to clean out entire towns forces that are not vehicles and restore them properly. This will enable modders to be able to populate litterally as many towns as they would like, with as many units as they would like, and this app will store all of those units - except towns x distance from player group units. This is only Sp compatable.

It will support hiding static units (units that are stationary, ai disabled), supports hiding units manning static weapons, including spotlights, and will return them to manning those objects, supports hiding units on waypoint plans and returns them to their original positions within the wp plan.

The reason this has actually become relatively easy to do, is that the scripts work on a town to town area basis, rather than by the group. The only script running constantly will be a small master script that checks player group distance to each town area, and executes hide/show accordingly. There is also only 1 global variable used to store all units per town, so both the management of the scripts and the global variable will keep this script from ever causing the savegame bug.

Usage will be very simple as well, only needing to name units desired to be of the 'static' type, and give appropriate marker names with each unit for them to watch - the script will recognize these units as 'static' and will restore them with ai disabled, and watching the provided marker. Any units not desired to be hidden are put into a global array provided, and any units that are not in that array, and are not static, are stored and later returned to their pos, allowing them to resume any waypoint plan.

Currently im not doing actual moving vehicles tho, it would be quite difficult to start getting into that area considering the wide scope of issues there.

To show what a dif this makes, I used a test mission, with all towns populated at start was getting around 20 to 25 fps, then I removed most of the units from all of the towns except the one I was in, jumped to 45 fps...

Getting the inital structure ssetup has taken some time, but now that it is setup, its going really well.

[Special Ed]

Sorry, making a second post here to hopefully fix wierd issue here with pag8 being blank and not loading - refer to bottom of page 7 for most recent update I just put in http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Edit, it fixed it -

[CharveL]

See now you're just being cruel. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

This keeps sounding better and better.

If you um...need someone to test your progress so far...you could twist my arm.

[Special Ed]

Thanks CharveL for the offer m8

This app, alike most others are big enough and complex enough to warrant having to test as I go to be sure I dont forget stuff/build script structure wrong - but beta testing might be a good plan for this, certainly keep this in mind -

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/thumbs-up.gif

[Jolly_Roger]

Looks nice for me !!!! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/notworthy.gif


I hope play this mission soon


http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Yarrow]

I read some of these posts, and I must say you are doing a amazing job here!! Cant wait till the final product. I also think it is nice of you to take your time. It will only make the "mission" much better! Keep on it!

[Special Ed]

Thanks Yarrow http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Indeed its the choice between time and quality or less time and less quality, I cant even bring myself to do it any other way than what I feel is right, even after stripping a number of ideas out its still taking alot of time, ah well, seems like thats modding for you in general anyhow...:p

[Special Ed]

Update


Just tested running both TownHide and TownShow scripts, its working http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

I am seeing just one unit not being restored, prolly an error in my unit count in the array, which i will need to fix, but, its working http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

In the town im testing in, ive got 3 Mg gunners, 4 tower guards and 6 patrol units, everyone except one tower guard is being spawned right back in place, and manning Mg's/spotlights, watching correct directions, this is awsome http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Still some more work to do in this particular app, but its looking real good http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif wohoo

[liljb15]

Can I beta test!!!??!?!?! I want to play your mission so bad.

[CharveL]

Sounds like a brilliant bit of scripting too that will really pay off dividends in framerate and immersion. There's nothing quite as disappointing as going a bit out of the way on some mission only to find the world completely deserted.

I wonder if this could be applied for general mission building to populate towns on-the-fly (sort of).

[Special Ed]

Sounds like a brilliant bit of scripting too that will really pay off dividends in framerate and immersion. There's nothing quite as disappointing as going a bit out of the way on some mission only to find the world completely deserted.

I wonder if this could be applied for general mission building to populate towns on-the-fly (sort of).
Nothing really brilliant my friend, what I would call 'brilliant' stuff would be like some of the dialog stuff people like CSL and others have come out with, that stuff is way beyond me.

Honestly it takes me a very long time to do scripts, this app now equals wieght of 35 kb so far, and took me about 10 hours at least over 3 days to do, I constantly have to check and recheck everything im doing to be sure im putting it all together correctly.

"I wonder if this could be applied for general mission building to populate towns on-the-fly (sort of)."

Would be impossible to do that, to populate towns with this, without having preset locations of the various towers and their gaurds, mg bunkers and their gunners, stationary gaurds and patrols, they would just be scattered alover the place and would look like crap.

Really to create an alive town/base the easiest way to do this is to just place the units by hand in the editor, especially when it comes to static units (not moving, guards primarily) - and with really very little effort put in by the mission maker, this script will hide/show all those units, heck u could populate every town on the map and this script can completely take out the lag, aside from any potential lag due to a town nearby of course, but we wouldnt want that town hidden now would we ... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

There are random patrol scripts of course, first ones to come to mind are CSL's and Kronzkys. Although I cannot say honestly if this script app would confilct with those units being used in random patrol scripts in towns or not, if it did I suppose a small subscript could be put in by the mission maker to account for this, I cant cover everything/

Anyhow, as usual, there are some bugs I dug up in the resulting multiple tests last night upon respawning units, seems there is some funky random thing going on where spawned units with a waypoint plan are getting like kinda stuck, where they stand there spinning around in circles, and out in the wide open with the waypoint right in front of them, Ill need to determine exactly what this is and find a fix, it only happens like once out of 5 times, but it needs to be fixed. Everything else works great, tower guards go back in their towers, etc, Mg gunners spawn and get back in weapons (resetting ammo to Mg's per spawn as well so they dont man an empty or half empty gun).

Hey, btw again thanks for the support and interest CharveL, much appreciated http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif


@liljb15

The mission is not in Beta stage, nor is it close to it, sorry, the mission has been in the works for well over a year now, and it certainly will not be next week or next month when it will be ready for beta testing, but when it is ready, it will likely be put up on Ofpec beta testing and your of course will be welcome to try it out http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

Quote[/b] ] Really to create an alive town/base the easiest way to do this is to just place the units by hand in the editor, especially when it comes to static units (not moving, guards primarily) - and with really very little effort put in by the mission maker, this script will hide/show all those units, heck u could populate every town on the map and this script can completely take out the lag, aside from any potential lag due to a town nearby of course, but we wouldnt want that town hidden now would we ... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

This is what I mean actually. Units and their respective waypoints would be placed accordingly on mission design but your script would only show the ones in your particular town or vicinity to reduce lag. Sort of a dynamic actor loading script.

[Special Ed]

Quote[/b] ] Really to create an alive town/base the easiest way to do this is to just place the units by hand in the editor, especially when it comes to static units (not moving, guards primarily) - and with really very little effort put in by the mission maker, this script will hide/show all those units, heck u could populate every town on the map and this script can completely take out the lag, aside from any potential lag due to a town nearby of course, but we wouldnt want that town hidden now would we ... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

This is what I mean actually. Units and their respective waypoints would be placed accordingly on mission design but your script would only show the ones in your particular town or vicinity to reduce lag. Sort of a dynamic actor loading script.
There was some sort of mis-communication here, what you just described is exactly what it does.

The main 'master' script checks distance to all 'designated' areas to player group units, and executes hide or show scripts accordingly for those particular areas. This runs throughout the entire duration of the mission hiding and showing appropriate town areas/base areas.

It hides all but the nearest 'designated' areas to player group units - of course this must include players units as well, cannot have players ai being sent into enemy/friendly towns that are completely dead, when they are really not.

But ya, thats what it does.

[Special Ed]

an update

Finally found a fix for the units stuck at spawn with waypoint plans, simple, Unit doMove getPos unit - ironically this was put into the script as a backup in case of this happening, but it never fired due to the one true root of a number of issues, that is a unit cannot hold a name of a previous existing unit, well, it can be assigned, but the name cannot be referenced to cause the new unit to do anything, this ultimately was the failure.

This is very good to know, very thankfull doMove seems to fix the stuck problem. ColonelSandersLite spent a few hours last night and formulated some code for the script that can fix the name issue here, which was not easy for him to get together, and the result is using globals equal to the units either in their inits or in any code to be able to pass this name on after the unit is deleted to the new unit which is spawned that represents him, and to be able to access these globals for those units. If this indeed turns out to be the best fix, my goal is to have only units that the mission makers desires to have accessable need these globals set to them, therefore again, avoiding use of too many globals to stay far away from the save game bug.

[Jolly_Roger]

Nice ed... your work sounds great for me !!!!

[Special Ed]

Thanks Jolly_Roger http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Ive tested the town hide/show function just now repeated times in the same mission over time, no errors, no problems to report, this is huge - has taken very much time and work, and great fortune to find and fix bugs, and get this thing to work.

Id like to give thanks to my God (the one and only http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif ), I highly doubt I could have pulled this off without him guiding me here, its strange how Ive ended up tracking a few bugs, for really no reason as they werent true bugs just to have that path I started on land me in discovering issues I prolly would never have found any other way -

thanks also to CSL, he helped hugely in finding a fix for the newly created units constant name reference, he really had to dive deep to figure out something that would work.

This although is one of the smaller apps Ive made, its certainly my most complex, having dived into an area that Im not used to in depth, multi dimensional arrays, managing element positions, finding elements positions within in array, removing elements, some pretty wild stuff (for me anyhow.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif )

Yep, still some more work to do, need to add a number of needed features, then make a master script to run both scripts on multi towns, a dead unit management script to update arrays so they dont get overloaded with dead units.

Still, this is a huge breakthru, time to open a cold one and celebrate (after 10 min celebration back to it... http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif )

[Special Ed]

Update

Just got back after a long welcome break.

I just got up the rough version of the master script to run the townHide function, I need to go back thru and optimize it, but although untested (and prolly a few errors) it looks like a solid structure and should do the job. Of course the town hide/show scripts are were already tested and fully working some time ago.

Once the TownHide function is tested on multiple towns in a test version, I will need to go thru and make a final version for release that will have both a clean templete and a 3 town sample templete.

Not sure yet if it might need a tester or two, so far testing has been ok solo with this.

There will be some required script altering for users, this is unavoidable, but its very simple stuff, basically just having to input names of certain units in each town and their adjecent watch markers (for stationary units/gunners) and a few primary markers/trigger names for each town. Considering the yield is to be able to litterally populate every town on the map, its not alot of extra work, at all.

As said before, this wont support hiding/showing vehicles, but almost everything else involving Man type units under the sun it does, including, well, everything, it stores even editor placed waypoint plans, stores Mg gunners and puts them back in upon showing them again, even tower guards, spotlight manners -

Funny the hide/show scripts took seemingly endless hours to do, this control script took one evening lol....

[CharveL]

Well hurry up man and release it before I break a hip or something! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[gassybutt]

Even without the missions, it sounds like it would be cool to be in the middle of these random type battles with the AI going about their business all around you.

Looking forwards to a release.

[Treelor]

I *just* now found this thread? Good lord. This stuff is exactly the kind of mission that I'm looking for. Great work, I've been thinking about learning scripting for ArmA (I tried before, wiki didn't help in the slightest) but now that I see that this sort of stuff can be done it's really renewed my interest.

I'm greatly anticipating this mission, hopefully you'll see it through to the end!

[Chip360]

Hows the progress on the TownHide Function Going?

[CharveL]

http://www.geocities.com/mn_ice_warrior/hes_dead_jim.gif

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[Treelor]

DO NOT WANT DEAD

[Chip360]

Oh well guyz : (

[Special Ed]

Not necessarily dead, but right now on back burner due to real life responsibilities lately and the fact I still needed a break, this is a very large mod for one person.

I appreciate the support from everyone, we will see what happens in the coming months.

No matter what happens, it has been quite a ride, and very great learning experience in scripting, even learning some basic C++ coding, pretty cool stuff.

Please dont hang on this mod, I cant realistically say what will happen, even if it does get done some day, there is still so much to be done, it wouldn't be soon.

Thanks again for everyones support and time show interest in this project tho, its made it more enjoyable especially through some of the really frustrating parts to know people were *actually* interested http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Mission is back online http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Report :

Town Hide Script system Complete, removes nearly all lag from each town

Town Hide system, now that it is complete, is being worked into the mission (not fun! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif)

Projection:

Once town hide system is fully put in and tested, moving on to completion of the reinforcement scripts, something I enjoyed very much, and needs completion.

If things continue on in a reasonable manner in speed of completion, I forsee a new video on the way, which will include the amazing reinforcements system - large part of this system thanks to Colonel Sanders Lite for his original version of the system that I modified for the mission.

See what happens here, its a good bit of work to get the town hide system worked into the mission, but it will nearly clean out all cities of their occupants while player units are a distance away, basically removing about 70 percent or more of all lag IG.

There is a link also to the publicized version of TownHide, I can provide a link if desired, it enables the enitre island to be populated with virtually no lag.

Moving on, and glad to be working on this again http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[R0adki11]

Is it at all possible that you release what you have got, it might get other people interested in using it and helping you.

[Special Ed]

Until at least an alpha version is ready, there is no true purpose in a public release, it would only diminish the effect of the final product, and encourage the chance of someone else taking the hard work put into the mission and making their own before it was completed.

Anyone that were interested in helping can contact me via a pm, and if it seems like something that person may be interested in trying to help with I can then send over the entire mission as is for them to look at http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I cant just publicly put it out tho for people to look at, even if it were just for sake of potential help drawn in, there are too many horror stories of people stealing other people work, and the norm for any big mission project is for people to come in and ask to 'check it out', etc, and the mission would be distributed to a few individuals for potentially joining/working on the project in a join effort.

I do feel the mission is far worthy of a team to continue work on it and its current stage is now quite far along, but there is a complexity level and some advanced scripting involved, I have never expected to have the luxury to find anyone, or even a team for that matter, of relatively highly talented scripters to join in, more often than not these people are already involved in projects of their own, or already in a team.

Colonel Sanders Lite joined in for quite some time, and his help has been huge, and really, I dont know how I could have gotten this far without him, not only have his scripts been implemented, but his knowledge he openly shared with me has been a gigantic help, but now I am on my own again, and its fine, its just the way it is http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

After 2 days of mind bending work integrating the town hide system, a welcome break I have found in making something new..

A video

I wish that U toob didnt seem to enjoy diminishing the quality of videos uploaded..
Nonetheless, here we go



Kolgujev Conflict Video 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jPKm9S_mBo)

Edit- warning. watch video in the small box, do not expand to full size unless you enjoy a pixelated view! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

This video reveals new additions to the mission, not revealed in the older video -

The still un-implemented helo reinforcement system, not completely finished, but its near completion and was a huge task. Its a combination of Colonel Sanders Lite's scripts and mine, combined to provide a fully functional, universal reinforcement system that works in real time, and as visually appealing as possible - units do not spawn in the helos, they spawn at entrances to barracks and move out to get in helos - pilots will board first and start up the engines, helos will sit tight and hold while running until all units have boarded, put this together with three helos in the flight pad area it makes a truly impressive sight to see during the boarding process..
Once a town has been taken successfully by one of the two opposing forces during a town battle, helo reinforcements can be called in, from either the friendly merchant city (Corazol), or, if enemy wins, from the enemy main base at the northern tip of Sahrani. This video shows a reinforcement execution from Corazol to Bagango. The appropriate troops are boarded, and flown in, and will be sent to defensive positions within the city.
A player can 'hitch a ride' on a helo and man the mg as well, which is what I did to finish up the footage of the helos taking off and dropping friendly troops to Bagango.

Also included, the new barrage script system, again, a system that combins both CSL's and my own scripts, to make a universal artillery system, that, again works in real time, no spawning, units will man guns when a strike is needed, and lock in on targets, and will disembark guns and return to standby positions when the strike is over.

Both of these systems are fully operated by ai, and the scripts, the artillery is already imbedded in the mission and fully running.

Lastly, a few final pics of units and tanks moving out during a town to town battle.

Seriously, if anyone was ever interested in joining in on a project that goes far into the realms of quality, and takes many of the major aspects and puts them into a realistic perspective, so the player can actually be 'wow'ed' by whats going on constantly, be drawn into the immersion, and find an island not just alive with life, but that life has a mind of its own.

The Ai intelligence added thru code has put quite a twist in the friendly and enemy behaviour, they know when to advance on a new town, they know when to take defensive positions, they know when to call in for reinforcements, and they know how to man static weapons left over in a city for defense, and they know alot more than that too!

Im happy to be working on this, it would be nice if some talented individuals out there might get interested in this and be willing to at least look at the mission as it is - Its worth it, I get a thrill as the creator just from doing IG tests constantly.

Anyhow, great stuff, moving on, need to finish getting the TownHide system de-bugged and properly working now thats its implimented.

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Edit/

For those of you interested in the techincalities, heres, as normal, some of the universal capabilities of the ai involved here:

Real time boarding scenario while helos sit tight at full throttle on the ground

Kill the pilot, co pilot will disembark and board as pilot

Kill even the co-pilot whom is pilot at the time, and one of the boarding troops will move to the pilot seat (he might not be the best pilot around, but he will get the troops to the DZ http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Destroy a helo, kill the occupants, depending on what side the reinforcement was for, that sides town just lost that many reinforcements for that town (not recommended to do this against a freindly reinforcement in Corazol http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Disable a helo at the base while they are boarding/destroy it, and the troops that were boarding will take defensive roles, and hold, eventually they will return to their barracks

If a helo is shot down that has survivors, the scripts will send those survivors to the town to be reinforced on foot.

You can jump on a friendly helo as the gunner of one of the two mg's, you cannot take the pilot seat -sorry! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Undetermined wether stealing of enemy helos will be allowed or not, dependent on overall mission play effect http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif Either way, you can sure as heck blow them up http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Some might not like it, but unless the main enemy base is taken over, you can destroy enemy helos involved in a reinforcement call, but on the next call, the air barracks will respawn new helos for the next call -

Means you can basically completely disable a reinforcement call from the enemy base, but to completely stop them from makign further reinforcement helo calls, their base must be taken over completely.

Happy trails http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Time to take a lil break http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Rak]

This mission sounds great, Total War meets ArmA http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif Looking forward to it.

[Special Ed]

Thanks Rakgitarmen http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Not real happy with what You-Tube did to the video, the orginal video is like twice as good quality that I uploaded - o well

[Special Ed]

Woot!

Finally got some "major' bugs worked out in the implementing of the TownHide system, and the first successful town battle has executed properly with it running http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Ran fraps during the battle, before the system was put in I was getting from 15 to 25 fps while in the fight, now im getting from 30 to 50 fps!

Thats with all 15 cities populated with between 20 to 30 advance troops, and artillery batteries!

Im sure something will come up, at some point again, there's just too many things that can go wrong with this system put in to expect it to be perfect after finding the obvious bugs, but its certainly working now.

[Special Ed]

mk,,

Ill remove all the code -

Spending 5 hours between brainstorming and putting in code for what seemed to be a simple addition made it kinda irresistible http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Last bit anyhow, time to execute this thing

And ya, wish I could put out a way pre- alpha just to show people what the mission has so far

Im not comfortable with that tho, and a big reason is because it is sp, not mp - I certainly dont want people to get bored of it after playing thru 20 times, then once the final release comes no one wants it..

Theres also a ton of debug code that comes in from like 20 scripts during the mission, and im not prepared to remove that until the mission is in an alpha stage, I dont think many people would like to see all that come up during their game play. Its not as simple as 'debug = false', much of the debug code is query reliant, so the only way to remove it is to go thru each script and comment it out, something saved for the Alpha version.

Sorry, its all I can do.

[Treelor]

No worries, I'm really glad to see that this is still going strong! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/thumbs-up.gif

[Special Ed]

Thanks Treelor http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Time to test the re- hiding of towns after a battle, lol, been putting it off for a few days, this will take some time, when one town battle takes at the very least an hour, and there is no temporary script short cuts I can make to speed it up for testing http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Special Ed]

5 hours of testing, fixing some typos in the script, and the integrated hiding after a town battle is over is working.

Ive discovered a new bug, one to be addressed way later due to low priority, but tanks that are alive from winning clan, of which once at a certain point in the newly taken town are cleared out, their crew disembarks and waits nearby, the tank engines are still running.. lol Stupid bug, I think its because I am ordering getIn False, and therefore it might force an eject command, which it seems leaves the vehicles engines on when no one is in it - later on I'll prolly need to put in some code that orders a getOut true or something, hopefully that will fix that, cant believe after a year of on/off testing I never noticed this.

Next area of attack in the mission, moving on to completion and implementation of Helo Reinforcement scripts! Been waiting a long time to get this far http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Thanks again btw all for your continuing support http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Three days of work, its working!

The huge bug of helos occasionally crashing into eachother during helo reinforcements is fixed.

Wow - a complicated delay system had to be installed, which made each helo wait on eachother before taking off from the base LZ or the DZ, but its all finally working..

Pheww..

Time to take a break and do.. something? else.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Next area of attack is to replicate the reinforcement scripts to work on the enemy helos, mostly minor adjustments, copy and paste -

Then move on to a new script system that sends the dropped off troops to either join advancable groups, split them up to various patrols within a city and split them up to man left over mg's and towers/tower spotlights. A new script system, but it should be pretty cool http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Moving on
Edit/

For those of you interested in the techincalities, heres, as normal, some of the universal capabilities of the ai involved here:

Real time boarding scenario while helos sit tight at full throttle on the ground

Kill the pilot, co pilot will disembark and board as pilot

Kill even the co-pilot whom is pilot at the time, and one of the boarding troops will move to the pilot seat (he might not be the best pilot around, but he will get the troops to the DZ http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Destroy a helo, kill the occupants, depending on what side the reinforcement was for, that sides town just lost that many reinforcements for that town (not recommended to do this against a friendly reinforcement)

Disable a helo at the base while they are boarding/destroy it, and the troops that were boarding will take defensive roles, and hold, eventually they will return to their barracks

If a helo is shot down that has survivors, the scripts will send those survivors to the town to be reinforced on foot.

You can jump on a friendly helo as the gunner of one of the two mg's, you cannot take the pilot seat -sorry!

Undetermined wether stealing of enemy helos will be allowed or not, dependent on overall mission play effect http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif Either way, you can sure as heck blow them up http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Unless the main enemy base is taken over, you can destroy enemy helos involved in a reinforcement call, but on the next call, the air barracks will respawn new helos for the next call -

Means you can 'plausibly' completely disable a reinforcement call from within the enemy base, but to completely stop them from making further reinforcement helo calls, their base must be taken over completely. Without taking over the enemy base, this would be difficult considering their defenses, but anything is possible with planning.

Edit/ Do understand there is a inputted level of realism here
The enemy base is huge, and there is no reasonable way to simply plot to start the mission up, go over there with a few units and destroy it, and remove their abilities to reinforce their cities/towns - anyone that attempted to do this off the bat would be severely disappointed over time after being killed one hundred times, it will take time, and patience, to get that far, and with help from the allied cities (if they still exist provided the player assisted in town/city wars) http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Of course you can attempt to plot against an enemy reinforcement, and guesstimate where they will land nearby their newly taken town, and shoot down a helo as it comes in, of course this wont be easy, there will likely be three helos coming in, and taking down one would reveal your position to the others - all enemy helos mg's will be fully manned, aside from being on top of the enemy city which holds x number of enemy troops nearby, A plan would be in order http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Happy trails http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Time to take a lil break http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Desiderius]

everything sounds amazing.. we cant wait until you release a first version http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif Maybe we can help with betatesting if you want.

Greetings

[Special Ed]

Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

For sure there will be heavy duty testing required, Alpha testing will be the first phase, where the mission will need alot of help, then move from there to beta.

Impossible for me to reasonably alpha test everything to perfection.

I would imagine when the time comes offers for testers can be posted here and on Ofpec. Of course all testers will be included in the credits for the mission.

[Treelor]

This is really sounding amazing. BI ought to hire you.

[froggyluv]

Quote[/b] ] Kill the pilot, co pilot will disembark and board as pilot



Genius!


Quote[/b] ] Rest of stuff...

Very cool!

[Nowyoudie]

Keep up the good work. There needs to be more people like you and you don't seem to spend a lot of time just on programming, but typing the posts on your own thread! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif You could always take a break and you don't need us to tell you to do that. But then again keep doing what you're good at. Making a game! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[Special Ed]

@Treelor

Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif I think most of the mission makers here wish the same thing would happen to them http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

@froggyluv

Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif Some of it is ideas to make things more dynamic, others are things that came up to keep the particular functions from being stopped by just one kill.

@Nowyoudie

When it takes over a month sometimes to finish just one area of the mission, its gratifying to post on that, as if a 'separate' mission has been completed, if I waited to post on the mission until it was at an alpha, there wouldnt be much to say for a long time http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif Coming on year three since this mission was first started in Ofp lol
Not being in a team also tends to make it get a bit lonely now and then, and like everyone else that works hard at a project, its nice to share from time to time.

Thats why I post every so often here, I never really expect anyone to respond knowing I dont even offer up a sample mission yet, but its appreciated and nice when people do http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

O btw, time invested in posting here in comparison to work on mission, incomparable lol - maybe for every 5 minutes I spend posting here, there must be 20 hours or more of work spent in the mission :P

[Special Ed]

Being ive been on an update spree lately http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

New features/changes to helo reinforcement scripts :

New reset helos script made - after a reinforcement call, helos rtb, and land in a relatively small area next to each other, and did not leave the original 'conformed' look of them all facing same direction, and in exact formation positions on the ground. So -

All is the same, except once the player is 1000 meters away from the base helo landing area, after all helos have landed and pilots have left, the helos are reset to original positions. Was a good bit of work, but it makes things much more visually appealing. And of course its impossible to ever see them get re-set this way also.


New script added to cancel out 'player get in helo gunner seat' scripts, now player can only get in the helo's gunner seat during a reinforcement call - a lag reduction application, so those scripts only run during a reinforcement call

Currently working on the script to move dropped off units to various positions within a city/town - Quite an interesting application so far - my first need to use the 'set' command to modify arrays within a multi dimensional array (something like 50 total elements in the array) - This complexity due to the fact im trying to keep this system of directing dropped off troops to one script rather than one per helo, which both reduces any potential added lag and further avoids the save game bug - this is the last and final, major application for the entire town battle system - and she's kickin' back hard to get this done http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

[Special Ed]

New update

Current progress on Reinforcement_Unit_Manager -

7 days of work, over 20 hours of work, is progressing well -

Its big

Current size is 57 Kb's, which includes the inputted info for one town for testing.

Expected size, anywhere between 100kb and 200 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

Completion areas : (untested)

Universal, all towns and all sides reinforcable

Universal system, only need input specific info for each town reinforcement, if groups do not pre- exist, they will be created, along wiht any needed waypoint plans

Mg stations, SpotLight gunners, tower guards, and standard static guards, all are inputted into the universal assignment system - only need input certain info for them, and the town, and they will move to positions.


Yep -untested tho, quite certain some issues will arise, but the script build appears solid beyond reasonable doubt overall.

Next -

Need to refine the patrols area, for units dropped off to be sent as patrols, which adds the units to new groups

then a whole new area -

Check on units, any tower guard units, once they are at x distance to tower are to be teleported to their proper height and position (this due to the issues of ai units getting stuck trying to climb ladders, and some other problems) -

Any units that have not made it to their designated positions or designated gunner seats over a large period of time will be instantly transported, this fixes any random occurances of units getting stuck -

For those not informed up to this point -

This script system takes over once the (up to) 3 helos have landed and drops units off, and sends them to various positions for defense in a newly taken town - these positions range from Static mg's, spotlights on towers, tower guards, static guard positions, and potentially multitudes of 2 - 3 man patrols.

Of course, this system sends units to various defensive positions within a town, of 14 towns, in real time, the only teleporting is when a tower guard gets right to the tower, or if a unit is stuck for a pro-longed period of time, but normally, this is all done realistically in real time.

Mind is blown out tonight, moving on - next target area - complete patrol assignments tomorrow (hopefully http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Moving on http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

new update -

Primary phase of the reinforcements sent out script is working.. finally

Lotsa time spent fixing typos (cant blame me, its a big script http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

Right now, during the test mission, the helos will fly to a mock up "Town1" and drop off units -

From there, the script will split the units up into various groups, and send them to various positions in the town.

The script requires inputting how many mg's, tower spotlights, static guard positions, and patrol waypoints plans are available for each town -

From there, (basically), it will send specified 'garrison' troops that were boarded on helos to those positions.

depending on how many 'garrison' troops were boarded, the script will assign units to all positions available in the following order, until it runs out of available units, first in the list being the 'primary' positions, last being least ::

1 static mg gunners

2 spotlight gunners

3 tower guards

4 static guards

5 patrols (with specified cycling/looping waypoints plans)

Any units left over are to be added to existing created patrols, normally by default each patrol is created as a 2 man, hence additional units can expand patrol sizes


The amount of garrison units available will depend on how drained the main 2 'advancable' groups are that have taken the ctiy/town.

If there are alot of units needed to replenish the 2 'advancable' groups in the newly taken town, there will be less units to left over to defend the town as garrison troops - there are three helos at both friendly and enemy main bases to send out, hence the troop limitation. (btw, there are a number of 'clans' that have 3 main advancable groups, the third being a tanker group, which is of course not normally needed to be 'reinforced', and not reinforced at this time)

Very happy to see it finally working, over 2 weeks of coding after work and on weekends, honestly very surprised to see the only bugs so far have been typos, lol, I expected worse http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Pretty cool to finally see the mass of units dropped by the three helos take off running to various defensive position in the town, given a few more minutes, and a dead town becomes alive with life, from various static guards to patrols moving about in safe mode... it looks good http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

In the test scenario, the town has three mg nests, 2 tower spotlights, 1 tower guard position, 5 static guard positions, and 3 patrols available, the reinforcement call completely fills every position with the newly dropped troops.

2nd part of the script will need to be finished, teleporting tower guards once they are near towers, incorporating a fix for stuck units, and a few other things - but this is a huge hurdle to see it finally working, and in a universal fashion http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Edit/

To describe a little bit about the reason why reinforcements are sent *first* to 'advancable' groups, lastly to defensive groups in a town -

Units in advancable groups of course will still remain as additional defensive troops as long as they remain in a town

Advancable groups are able to initiate attacks on enemy towns, provided there is enough units in their groups to execute an attack, therefore without enough units, they will just sit there and not advance to take new towns.

If a clan takes over a town, once they have been reinforced, if they have enough units in their advancable groups, and there is a nearby enemy town that is a valid enemy town to attack, they will proceed to push forward and execute a new town battle.

Moving on

[Special Ed]

Some weird page bug, again now for the 3rd time, anyhow, refer to page 10 for latest update..

3rd time now I post an update and it puts a non existent post on top of the update on the next page...

[CharveL]

Holy crap, I was just cleaning out some old favorites links and came across one to this thread which I thought was long dead.

And then to find all these updates and some light at the end of the tunnel!

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif

I've been drifting more and more away from ArmA lately due to AI frustrations, general malaise, and a lack of gaming time but by the sounds of it, this will give us just the right offline botox injection it needs to carry through to ArmaII.

So thanks again for your efforts Ed and feel free to send a link to it early for me via pm, lest I meet with some untimely demise before having the pleasure of making to the alpha release. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Heh, it's tough not getting caught up in 'feature creep' with such an open-ended and rich scripting environment like this game has, but the payoff will be in spades I'm sure.

[Special Ed]

Holy crap, I was just cleaning out some old favorites links and came across one to this thread which I thought was long dead.

And then to find all these updates and some light at the end of the tunnel!

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/yay.gif

I've been drifting more and more away from ArmA lately due to AI frustrations, general malaise, and a lack of gaming time but by the sounds of it, this will give us just the right offline botox injection it needs to carry through to ArmaII.

So thanks again for your efforts Ed and feel free to send a link to it early for me via pm, lest I meet with some untimely demise before having the pleasure of making to the alpha release. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

Heh, it's tough not getting caught up in 'feature creep' with such an open-ended and rich scripting environment like this game has, but the payoff will be in spades I'm sure.
Thanks CharveL http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I am trying to avoid the feature creep syndrome, problem is, I want the mission to be as much 'real time' style as possible, just want to do it right, and avoid viewable spawns and such.

The mission uses 13 factions, which wage war on each other periodically, just the nature of that in itself has made many applications/features/functions become quite lengthy and complex to pull off, basically each function has to be universal in its design to be called upon and used by any of the clan factions, and more so complex when spawning is avoided.

[kju]

@Special Ed
select 'Print this topic' if you have the bug with topic and no posts

[Special Ed]

Thanks Q

Have to try that if it happens again

[Special Ed]

Its all about the feeling of the mission right? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Wow alot of time spent getting the part of the helo scripts to send out units finished, its now done.

The most complex combination of scripts ever, hands down.

One stupid bug ive found, very annoying, and hard to fix -

Units dropped from a helo dont want to respond to doMove/MoveTo orders until either the helo has left, or a good amount of time has passed - dont ask me why, I setup a test mission to confirm this, and yep, the units dont do jack after disembarking until the helo lifts off - wow, an unbelievable bug issue wiht arma http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/sad_o.gif

Only good news is there is a fix, I can make a waypoint and give it to the group being dropped off, and its the only thing they will immediately chase down after being dropped, bad thing, not easy to impliment this change for garrison troops..

Means I have to add in a waypoint for each garrison type group dropped off to get them moving towards the town upon exiting helo, and also manage the waypoints, hence have to remove them afterwords, yep, unreal pain in the ...

As it is now, they work fine, except the garrison troops spread out around helos and sit there for like 20 secs before they decide to follow the oders given by the scripts to move to various positions, which works, but is not as visualy appealing as it should be.

So the fix is to initially send garrison troops to the center of the town being reinforced, then let the scripts take over and send them to their positions, a simple bug fix has turned into a major problem, this is basically brain surgery to get this worked into the scripts... I dont think Ofp units had these issues.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Anyhow, on the upside, again, helo scripts main functions are now complete, some bug fixes remain.

Provided I can keep my sanity over the next week, and actually get all the bugs cleaned up to where I am happy with the overall function, I am thinking of releasing the helo reinforcement script system, at least its something from the mission people can look at and play with. I cant release the core battle function due to people using it to create their own versions of my mission before my release, but this reinforcement script system I can release, and if its nothing more than a glimpse at what the mission provides, or maybe someone wants to use it in a mission..

Of course the function will be released before it is directly implemented into the mission, so it is completely standalone.

Mind is blown out, time to dig a hole and go to bed http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/goodnight.gif

[CharveL]

cool keep the updates coming!

[CharveL]

cool keep the updates coming!

[Special Ed]

Spent already too much time trying to fix this issue with units not wanting to respond to orders for x time after getting out of helos.

I tried adding a waypoint to the group before creating the units, I tried adding a waypoint during their flight, all the same, they get out and spread around the helo and sit there for 10 seconds or so before moving, which is no better than what I had.

Done with this. Moving on to other issues. As it is, garrison troops dropped will spread out around helo crouched for about 10 seconds and then they will incrementally advance to in town defensive positions. Way too much time spent on this.

About 5 other smaller bugs to fix, and moving on to release the helo reinforcement script function, then impliment into mission.

Moving on.

[Special Ed]

New update

Bug causing some helos to get stuck trying to take off from DZ's near towns - fixed

Bug - 25 % of units that are spawned at barracks doors and sent to helos want to roam the helo pad area for up to 30 secs before getting in, I cannot find a fix

Have tried -

Reveal Helo

All forms of setBehavior and SetCombatMode

DisableAi Target

Nothing, some units insist on scoping out the area before following their orders to get in helo as cargo

This is likely due to the mass number of units moving into the helos nearby, and the 3 helos with blades spinning nearby, and the units, due to Armas currently screwed up ai wanting to investigate all this before identifying everything as friendly..

Nothing new, Armas Ai in some areas is impossible to fix, I have on last attempt here, to just do a 'doMove' same pos for each unit upon spawn, then give them their orders, I doubt it will change anything.

To confirm it is the ai behavior, they work great in 4 x speed, they run right into the helos, because the fast speed dulls their ai and makes them do only the most important things (which are denoted as such by the game engine).

Setting their behavior to safe mode was the only thing that worked, how sad tho, because setSpeedMode wont respond to 'FULL' speed in this mode, so they go right in, but walk at a snail crawl to get there, which is worse than ever.

Last attempt to fix this, and it prolly wont work.

Thanks to Armas garbage Ai, once again, have to settle for it as is, during the 3 helos loadup sequence, dont be suprised to see a bunch of units running alover the place before they get in..

Either way, nearing completion of bug fixes.

Moving on.

[Special Ed]

Sweet!

Problem fixed!!!

Correct timing of SetSpeedMode causes it to work, provided its used *after* a command is issued to a unit! What a sight to see all these units move into the helos on the pad area correctly!

Now that this fixes the load issues, have to see if this might clean up units sitting at the Lz before moving out too!

[Special Ed]

The first Alpha version of the Reinforcement system

I feel inclined to release this, its been a heck alot of work

This *should* not require any addons, please let me know if it says it does, I think after looking at the sqm file it is all either standard stuff or addons free'd up by sixth sense eu, all of which should be avaliable thru any updated Arma version.

When you run the mission, simply select your radio, and execute the reinforcement call only once, do this by selecting "SendHelo1In", which actually activates a full 3 helo reinforcement call (I know, radio test name never got changed http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif) . Over a short period of time, after the pilots have boarded you can jump in any helo and hitch a ride to the town being reinforced.

This script system is universal, the information provided to the main helo scripts allows any town to be reinforced by any groups.

This is an Alpha, the enemy helo scripts need to be put in, a matter of primarily copying and pasting the current friendly scripts and making a few name change modifications.

There is also a bug that shows an error upon a helo crash, which is a seldom possibility, this is to be fixed, again this is an alpha version. Recommended do not use fast time during the test, it tends to increase chance of helos crashing, because fast time can mess up delays in scripts. Overall reliability is very high. Also note that helos land very close together at the DZ, this is only for testing, all towns in the mission will have the helos landing farther apart, for obvious safety reasons..

Enjoy

Helo Reinforcements ALPHA1 (http://rapidshare.com/files/136170230/HeloTestMajorV2.Sara.rar.html)

Edit/

This is currently setup to run from mission editing area

Put this under a characters name under your documents, Arma Other Profiles, your characters name, Missions

Then run it, in Arma from editing area, Sahrani map, preview.

I think this still can be put directly into your missions as well, but it is not currently pbo'd

This is an Alpha, Im sorry but its been around 3 months of work and focus is to actually get it to a final beta and implement into mission and release a final beta, final beta release will be in permanent form.

[Manzilla]

Wow, this is nice. Congrats on the Alpha and thankds for getting something out.

[Special Ed]

Thanks m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Btw fyi, the location for the pilots spawn is at the front of the air factories, these are actually movable spawn locations denoted by markers, so I never made perfect locations for them to spawn from, but they can be moved to spawn from anywhere. They will be moved to newly placed building doors later.

The troops that board the helos spawn from actual barracks doors of three buildings around the helo pad area.

Also note that the town being reinforced is empty of units except for 2 groups, these 2 groups are remaining units left over from a successful attack. The reinforcement scripts are set up to reinforce towns in the following order :

Reinforce "advancable' groups first - these are groups that are already pre-exitsing that can be moved forward later on during battles against other towns, units will be joined to these groups and move to in town positions to fall into formation. These are the units in potentially 2 main groups left over that have successfully taken over the city/town, which later on can move to attack a new city/town. Does not matter if no units are left from one of these groups, their waypoint plans are still valid, and new reinforcement units will move to the current updated in town holding positions which wait on a variable to continue waypoint plans to attack the next town.

Move at least one, if not 2 units nearby each avaliable artillery piece for usage upon next battle. During the next battle scripts pickup and use nearby proper side units to man arty pieces in town to barrage enemy town.

Man any script provided mg's

Man spotlights next

Move units to static guard positions

Move units to patrol routines


In this order

All the script needs is the locations of such for each town, and it will fully occupy provided positions in the order above.

Any residual units left over will be added to patrols. In this case, there are three patrols, each of which ends up with 1 extra unit per patrol due to a test scenario here of allowing 3 total units extra left over, standard patrols are 2 units per, in this case equals 3 total units left over that have been dropped (1 unit added per patrol, 3 total extra units, thus 3 man patrols)
This is dependent on if all units make it to the Dz alive, it is more than possible for a unit of 2 to get stuck and not make it to heli before lift off, or a unit or 2 to die upon drop off (squished?) best I can pull off, but total dropped off alive unit count will be used effectively. There is a chance a unit put into the advancable groups may get stuck, this has not been addressed and they likely will still move upon a new attack, but all garrison units will be forced to their positions if stuck for x time.

This is a test scenario, the lack of advancable group units left over from the winning clan denotes how many units will be left over to defend the city/town, which involves simple math to execute proper unit additions to advancables/garrison troops for each call.

Edit

You can also see what happens if you destroy helo 1 using the radio command during the load up process, if u do it before the pilots spawn it will re-create the helo (due to the side still having the ability to create helos), if u do it during the loading process, it will stop the units boarding it, and eventually send them all back to their back to their barracks. Again, during actual in flight disaster, I need to bug fix that, it still seems to work fine in overall effect, but brings up an error..

[CharveL]

Excellent! Will give it a go...

[Special Ed]

Fixed error showing upon helos crashing, stupid typo..

Its finally time to replicate the 3 scripts for the enemy helos, put them in. Once that is done, and tested, the markers will be switched to 'empty' type so they are not visible in game, and will comment out the debug code that shows, and release it as the final version. I am not likely going to get into making a description for it, it will simply be released as both a glimpse of a chunk of the mission, and if someone wants to use it in their mission, the description for usage in the scripts should be sufficient. Only reason Ive decided not to go into a huge official release of the reinforcement system with a fancy usage description and modifications for ease of users, is because it will chew up more time, and I greatly desire to get this thing implemented into the mission, actual implementing will take some time, more code brain surgery, alot of markers, and alot of testing.

Either way, the reinforcement system is free to use in a mission, provided credit is given to both ColonelSandersLite and myself for the creation of it.

[Special Ed]

After spending much of the day yesterday on it, the enemy reinforcement scripts and corresponding script reliant markers are done. Tested a few times over, its working.

Of course, something had to come up..

The Mi-17's are showing very unreliable at low to moderate fly in heights, so the flyInHeight is going to be changed for them to be higher. They dont have the reaction speed the blackhawks do, and are crashing, ALOT, when encountering steep terrain.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/banghead.gif
Aside from that, the entire function is now complete, believe it or not.. wow, wasnt sure if this thing would ever get done, somewhere around 20 scripts total to put this function all together.

Moving on.

[Special Ed]

k heres the scoop

Due to the *overwhelming* response to the initial Alpha release of the helo reinforcement system, I dont plan on bothering to release the final beta unless people are interested, not going to waste more time on modifying functions for public release to get no response, no offense, but thats just plain logic.

Next, the helo reinforcement system is now full working for both friendly and enemy bases, which supports up to 9 groups to fly in, 30 some units. Only remaining thing to do is put fly in markers for all the other towns. Implementation will take some time, will likely require a separate script in the mission which processes by math the count of units that should be placed in certain groups to reinforce what during each call. Problem is, I cant effectively do this now, because the towns in the actual mission do not yet have defensive objects/defensive marker positions/etc placed yet. Hence, its time for a new change...

The time has come to build up the towns into bases, with both defensive units and objects, walls, buildings, patrols, etc.
This was done too early in the original Kolgujev Conflict mission in Ofp, before things were even close to ready.. Now, the helo scripts are done, and their implementation rests on having these objects and markers avaliable so the scripts can send units to these marker positions and to static weapons/spotlights/towers, etc.

It suks a little bit, cause I dam well know by making this focus change, by the time I come back to put in the helo scripts, I'll have forgotten half of that shi# in the scripts, and prolly have to end up spending half a day re-learning them, but this is the proper way to do this, in correct order.

First step, look around and pickup any desired new map object packs, aside from what I already have avaliable thru sixth sense Eu.
See if there is *finally* a system that lines up walls and such on hills, if not, time to remember the method I had to modify objects angles in their inits to get walls looking good.

Begin work on town 1. Completion = town 1 to town 15 completely built up.

I dont know if anyone is even bothering to watch this topic anymore, but do expect to see some impressive pics in the near future, towns and cities will be built up extravagantly just like in the old Ofp pics, the effort will be put in to individualize each town/city and bring them to life.

Lastly, there is a very good chance there will be a relatively soon release of KolCon battle system pre-Alpha. The reason for doing this is simply to get all this very hard work out, for others to see (call it self gratification if u like http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif). Unfortunately, it will come with a current Uela, the battle function as a whole may not be used in a mission. The scripts can be ripped, but any direct usage of the battle function as a whole will be currently forbidden - and this is not like me to do such, but understand this :
coming on 3 years of work on this, most of the code is mine directly, and there is alot of code, and code structure that I modified/enhanced which was written by ColonelSandersLite, whom stayed with the project for at least 6 months.

This mission is not yet done, and if people decide they want to use the battle function *as a whole* to create a backdrop to their own mission, then their mission, if released before this is finished, will hugely diminish the effect of this missions release.

Lastly, the battle system has many areas of mass complexity, involving many scripts linked together, usage of global arrays being modified often in scripts, it is doubtful anyhow unless someone is a well accomplished scripter in Arma, it will prove worthless to attempt to use the battle system anyhow in someones mission. If it ever happens, it would happen by usage of the battle system as a whole, as it is now, which I regret at this time I cannot give support to, and declare such is not allowed, nor acceptable.

Again, normally I rather enjoy to allow my work to be freely used, but in this case, releasing something that is not yet a fully finished product, I cannot allow this, because of the potential destruction of the current project by somone elses use of the scripts in a release before the project is complete http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/confused_o.gif

On the positive side, many here have asked for an 'alpha' or preview of the battle system, and this will be a way, by such terms, I can provide such. It will not lack the debug text, simply because the debug text will remain until the mission is in beta stage, in case any issues come up for ease in finding problems. And it will not be modified for ease of usage, it will come as I have it, where it is in test phase, rather than it running on random selection. Players can watch battles pan out, by selecting thru radio which battle sequence they wish to see occur, and hence that town battle will execute.

This is all really dependent on public interest, if it dies, so does the updates, I have re-kindled my enjoyment of working on the mission now that the appearance aspects can be addressed, it means the battle function is closer than ever to being complete, but updates are dependent on interest, if no one wants the mission but me, Im not going to put up pics for myself http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

I appreciate the support in the past, but I think maybe lotsa folks just have gotten bored of updates here, which is fine, worst comes to worst, updates will thus end, but I will continue enoying seeing a gargantuan mission grow near completion that surpasses every mission I have ever played http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Cheers http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[hamis]

I'm really looking forward to release!Good luck with your project. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/xmas_o.gif

[Snake Man]

Due to the *overwhelming* response to the initial Alpha release of the helo reinforcement system, I dont plan on bothering to release the final beta unless people are interested
Actually I haven read all this topic through, but I feel your pain as a fellow unappreciated mission maker (http://tactical.*********************************.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21338), I'll take a look at your mission on princible. I mean that is if you want someone to test it and give feedback.

I cant promise anything major, but I'll sit down, take a decent look at it and then report back what I think about it.

[kju]

Special Ed sorry to say, yet your posts are most of the time
way too large or at least not well structure (use bold or underlined). http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

At least I don't want to spend the time to read everything. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/confused_o.gif

That said I am still very much interested in your project and check
updates of this thread like every time.
Yet huge posts scare me of. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[Wolfrug]

@Special Ed

Sorry I haven't had time to look at your script, although I'm sure it kicks ass http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif One thing you need to be aware of is that the more "universally useful" a script is the better - right now it seems like this script is mostly useful for one single function inside your mission.

If you want your resource tested and potentially hosted, you should head over to OFPEC(.com), register at the forums, and make a post about it in the Resources Beta testing & submission forum. There you will hopefully receive script-specific comments and a chance that it gets added to the Editors Depot http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/thumbs-up.gif

Keep up the good work! We need a good SP sandbox mission in ArmA, badly!

Regards,
Wolfrug

[Special Ed]

Well thank you gentlemen for your responses, I sometimes get too emotional, and this dang project is usually the cause of that http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

@Snake Man

Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I appreciate the offer, any feedback is welcome, and I appreciate your interest as well.

@Q

I know, the posts get huge often, and I try to get everything in each post I can that describes whats going on. Thanks for your interest too http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

@Wolfrug

Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

The script is actually completely universal, and can be used in any mission. The problem is, its pretty complicated to get into describing how to implement new towns/markers/objects in the script to get it to work on them. I knew it would prolly take me a week or more to really get a step by step description put together for how to use it, and that would of course lead to desiring to make it more user friendly for the public, leading to more script put in to do such, I just couldnt fathom doing more with the system after so much time.
To be dead honest, it took such a huge effort to get it fully working, there was just this huge desire to at least put it out, let people see a piece of the mission working, without releasing the main battle function.

@hamis

Thanks m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif


@ all

Thanks again for helping to put a little spark back in mission feeling, I really got burned out after the helo scripts, I appreciate the support.


Cheers to all of you guys, and I'll keep the mission updated as progress continues. Screenshots should be in order as towns are built up with fortifications and properly populated with initial garrison troops.

[Drongo69]

The sad fact is, the community doesn't really seem to give a shit about missions these days. SnakeMan gives a good quote about the state of things in the link in his post above.

If you are not making this mission simply for your own personal satisfaction, you may as well spend your time on something else. You can be fairly certain that about the only responses you get upon release will be "can you make an MP version?" or requests to add/remove certain addons.

It's probably not what you want to hear, but that's the fact of the matter with the ArmA community.

Good luck with it though, it's a great concept.

[liljb15]

It really is a shame how little response great missions like yours get.

I don't know why but most missions which should be getting unwaivering attention seem to go unnoticed.
Great missions like
-EVO CTI
-Seize zones
and
-Quarantine
seem to go unnoticed by the Arma community

[heklos]

Just to chime in here. I have been watching this thread for a few months now, and I read every word that Special types in here.

I am of the few (I think) that let you get on your way as a creator instead of pestering you if certain addons/maps/items are going to be included. So because of that don't think that nobody is looking or interested. Some or most of us are adults with full time jobs, and while I love playing with scripts/addons and whatnot that are released in here, I don't always have the time to write out a thorough message about how I used it, or even to
actually create something that others would want to play. (hell it took me a whole evening to even add some weapons to Quarantine after tracking down how things fit together.)

I hold a lot of you and your fellow mission makers/addon/script/island creators in awe at times, as with the demands of a full time job and being in a place that is not the greatest when it comes to having net access makes it difficult for me to sit down and hack away at things to make missions/addons/scripts/islands and at times I get all excited to see what has been released by those who do have the time. I was practically giggling like a school girl when I was home on leave last time and I got to play on a server with Phaeden of ACE/WGL fame.

So in short I guess. Keep the faith bro. Those like me are watching and are excited to see your masterpiece. Try to not get discouraged because it seems that no-one is interested, because again, some of us (like me) are just leaving you alone to finish and not bug you constantly with "whens it done" or "can you add X".

http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Thanks guys

@tacrod

Either in this thread or the Ofp one, someone had already asked about a mp version http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Ya, I do hear you - and it does seem a shame that the overall interest in these forums is not waht it was in ofp days.

Although I dont think there will be little response upon release, muchly in part due to the fact it will be beta released for testing on Ofpec, which, for large scale missions, tends to reel in alot of interest (at least in the past..)

I always seem to come in late. When I released WWIIIFFF for GR quite a few years back, it was released about a year before the game really died, and I had to advertise alot to get it noticed and get responses, by the time I released the final part of the mod, Gr was nearly dead lol, and I personally thought part 2 was better, but it got few responses.
So I do know where you are coming from, it seems as time goes on, people are waiting more for Arma2 and less wanting to wait on missions for Arma1.. In many respects, just from mass ai problems Ive seen, and a number of other things, I cant blame people, its kind of a shame to go down a bunch of steps from Ofp, rather than up in Arma.

@liljb15

I am partly to blame for *some* lack of responses, I would admit at times I post an update that just says "a bug fix here, changed this or that", but more often than not posts are significant updates, like the release of the town hide system and putting out the reinforcement system. The reinforcement system I sort of expected a few responses from a few folks after just running it once or twice, but sh*t happens, personally I really enjoy appearance of the mass scale of the function, and the fact it provides real time deployment of troops by helo to completely defend a city, so I was surprised no response, but like you guys said, what do you do http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/confused_o.gif

@heklos

Thanks m8 http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Believe it or not I work full time job too (apart from this mission http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif ), and ya, it chews up some serious time, especially weekends, not to say its not fun at times, but it is very time consuming.
I can understand where you are coming from, the 'when will it be done' posts I dont think any creator likes of a mission in the works, because of course we normally cant afford to attach a Eta for the project, like you said, due to real life priorities.
I can really appreciate your angle too, even lots of ideas that come up from people posting are more often than not undoable, because of the fact there is too much to do as it is, and adding more stuff is like, impossible to fathom.

Well thanks again all. Your posts overall have been encouraging.
Thanks for your time too.

Sincerely

Special Ed

[CharveL]

Don't listen to these guys Ed, for every one that posts something there are ten more that are interested but simply don't want to post.

I enjoy reading your long-assed posts actually. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Thanks Charvel http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Your prolly right, nice job on encouraging me to make more long posts in the near future! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Cheers!

[Manzilla]

I read em too. I agree with CharveL, there's a lot of us that play around with the missions posted here but never get around to or just don't post. I'm guilty of playing most of these missions but not giving much for review. Especially the longer ones, I usually take some time playing them. And also usually edit, tweak or incorporate parts of the well made ones into a more "personal" mission, for personal use only.

If it wasn't for many of you guys that are experienced mission makers posting your work here or OFPEC, I'd never have even attempted to learn this stuff. And thus my "ArmA time" would've been limited to a few weeks after the US release in May 07. I would've no doubt move on to a different game, or none at all.

[Manzilla]

Oops. My apologies for double posting.

[Special Ed]

@Manzilla

I am too guilty of this, in fact as far as replying to threads about peoples work, I tend to get interested in addon wip's and post on them, actual missions I seldom do.. guess that might make me a bit of a hypocrite.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

---

Starting some work on the first town, and just to let it be known, a number of the fences and walls are going to be used from LowFly's EU. 6Th Sense EU is my proffered EU, and most objects used are from there, because they are all destroyable but 6thSense offers little in the form of walls and fences, which I gotta have. So, many of the towns will have fences or walls that are indestructible http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/confused_o.gif but, there is like 20 dif really nice types for individualizing each town, gotta use em. I did test to be sure ai spots targets and fires thru various wire type fences placed by both Eu's, and it works fine. Like to post pics of the first town once its done.

Cheers! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[CharveL]

Don't you be slackin' on the updates, son. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

[Special Ed]

Forgive me.

Due to Rl work, it is simply not feasible, nor healthy to continue the quest towards creating this mission.

I say creating this 'mission', yet it was envisioned, and was in the process of transpiring to be practically its own game, worked off of the Arma platform.

Much has been accomplished over the years, but it is just not possible to do this any longer, realistically.

I think part of the drive to try to complete every aspect desired of the mission was the thought that I may be hired some day to do this for a living, the problem still remained, that I have a real job, family, and responsibilities, and this is truly not my paying job.

I do wish the mission had transpired fully to what I had envisioned, and I know that I fully could pull it off given the time to do it. But, I work a full time job, which I enjoy, which pays my bills, and that is my job, not this mission.

Thanks all for your support, and yes, this is the end of this thread, and endevour to complete this project.

As far as releasing the mission as it is, I must say it would be pointless. I highly doubt anyone would desire to carry it on to completion, simply due to the fact they would have to spend huge time learning what is going on, that I already know by heart, and then realize that there is months left in just completion of the remaining aspects of the primary battle function itself, which still leaves more time in any desired 'single mission' content to be added for further mission immersion.

Moving on to just casual gaming, heck might even buy meself an mmo or something just for fun! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

Laters all, was a heck of alot of work here, but was nice to meet so many cool good people here too! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/biggrin_o.gif

[kju]

sorry to hear that Special Ed - thanks for all the fun you brought us http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

you may reconsider releasing the mission though.
even if its not (well) playable, people could learn from the code
and takes ideas from the concept.

[action man]

So after 21 months your telling us it's not even going to be released?? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/crazy_o.gif .Perhaps the best thing to have done was posted when the mission/campaign was released,that way you wouldn't have looked like you was just all talk and no action all this time! http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/wink_o.gif EDIT= in fact whilst i'm on my soapbox i think it would be a good idea for guys to only post about released missions and campaigns in here! I've followed countless similar threads in the Flashpoint user mission section over the years only to be told in the end what realy amounts to the fact that their's no mission or campign!

[Manzilla]

Stuff happens. Give him some damn slack. RL life is more important then a PC game. He tried and he came forward to let us know he can't finish it. Instead of bitchin' about it, maybe you should offer to pay him for his time that way you may be able to play it

Special Ed,

Sad to hear but completely understandable. Take care of yourself. Hopefully the Moderators can shut this down before more children start crying over spilled milk.

Regarding Q's post I completely agree. I'd love to see the code and learn from what's there.

[Special Ed]

@ Q

Heck ya http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif You know alot of missions may not ever, I mean ever have transpired from Wips' to completion if it wasnt for the great people here that spend time of their own to listen to updates and respond. I mean that. If there was just dead silence thru the updates in this mission, I may have just dropped it a very long time ago.

@ Manzilla

Im not concerned about negative responses, because I know how much work ive put into this mission, and time, and hence their posts are meaningless. It takes 1 min to cry and bash me, it took me hundreds and hundreds of hours to do what has been done, not to mention the occasional exhaustion felt from spending too much time on it, which ends up sometimes affecting mood in Rl work, which is not cool.

@ action man

If I was paid by a company to do this, and promised delivery and it never came, go ahead and attack.

Truth is, I have a medium to low paying job, that I still enjoy, many bills to pay, and this mission is not my job. I do not have a team of modders working on this with me, Colonel Sanders Lite helped for a good bit of time on a few large areas in the mission, still, most of the work has been done by myself. If I was in a team of people, eh, maybe some attacking might be warranted, but still, even then, most cannot, nor should not, put a game/hobby before Rl responsibilities. So what, it didnt get done. Theres only about a trillion other great missions here either done, or on their way. Just move along, its not a big deal. In fact, the only person that really loses anything here is me, for all the time I spent I never got to see the final product released..

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

Lastly, as far as the code goes for the mission, releasing the unfinished product - fyi most of it is in .Sqs form, many seem against it, and seem to persuade towards .sqf - I have never seen performance issues with .sqs, and for creating massive scripts that have often been required in the mission, this was a perfect selection. I think really my main reason tho for not wanting to put it out, is because it at least leaves an open door if I ever wanted to poke around with it some more some day - but I have no inclination to go full blast any longer on it.

Edit/

On page 11 is the download link for the helo reinforcements system, honestly its likely the most complex feature added to the battle system, if anyone was interested in checking out code/etc. Its also a stand alone system for the most part, that can be integrated into a Sp mission.

[action man]

My appologies Special Ed!After re reading this thread iv'e come to a different conclusion. Thank's for your time trying to get it released. It's just that i've become pesimitic and have "tarred you with the same brush*

[Snafu]

It's a shame your mission has come to an end but that's life. It was a very interesting (the most interesting IMO) and challenging idea you took up and I am impressed by the amount you were able to do. I would have never been able to do what you did at all. It might be a good idea to put your released scripts up on OFPEC.

Good luck down the road mate.

[Special Ed]

@ action man

Not a big deal, I didnt take it personally. Ive worked on and released other missions and mods, both for this game and for GR, so im used to seeing that sort of stuff come up, for various reasons.

@ -snafu-

The town hide script function was *almost* released on Ofpec, another script system the mission uses, but I changed my mind when I realized it would then of course come under scrutiny and likely require a bunch of time to respond to questions, people asking for more features, etc, and I just dont have time to deal with all that. Same goes for the helo reinforcement system, in fact that particular script system doesent even have any descriptive documentation, I released it as is, because of time once again. Although the town hide function does have a thorough usage description, it took alot of time to put the description together, which led me to making it more user friendly.

Best I can offer, sorry. I can remember back in the day when I was learning ofp scripting, and opened up and had fun with Mfcti scripts, and actually made a few of my own personal versions with added script content, I had to really look at what was going on in the scripts, but it was kinda fun too.

Thanks for the nice posts too http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif A very kind farewell and I appreciate it http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Due to inspiration from others here, Ive decided to do something..

Honestly, the truth is Ive been working on the mission again lately, but I cannot put the time in I had before, which is why I wanted the topic closed, because I no longer wanted the pressure.

Anyhow..

Here is the scoop.

For those of you that have enjoyed partaking in the long journey of updates and mission application releases, the mission in its current state will be released for your viewing and enjoyment.

Know that it is not even in Alpha stage, but you can directly jump into the missions current testing/growing phase.

The decision has been made to now intermittently release new updates to the mission as it continues to progress.

Many good folks here have asked and asked for the product in its current state, and its time to get something out.

I need to pack pack up the mission, compose a simple instructional on how to kick things off once the mission starts, and will put it up in the next hour or so.

Also know that the appearance factor of the mission has finally began, thanks to mapFacts 3DE editor, proper wall stretches can be done correctly now, and the first town appearance overhaul has begun, which includes everything from manned mg bunkers, patrols, tower guards to defensive walls.

Please note that the mission in all non 'Alpha' stage releases, as this version is, will be packed in non Pbo form, and will only be playable in the editor preview area, simply because it is not ready to be Pbo'd, it belongs in the editor area, and any users of it hence may view more in depth this way what is going on, and make any desired personal changes easily.

[Special Ed]

Edit

Removed for now http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Materado near completion after 3 days

Overhead (http://img376.imageshack.us/img376/2308/image21hg3.jpg)

Main barracks area (http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/8049/image22zz8.jpg)

TIdy campfire (http://img510.imageshack.us/img510/3061/image23aw6.jpg)

Patrol (http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/2601/image24wm8.jpg)

Fuel station and 'hand me down' transport (http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/8/image25ug1.jpg)

Main entrance (http://img158.imageshack.us/img158/7971/image26pz3.jpg)

1 (http://img158.imageshack.us/img158/3621/image27zr7.jpg)

rear entrance (tower is occupied) (http://img234.imageshack.us/img234/2510/image28kk5.jpg)

This is actually one of the smallest towns, in both militant strength and size. Consists of 3 patrols, 2 interior, 1 exterior, 1 static mg, about 7 standard static guards, 2 platoons of offensive troops stationed, 1 artillery piece, 4 civilians, and this clan has no armor (due to size of clan).

All units in each town, that represent a different clan will be transformed into a different appearance type via avaliable addons, to give a unique representation of each clan. The clan that originally holds Materado is an allied clan. They will no longer appear as "u.s." troops tho.

Of course, as the mission theme goes, weapons, armor and vehicles used by clans are what could be scavenged or bought from the war torn landscape, there is no definitive 'allied/enemy gear', much of these things will be outdated and beat up, but at least functional, all that matters in this world of multi factioned war.

Lights will be put in after all towns primary work for appearance and final population is complete, for quality look and feel at night time.

Also huge thanks and full credit goes to the mapFact team that created and released the 3DE editor, the wall placement that looks excellent would not have been possible without it, and the ease of and speed of working on town appearances has tripled at least due to their editor.

[CharveL]

Holy crap Ed, I never really thought I'd see the day! Looking forward to trying this and seeing you reinspired.

ArmA truly needs this kind of thing more than some obscure troop carrier or rpg mod.

This will keep me busy over the thanksgiving weekend.

cheers

[Special Ed]

Holy crap Ed, I never really thought I'd see the day! Looking forward to trying this and seeing you reinspired.

ArmA truly needs this kind of thing more than some obscure troop carrier or rpg mod.

This will keep me busy over the thanksgiving weekend.

cheers
Thanks http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Just remember its in a very 'incomplete' stage http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

After a few minutes its easy to see how to execute a battle scenario via radio, and feel free to explore some, the various clan battles take place in huge varieties of different environmental conditions. And the best bet, is to drop in a humvee near the town you choose to start in, which will be battling with another, and then after the battle is over, if the next battle that is executed involves a new pair of towns, you can drive there. (be sure to put the humvee outside of the town, or artillery strikes will likely blow it up).

/edit

Hoping the next mission update release will be the main visual aspects of the towns completed, this also includes towns fully populated with defensive units and civilians. As of now, towns only hold the 2 main attack groups and some have an additional armor crew with armor. Fully populated, towns will hold anywhere from 40 to hundreds of of units, patrols, static units, etc, a few towns will have additional defensive tank patrols as well. Materado is nearly complete, but its also one of the smallest of towns.. It is *possible* this next update release could be within a month, just have to see what kind of time I have with work, and how much time the bigger towns will take.

[liljb15]

Oh my God Oh my God you actually did it! I'd never thought you would finish it! I'm going to DL right now.

[Special Ed]

Its far from finished.

This is a pre-alpha, a work in progress release in order to provide 'something' after years while the mission continues to be worked on.

The release is primarily for those that have wanted to see a 'wip' release.. and a number of people have asked over the months for a pre-release to at least be able to check it out.

The only thing the mission houses right now is the primary battle function, along with integrated artillery support. There is still de-bug text, very raw form.

So basically if you are looking for an official first version release of the mission, this is not it. This is just a Wip release.

Anyone interested in checking the mission out needs to read the brief readme attached to it.

[Special Ed]

Have decided for now to remove the temp version of the current Wip mission.

Honestly I think I may have been a bit too eager to put *something* out, and the last desire I ever wanted was to wreck the final product by making early releases.

What I am going to attempt to do, is release a 2 town battle, which will include both towns appearances complete, and fully populated with defensive units.

The first town is done in completion, the second town moves towards completion soon, which is quite large.

There may likely still be the debug text, im going to look into trying to disable it all for this 'preview' mission tho, there is *alot* of debug code embedded in alot of scripts..

Once this release of the two town battle happens, that shows not just the core battle function, but also shows appearance factors integrated, it will be far more enjoyable to give a try. The core battle function itself is Imo a very unique and universal fully functioning battle system, but, without the proper appearance factors and full town populations complete, it is like a sandbox with no toys, and I realize this now.

Stay tuned, see what sort of rabbit I can pull out of a hat here. I will try to make this stripped down 2 town battle 'preview' mission worth the time, it will make a gigantic impact just having these two towns complete in their appearances and populations tho, I can gurantee this http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif I will also make it a proper mission, pbo'd, and ready to roll http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Ive already posted pics of the friendly town Materado, in a few hours I am hoping to post pics of the enemy town adjacent to Materado, which is actually the second largest city held by a clan on the map (aside from the merchant city and the main enemy base), it has taken quite some time and effort to populate it with objects and defensive units. This enemy clan held town has potential to go to war with Materado at mission start, hence these will be the two towns for the 'preview' release.

Lastly, if I can find a way to remove the debug text quickly from the scripts for the 'preview' mission, I will do it, it just depends on time.. This preview mission will be worth its weight, done wasting time on a 'pre' release that holds little more than the core battle function, time to let shine what the mission holds in store for the future proper.

Try to work with me here guys, understand the reason a mission like this has never been released, is because of what I have had to go through to get this far. The battle system and all of its extremities have been scripted and implemented (apart from the reinforcement system which is not yet installed) to provide maximum detail and effect... the missing link to show off these functions is the appearance factor inegrated with them, and to provide a 'true' mission preview, without all the radio battle executions and hopefully I can get rid of the debug text for it too..

C what happens here.. this should be interesting.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif

[CharveL]

Sounds like a good compromise and maybe you can make it sort of modular by adding each new town in a new version as they become available.

Good work, Ed!

[Special Ed]

Thanks Charvel http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Expansions are possible, I should be more careful tho as to how much I release early from now on too http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

Obregan.. held currently by Ogokk clan..

One of the main entrances (http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/949/image11zi3.jpg)

1 (http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/6781/image10cm6.jpg)

2 (http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/7369/image9nn8.jpg)

In town tank street patrol (http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/5431/image7qc7.jpg)

Vip Conference (http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/7610/image6za1.jpg)

HQ area with spec ops patrol (http://img48.imageshack.us/img48/589/image3fr4.jpg)

View to a kill (http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/300/image4lj1.jpg)

Depot/Parking area (http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/6043/image2gr6.jpg)

Rear entrance/Night (http://img48.imageshack.us/img48/9305/image1av5.jpg)

Only thing left to do is to finish the patrols, which there will be 6 of, right now only one exists.. Everything else is done in Obregan.

Final clean up for both towns will involve additional street lights to illuminate the towns proper for night incursions, and install the 2 towns which are currently in separate mission files directly into the main mission.

Then, final preperations for preview mission release :

2 scenarios will be avaliable for mission type :

1 assist the friendly clan holding Materado in defending their town against the enemy forces from Obregan

2 (much harder) assist friendly clan holding Materado in a successful full scale war against Obregan, and help them take over the enemy held town.

Once the two towns are installed, the core mission battle function will take care of the rest and everything as far as the war goes is ready. Again I will try to get rid of the debug text, and also get rid of all radio test options, bottom line this will be a real mission. Thinking that for option "2" at this point allowing player to have a 3 man spec ops team to assist the friendly clan in a successful take over of the enemy town.

Hopefully within a week or so the preview mission will be ready for release, hoping by the end of next weekend, but we'll see http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

And ya, taking part in the 2nd option of going to war and attempting to take over Obregan should be pretty .. atmospheric? http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

[Special Ed]

Work is nearing completion on the official demo 2 town battle mission. Expecting, and hoping for release this evening.

A major bug has come up that has slowed everything down, until now, after much testing, I have made a decision on the fix.

Any vehicle that is manned by Ai, where the ai is killed, is very prone to being engaged relentlessly by the ai, even tho its empty, until it is dead. Ive tried numerous fixes, searched the forums here and tried some fixes I picked up, nothing is reliable except either manually destroying the empty vehicle, or replacing it with a new vehicle in the same place. This particular issue at this time is a major problem with static Mg's at base entrances, now that the Mg's have been placed, they are literally stopping the entire invading force in its tracks to try to kill the empty Mg.

The replacement was the ideal solution, but the major problem is that I cannot store a turrets directional headings for the replacement Mg.. Therefore it does look bad, the original Mg usually has the gun turret facing a very different direction then strait out, and the replacement is very noticable.

So, the other option is to kill the Mg once the gunner is dead. I have decided to go this route, it is still non harmful visually, and works fine. What will happen, is later on a bug fix will be added to the main mission to incorporate replacing the dead Mg's with new ones upon a reinforcement call. This means of course the swap with the old mg's visual appearance wont affect the actual town battles immersion factor, this will happen later after the war is over.

Anyhow, I have a temp script that fixes this for now in the Demo 2 town battle mission. After full completion of all towns being populated and appearance factors complete, a universal script will be implemented into the main mission to cover this.

The 2 town mission will be pbo'd, will have proper briefing, primary objective (win condition), and have 2 versions, 1 defend the town, 2 full scale war.

Moving on.

[Special Ed]

Been spending alot of time getting together these two versions, unfortunately it wont be done tonight.

Most of the time today has been spent to get proper addons in, and get nice briefings setup that have objectives which are integrated into the battle system results of the selected battle scenario of this Demo version.

The full scale war version has taken the most time, and involves mercenaries assisting at a certain point in taking over the enemy town. This is because in the actual mission this would not normally be a doable scenario for this particular allied town to go to war with such a large enemy town, it would normally be declared thru scripts as a defend scenario, with the enemy town as attackers. The mercenaries assisting makes this doable.

Doing the briefing right now for the full scale war version right now. This version includes multiple objectives for the player as well.

Stay tuned, its turning out well. Hopefully a day or two more.

Btw -

All debug text removed

All markers set to empty

[Special Ed]

Cleaning up the Demo mission, shouldnt be much longer.

Added 2 music files that play during the 2 two town battle.

Music can also be deactivated via action menu, and can be restarted.

A 'special' unit as player team member..

Mercenary groups that assist at a certain point in taking the enemy town.

Finishing script to stop stupid ai from attacking every empty static weapon that was previously manned (this now includes Mg's and spotlights)

Finishing mission complete/failed circumstances, missed a few mission failed possibilities.

Friendly clan has been revamped with a nice addon for units and some additional mercenaries.

Been working alot this week, and have had only a few hours each night to try to get this cleaned up, hoping for either tomorrow or sunday release.

[Special Ed]

THE BEGINNING

Demo Mission for Kolgujev Conflict Arma (name pending)


Help save the allied clans on the island from annihilation...

After many months have passed since the great war, survivors have banded together and clans have began to form across the island which are based in many towns. Clear definitions of most clans dispositions becomes more and more evident as these groups slowly build their towns into something useful, and expand their group sizes. Many 'dark' clans, as they have been deemed, become giants, holding huge cities to the north, and continue growing, and begin to flex their muscles on nearby allied clan held towns that have very little in numbers and assets. As time draws on, and unrest continues, a huge city forms in the old town of Corazol. It is now considered 'the merchant city', a place where all sides and factions come and go to buy or sell, or to just mingle in the city and maybe visit the tavern and get drunk. The merchant city has become a dangerous place, although ironically it is considered to be managed by an allied clan, Erudin, whom even has their own radio station, the clan both supports the efforts of the other allied clans and freely allows trading of any faction within their city walls. Things lately have been escalating across the island, various large 'dark' clans seeking more power continue to attack allied clans, full scale wars have begun to occur as the allied clans retaliate, and are often annihilated because of their weak strength... The fate of the island is becoming grim..


From Notes in the briefing :

After having survived the great war, and since then spent many months wandering the the war torn island, I have made the decision to help the allied clans that have grown in various towns. I've recently met up with a young lady while in the merchant city, and she really seems to know her stuff. We have teamed up together to help our allies against the ever growing monster that many of the enemy clans are becoming. War between clans is occurring more and more often lately.. and for many allied clans everything they have worked so hard for to create a resemblance of a decent life in their towns now is threatened to be destroyed. We are outnumbered, and outgunned, we must find a way before it is too late for us..

Download Link :

The Beginning (http://rapidshare.com/files/157575658/The_Beginning.rar.html)


The mission presents :

2 towns fully occupied with defensive forces, fully populated proper with objects.

A full scale war between Vallon and Ogokk, Vallon being the allied clan. This involves many detailed aspects of Ai warfare, the ai will goto war against itself, on a mass scale. Have included mercenary groups that assist the allied clan later in the mission as well.

High quality addons chosen for necessary applications, greatly improving visual quality overall and effect.

Full briefing, with 2 main objectives for a completed mission, there is no 'mission failed' criteria, as the mission is designed, failure leaves the option to attempt to take over the town by your own means still even if all allied clan forces have been killed, although it also means another allied clan has been decimated by the enemy as well.

Ai operated artillery strikes from both towns. Ai nearby will attempt to man arty pieces if they are empty (gunner killed) to keep the barrage going.

Full freedom to do what you want, how you want to achieve your goals.

Music added, along with on/off option in action menu.

Challenging scenario, assisting a clan of rag tag allied rebels against an ominous force.


Mission Difficulty :

This mission is not easy. But you will have complete freedom to approach your goals however you desire to.


Mission Bugs :

There are some bugs that remain in the core battle system, many of which are not truly bugs, but simply areas that need to be refined for better game play quality. The main issues :

Artillery from an opposing clan will continue to fire on a town until a *leader* of a group of the same clan is within the walls of the town, which has proved to not be enough, as leaders tend to stay back, and send their troops in. Still, chances of these troops being hit by their own arty until the group leader has moved into the town is slim.

A chance that friendly clan units during the field battle may end up prematurely advancing to enemy town due to spotting town defensive units/or falling under fire from them - this is because this one battle scenario is the only one that has a small area between towns where there is a clear view of the enemy town from the battle area, just worked out that way here. All other town battles have towns farther spread apart, or do not have clear view like this. Best bet is just to save game when you get to the counter strike location, in case the rare occurrence happens where the clan units advance to early.

Taking towns - currently for a town to be taken, ALL enemy forces in a town must be eliminated. Ai groups that are attacking the town are set to scour the town for enemies, and if they miss one or two, once they have finished their sweep, they will outright seek out stragglers. This equates to sometimes one or two units making it tough to take a town, especially a big one, until the Ai is set to chase down the stragglers, which can take some time to get to that point. Suggestion, keep an eye on guard houses in particular, as ai tends to miss those enemies sometimes, and watch out for stragglers. Later implementation of a system to eventually manually kill one or two stragglers left over may be put into scripts.

Units may still fire some on Arty pieces no longer manned, for a short time. It has been scripted to eventually make the pieces un-usable, hence ai wont fire any more, but it takes a little time.

On a rare, very rare occasion, the tank will take a very long time to make an appearance on the battlefield (arma Ai..), for whatever reason, like 10 % of the time, tanks want to go on a sight seeing tour before properly resuming their path..

Once in a while a 'Error - Zero Division' count comes up for various town area checks, honestly it has never affected gameplay in 6 months of testing, and havent gotten around to seeing what is causing the random error yet.

Lowfly Eu walls were used for the allied town, and not for the enemy town. Note that the map mess of walls wont appear at all for the enemy town as you near your primary objective. Was not aware that Mapfacts walls show no map icon, hence at some later point may end up replacing Modesta's walls with mapfacts.



Last Notes :

There is in game music. You can turn it off and on via action menu. Note that if the music is turned Off, it will take some time, up to 2 and a half minutes, for the 'On' switch to come back for use - this is because the music is set to loop so it continuously plays, and each delay set must be completed before the option to play music again can be returned. There are 2 songs, a second song becomes avaliable later on in the mission.

Although the bugs remain that are stated above, I have tested and refined this demo mission, and can attest it is of good quality, and has alot of 'atmosphere', in fact it has turned out better than expected (of course time to do it took 3 times as long as expected too http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif). This mission is worth its weight.


Addons

Yes, quite a few of them. And without them, it would never be the same. Expect these addons to make a huge impact in your gameplay experience here, because they move the missions visual appearance to reflect what the mission plot and setting is, which neither Arma nor Ofp could ever do with their default addons.


ADDONS REQUIRED :

Queens Gambit

Flags.Pbo - provided directly with mission, install in addons or create mod folder

Note that addons here that links direct to the Bis forums topics for addons *do* have multiple reliable links on the first page in the topic. If a topic does not, I dug through and found reliable links hosted by various sites.

map_misc - mapfact
http://www.mapfact.net/include....52561d1 (http://www.mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/newseng.php&PHPKITSID=10a42e30c518066417996210452561d1)

MapFact EU
http://www.mapfact.net/include....52561d1 (http://www.mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/newseng.php&PHPKITSID=10a42e30c518066417996210452561d1)

Mapfact 3DE
http://www.mapfact.net/include....52561d1 (http://www.mapfact.net/include.php?path=content/newseng.php&PHPKITSID=10a42e30c518066417996210452561d1)

Lowfly EU
http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....=lowfly (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=70;t=59830;hl=lowfly)

BB Mercenaries
http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....enaries (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=70;t=74429;hl=mercenaries)

Resistance Units (apocalypse mod) (freedom fighters)
http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....istance (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=70;t=72188;hl=resistance)
http://www.armedassault.info/index.php?cat=addons&id=392
http://armed-assault.de/downloads/apocalypse-mod-10-beta.html

Tanya
http://www.armedassault.info/index.php?cat=addons&id=552

SF Delta Units
http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....t=76021 (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=70;t=76021)

SF Delta weapons (scar)
http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....t=76021 (http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard311/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=70;t=76021)


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lastly

This entire post is the actual readme included with the mission, for easy reference. The actual install instructions required to play the mission, are the same as always :

Installation :

Install above listed required addons

Put the 'The_Beginning.pbo' in your Arma/Missions folder

Put the addon 'Flags1.pbo' in your addons folder, or make a mod folder for it if preferred.

Run the mission http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif


Credits :

ColonelSandersLite Scripting assistance for various mission apps, framework design of the barrage system

Special Ed most of everything under the sun in the mission apart from the above

Full credit goes to every author (many of them) for these amazing addons used I know these guys have worked very hard on.

Ralph Just for being there in time of need.. Ralph is still alive!!!! (CSL knows about Ralph.. http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/tounge2.gif)

[Special Ed]

Any comments, feedback is appreciated btw http://forums.bistudio.com/oldsmileys/smile_o.gif

I have spent enough time testing this Demo mission to say it is Imo pretty dang good, and worth grabbing the addons for.

The bugs are really not that big of a deal for the most part, and yet I still felt compelled to put down the bugs, to simply be honest about the entirety of the mission content.

/edit/

by the way, i forgot to mention player can take over a town by going to the flagpole in center of town, and must hold position there for up to 60 seconds, only if the town is clear of enemies, then they will be able to take the town. Know that you cannot hold a town that a friendly clan is at war with, if the battle ends and the friendly clan is defeated, player will then be able to take and hold the town normally again (this removes issues with players 'stealing' a town that an allied clan is attacking).

Edit/

One more addon has been added, the mapfact 3DE is currently required for the walls to properly show. The wall pieces call on a script in the Mapfact 3DE mod. Note it is not necessary to directly run the 3DE directly, the mod folder just needs to be active while running arma.

[Special Ed]

Mission has been moved to updates on Ofpec.

Thread is finished here.

Out.

[W0lle]

Closed upon request.