[SP Campaign] M.E.R.C.S. - mercenary expendable ruthless covert selfish

So, just got time to continue, but just after that found something serious (added description to the same post).

After that I enlisted AAF. There was an issue on the shooting range. I wanted repeat shooting, so loaded last save. But after that some later conversation about FIA in the Sofia kicked in. So tried previous save, just after disembarking the truck. Same result... Now the following coversation suggested, we're riding APC while we was still standing at the truck near shooting range. Just weather changed. What's the more weird, I saw team memebrs icons, also 3D somehwere far, while I was just standing unable to move. Looks like mission breaker...

Okay, one question regarding the shooting range. Were you able to actually shoot or did the mission skip it right away? And which version do you use? Campaign PBO or Addon Version? If addon is it the one from steam or manually downloaded (dropbox)? Have to ask because I've pushed out a few last minute updates one or two days before the MANW deadline and didn't make a huge version change posts. It might already help to redownload and then revert the mission.

It's campaign version. I wanted to repeat, because task was over ("done") as soon I loaded the mag - was ordered to pick up MG. Although I could still shoot and score was updated until decided to load save. Started the mission from the beginning. Second time played whole sequence without single load, and all was OK this time except the task done at the mag load. Now we're properly riding APC...

Yes, that's due to a change of an engine command causing the condition to be satisfied too early. I didn't notice it and had to do last minute adjustments. As said, a redownload of the latest version gets rid of that issue.

14. After that - smell of the grand finale. Three offers. Which to choose if any? Of course planned to check every of them, but which should be my official? When thinking about that at third meeting spot (DSE) bodyguards suddenly started to shoot. Someone is attacking? No. they just bravely engaged my empty quadbike. Hmm. Return on foot then. Eventually decided to be consequent. I wanted to move to Europe and live there, so I'll. Those knights was anyway too surreal to take them seriously, but probably I have to stay with them to see base defense battle...

Ah, so that's why some users reported the DSE guys were firing on them! Never happened to me because I always left the quad with the AAF. I had to do some really clunky workarounds in that mission to make these interactions will all sides possible. And by interactions I mean both talking and... So, I need to set that darn quad as captive.

Added final battle notes, not sure, if anything more should happen, we killed all, I/we managed to find except jets, but nothing more happened then.

Also in my RPT amongst 3.5 MB of other logs, mostly from mods, mostly from JSRS can't loading titan missile sound, I found lots of this:

Destroy waypoint not linked to a target: Near target acquisition is slow and may even select friendly unit.

15. So we're attacking the facility. I've chosen support from the ridge role so i was doing exactly that. After a time all fightings calm down, yet no progress. i thought, classic "hidden survivor" issue. So I was forced to abandon my post and finish the job personally. Then there was info about searching for the device and loading it. We was tasked to defend the base till then, but nothing happened, just time passed. Then device was loaded, order was for infiltration team to get the truck out of there immediatelly. So I was waiting at the truck to see, if infiltration team will do the job. Apparently not. He was just standing near the gate just as me. So after probably it's my job... But as soon I entered the truc,k they called me a thief and ordered all to stop me. Not good. Had to load earlier save. By the way noted, for some reason not all my saves are on the list, I saved just before entering the truck, yet I had to load save from before final clearing the facility. Weird. So I repeated last part. This time supposed driver get in the truck properly and mission ended.

16. Finally the base defense. At first tried option to escape with Drazen. This failed because of his most weir behavior. At first he simply refused to leave the building. Tried make him embark the truck as a driver and pointng various places to go... Eventually/suddenly he left the house on his own. But as soon I gave him next move order he... got in back. Battle is raging on around, and we're dancing here... Nah. Restarted. Same problems. Third time ignored him.

Battle was fantastic. Lots of shooting, shouting, booming, dying, flying and lagging. I located my men on the slope of the central hill to have fire support from elevated position. Most of them died, survivors I relocated to the another, lower spot of the slope towards the camp. One chopper was shot down by our AA turret, but then apparently missiles was all used, so second chopper and fast movers had clear sky except static MGs. Despite foggy weather we in general repelled all the attacks. Then happend nothing. I assume, it's another "hidden survivor" problem. Some managed to find and kill myself, but then I had no more free time for extensive hunt around the camp and as affraid, I have to kill fast movers too, whilke these was flying somehwere far, barely audible. IMO there should be more flexible conditions of progress than simple "kill them all and every one" and definitelly attackers should just flee when most of them died. So, until I find them all later, looks, like it's kinda over of this fantastic campaign.

15. Yes, I can confirm "hidden survivor" issues. Sadly, the AI has a somewhat different understanding of "Seek & Destroy" than I do. It's a tricky situation and I haven't found an ideal solution yet. On one hand are these stupid idiots walking away (but not far way enough) from the combat or hiding causing the not present trigger to never fire. On the other hand a "seized by" trigger is so damn inaccurate because it relies on perception, sometimes it fires right away and sometimes there's just one enemy left who still thinks he's in control of the area. Same goes the other way round - if friendlies don't see an enemy they think the area has been seized, even if there's a bloody army right behind the next hill. I found that one squad in the eastern part of the facility are usually the last men standing. And in most of the cases there is one AT guy hiding behind one of the houses doing nothing. I don't know if it's a wise desicion to work based on a ratio or timeout but it can't stay that way. As for the truck / waiting after combat, both have timeouts to ensure it continues because of obvious AI flaws. Bot the scientist as well as the infiltration team get waypoints and get in / get out orders assigned that only work in like 30% of the cases. Horrible rate considering that these are commands / functions from the vanilla game itself. Hence I've added timeouts of 180 seconds both for the scientist's and the infiltration team's movements. Not sure what happened with the savegames there, I use the saveGame command a few times but don't do anything else with user saves.

16. An AI flaw I don't understand myself. It helped to move the quad right in front of the house and order him to get in, because he went right through the wall then. I've actually added an ugly teleport in that last minute version, a redownlaod should help. (If you didn't do already.)

That's another AI pathfinding issue. Using debug options I can track the AI's movement and boy they do funny stuff. One time a full APC drove right into the sea and stucked on a rock. There's actually a 30% win ratio this time (25% in earlier versions), means when just 30% of the hostiles (planes included) present during the last wave are left the mission succeeds. I've raised this amount two times by now and it's driving me nuts that it's still not working in some cases. One would expect that the simplest engine commands (move-to-that-pos) are being followed, but no, the AI stucks somewhere, they retreat even if fleeing is not allowed, they take totally stupid ways - don't know how to handle that aside from moving their spawn points right into the camp...

For now, you can try a restart or use the debug console to cheat but that's not really a solution, I'm sorry. A few neat code pieces to get around that issue until I've found a better solution.

Variable win amount of enemies that can be left:

IP_WinAmount

Track all groups:

IP_TESTMODE = true;
{[(leader _x)] call IP_fnc_track} forEach allGroups;

Kill all enemies:

{if (side _x in [east, independent]) then {_x setDamage 1}} forEach allUnits;

Hm, interesting thing that destroy waypoint. AAF units usually have one on the truck (as they want to destroy it). Doesn't seem to work though, could swear it did in editor tests.

Not a problem. Important was to see the battle, and I saw it. :) No doubt, A3 is far from "ready" status to me. Working on such "wip-py" game can be extremelly annoying. Even more, if you know, how old some issues are. But what we can do?

It's a tricky situation and I haven't found an ideal solution yet. On one hand are these stupid idiots walking away (but not far way enough) from the combat or hiding causing the not present trigger to never fire.

Maybe try not using triggers at all, but some scripted solutions instead with more complex conditions like counting alive units in the radius and if enough is dead, rest flee/surrender.

Glad you enjoyed the battle. Of course, you should try to reach at least one ending. ;)

Yes, but the task is to fully secure the facility. So even if I work absed on a ratio I had to delete / kill the remaining enemies once the ratio has been reached. And that looks weird, provided the player sees a guy disappearing right in front of him. Problem is I can't really say when the player is idling. If saw "hey, looks like the player is just walking around with no clue of what to do" I could trigger the progression. Problem is I can't say that for sure.

Thinking about this surrendering might be an actual option. Well, I'll do some experiments sooner or later.

"hey, looks like the player is just walking around with no clue of what to do"

player addEventHandler ["Fired",{time_LastAction = time}];


waitUntil
{
sleep 5;
if not (isNull (player findNearestEnemy player)) then {time_LastAction = time};
((time - time_LastAction) > 180)
};

:)

Joking. But...

Was my first though as well but let's put it that way: People start shooting things when they get bored. (Or at least, that's what I'd do.) ;)

Splendid news, everyone!

I'm just back from a small photoshooting. Today, EUROFORCE received their brand new uniform protoypes. They're not perfect yet but I think it's time to say good bye to MTP. Check out the new Hex-Camo (oh, CSAT will be pissed). Based on a camo scheme made by black-light-studio.

From left to right: EF Desert, EF Altis, EF Woodland, EF Black, EF Snow.

And some more in action (sorry, the snow ones are a bit dark, seems like Thirsk and the Splendid Cam don't like each other):

Altis and / or Black schemes for EF troops in the campaign might come in the next update. I've made the others just to learn re-texturing, might be used in future projects or maybe as stand-alone EF addon someday.

Good evening! Happy to finally release version 1.00. This update contains a set of fixes and tweaks. There might be further addon support and some more generic stuff in the future. Though I'm short on time and motivation for this project (too many new projects requiring my attention) so I thought I'd finally push out the necessary update before even more time passes by. Enjoy! ;)

Changelog

1.00 - 18.01.2015

• FIXED: Glass System wouldn't work after reload.
  
• FIXED: Glass System could see through terrain.
  
• FIXED: Home Sweet Home, Glass System was still active after returning to the hub from freeroaming.
  
• FIXED: Meet And Greet, Some faction representatives opened fire on the player's quad bike.
  
• FIXED: Helo insertions in the second half of the campaign didn't work because of Helicopter DLC changes.
  
• FIXED: Ransom Demand, the thief should now stay in the car.
  
• CHANGED: New textures for EUROFORCE units.
  
• CHANGED: Brave New World, Disabled saving to avoid mission flow stuck on loading.
  
• CHANGED: Diplomatic Incident, Lowered seizable trigger area for second mission objective.
  
• CHANGED: Smash And Grab, Lowered to-clear trigger areas.
  
• CHANGED: Hostage Down, hostage must now be alive and within 750 metres of the helicopter on extraction to be considered survived.
  
• ADDED: Shop System, camo versions of the vanilla sniper rifles.
  
• ADDED: Shop System, vanilla 3GL ammo (HE + Smoke).
  

Known Issues

Development Roadmap - Scopes & Features

Alpha (RETIRED):

• 1 Intro Mission
  
• 1 Hub Mission
  
• 5 Contract Missions
  
• 1 Ending
  

Beta (RETIRED):

• Campaign Completed
  
• 1 Intro Mission
  
• 3 Hub Missions
  
• 22 Contract Missions
  
• 8 Endings / 11 Variations
  
• Advanced Shop System (Vehicles & Camp Enhancements)
  

Gold (RELEASED):

• Voice Acting (CANCELED)
  
• Mod Compability (ONGOING)
  
• Generic Side Missions (OPTIONAL)
  

Contact

You can reach me on the BI-Forums: http://forums.bistudio.com/member.php?53386-IndeedPete

Or feel free to add me on steam: http://steamcommunity.com/id/IndeedPete/

License

Content created by IndeedPete is published under the "Arma Public License Share Alike (APL-SA)". You are free to take or change anything you can use, just give me a mention in the credits.

All authors of third party content gave me permissions to use their works in the MANW Contest.

Credits & Thanks

• Bohemia Interactive Studios for this great game!
  
• aeroson for his get/set loadout and repetitive clean up scripts!
  
• cobra4v320 for his HALO/parachuting scripts!
  
• Kydoimos for cross-reading and improving some of the dialogues and texts!
  
• mrflay for his explosion detector!
  
• Shuko for his SHKPos script!
  
• Surfer for his help regarding the awesome M.E.R.C.S. logo and way too many textures and images!
  
• tpw for his ambient civilian script package!
  
• And all the great people on the BI-Forums who helped out with answers and feedback to so many questions!

Download

Addon Version

Dropbox v1.00

Steam Workshop v1.00

Campaign PBO Version

Dropbox v1.00

Deleted

Ah great, the finalists have been selected! Thanks again to all voters, supporters, players, testers and contributors! And congrats to all finalists out there! ;)

I found it was time to update the logo once again and BI's insignia fits quite well. :D

Congratulations on reaching the final, you deserve it! Some strong competitors, but even a third place would be totally awesome!

Thanks! Don't get my hopes up, I wouldn't even know what to do with that money. :D

Update!

This new version brings you some tweaks and fixes. In addition I've added modfied shop configs kindly provided by Bolo861 which adds support for tons of mod weapons, magazines and items (see changelog). Since I don't own / know many of these mods I can't ensure everything is working properly when running these. However, it does not change anything if you don't use them. Since both the Addon builder and the game (1.40) itself fail to create readable "Campaign PBO"-PBOs I had to fall back to publish the update for the "Campaign PBO" version as plain folder. This does not change anything, it's just not in PBO format.

Enjoy and shout out loud once you hit another bug!

Changelog

1.01 - 10.03.2015

• FIXED: Brave New World, BIS functions were falsely enabling saving again.
  
• FIXED: Home Sweet Home, Toilet Guy still had BI randomisation on him.
  
• FIXED: Home Sweet Home, Leave-hub-trigger was wrongly configured causing units to disappear.
  
• FIXED: Home Sweet Home, Coming back from a duel caused the freeroaming functionality to trigger.
  
• FIXED: Meet And Greet, Finally managed to prevent the AI from attacking the empty quadbike.
  
• FIXED: Sanctuary, It was possible to get more than one weapon from the buddy.
  
• FIXED: Shop System, magazine selling prices were applied wrongly.
  
• FIXED: Shop System, Titan Short had wrong origin set.
  
• CHANGED: Home Sweet Home, Ambient helicopter powers up less often and for a shorter period of time.
  
• CHANGED: Panzerfaust, Disabled ambient life scripts.
  
• CHANGED: Sauerland Express, Added some more light at the beginning.
  
• ADDED: Thanks to Bolo861's customised shop configs the following addons should be (partly) supported by the shop system: EMU (Elite Mercenary Unit), MAX H3 PACK, HLC mods, Massy weapons pack, MRT Accesories and Functions, SMA Weapons, SOCMOD, TFA Naval Special Warfare gear, Trixies' Weapon Packs, EricJ Weapons Pack, Ag MP9 pack, RH M4/PDW/Pistol pack, RHARD MK18, DarkGiver Sig SG55x Pack, C1987 MP-7 Pack, FHQ M4/Accesories Pack, Spectrobe G36 Pack, Genoma Helmets, Ov SA-58, Purple Benelli Super 90 Pack
  

Download

Addon Version

Dropbox v1.01

Steam Workshop v1.01

Campaign PBO Version

Dropbox v1.01

Good day, chaps!

With the MANW Contest being over today I'd like to shout out a last "thank you" to all voters, supporters, testers, players and other people involved in this project. It's been a long way and of course I feel a tiny bit of sadness that M.E.R.C.S. didn't make the top three. But looking at the competition I must say it's no surprise. Some splendid projects have been awarded today for good reasons. Congrats to all winners and participants! But don't forget the majority of great concepts and projects out there that also didn't make it to the podium!

Be assured that I'll continue work as usual. M.E.R.C.S. should receive at least updated shop configs with the rollout of Marksmen. And I've got more in the pipe with Contention Zone and a yet unannounced project. I can hopefully share some details in the coming months and maybe even publish one or two releases this year. ;)

Stay tuned out there!

I felt as if not enough people have pointed that out, so I just wanted to say that this campaign is perfect and I loved every second of it. I've gone through every single ending I could find (6?) and they made the whole thing even more engaging. Love your work and I hope to see more of it.

Lovely to hear, thanks! There are eight endings totalling in eleven different variants. Check the M.E.R.C.S. campaign flowchart:

Just gave it a try and it's an amazing campaign! Shamefully, I must admit that I have properly tried it after the MANW contest... kinda bummed that it didn't earn at least a third place.

Speaking of which, are you still open to requests/suggestions about adding new custom weapons/armor/clothes to the shop? :)

EDIT: Forgot to mention, I have downloaded the new version, where randomisation script shouldn't apply to Nikos (I am assuming it means the gear?), but in my game he keeps having two sunglasses. :D

Ah, don't worry! I doubt the judgement would have been different if you voted for it. ;) There were too many geat entries and too few places. Maybe they should have opened up more categories with smaller prizes as some people suggested.

Anyway, I can write down any wishes but might not be able to grant them soon. Will port the shop system to my next SP project (obviously a M.E.R.C.S. successor) which is still in concept stage and plan to enhance both functionality and configs. I hope I'll be able to upgrade some of M.E.R.C.S.' systems, provided backwards compatibility is easy to do. Really running short on time with all the Arma and real life work at the moment. So I'm focussing on new projects rather than old ones. But I've also received some updated mod configs from a dedicated user and of course plan to add the Marksmen gear as soon as the DLC hits stable.

As long as he is not randomly wearing weird hats it's fine.^^ The first set of glasses are part of his clothes or face (as is the jewelry) and I've added the second pair. I saw he had two pairs at some point but forgot to change it. Now he's just a super cool dude smuggler. :D

Update time! 1.02 brings some more mod support for CUP as well as the Marksmen content and fixes a few bugs introduced with Arma 3 1.42. Enjoy! :)

Changelog

1.02 - 19.04.2015

• FIXED: Some spelling errors.
  
• FIXED: Force Recon, mission would not finish due to AI bug.
  
• FIXED: Added re-chambered Rahim and Zafir magazines to the shop.
  
• CHANGED: Riot Control, changed win condition to "Negades seized by BLUFOR" instead of "all OPFOR killed".
  
• CHANGED: Protection Money, moved waypoints of the HVI a bit more outside of the camps to prevent AI from stucking there.
  
• ADDED: Helicopter insertion participants are now 10 seconds invincible after drop to prevent death from disembarking.
  
• ADDED: Shop support for Marksmen DLC gear.
  
• ADDED: Thanks to Bolo861's customised shop configs for CUP.
  

Credits & Thanks

• Bohemia Interactive Studios for this great game!
  
• aeroson for his get/set loadout and repetitive clean up scripts!
  
• cobra4v320 for his HALO/parachuting scripts!
  
• Kydoimos for cross-reading and improving some of the dialogues and texts!
  
• mrflay for his explosion detector!
  
• Shuko for his SHKPos script!
  
• Surfer for his help regarding the awesome M.E.R.C.S. logo and way too many textures and images!
  
• tpw for his ambient civilian script package!
  
• And all the great people on the BI-Forums who helped out with answers and feedback to so many questions!

Download

Addon Version

Dropbox v1.02

Steam Workshop v1.02

Campaign PBO Version

Dropbox v1.02

And, as already announced a teeny-tiny suprise. A sneak peek on five exclusive concept screenshots of the official M.E.R.C.S. successor! Keep in mind that due to concept stage what you see is most likely to change and not being released anytime soon. For now, I can only say that it's SP only, will be a full-blown campaign, rely on (as little as possible) third party content and has voice acting planned! Can you guess the setting? ;)