Devils Peak [SP]

[froggyluv]

http://img188.imageshack.us/img188/9937/devilpeak.jpg

DEVILS PEAK
1.0 Updated 9/5/09


This is a large scale D-day type amphibious assault mission at night. You are part of a 200+ assault team to both take the fortified beach, then eradicate all AA batteries from the cliffs. Enemy tanks are coming in from the east to assault the city of Chernogorsk, but friendly Air can not come in to counter until those AA are dealt with. Finally, an high ranking enemy officer is to be terminated in Elektrozavodsk.

Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ae7Z-VHa7Q -video by [DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-

Version History:
v1.0
Updated

Version 1.0

-Resized forces so they play out better

-All of your team are teamswitchable now

-more complete ending

-changed starting gear/character for more pimpin gear



v0.92
- Changed AA triggers so now you only have to kill the gunners to complete
- Added choppers and reduced tanks cause choppers were getting skewered
- Made it so you can complete the mission if 1 has died and you teamswitched
- Lots of other little things

v091a
- Small fix where a few boats weren't coming
- delayed the tanks a little.

v0.91
- All major bugs fixed and should run smooth now.



As always, I recommend Veteran settings.

Warning: This mission is quite large with many units fighting from the start and may not run properly on more moderate PC's

Install: Place pbo into Arma2/Missions
Downloads:
Armaholic: Devil's Peak v1.0 (http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=6362) V1.0

Megaupload: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=AV80GJY1 -version 1.0

Credit: Worldeater for his RSCTitleTicker

[Snafu]

First of all:

Seaborne invasion missions - always good.

Secondly, major issues with the mission:

- The tanks that go to Chernogorsk drive right up to the beach, waste any survivors and shoot at me and the AI troops on the hill. By the sounds of it, they were meant to remain in the city?

- I killed all the AA pod operators but no choppers came. I don't know if they arrive before hand, the mission got a bit confusing (which is good) with fire coming from everywhere, but I am sure I saw a chopper wreck in the woods east of the peak.

Once you fix up this mission it will be pretty good. I have a pretty good 'puter so no performance issues. Here's a short AAR:

Ordered the boat to go forward, shot at enemy on the hill with my 50 and had the boat land in an area that provided cover. Disembarked, moved forward where my squad got pinned down and took 2 or 3 KIA. A warning message came up saying tanks arrived so I had my and my squad go up the front of the hill, cleared out the enemy on the top. I am sure I got all AA pod operators but there was no confirmation message, I think the hill is clear too.

[froggyluv]

Hmmm. Did you receive a message that objective 2 had been completed? I think what happened is that you have to clear all enemies within a 30x30 radius of the peak and there are some guys really hidden in those rocky crannies - while testing I couldn't find guys even while using Cadet's radar mode :p One reason I used a perimeter trigger is that when I named actual units to be killed, ie.AA1, even if you killed the user, the unit was still alive until you killed the actual gun. That made for a very time consuming blowing up of 8 or so units. The other is that all of the Static guys, ie. Ags-30;Kord;AA, are programmed to hop out of their units if Blufor gets too close to him and join the firefight, and then get back in.

The tanks are rolling toward you once the mission starts to give you a real sense of urgency, but I wonder how long did it take them to arrive? It should have been about 20 minutes. And of course, the choppers only come after Objective 2 is complete, but I will test this thoroughly today.

Excellent feedback -snafu-!

Edit- The tank warning comes when the tanks reach Elektrozavodsk, but they are en route to Chernogorsk, that means right down that beach-y road you are on. Did you say you assaulted the mountain from the front?!?

[Snafu]

Hmmm. Did you receive a message that objective 2 had been completed? I think what happened is that you have to clear all enemies within a 30x30 radius of the peak and there are some guys really hidden in those rocky crannies - while testing I couldn't find guys even while using Cadet's radar mode :p

I didn't receive a message so I guess there were still some bods hiding somewhere. I find that the soldiers in ArmA2 tend to blend in really well with the environment that I have trouble spotting enemies.


One reason I used a perimeter trigger is that when I named actual units to be killed, ie.AA1, even if you killed the user, the unit was still alive until you killed the actual gun. That made for a very time consuming blowing up of 8 or so units. The other is that all of the Static guys, ie. Ags-30;Kord;AA, are programmed to hop out of their units if Blufor gets too close to him and join the firefight, and then get back in.

I can't remember how it works, but wouldn't placing empty AA pods in with guys (named AA1 etc.) given an order to board them get around that?


The tanks are rolling toward you once the mission starts to give you a real sense of urgency, but I wonder how long did it take them to arrive? It should have been about 20 minutes. And of course, the choppers only come after Objective 2 is complete, but I will test this thoroughly today.

Edit- The tank warning comes when the tanks reach Elektrozavodsk, but they are en route to Chernogorsk, that means right down that beach-y road you are on.

I think it took them 10-15 mins to arrive but I am not entirely sure. I think it was about 5 mins after the message appeared that they were heading to Chernogorsk.


Did you say you assaulted the mountain from the front?!?

Hehe, yeah. The message appeared saying that the tanks are on the way so instead of flanking, which I thought would take to long, I went up the hill with my Corpsman, the other two in my section were slower in getting up. My guy did fall twice though.

One of the worst things about mission editing, people who play your missions tend to do things completely different than you expect! :biggrin_o:

[froggyluv]

Ok, there was a problem with that trigger atop the peak so thats been fixed and helos are incoming now. Still having a problem with the endgame triggers but it should all be fixed and reuploaded today. Also, slightly delaying the tanks.

[Sgt Gul]

is the new mission up?

[froggyluv]

I'll have it up within the next 2 hours I promise :D Fixed 99.9% of all problems and its turning out really well.

---------- Post added at 12:07 AM ---------- Previous post was Yesterday at 10:28 PM ----------

Updated

Version 0.91

All major bugs fixed and should run smooth now.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=M20Y3MDJ

First post updated

Version .91a uploaded. Small fix where a few boats weren't coming + delayed the tanks a little.

[froggyluv]

Updated

Version.92

-Changed AA triggers so now you only have to kill the gunners to complete

-Added choppers and reduced tanks cause choppers were getting skewered

-made it so you can complete the mission if 1 has died and you teamswitched

-Lotsa of other little things

[trickster1982]

It seems a good mission this!only problem is once my team got out of the boat everything slowed down horribly & then crashed to desktop, not sure if it was a game error or my rig creaking under the sheer amount happening on screen!:(

[Killerwatt]

@<hidden> I can mirror your mission on my rapidshare premium account if you like?

[froggyluv]

@<hidden> That would be great. Much appreciated :)

@<hidden> - That sucks! What are your system specs and do you generally have problems with larger sized mission? There's definitely a lot of units in this mission and a lot of triggers as well. Just about every static gunner has his own trigger to get out and fight if a Blufor unit get's too close. Strange though that I haven't experienced any slowdowns in this mission such as I might when wandering around one of the big cities :confused:

[trickster1982]

My specs are:

AMD Athlon 64 6000 X2 @<hidden> 3.00 GHz
Nvidia 8800GTX graphics card - driver version 190.15
Windows Vista 32 bit home edition
2GB RAM
600GB dual hard drives

I cant say ive had any real problems with other large scale battles to be honest!Im running everything on a mixture of normal & high settings with a 3000m view distance & decent frame rates, might just have been a one off crash so il have to try again later!

[Killerwatt]

@<hidden> Froggyluv here is the link just edit it into your post.

http://rapidshare.com/files/257685478/Devil_s_Peak.Chernarus.pbo

[froggyluv]

@<hidden> - Sorry bout that mate. Let me know if it gets any better for you. Snafu said he didn't have any probs but he did say his system was rather beefy.

@<hidden> thanks again!

[froggyluv]

Updated

Version 1.0

-Resized forces so they play out better

-All of your team are teamswitchable now

-more complete ending

-changed starting gear/character for more pimpin gear

[Tarisai]

Looks great from what I can tell - watching all those tracers fly over head and the deafening firefights are really quite immersive.

I'm having a problem that I've never experienced before running this mission. Basically, I get my squad off the boat and we make for a nice firing position; I set up targets and give the order to fire and...everyone is shooting nerf pebbles...

Everyone and everything is invulnerable. I can walk out into the open and i don't die. I can walk up to the enemy line and empty entire magazines into the their faces and nothing.

Is this a problem anyone else has experienced?

Would really like to play this mission as you designed it. As I said, it looks great!

[froggyluv]

@<hidden> Well that is just bizarre! I can't recreate that God Mode effect at all and get promptly shot in the brain when I've tried. The mission is quite a beast on resources, so perhaps some crazy performance bug set in or something. Are you running any mods with this?

[trickster1982]

I still struggle with this one!it starts out ok but once I get halfway up the mountain my frame rates absolutely drop through the floor & it gets unplayable :( shame as it seems a pretty awesome mission! I dont get problems with any other SP missions ive downloaded barring a couple that have insane amounts of enemies & friendlies on screen, must just not agree with my rig! I could maybe turn my settings right down & play it, but you know how it is when you've got used to the game looking gorgeous & dont like turning things down....

[froggyluv]

I just did a guestimate and it seems that there are approximately 350 total units in this mission, and a hells a lot of waypoints -so, yeah, it can be a beast!

I'm running it on a intel 8500 @<hidden>; 4 gig ram; ati 4870 oced; win7 and I do usually set my settings down to mostly 'Normal' except I always like very High on Object detail and VD at 2000. My FPS usually starts around 29 and can dip into 14-15's when all hells break loose but generally maintains 20-22.

There are also a lot of triggers firing such as telling the enemy static gunners to get out and fight you if you get to close but then to get back in so this might be adding to the hit. Maybe I'll see about making a lite version that takes away those features and what not but would be more playable for everyone.

[[DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-]

appears difficult to assault the beach with the units on the hill firing down upon us. The hill is too far to shoot with the m16, I end up using half a clip to kill one guy.
SPRsayswhat? ;)

[s|ck]

Holy memory resource hog lol

Wasn't able to play either here.

[froggyluv]

-Ziggy-;1433604']appears difficult to assault the beach with the units on the hill firing down upon us. The hill is too far to shoot with the m16, I end up using half a clip to kill one guy.
SPRsayswhat? ;)

Then you would have hated the 1st version in which you had nothing but ironsights! :p

I wouldn't recommend spending too much time trying to take out the guys high up on the rockface although someone here did take the peak with a full frontal ascent. There are a few different ways to attack that mountain but there is definitely a 'soft spot' as well. One good idea is to watch your friendly AI squads before you fully engage and look at which areas are taking the most damage. I tried to make this mission play out as dynamically as possible and I've seen AI Blufor take the peak themselves as well as get annihilated pretty early -same goes for the later tank vs. helo battle.


Holy memory resource hog lol

Wasn't able to play either here

Looks like I might have to put a liability disclaimer on this mission -"Play at your own risk!"

[Tarisai]

I'm running a dual core with 2gigs of RAM on an out-dated MOBO with Windows Vista.

That's my problem right there. :P

Got up to date replacements currently in the post to match my GTX 260 so I'll give it a go then. I think the scripting in this game is what kills my (and possibly other people's) performance. In simple scenarios, even if there are hundreds of units, I can crank the eye candy; however in the campaign or in script/trigger heavy user missions my FPS drops and get bugs like this one (invulnerablilty).

Anyway, it looks intense. Can't wait to give it a proper go.

[[DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-]

I like hard missions, but I would enjoy the mission more if I were able to kill more. as it is, I saw the ai doing more of the work than me and my two mates.

I died climbing the hill, as I crested a ridge my character hopped up into the air and fell down the hill. I think a rock glitched me flying!

it does require a hefty system. I ran the mission all high, AA normal, and post low.
mission start I was at 25 frames. but it looked EPIC !
I will see what happens when I run fraps, maybe I can give a short vid to the community. :cool:

[froggyluv]

-Ziggy-;1434083']I like hard missions, but I would enjoy the mission more if I were able to kill more. as it is, I saw the ai doing more of the work than me and my two mates.

I died climbing the hill, as I crested a ridge my character hopped up into the air and fell down the hill. I think a rock glitched me flying!

it does require a hefty system. I ran the mission all high, AA normal, and post low.
mission start I was at 25 frames. but it looked EPIC !
I will see what happens when I run fraps, maybe I can give a short vid to the community. :cool:

I hear ya. Perhaps I will add some 'extra' weaponry in a future version stored in your boat. I generally aim straight for a flanking position with my squad, foregoing most of the initial beach battle to try and attack the Mountain from an angle or the rear. Still a lot of fighting to be had on the sides, depending on whether a patrol spot you or not, and definitely on the top. A video would be great as I don't have the software for it.

I'm working on a modified version with about a quarter of the Blufor troops cut and some smaller cuts on the Redfor side and it seems to add about 5-7 fps with possibly more. If anyone that was having major performance problems is interested in testing it just drop me a PM. It still plays out nicely, but not quite in the grandiose way that I envisioned.

[[DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-]

vid turned out to be longer than expected :scratchchin:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ae7Z-VHa7Q :j:

[{USI}_Zombie]

enjoying your mission, it seems to work well except twice tonight when we cleared the hilltop, it said saving game, then ctd while I was hosting. Also, can you please add this code to the description.ext so it will stop showing up as an issue in my rpt file?

class Header
{
gameType = COOP; //DM, Team, Coop, ...
minPlayers = 1; //min # of players the mission supports
maxPlayers = 8; //Max # of players the mission supports
}


Thanks again for the fun mission, just a few minor tweaks :p

[froggyluv]

@<hidden>[DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy- Nice job on the video! Thanks alot man. It was really cool watching someone else play a mission that I've tested thru so many times, and go about it totally differently. Noticed you don't engage MG'er's on the little Island with the Lighthouse, taking them out saves a lot of your Ai boats and allows a sniper team to plant themselves there. Frontpaged.


@<hidden>{USI}_Zombie - thanks. I know nothing about MP code but I'll put that in if it helps. Not sure about the CTD, I was having problems with the save crashing when using big mods like SLX (cannot commit error), but never on vanilla. Check PM.

[{USI}_Zombie]

I got your pm. I really don't make sp missions, I originally thought this was an MP mission because there is more than 1 playable slot :p

The code I posted goes in the description.ext, seems to be an Arma2 thing, and will generate an error in the arma2.rpt if you don't have it. I am not certain that save game works in MP or it could be an addon thing, since the guys I play with use 2 or 3 addons.
Thanks again for the fun mission.

[Maddmatt]

I just played it, and nearly everyone was invincible. Ran up to a bunch of enemies, we unloaded all our ammo into each other but were all unharmed. A few guys did die though.
Also saw some guys swimming in the sea near the start.

FPS was pretty bad too.

Looks like it could be a good mission though. Maybe you could use some scripts to only spawn certain enemies when necessary, to reduce the CPU load? You should be able to make such scripts using the 3D editor (either the BIS one or the one by Ionis that you can find in the Addons section).

[SirKnightTG]

I just played it, and nearly everyone was invincible. Ran up to a bunch of enemies, we unloaded all our ammo into each other but were all unharmed.

...

FPS was pretty bad too.

...



Same for me. Not a single person could hit the broad side of a barn, even at point blank. I also saw some sort of dirt pile or something, it was hard to tell, that was just floating in mid air with an enemy guy stuck in it with only his head and gun sticking out. lol!

[froggyluv]

Yeah, I'm sensing a common theme here :rolleyes:

Certainly I didn't add any scripting that would effect damage or bad shooting so again this must be performance related. I would say I have a moderate rig and have never had these issues unless I triple up on some heavy duty mods but alas, they are a reality for many. I have made a lite version (not released yet) that downsizes the forces and does add some FPS to the mission, I'm just not sure that I like it though. In terms of creating "create groups' scripts and whatnot, it might save some initial fps but would be tough to still keep the manic beach gunbattle withought all of the groups present from the start. I will ceratinly look into it though.

Thanks for letting me know though guys, I do appreciate it. And please, leave a brief bio of your setup and settings to help me gauge the scope of the problem.

[[DirTyDeeDs]-Ziggy-]

I had no such issues about units being 'invincible', but there was one burm? (is it) not resting flat on the ground. you can see it in the video I made when I fire at an enemy midway thru (@<hidden> approx 5 min mark).

my rig is in my sig, and the settings I play with are all high cept for AA normal and post low.
1600x900, 3D render 100%, XP32

perhaps it is my high cpu clock that negates the invincible effect?

[Splicer]

Great mission... but with a serious issue.

The enemy simply could not be killed. In my case, my squad and I were fighting another enemy squad and then I saw another friendly going all the way to the enemy squad, and I mean 2 feet next to them, unloaded a whole magazine to one enemy guy and NOTHING! That really turned me off.

Also, for some reason while playing this mission my XP machine crashed and I could not get the OS up again. As soon as I logged in the system kept crashing.

I ended up logging in in safe mode, then logged in normally and things went back to normal (so far). FYI.

-Splicer.
==


Same for me. Not a single person could hit the broad side of a barn, even at point blank. I also saw some sort of dirt pile or something, it was hard to tell, that was just floating in mid air with an enemy guy stuck in it with only his head and gun sticking out. lol!

[maturin]

No problems here, though fighting in Elektrozavodsk finally brought my little laptop to its knees.

The amount of static defenses on the mountain may be excessive. Those AGS GLs slaughter entire squads of marine as they pile out of the boats, and it takes a long time to find them all on the summit, just to shoot them like dogs.

A script making them leave the guns to fight when you reached the top would reduce USMC AI casualties and give you a better fight up top.

I ended up single-handedly taking the mountain because BI's beta patches made it so my squad moved 100m every ten minutes while under fire.

[jasonnoguchi]

JESUS! I played this with ACE and ZEUS AI and NONE of the assault boats made it to shore! hahahahah! (ok, I know because I deliberately waited behind and see if any would make it to see where the defensive gaps may be hehehehe)

[froggyluv]

Glad to hear people are still playing this :)

@<hidden>: The only reason I can think that enemies were'nt taking damage again is a performance issue. I've never had that happen to me on this mission but have seen it on equally large or larger sized missions.

@<hidden>: A lot has changed in terms of AI since I made this so it probably plays out quite differntly than intended. The majority of the friendly squads are intended to take fire aka die, so that your squad and generally 1-2 other may reach the peak. There are commands running in that if you get within 10m of a static gunner that he will disembark and fight -perhaps I should have increased that range. The problem with having them all disembark early is that some may run off and they are required kills to achieve the objective/trigger. Making the actual static guns the target was used at first but required too much firepower and was too time consuming so it was changed.

@<hidden>: LoL! Probably Zeus's expanded ranges led to that utter defeat and I haven't tried it with ACE (yet).

---------- Post added at 06:28 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:22 PM ----------

Ok, tried with just ACE and some squads made it intact to shore. The weakness is in taking a right flank landing area and rushing your men to the right of the mountain, then assaulting from the rear. Actually the 1st objective is made to be a red herring in a sense, in that it is almost futile to try and duke it out a frontal position on the beach.

[Tonci87]

Whn I played it i first went to the Lighttower and killed the machinegunners there, then I went to the Huey wreck, took the gatlin and killed everything in range. After that it was much easier to get up the right flank

[froggyluv]

Whn I played it i first went to the Lighttower and killed the machinegunners there, then I went to the Huey wreck, took the gatlin and killed everything in range. After that it was much easier to get up the right flank

Nice one, I never even thought of that.

[trickster1982]

Im waiting for 1.05 before attempting this one again, hopefully there will be some performance increases so I can complete it! On previous attempts ive got about 2 thirds of the way up the hill before my PC has come grinding to a halt!

[Splicer]

Glad to hear people are still playing this :)

@<hidden>: The only reason I can think that enemies were'nt taking damage again is a performance issue. I've never had that happen to me on this mission but have seen it on equally large or larger sized missions.

@<hidden>: A lot has changed in terms of AI since I made this so it probably plays out quite differntly than intended. The majority of the friendly squads are intended to take fire aka die, so that your squad and generally 1-2 other may reach the peak. There are commands running in that if you get within 10m of a static gunner that he will disembark and fight -perhaps I should have increased that range. The problem with having them all disembark early is that some may run off and they are required kills to achieve the objective/trigger. Making the actual static guns the target was used at first but required too much firepower and was too time consuming so it was changed.

@<hidden>: LoL! Probably Zeus's expanded ranges led to that utter defeat and I haven't tried it with ACE (yet).

---------- Post added at 06:28 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:22 PM ----------

Ok, tried with just ACE and some squads made it intact to shore. The weakness is in taking a right flank landing area and rushing your men to the right of the mountain, then assaulting from the rear. Actually the 1st objective is made to be a red herring in a sense, in that it is almost futile to try and duke it out a frontal position on the beach.

@<hidden>,

I'm glad to hear that it is not a common problem (but it had to happen to me... :( ). I'll give it another shot (no pun intended) and see how it goes.

@<hidden>: I've read your posts on how ArmAII's AI is greatly improved with Zeus. I will definitely get Zeus and see how long I can make it (I'm still going through a learning curve on using ArmAII, just played veteran and got smoked quicker than I thought... and this is without Zeus! :) )

Best, -Splicer.

[jasonnoguchi]

@<hidden>, indeed, the BIGGEST difference Zeus make is engagement range. The wildly extended engagement range might have made landing a frontal assault impossible as frog mentioned. :(